The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #168161   Message #4062359
Posted By: robomatic
01-Jul-20 - 06:58 PM
Thread Name: Obit: comic Carl Reiner [Rob's dad] (1922-2020)
Subject: RE: Obit: comic Carl Reiner [& Rob's dad] (1922-2020)
I loved the switcheroo that was part of the structure of "The Dick Van Dyke Show" where the star played a writer and the creator/writer played the overbearing star.
The show was fun, entertaining, and made some social points along the way. Also gave the great Mary Tyler Moore a leg up on her path to greatness.

Carl Reiner was also a writer/ performer on Sid Caesar's "Your Show of Shows" which my father spoke of with reverence. It was a progenitor to most television sketch comedy and was staffed by many future comedy greats.

I grew up listening to the dialogues that formed Reiner's performances with Mel Brooks that went under the rubric "The 2000 Year Old Man"*. Reiner proved to me how important the straight man role is.

*The 2000 Year Old Man was the central tie-in, but in their first album there was also, going by memory, Mel Brooks playing such interviewees as a one hour old baby, an Argentinian tourist (Adolf Hitler), a slew of psychiatrists from a convention (Texan, Indian, Israeli), one of the first astronauts, an Italian film director... etc...

Any of the remembrances of him I've seen or read have left me laughing.