'Humor Is Hostility--~
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April 28, 1975, The Retriever, Page 7 'Humor is Hostility-- ~ . , Art Buchwald . Speaks Art Buchwald has been delighting cPS: Do you find that you have always perfect position because everybody in this Hill the other day, which was the first time millions of newspaper readers for years been a humorous person? country is so angry and sore at everything I was up there in a long time. I just did a with his pot-shots at polititions, cor Buchwald: Yes--all the time. and I'm one of the few people who three piece about.. do you know the Bermuda porations, and other well-deserving CPS: As a child? times a week can get it off my chest. Triangle? You've heard about it? personalities and institutions. His syn Buchwald: Yes, I was the class clown and cps: But in a constructive way. CPW: Yes. dicated column, "Capital Punishment" I was always getting into trouble when I Buchwald: Well yes, but if you're Buchwald: Well I did a piece about the appears in over 450 newspapers world was in schooL And in the Marine Corps I destructive it doesn't bother me. Washington triangle between the White wide, and his dozen books have sold in the got into trouble for being funny. All my life cps: Do you find that humor and satire, at House and the Capital and the Jefferson millions. I was doing it and it has only paid off in the least in your writing tends to expose and Memorial. And all the bills and all the trial last few years. correct the foibles and prejudices of ballons and everything gets lost in the Buchwald was born in New York in 1925. CPS: What did your parents think of you as society? Tidal Basin, and are never heard from He was raised in Queens and dropped out Buchwald: I doubt it. I doubt it. again. of High School to enter WW II. When the a child? Buchwald: Well, I had sort of a checkered war ended he spent some time at the CPS: Do you think that your writing cPS: Your schedule and format for University of Southern California, but career. I was a foster child. So my foster parents could not make heads or tails of . makes people aware of them? writing--as to a specific time of day and dropped out of there to go to Paris. Buchwald: I don't think that deeply about me. And my father wasn't too sure about location-- is eclectic and varies from day to He went to Paris because he'd heard it. All that I know is that I have to get out day? that, " .. .in Paris, the streets are paved me either. At a very early age I went into my own fantasy world. Which is what you three columns a week and I never sit down Buchwald: I try to get it done in the with beds." Buchwald never did find the and say "This morning I am going to save morning so I can relax for the rest of the beds, but in 1949 he did stumble into a job ha ve to do if you are going to be a writer. day. You have to go into fantasy awfully early. the world." I just sit down and say I've got on the staff of the European edition of the to do a column and I better get it finished now defunct New York Herald Tribune. CPS: Would it be appropriate to charac terize your writing as political-social before lunch otherwise I'll have a lousy The budding homorist started writing a humor? Or how would you characterize lunch. UFWattacks column on personalities called, "Paris your own writing? . CPS: Do you think that this country now After Dark," and soon, the column began Buchwald: A political cartoon in words. needs more humor than anytime since to run in the New York edition of the Instead of using a sketch I use my World War II or the Depression because of Gallo spots Tribune. typewriter. But occasionally I write the great number of seriously unresolved In 1962 Buchwald was called to something that isn't political just to prove problems? Buchwald: Well, I wrote a column about (CPS) - Have you noticed the TV Washington to start a column on the that I can do it. When I started out for the commercial with the humble, shy, Spanish political figures of the capital, and he has first fourteen years in Europe I wasn't that in which I said that there is a shortage - of humor, and therefore we have to charge accentented young woman, who urges all been stabbing away ever since. writing political stuff, just humor about to buy her family's "Madria Madria" Europe. more for it. It used to be that a barrel of Buchwald has not mellowed through the laughs was about four dollars, but now Sangria wine, made in the Spanish CPS: What type of journalistic devices do . tradition, so she'll no longer have to make years, his aim has remained straight and you use in your writing? because of the shortage, Baker, Iron and true. He called J . Edgar Hoover, "a Harpie have raised it to about $14 a barreL commercials? Buch wa ld: Usually I write dialogue Well, another ad cover up has been mythical person first thought up by the because I like dialogue. If there is any Reader's Digest." When he traveled to cPS: So that in actuality humor does tend undercovered. The woman is Ofelia Gallo, formula involved it is to treat serious an Argentianian whose husband and uncle, Russia he said he took the trip " .. .in the things lightly and light things seriously. I to aid the country? interest of Science," so that the com Buchwald: I guess so. I haven't thought of Italian ancestry, operates the Gallo might treat Fanny Foxx going into the wineries of Modesto, Ca. munists could see what a, "bloated, Tidal Basin incident very seriously and I about it. But you are competing with Jerry Ford, the budget, and Congress when it The United Farm Workers and the AFL plutocratic captialist really looked like." might treat aid to Vietnam lightly. It CIO want the government to ban the When then-President Nixon was en comes to humor. It used to be you write the seems to work doing that. commercial. trenched in 'Watergate, Buchwald had a CPS: Wha t purpose and function do you humor and they would write the straight stuff. Now they're writing humor and Accordirig to the UFW, the contested field day. In one of his columns, he com find humor and satire serve? commercial gives the impression that mented that Bebe Rebozo, Nix.on's close Buchwald: They relleve the tension. It's you're writing straight stuff. CPS: What is the actual process of writing . "Madria Madria" is turned out by a small friend, had resigned and that Nixon was quite a life to laugh at and people do it in family winery run by Spanish Americans going to hold a press conference to an different ways. Comedians do it on a column? Do you have steps that you go through in turning one out? who cannot afford an actress. nounce the appointment of a new friend. television; other people do it on the stage, According to a UFW spokesperson, and I try to do it in' writing. The whole Buchwald: I read the papers and in the When Buchwald was asked why he at papers I see the story. And then it occurs to "consumers are being taken in by ~ he a s, thing is to try and make people feel good. especially wine buyers who are trying to tacked Nixon so much, he replied, "I'm a I don't have a real purpose in mind, me I've. got to do something on that story. great fan of President Nixon. I worship the And then I think very hard--maybe a day, avoid Gallo products. Gallo is trying to because I wouldn't be doing it if I didn't circumvent the boycott by putting out quicksand he walks on. '" get paid for it. It's the only way I can maybe two days, maybe two minutes; how • do I say that in a different way? products under different names with CPS correspondent Richard Rasnick survive. It's all defense for me. different non-existent manufactures." recently spoke with Buchwald about his CPS: Writing? CPS: Do you go out and investigate all the A Gallo spokesman says the VFW theories on political humor, and filed this Buchwald: Yes. Humor is hostility. subjects you are writing about? complaint is "just another ... unfounded, interview. Getting it out of your system. I'm in a Buchwald: No. No, I was up there on the ridi culous charge." 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