Author: Ruben Bolling

Support the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art!

Ruben Bolling Leave a comment

This just in from MoCCA:

This holiday season the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art is pleased to offer a 2-for-1 membership special!

Purchase a membership for someone special and  get one for yourself! Memberships start at just $35.

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It is a fantastic way to show the comic and cartoon fan in your life how much you appreciate them and a wonderful way to support MoCCA!

Already a member? Even better! Take advantage of this offer and your membership will be renewed for one year and you will get the additional membership as a gift!

To take part in this wonderful offer, simply visit our membership website and choose which membership level you would like to give. Then just let us know who and where you would like the gift membership to be go to and we will handle the rest! Or you can call MoCCA at 212-254-3511!

Core Benefits of MoCCA Membership include:

Membership card
MoCCA pin
Free admission to the MoCCA Gallery
10% discount at the MoCCA Gift Shop
Reduced admission to MoCCA events
Invitations to Members-only events
Reduced table fees for the MoCCA Art Festival

Happy Holidays to you from all of us at MoCCA!

Hail Caesar

Ruben Bolling Leave a comment

A very touching anecdote related by Mark Evanier about the memorial/tribute to Larry Gelbart, the great comedy writer (MASH, Tootsie, many many others) who got his start as a writer for the Your Show of Shows, starring Sid Caesar.  One of Caesar's trademark schticks was convincingly speaking gibberish in foreign languages.

I'm going to quote a lot more than I usually do because this is a first-hand account:

Perhaps the most touching moment came from Sid Caesar. I'll say this
as delicately as I can: The great Caesar is not in great shape. He is
frail and largely confined to a wheelchair. Unable to get up on stage,
he delivered his speech from the front row of the audience, helped to
his feet by an aide.

Now, in the best of health, Sid Caesar was never good at speaking as
Sid Caesar. In fact, earlier in a clip that was shown, we'd see Gelbart
talking about how uncomfortable Sid was when not enveloped in some sort
of character. Now, he tried…but the words just wouldn't come. He
started a sentence, lost his way in the middle of it and just froze up.
The audience squirmed uncomfortably…

…and then a smart person in the front row — someone said it was
Mel Brooks but I don't think it was — called out, "Sid, try it in
Italian!"

Instantly, Sid began speaking in the double-talk Italian for which
he's so famous. It was utter gibberish but it was wonderful, eloquent
gibberish that was somehow infused with love for his friend, Larry. The
audience went crazy/ Because we love Sid and always will…just as
we'll always love Larry.

Read the whole post at Mark's blog.

Very nice.  And it's amazing — you get a theater full of the best TV writers America has ever produced, and when a performer begins to fail, someone there will save the show with an instant solution that not only brilliantly rescues the performer, but brings the house down.