George Carlin: The Mark Twain Prize on PBS

[BombsAway Bob]

The Best PBS show of the year, watching these clips of George as he progresses from a character-based short-haired straight comic, to one of the most important social comics of the past 40 years...Don't miss it!

[Tom]

Important social comic?????

That makes as much sense as "Hand me the piano.":rolleyes:
I thought his career hand a steady downhill trend tot he point he was nothing more than an obnoxious old coot not worth listening too. He peaked in the 60's. Hippy Dippy weather man was his zenith.

[DanG]

The Best PBS show of the year, watching these clips of George as he progresses from a character-based short-haired straight comic, to one of the most important social comics of the past 40 years...Don't miss it!


Couldn’t agree more Bob; :ThmbUp: :ThmbUp:

I miss George and his body of work is in the top-5 of comic writers / performers imo.

BTW: Garry Shandling story of meeting George as a student in Arizona spoke volumes about the man. He gives George material after just meeting him before his set. Carlin tells him he does his own writing but he will look at it tonight. Shandling is thinking…’yeah right; sure he will. He sees him the next night and George invites him backstage and shows him notes he made on his work and talks to him for 20 minutes.

That gesture speaks to the man and thank goodness he has volumes of his work we can remember him by.

[ArlJim78]

nobody deserves it more, Carlin was truly a master of his craft, a comic legend.

I watched the show, and overall liked it, some of the stories people told were good, but mainly I just liked watching the Carlin clips.

my only HUUUUGE disappointment was that the host was one of my three most disliked people in entertainment, the truly classless Bill Maher. of course he opened the show and his very first line was something about how it's so great to have a president that can speak english again. there was really no reason to bring his political views to this show, but with him its impossible not to because like I said he has no class. he took a few more cheap shots against bush and republicans, but as per usual no democrats were skewered.

[JustRalph]

this is one true guy that I find a real paradox

I like some stuff " A place for my stuff"

But sometimes I think he took the cynical side too far. Although I loved some of the stuff he did on religion.

The Drugs and the multiple trips to rehab ............... Damn, hard to forgive.

[BombsAway Bob]

Important social comic?????
That makes as much sense as "Hand me the piano.":rolleyes:
I thought his career hand a steady downhill trend tot he point he was nothing more than an obnoxious old coot not worth listening too. He peaked in the 60's. Hippy Dippy weather man was his zenith.
It's OK, TOM! You just haven't evolved far enough yet to grasp the decision George made about his career in the late '60s. (I mean, look at your cherubic avatar). If Hippy-Dippy is your thing, check out the Cheech & Chong trilogy..
Peace Out! :cool:

[ArlJim78]

this is one true guy that I find a real paradox

I like some stuff " A place for my stuff"

But sometimes I think he took the cynical side too far. Although I loved some of the stuff he did on religion.

The Drugs and the multiple trips to rehab ............... Damn, hard to forgive.
i judge him as a comedian, for which I think he was of of the best ever. whatever personal foibles he had? well i'm not passing judgement there

his religious stuff was great. what I liked about him is that he said things aloud that very much matched how I think and feel about most things. he was a real cynical curmudgeon. for example in one of his last shows he said "Contrary to what you might think, I really like people. However I only like them for short bursts of time".

[BombsAway Bob]

I tried to put the "You Tube" clip in here, but PA Filters must prevent any You-Tube segments that may have a liberal view from posting(JK....I think)
Anyways, this is George at his rapid-fire best. Even Tom might like it!
http://www.pbs.org/weta/twain2008/

[GaryG]

That bit about the difference between baseball and football was my favorite. That is, except for his part as Fillmore in Cars.

[bigmack]

He had some nice material over the years but I wasn't a big fan. Seinfeld was and wrote an op-ed piece for The Times:

You could certainly say that George downright invented modern American stand-up comedy in many ways. Every comedian does a little George. I couldn’t even count the number of times I’ve been standing around with some comedians and someone talks about some idea for a joke and another comedian would say, “Carlin does it.” I’ve heard it my whole career: “Carlin does it,” “Carlin already did it,” “Carlin did it eight years ago.”

And he didn’t just “do” it. He worked over an idea like a diamond cutter with facets and angles and refractions of light. He made you sorry you ever thought you wanted to be a comedian. He was like a train hobo with a chicken bone. When he was done there was nothing left for anybody.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/24/opinion/24seinfeld.html

[Tom]

Anyways, this is George at his rapid-fire best. Even Tom might like it!
http://www.pbs.org/weta/twain2008/

Don't get me wrong, I liked some of his stuff, but my big problem with him was that he too often sacrificed humor for politics. When he did real comedy, he was very good, but alienating half your audience was pretty stupid, and I say that for right wing comedians as well. A few good natured snipes over the aisle is fine - I liked a lot of the Bush jokes - but enough is enough.

