It’s all ultimately about comedy duos. Two cartoons from today’s feed: a Zippy — Ho Hos in the forest primeval — that’s a reprise (with fresh variations) of an old strip; and a Wayno/Piraro Bizarro — show me the card, teller — that’s incomprehensible unless you have a piece of popular-culture knowledge:
(#1) Food product vocabulary, climate change, Mel Brooks & Carl Reiner — a reprise of this earlier strip:
(#2) From my 6/10/16 posting “Ho Ho trees, Ho Ho logs”: Henny Youngman as the punch line
(#3) Wayno’s title: “Hush Money” (If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Dan Piraro says there are 3 in this strip — see this Page.)
Snack-food Swiss rolls of the forest. The stately giant Ho Ho tree is the subject of #1 and #2. See my 12/17/18 posting “Four Swiss rolls”, about cake roulades, of which Ho Hos are a snack-food exemplar. As for Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks, from Wikipedia on Reiner:
(#4) Reiner & BrooksCarl Reiner (… born March 20, 1922) is an American comedian, actor, director, screenwriter, and publisher whose career spans seven decades. During the early years of television comedy from 1950 to 1957, he co-wrote and acted on Caesar’s Hour and Your Show of Shows, starring Sid Caesar. In the 1960s, Reiner was best known as the creator, producer, writer, and actor on The Dick Van Dyke Show.
Reiner famously formed a comedy duo with [his good friend] Mel Brooks in “2000 Year Old Man” and acted in films such as It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World (1963), The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966) and the Ocean‘s film series (2001-2007).
And on Brooks:
Mel Brooks (born Melvyn Kaminsky, June 28, 1926) is an American director, writer, actor, comedian, producer and composer. He is known as a creator of broad film farces and comedic parodies. Brooks began his career as a comic and a writer for the early TV variety show Your Show of Shows. Together with Carl Reiner, he created the comic character The 2000 Year Old Man. He wrote, with Buck Henry, the hit television comedy series Get Smart, which ran from 1965 to 1970.
In middle age, Brooks became one of the most successful film directors of the 1970s, with many of his films being among the top 10 moneymakers of the year they were released. His best-known films include The Producers (1967), The Twelve Chairs (1970), Blazing Saddles (1974), Young Frankenstein (1974), Silent Movie (1976), High Anxiety (1977), History of the World, Part I (1981), Spaceballs (1987), and Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993). A musical adaptation of his first film, The Producers, ran on Broadway from 2001 to 2007. [Let me especially recommend his 1983 remake of To Be or Not to Be, starring Brooks and Anne Bancroft.]
Oh yes, take Henny Youngman … please. (Some notes in my 9/8/12 posting “Take my wife”.)
The teller with the card. If you don’t know about Penn and Teller, #3 makes no sense at all. From Wikipedia:
(#5) Penn & Teller (Boston Globe photo)Penn & Teller (Penn Jillette and Teller) are American magicians and entertainers who have performed together since the late 1970s, noted for their ongoing act that combines elements of comedy with magic.
… Penn Jillette serves as the act’s orator and raconteur. Teller generally does not speak while performing, and instead communicates through mime and nonverbals, though his voice can occasionally be heard during their live shows and television appearances.
In #3 the silent Teller (drawn from life) is acting as a bank teller (“Hush Money”) — with, of course, a pen conspicuously available at his window — doing a card magic trick.
As for the 3 of clubs, P&T have a special affection for this card.
It all fits together.
Leave a Reply