• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

Civitans, Jan 1993. My dearly beloved, you do me honor with an invitation to join you today. We stand only five days before the inauguration of the man from Hope, Arkansas to be president of the u. s., let us turn our attentions for a few minutes to the funny side of politics. In next week's TV Guide there is a story about the actors ~on a program called Saturday Night Live who have roasted our leaders. The title of the article is Passing the (Blow) Torch, and it goes from Dana Carvey who has done George Bush, to Phil Hartman, who wears a silver wig and adds some make-up to make his nose bulge out. Dana Carvey has raised his voice a few notes, learned to speak without pronouns, and, as the article puts it, points ih so many directions he seems to have three hands. But now the role of Comedian-in-Chief has been handed to a Bill Clinton look-alike. We can only wait with high expectations for a 4-year tenn of fun,,even though we cannot know what it will be. TheTV Guideaarticle quoted one of the script-writers for the show--At any moment a new administration will confront events no comedy writer can foresee. Already the burlesque has begun. I hear it said around that the Clintons demanded that storm windows be installed in the ·white House, because Bill does not like the draft. And there are bumper stickers in George Bush's Washington, reminding him the Saddam Hussein still HAS his job. One night last week, on the Jay Leno late-night show, an actor dressed himself as Socks, the Clinten1s black cat, and delivered a few choice lines. It's easy being a cat, he said; you sleep all day and roam around all night. A combination of Ronald Reagan and Ted Kennedy. And he thanked George Bush for leaving behind all those shredded Iran-Contra documents to put into his litter-box. ftccording to the TV Guide story, actor Carvey said, The comedian's prayer is, Please God, send me a public figure who'll run for President and who's the funniest guy you can imagine. And, all through our history, people have found occasion to laugh at the people they have chosen to their highest office. Laughter is the best political medicine. Shakespeare has a line warning us of people who have lean and hungry looks, and to whom noth• ing is funny; ThoIJBs Carlyle said that the person who cannot laugh is not only fit for treas• ons, stratagems, and spoils; but his whole life is already a trearon and a stratagem. So let us for a few minutes remember the presidential jokes have that tickled the furmy-bones of our fathers and grandfathers, for in laughter there is life and health. F~c Talent Show Feb/93. My dearly't:eloved, lad'ies and gentlemn, boys and girls, and thank you Mr.Ringmaster for that in• troduction. But she did not tell all. I am ab ackyard g:ireenet. I am a professor. I am also the only member of this cast of characters who is devoid of talent. I am grateful for the ±wtn!!J!bnttiw« invitaticm; I am the exception that proves the rule. What I can do is talk. I wasl:orn talking. In fact I made a career of it. Among my thousand hobbies is the collection and repetition of bad jokes. There are people in this world, some of them not far from where we are gathered, who in my classes did not take notes, but instead kept the evidence of the grim reality that is the gaping hole where a sense of humor should be. A soft 8nswer-unay turn away wrath, as I read somewhere, but it has always been my firm belief that a bad joke will drive reason and intelligence off the campus. So if you do notgroan in misery in the next few minutes, forever afterward people will hold suspect the suspicion that you are a good humor~-~erson. Let us call it Bad Jokes 101. It meets no divisional requiremt, and it may even set~by a century mankind's laborious ascent into the light. The study of what makes us laugh is, as with all things intelligent, as old as Aristotle. Those whoj3st with good taste, he said, are called witty. a.t. wit he defined as educated insolence. Uneducated inso• lence is an entirely different matter. So let us give examples of different kinds of bad joke. At the bottom of the thennometer is the pun, the play on words. It has been called the lowest fonn of humor, ~t that is only if you said it first. If I said it first it is a priceless gem. A patient went to the doctor to report a problem. Last night I dreamed I was a wigwam, he