Hail Caesar

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.