[toetoe]

Sorry, but Georgie became such a zealot that it detracted from his humor.

Very uneven, also. Blame the drugs if you must, but as long ago as 1982, when I saw him live on the Tonight Show, he was astonishingly, indescribably unfunny. He went off on a riff about a big fat cyst on a French chef's neck, just out of left field. What the ... ? :confused: . Whoa, George DUDE !

All I require is funny stuff without Oliver Stone-style sledgehammering, without admonitions as to what I should believe. :ThmbDown: .

[ddog]

well that's it then, if all we require is pap then i guess the parties started.

Maybe what we believe IS THE FUNNY STUFF!

[chickenhead]

am a huge fan of a whole lot of his material, he practiced and I think respected his craft as well as anyone. There are Carlin clips that will be watched for many many decades, and will be as true then as when they were first performed. They are perfect.

That said, his last few shows were sad to watch. I think perhaps his own personal bullshit meter had blown out as some point, the cynicism overwhelmed the bit of whimsy he always maintained in his earlier times. If there was an upshot to the pieces, a wink at the end, I wasn't around to see it -- and unfortunately that is how I remember him.

[toetoe]

Whoops, make that 1992. :blush: .

Chick,

Very insightful. I think you have hit upon the cause of his screedy and doctrinaire late-career bent. :ThmbUp:

[BombsAway Bob]

am a huge fan of a whole lot of his material, he practiced and I think respected his craft as well as anyone. There are Carlin clips that will be watched for many many decades, and will be as true then as when they were first performed. They are perfect.
That said, his last few shows were sad to watch. I think perhaps his own personal bullshit meter had blown out as some point, the cynicism overwhelmed the bit of whimsy he always maintained in his earlier times. If there was an upshot to the pieces, a wink at the end, I wasn't around to see it -- and unfortunately that is how I remember him.
It Could be called "The Lenny Bruce Syndrome", without the smack...
I believe brains like Lenny, Richard Pryor,& George ran at 150% capacity, 24/7, never pausing without the assistance of foreign substances. The cynicism that built from discussing the meaning of life through their eyes & ears eventually eats at their inner being. It is sad to watch at the end.
I prefer to remember bits like George's "revision" of the Ten Commandments.
Genius stuff.

[ddog]

his material was not that of a cynic. imo.

"I like people , just in small doses" or something to that degree.

not a cynic at all.

[PaceAdvantage]

I tried to put the "You Tube" clip in here, but PA Filters must prevent any You-Tube segments that may have a liberal view from posting(JK....I think)
Anyways, this is George at his rapid-fire best. Even Tom might like it!
http://www.pbs.org/weta/twain2008/Huh? Not so Bob. You just don't understand the mysteries of posting a youtube clip.

[JustRalph]

Right Wing Comics? Where? ??????

[Tom]

Here ya go, BAB!
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[PaceAdvantage]

Here is the clip BombsAwayBob was trying to include:


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[Rookies]

Right Wing Comics? Where? ??????

RIGHT HERE RALPH, right here !!! :lol: :lol: :lol:

(Sorry, that ball was set on a tee to be spiked !!! )

As for Carlin, loved him. Pople like Tom obviously missed his odd stuff like the whole HBO show on Advertising. He talked about some " food ads" shite there, that he had no clue about in real life... but he nailed EVERY one !

Like this: " Chocolatey... you know what that means don't you ?

NO ****ING CHOCOLATE ! "

Bravo, maestro ! :D

[toetoe]

The clip is impressive in that he learned his lines well. The problem is that the lines are ordinary, although the crowd will never tell him that.

Here's a line that would apply:

"I'm really p!$$ed, but I look like $h!t." Poor man needs a cane. :( .

[Hosshead]

am a huge fan of a whole lot of his material, he practiced and I think respected his craft as well as anyone. There are Carlin clips that will be watched for many many decades, and will be as true then as when they were first performed. They are perfect.

That said, his last few shows were sad to watch. I think perhaps his own personal bullshit meter had blown out as some point, the cynicism overwhelmed the bit of whimsy he always maintained in his earlier times. If there was an upshot to the pieces, a wink at the end, I wasn't around to see it -- and unfortunately that is how I remember him.
Very True. I LMAO at his earlier stuff. BUT:
After his wife died (who he really loved) he was so bitter he couldn't keep it out of his "humor".
Her death verified that there was no God.
The cynicism that was funny before, was wrenched up about 10 notches, and there was almost nothing left, but bitterness . At least that's the way his later HBO specials looked.