said; th~\~~~f~e I dreamed I was a teepee. No probaem, the Dr replied;. you 're just too tense. · string who, after tontorting himself, and unravelling a part, answered, when asked if he~were a member of the twine family, I'm a fra~ The triple pun--woman named ranch F~US--it is where the sons raise meat. The dog people who passed by; vet told him to feed dog ~arlic with his food. Now his bark is worse than his bite. How do you make a Venetian blind? you hit him in the eye. Lawyer, to witness: you testified that this is the person who hit you with his car. Could you swear to the man? Oh, I did that, he said; but he just swore back at me. Another form of humor is the misdirection, the misunderstanding, sometimes deliberate. Man in ice-cream parlor asked, Whattflabors? In heavy hoarse voice, vanilla, choc, strawberry. Say, do you have laryngitis? No, just van, choc, strawb. Elderly couple sits in hotel lobby, behind potted palm. On the other sidB of it ayoung couple sit, and he begins to talk sweetly to her. Woman--Fred, that man is going to propose to her, and he d oesn 1 t know )!3---8. re here. You should whistle to warn him. lolly should I? nobody whistled to warn me. ft<j\.f [0 (~ What kept you out of class yesterday •• acute influenza~ No,a cute brunette. Messenger to king,Sire, Lady Godiva rides without. King looks out window, says, very tactfully put, young man. Absent~minded professors are subjects of many a story. Wife of one goes to her Dr; doctor, I'm wt>rriedc:.bout the prof; his mind is wandering. Oh, I know the prof, the Dr answers; don't worry, it won't~ wander far. And then there are the students. Measure height of the flag pole. Cut pizza into i 6 or 8 pieces? 6; I can't eat 8 pieces. Two Carolina students set out to drive to Disney World. See sign, Clean Rest Rooms. Cleaned 32, day and a half late getting to Orlando. Saw sign, Disney World Left. BillShepherd, the original of the Deacon; swallow-tailed coat, tall blaak hat, plumber's friend. Also master of the prank. Had his own fraternity, Signa Phi Nothing. West Stanly School Theatre Awards Banquet, May 1993. \ My deafiy beloved, ladies, gentlemen, you do me honor to invite me to share in this happy oc• casion. We are met here to honor the best in a top quality theatre group, and to all of you I give a salute to your talent and enthusiasm and imagination. I have known your director Jim Kennedy for 30 years, since he and I, were troupers together on the campus of our college and also in the summer barn theatre at the county park on the Yadkin River. It is a delight to see him again, and to visit with you. We have in common a love for the theatre, for the per• fonlnance of a work that was designed to entertain while at the same time compelling thought and imaginationfland emotional experience that leads to maturity of soul and spirit. Thevalue of the theatre, as is true of all the arts, is to make people happy, while leaving a pebble in their shoe which forces the audience to think about something that may be novel and therefore painful. ~mind and a creative imagination both rejoice at the harmonies they can find, or make, oetween man and nature; and where they find no harmony, they solve the conflict as well as they may and then they endure with a shiv~r what lif f§.C~ upon us. In that we find ourselves right in the middle of growj.~~:Q, and j\l~~rilo Picasso said that art. is a lie that makes us realize the truth;~Q~t-~0's Braque said tha art is meant to disturb, while science reassures. In response to man's fears and man's hopes!~here came/a very~: ... ago/ the art of the drama. From the very earliest memories of hmµan existence there ~s eC ~actor, the mimic, the creator of illusion and make-believe, in a presentation which reveal84a truth we uld learn in no other classroom. It is one of the oldest of organ- _\ ized human activities. C nturies before there were written words and standardized stages, "' there were dancanse and ers who acted out recognizable human situations. So popular we re these primitive theatricals that even as people were building tow~~ finding food and water j they also constructed place for actors to perform before spectatOFS'"WOne oft he oldest sur- j ~v~ing theatres, and strange enough also one of the best, is the open-air stage with seating ';;' ~ on the, side of a sloping hill at Epidaurus in the Argolid of Greece.

Load more

  26

Copy Link