Quick poll NDC

[luisb...@aol.com]

Who is funnier--Robin Williams or Jerry Lewis (or someone else)?

[marcus]

On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 9:04:09 AM UTC-4, luisb...@aol.com wrote:
> Who is funnier--Robin Williams or Jerry Lewis (or someone else)?

Luis, do I smell a set-up here?

OK, I'll play along. Although I may be the only non-French speaking person who thinks that Jerry Lewis was funny in his prime, I think Robin Williams was the funniest man on the planet...closely followed by Richard Pryor.

[Just Kidding]

On Wed, 11 May 2016 07:41:11 -0700 (PDT), marcus <marc...@yahoo.com>
wrote:

No way to pick just one. In no particular order:

Andy Kaufman
George Carlin
Richard Pryor
Sam Kinison (in small doses)
Robin Williams
Steve Martin
Jonathan Winters
Bob Newhart
Dick Gregory
Eddie Murphy
Bill Hicks
Lenny Bruce
Billy Crystal

These are all primarily stand-up comedians. I could have but didn't
include a lot of funny people who were better known as comic actors
(although some of the above are/were excellent comic actors as well)
like Red Skelton, Jackie Gleason, many cast members of SNL, etc.

[Willie]

Great list. My wife and I just binged through "The IT Crowd" (which aired on BBC from 2006-2008, so we're late to the game). In it, Richard Ayoade plays Maurice Moss, and affords many, many laughs. He's Charlie Chaplin gone geek. Don't know what else he's done. I think the hardest laughs I've had might have come from Don Rickles, though Billy Crystal was pretty funny here:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x31mtu_analyze-this-the-meeting_fun

[poisoned rose]

> Billy Crystal

If only Billy Crystal were half as funny as he thinks he is. He makes my
flesh crawl.

Check out Jim Jefferies sometimes.

[Rachel]

On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 12:17:44 PM UTC-7, poisoned rose wrote:
> > Billy Crystal
>
> If only Billy Crystal were half as funny as he thinks he is. He makes my
> flesh crawl.

then we could use you as bait...

>
> Check out Jim Jefferies sometimes.

who?

[Willie]

What's a good Jim Jeffries? I watched the airline etiquette bit and wasn't amused. But folks were definitely laughing, so maybe I'm not getting it.

[marcus]

On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 2:13:41 PM UTC-4, Willie wrote:
> Great list. My wife and I just binged through "The IT Crowd" (which aired on BBC from 2006-2008, so we're late to the game). In it, Richard Ayoade plays Maurice Moss, and affords many, many laughs. He's Charlie Chaplin gone geek. Don't know what else he's done. I think the hardest laughs I've had might have come from Don Rickles, though Billy Crystal was pretty funny here:
>
> http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x31mtu_analyze-this-the-meeting_fun

A lot of people cringe at the mere mention of Don Rickles. I'm not one of them. He's still funny. I spent a night a few months back watching him on The Tonight Show with Carson and on the Letterman show via YouTube. He's a riot. As for Billy Crystal, I've loved him forever. He and Robin Williams together were a force to be reckoned with. One time both Williams and Crystal were guests in the Mets broadcast booth with Ralph Kiner and Tim McCarver (I think they were promoting Comic Relief) and they had everyone in stitches. They even did play by play for half an inning and McCarver was laughing so hard he couldn't speak. I've never tried to find that on YouTube. Have you seen Crystal's one-man show, "700 Sundays"? If you haven't seen it, Willie, it is an incredible performance.

Other comics I've liked are Chevy Chase, Gene Wilder, Gilda Radner, Robert Klein, David Steinberg, Stephen Wright(who I just saw live a couple of months ago) and then the Marx Brothers(fantastic),Chaplin, Abbott & Costello, Laurel and Hardy, Jonathan Winters, Red Skelton...Oh God, how could I forget the Great One, Jackie Gleason, and many more too numerous to mention.

Marc

[M. Rick]

Jackie Vernon
Totie Fields
Slappy White
Rupert Pupkin
Bob Dylan

[marcus]

Just re-read my list above. How the heck did I forget to mention perhaps one of the greatest of all, and a very big influence on my life, Lenny Bruce?

