Laugh In's Dick Martin Dies at 86

[Zoneboy]

Link


LOS ANGELES (AP) — Dick Martin, the zany half of the comedy team whose "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" took television by storm in the 1960s, making stars of Goldie Hawn and Lily Tomlin and creating such national catch-phrases as "Sock it to me!" has died. He was 86.

Martin, who went on to become one of television's busiest directors after splitting with Rowan in the late 1970s, died Saturday night of respiratory complications at a hospital in Santa Monica, family spokesman Barry Greenberg said.

"He had had some pretty severe respiratory problems for many years, and he had pretty much stopped breathing a week ago," Greenberg said.

Martin was surrounded by family and friends when he died just after 6 p.m., Greenberg said.

"Laugh-in," which debuted in January 1968, was unlike any comedy-variety show before it. Rather than relying on a series of tightly scripted song-and-dance segments, it offered up a steady, almost stream-of-consciousness run of non-sequitur jokes, political satire and madhouse antics from a cast of talented young actors and comedians that also included Ruth Buzzi, Arte Johnson, Henry Gibson, Jo Anne Worley and announcer Gary Owens.

Presiding over it all were Rowan and Martin, the veteran nightclub comics whose standup banter put their own distinct spin on the show.

Like all straight men, Rowan provided the voice of reason, striving to correct his partner's absurdities. Martin, meanwhile, was full of bogus, often risque theories about life, which he appeared to hold with unwavering certainty

[Zoneboy]

Link


SANTA MONICA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dick Martin, who co-created and co-hosted Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In – a show which forever changed the face of television – and who championed free speech and satire as staples in American media, died today of respiratory complications, while surrounded by his wife, family, and friends. He was 86 years young.

In addition to a 25-year career in nightclubs and the success of Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, Dick Martin began a second career as a television director in 1976, starting with The Bob Newhart Show. He was the chief director of the 1980s sitcom Newhart as well as the host of the short-lived Mindreaders game show in the late 1970s. By the time he retired from his second career, he had directed over 200 hours of television.

He married Britain’s first Playboy Playmate Dolly Read (Dolly Martin) in 1971. Dolly Read had starred in the cult classic feature film Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Martin was formerly married to Peggy Connelly. He has two sons, Richard Martin and Cary Martin.

Dick Martin was born on January 30, 1922, in Battle Creek, Michigan. He took an early interest in comedy and in his twenties worked briefly as a staff writer for the radio show Duffy's Tavern, working with the author and Broadway director Abe Burrows.

In 1951 he had a bit part in the Vincente Minnelli film Father's Little Dividend, alongside Spencer Tracy and Elizabeth Taylor, but it took him several more years to begin carving out a career for himself in television comedy. This began with an appearance on The Bob Hope Show, in an episode which also featured Diana Dors and Betty Grable. He then appeared in two episodes of The Dinah Shore Chevy Show, the first of which featured Shirley MacLaine and the second of which involved his first appearance with Dan Rowan, who was to become the other half of his famous double-act.

It was 1952 when Dan Rowan and Dick Martin met. Dick Martin, who had just seen Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis perform at Slapsie Maxie’s nightclub, decided “that looked like a lot of fun.” Nine days later, Rowan and Martin broke in their act at Charlie Foy’s Supper Club in the San Fernando Valley north of Los Angeles. They didn’t do all that well but while sitting at the bar after the show, comedian Joe Frisco came up to them and said “Don’t give up kids – you’ve got class.”

Rowan and Martin began playing nightclubs throughout America. The first time they played Las Vegas was early 1953 at the Golden Nugget; they played three times downtown at the El Cortez before moving “up” to the Strip. They received their first big break in Lake Tahoe at the Calvada Lodge, owned by Joby Lewis of the Detroit “family.”

At the Calvada, they opened for a young singer named Nat King Cole. After a 3-week stint in Tahoe, Nat took the boys to Australia where they played Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, then flew on to play Auckland, New Zealand. Cole then took Rowan and Martin to the Chez Paree in Chicago, and on to the Copacabana in New York City. It was in 1955 that Rowan and Martin first played the Sands Hotel for a four-week engagement on the Las Vegas strip – they had arrived!

Between 1962 and 1964, Martin – without Rowan – was a regular on The Lucy Show.

Nat King Cole had opened the doors for Rowan and Martin, and they were now booked continuously as an opening act in Las Vegas and New York. At the same time, they began making appearances on the Ed Sullivan Show (a total of 18 times), the Perry Como Show (8 times), and The Hollywood Palace (10 times). They also appeared on the Dean Martin Variety Show on NBC.

In 1966, Dean’s producer, Greg Garrison, sold NBC on the idea of a Dean Martin summer show. NBC wanted to have rotating hosts in the manner of The Hollywood Palace, but Dean Martin insisted on Rowan and Martin as sole hosts of the shows.

The 12 shows they hosted were so successful that NBC approached Rowan and Martin to host their own variety show. Dan and Dick said they “had something a little different” in mind. NBC said, “let’s give it a try” and Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In was born. They shot a special in September, 1967. NBC was not thrilled with the show, but critics around the country were so enthusiastic that NBC relented to a 13-week run beginning mid-season.

Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In began their 13-show run in January, 1968. NBC put the show on opposite The Lucy Show and Gunsmoke, two mega-hits and nobody gave the show much of a chance – but by the eighth show, Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In was the number one show in the country. Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In taped 144 shows and went off the air in 1973.

