When you're a kid obsessed with comedy, your personality quickly gets defined by the comics you love. For me, that comic was Bob Newhart, but it didn't start with Newhart.
I was in fifth grade reading Ellen DeGeneres' book My Point... And I Do Have One. I could not get enough of DeGeneres' material. (This was before she came out on her sitcom Ellen or her talk show.) My teacher that year, Mr. Parsons, encouraged my interest in comedy. One day, after I likely attempted, probably poorly, to do a DeGeneres bit, Mr. Parsons told me, "You should go to the library and get Bob Newhart's comedy album. If you like Ellen DeGeneres, you're going to love Bob Newhart."
I did as I was told and went to my local library in the suburbs of St. Louis, Missouri. I found a CD of Newhart's album The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart I don't remember where I was when I first listened to it, or the moment I knew this man's personality was about to become my personality, all I know is that when I listened to that album, I knew I was obsessed. I began to compile everything I could know about Bob Newhart.
To say I was the only little kid in the 1990s obsessed with Bob Newhart would probably not be true, but I know there weren't a lot of us. None of my peers knew who he was or cared. It wasn't until years later, when I started performing comedy, that I instantly knew my love of Newhart made me cool to the people I so desperately wanted to seem cool to: comics.
Any comic will tell you, if you get Newhart's comedy, you get comedy. When Newhart started, there was no such thing as an "alternative" comic. Nowadays they're everywhere, but in 1960 when his first album came out and became a Billboard number one album–and continues to be the highest-selling comedy album of all time–nobody had heard comedy in the way Newhart did comedy. He wasn't an insult comic, he didn't do the standard punchline bits, he rarely worked the room, instead Newhart leaned into his own thing. He would do these little solo sketches, if you will, often playing the part of the straight man reacting to someone else, usually on the other end of a fake phone call. These bits became insanely popular, and in turn Newhart instantly became famous.
After I discovered that first album, I devoured everything Bob Newhart ever did. I became an instant fan and devotee to the comedy school of Bob Newhart. With that said, and in recognition of Newhart's passing on Thursday at the age of 94, now is the perfect opportunity for me to share with you everything from Newhart's career you need to get into.
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By H. Alan Scott
When Lisa Kudrow was approached to star in a serialized adaptation of the 1981 film Time Bandits for TV (July 24th on Apple TV+), she jumped at the chance to work with creators Taika Waititi, Jemaine Clement and Iain Morris. "I love the way they tell stories and their sense of humor."
In this version, Kudrow plays Penelope, the leader of a group of thieves on a time-traveling mission to save the world. Kudrow's part was originally written for a man, "so it took a long time before the scripts stopped having male pronouns." One thing Kudrow responded to was Penelope's false sense of confidence.
"I just love that kind of fake thing. That's the confidence that's fun to play. I like to inhabit confidence." Despite her character "facing danger every episode," Penelope still finds a way to be a blunt and possibly mean leader—in a funny way—to her group, which includes an 11-year-old boy. "There were talks about, 'Should I, just in case, do a take where I'm not so mean?'" But that behavior only exists in her character. "I don't act like that. I don't have as much to prove as Penelope does."
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