Wow.

Marc

[Rachel]

i think i just saw this little skit on msnbc, where donald trump was on the honeymooners or something?

yeah.

[gj]

On Wed, 11 May 2016 06:04:07 -0700 (PDT), luisb...@aol.com wrote:

>Who is funnier--Robin Williams or Jerry Lewis (or someone else)?

Robin Williams is funnier AND more annoying.

-GJ 2.1

[Just Kidding]

On Wed, 11 May 2016 12:52:18 -0700 (PDT), marcus <marc...@yahoo.com>
wrote:

>On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 2:13:41 PM UTC-4, Willie wrote:
>> Great list. My wife and I just binged through "The IT Crowd" (which aired on BBC from 2006-2008, so we're late to the game). In it, Richard Ayoade plays Maurice Moss, and affords many, many laughs. He's Charlie Chaplin gone geek. Don't know what else he's done. I think the hardest laughs I've had might have come from Don Rickles, though Billy Crystal was pretty funny here:
>>
>> http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x31mtu_analyze-this-the-meeting_fun
>
>A lot of people cringe at the mere mention of Don Rickles. I'm not one of them. He's still funny. I spent a night a few months back watching him on The Tonight Show with Carson and on the Letterman show via YouTube. He's a riot. As for Billy Crystal, I've loved him forever. He and Robin Williams together were a force to be reckoned with. One time both Williams and Crystal were guests in the Mets broadcast booth with Ralph Kiner and Tim McCarver (I think they were promoting Comic Relief) and they had everyone in stitches. They even did play by play for half an inning and McCarver was laughing so hard he couldn't speak. I've never tried to find that on YouTube. Have you seen Crystal's one-man show, "700 Sundays"? If you haven't seen it, Willie, it is an incredible performance.

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/08/26/watch-robin-williams-cracks-up-the-broadcast-booth-at-shea-in-1989/

>
>Other comics I've liked are Chevy Chase, Gene Wilder, Gilda Radner, Robert Klein, David Steinberg, Stephen Wright(who I just saw live a couple of months ago) and then the Marx Brothers(fantastic),Chaplin, Abbott & Costello, Laurel and Hardy, Jonathan Winters, Red Skelton...Oh God, how could I forget the Great One, Jackie Gleason, and many more too numerous to mention.
>
>Marc

Steven Wright was great, although he was something of a one trick
pony. He was a master of one-liners, though:

All those who believe in psychokinesis raise my hand.

The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.

I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met.

OK, so what's the speed of dark?

How do you tell when you're out of invisible ink?

If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked

something.

Support bacteria - they're the only culture some people have.

When everything is coming your way, you're in the wrong lane.

Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to be lazy.

Hard work pays off in the future. Laziness pays off now.

Everyone has a photographic memory. Some just don't have film.

Shin: a device for finding furniture in the dark.

Many people quit looking for work when they find a job.

I intend to live forever - so far, so good.

Join the Army, meet interesting people, kill them.

If Barbie is so popular, why do you have to buy her friends?

Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.

Dancing is a perpendicular expression of a horizontal desire.

When I'm not in my right mind, my left mind gets pretty crowded.

Boycott shampoo! Demand the REAL poo!

Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?

What happens if you get scared half to death twice?

I used to have an open mind but my brains kept falling out.

I couldn't repair your brakes, so I made your horn louder.

Why do psychics have to ask you for your name?

If at first you don't succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.

If at first you don't succeed, then skydiving definitely isn't for
you.

A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.

Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.

For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism.

The colder the X-ray table, the more of your body is required to be on
it.

The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the
bread.

The severity of the itch is proportional to the reach.
____________________________

Lots more here:

http://www.weather.net/zarg/ZarPages/stevenWright.html

[Tim]

Funny + annoying = Lewis Black

[Rachel]

the awful coincidence is just merely a day or at most two ago, i was thinking about shamPOO, and what it really means. :-///

[gj]

Yeah, but he's always bitching. Gives me a headache.

-GJ 2.1

[RichL]

<luisb...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:40a229bf-fb97-4dd8...@googlegroups.com...

> Who is funnier--Robin Williams or Jerry Lewis (or someone else)?

I hate to say it given his current situation, but Bill Cosby. I should say
WAS funny. Now, not so much.

[nate]

he did literally have me rolling on the floor laughing out loud in the 60's. today it is so sad to see such a fall. :(


- nate

[Just Kidding]

I'm proud to say I was never a Cosby fan. Although I did like his
Noah's ark routine.

[Rachel]

i never thought he was funny. i thought he was smart.

[Just Walkin']

Victor Borge
Danny Kaye
Oscar Levant
Mickey Katz
Allan Sherman

[luisb...@aol.com]

On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 1:14:56 PM UTC-4, Just Kidding wrote:

I must say that I wasn't expecting anything close to this number of posts. I thought, maybe 2. Great.

I was inspired by looking at a series of tapes of Martin and Lewis along with some of his 'dumb acts' from movies and tv shows. I don't know M+L that well and it was sort of a revelation. I think it's Lewis' acting that really gets me. All this started me thinking about Williams because of his manic-ness and this hard-to-ignore sense after he died that maybe he wasn't as funny or great as I'd once thought. So I wondered what other people thought. Maybe it's because he was so language based compared to Lewis. At the same time Lewis has juvenile manic material in his movies that I find unwatchable.

I didn't think anyone would post lists. I was heartened to see the names Mickey Katz and Allan Sherman appear because I actually listen to those guys and like them quite a bit. If Rich L will indulge me:

Meet...
Merowitz, Berowitz, Handelman, Schandelman,
Sperber and Gerber and Steiner and Stone.
Moskowitz, Lubowitz, Aaronson, Baronson,
Kleinman and Feinman and Freidman and Cohen.
Smallowitz, Wallowitz, Tidelbaum, Mandelbaum
Levin, Levinsky, Levine and Levi.
Brumburger, Schlumburger, Minkus and Pinkus
And Stein with an "E-I" and Styne with a "Y!"

To me, a genius last line.

A list for me would have Louis CK very near the top. Ditto for Gervais. I've gone to see Chris Rock and he knocked me out of my seat. I've studied scenes from The Office.

[DianeE]

<luisb...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:40a229bf-fb97-4dd8...@googlegroups.com...

> Who is funnier--Robin Williams or Jerry Lewis (or someone else)?

----------------
Mel Brooks.

DianeE

[marcus]

On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 5:12:42 PM UTC-4, Just Kidding wrote:
> On Wed, 11 May 2016 12:52:18 -0700 (PDT), marcus <>
> wrote:
>
>> >A lot of people cringe at the mere mention of Don Rickles. I'm not one of them. He's still funny. I spent a night a few months back watching him on The Tonight Show with Carson and on the Letterman show via YouTube. He's a riot. As for Billy Crystal, I've loved him forever. He and Robin Williams together were a force to be reckoned with. One time both Williams and Crystal were guests in the Mets broadcast booth with Ralph Kiner and Tim McCarver (I think they were promoting Comic Relief) and they had everyone in stitches. They even did play by play for half an inning and McCarver was laughing so hard he couldn't speak. I've never tried to find that on YouTube. Have you seen Crystal's one-man show, "700 Sundays"? If you haven't seen it, Willie, it is an incredible performance.
>
> http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/08/26/watch-robin-williams-cracks-up-the-broadcast-booth-at-shea-in-1989/
>

Thanks for that link. That was McCarver and Steve Zebriskie(sp?), but I know that Ralph Kiner was there for part of it. There was a gag about a runner on first taking a big lead, and Crystal saying that he was doing the "Funky chicken", and Williams retorts that the censors will be coming, and then says words to the effect, "Oh you said 'funky', I thought you said something else." I think McCarver was in tears at that point.

[M. Rick]

On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 3:04:43 PM UTC-7, Rachel wrote:
> the awful coincidence is just merely a day or at most two ago, i was thinking about shamPOO, and what it really means. :-///

The Hindi origin is Campo - to press. No poo. Or Warren Beatty.

[Rachel]

Warren Beatty...don't get it.

Hey, a couple days ago, I was thinking of shaving off all my hair when Bob....passes on... (not the first time i thought that...going around in circles....sigh....)

[DianeE]

"Rachel" <golda...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:6ccdb094-c86d-482c...@googlegroups.com...

-------------
Warren Beatty starred as George the hairstylist in the movie "Shampoo" many
years ago.

DianeE

[BobbyM]

On Thursday, May 12, 2016 at 9:19:09 AM UTC+9, luisb...@aol.com wrote:
> On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 1:14:56 PM UTC-4, Just Kidding wrote:
> > On Wed, 11 May 2016 07:41:11 -0700 (PDT), marcus <marc...@yahoo.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > >On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 9:04:09 AM UTC-4, luisb...@aol.com wrote:
> > >> Who is funnier--Robin Williams or Jerry Lewis (or someone else)?

> I must say that I wasn't expecting anything close to this number of posts. I thought, maybe 2. Great.

That would have probably been true except that you broadened the parameters with "or someone else", leaving the door open for anyone to list any comedian.

Your original question (above) seems to indicate that you think Williams & Lewis are the funniest comedians ever, in your opinion. Is that a correct assumption?

[luisb...@aol.com]

No, not correct. I was comparing them because of their manic-ness, asking whom of those two were funnier. It's true that the "or someone else" broadens it. I still didn't think there would be much response. So I'm glad.

[Rachel]

Believe it or not, I think I actually *saw* that as a kid, like in 3rd grade (seem to remember the tv set/location on library) but I didn't get it, understand it.

[DianeE]

"Rachel" <golda...@gmail.com> wrote in message

news:81855269-9d76-4997...@googlegroups.com...

> On Thursday, May 12, 2016 at 3:48:53 AM UTC-7, DianeE wrote:
>> "Rachel" <golda...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>> news:6ccdb094-c86d-482c...@googlegroups.com...
>> > On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 9:52:09 PM UTC-7, M. Rick wrote:
>> >> On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 3:04:43 PM UTC-7, Rachel wrote:
>> >> > the awful coincidence is just merely a day or at most two ago, i was
>> >> > thinking about shamPOO, and what it really means. :-///
>> >>
>> >> The Hindi origin is Campo - to press. No poo. Or Warren Beatty.
>> >
>> > Warren Beatty...don't get it.
>> >
>> > Hey, a couple days ago, I was thinking of shaving off all my hair when
>> > Bob....passes on... (not the first time i thought that...going around
>> > in
>> > circles....sigh....)
>> -------------
>> Warren Beatty starred as George the hairstylist in the movie "Shampoo"
>> many
>> years ago.
>>
>

> Believe it or not, I think I actually *saw* that as a kid, like in 3rd
> grade (seem to remember the tv set/location on library) but I didn't get
> it, understand it.

-------------
That was *not* an appropriate movie for a 3rd-grader! His character was a
Casanova who IIRC got his comeuppance in the end.

DianeE

[Rachel]

I was a Casanova by third grade! :-D

[luisb...@aol.com]

But it was Garry Shandling who told what I think is one of the greatest jokes ever. Stop me if you've heard it.

So this lion is fucking this zebra. Another zebra appears up the trail and starts walking towards them. The first zebra turns to the lion and says, "That's my wife. Pretend you're killing me."

[Will Dockery]

On Sunday, May 15, 2016 at 9:09:18 PM UTC-4, luisb...@aol.com wrote:
>
> But it was Garry Shandling who told what I think is one of the greatest jokes ever. Stop me if you've heard it.
>
> So this lion is fucking this zebra. Another zebra appears up the trail and starts walking towards them. The first zebra turns to the lion and says, "That's my wife. Pretend you're killing me."

Good one, I missed this entire thread the first time around.

:)

[Will Dockery]

On Wednesday, May 11, 2016 at 9:04:09 AM UTC-4, luisb...@aol.com wrote:
> Who is funnier--Robin Williams or Jerry Lewis (or someone else)?

Funny in very different ways, of course.