Though he never neglected his television work, Martin became eagerly involved with Hollywood, appearing in comedies such as The Glass Bottom Boat; Zero to Sixty, with Darren McGavin and Joan Collins; and Carbon Copy, with George Segal and Denzel Washington. Martin also had acting roles in popular series including Coach, with Craig T Nelson and Jerry Van Dyke; 3rd Rock from the Sun, with John Lithgow and Kristen Johnston; Blossom, with Mayim Bialik and Joey Lawrence; Baywatch, with David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson; and Diagnosis Murder, with Dick Van Dyke and Scott Baio.

Dan Rowan retired to France until his death from lymphatic cancer in 1987.

Rowan and Martin also appeared together in comedy western film Once Upon a Horse and in the 1969 horror spoof film The Maltese Bippy, with Julie Newmar.

Dan Rowan and Dick Martin received the 2,194th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2002.

As requested by Martin, there will be no funeral.

[BarneyFife]

That's sad news, he was a funny man.

[OH Nuts!]

Yes it is sad news, he was very funny and very pleasant. I'm really going to miss him.

[catlover79]

[user296686@aol.c]

God Bless him. I pray he rests in peace. I always loved him. I always thought he was SO funny. Deepest respects and sympathy to his loved ones.

[OH Nuts!]

Originally Posted by user296686@aol.c

God Bless him. I pray he rests in peace. I always loved him. I always thought he was SO funny. Deepest respects and sympathy to his loved ones.

I feel that way too. He was a very funny and witty man. He had a nice quiet charisma about him.

[Cactus Jack]

He was hilarious, I loved him on the reruns of Laugh In and the DVDs RIP

[dawsongirl]

I always liked him. Funny guy, good game show player. This is very sad.

[samanddiane4eva]

[80sTrivia]

Sad to see you go, Mr. Martin. You sure gave the world countless laughs over the years, and you will indeed be missed...

[DLevine2]

R.I.P. Dick Martin

[ABlairican Pie]

MSNBC.com


TV's 'Laugh-in' comic Dick Martin dies

Half of comedy team whose show made stars of Goldie Hawn, Lily Tomlin

The Associated Press
updated 9:31 p.m. PT, Sat., May. 24, 2008

LOS ANGELES - Dick Martin, the zany half of the comedy team whose "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" took television by storm in the 1960s, making stars of Goldie Hawn and Lily Tomlin and creating such national catch-phrases as "Sock it to me!" has died. He was 86.

Martin, who went on to become one of television's busiest directors after splitting with Dan Rowan in the late 1970s, died Saturday night of respiratory complications at a hospital in Santa Monica, family spokesman Barry Greenberg said.


A 1966 photo shows comedians Dan Rowan and Dick Martin, right, who went on to become hosts of "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In." Martin was the zany half of the comedy team.


"He had had some pretty severe respiratory problems for many years, and he had pretty much stopped breathing a week ago," Greenberg said.

Martin had lost the use of one of his lungs as a teenager, and needed supplemental oxygen for most of the day in his later years.

He was surrounded by family and friends when he died just after 6 p.m., Greenberg said.

Ground-breaking comedy
"Laugh-in," which debuted in January 1968, was unlike any comedy-variety show before it. Rather than relying on a series of tightly scripted song-and-dance segments, it offered up a steady, almost stream-of-consciousness run of non-sequitur jokes, political satire and madhouse antics from a cast of talented young actors and comedians that also included Ruth Buzzi, Arte Johnson, Henry Gibson, Jo Anne Worley and announcer Gary Owens.

Presiding over it all were Rowan and Martin, the veteran nightclub comics whose standup banter put their own distinct spin on the show.

Like all straight men, Rowan provided the voice of reason, striving to correct his partner's absurdities. Martin, meanwhile, was full of bogus, often risque theories about life, which he appeared to hold with unwavering certainty.

Against this backdrop, audiences were taken from scene to scene by quick, sometimes psychedelic-looking visual cuts, where they might see Hawn, Worley and other women dancing in bathing suits with political slogans, or sometimes just nonsense, painted on their bodies. Other times, Gibson, clutching a flower, would recite nonsensical poetry or Johnson would impersonate a comical Nazi spy.

'You bet your sweet bippy'
"Laugh-In" astounded audiences and critics alike. For two years the show topped the Nielsen ratings, and its catchphrases-- "Sock it to me," "You bet your sweet bippy" and "Look that up in your Funk and Wagnall's" — were recited across the country.

Stars such as John Wayne and Kirk Douglas were delighted to make brief appearances, and even Richard Nixon, running for president in 1968, dropped in to shout a befuddled sounding, "Sock it to me!" His opponent, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, was offered equal time but declined because his handlers thought it would appear undignified.

Rowan and Martin landed the show just as their comedy partnership was approaching its zenith and the nation's counterculture was expanding into the mainstream.

The two were both struggling actors when they met in 1952. Rowan had sold his interest in a used car dealership to take acting lessons, and Martin, who had written gags for TV shows and comedians, was tending bar in Los Angeles to pay the rent.

Rowan, hearing Martin was looking for a comedy partner, visited him at the bar, where he found him eating a banana.

"Why are you eating a banana?" he asked.

"If you've ever eaten here, you'd know what's with the banana," he replied, and a comedy team was born.


'We looked good'
Although their early gigs in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley were often performed gratis, they donned tuxedos for them and put on an air of success.

"We were raw," Martin recalled years later, "but we looked good together and we were funny."

They gradually worked up to the top night spots in New York, Miami and Las Vegas and began to appear regularly on television.

In 1966, they provided the summer replacement for "The Dean Martin Show." Within two years, they were headlining their own show.

The novelty of "Laugh-In" diminished with each season, however, and as major players such as Hawn and Tomlin moved on to bigger careers, interest in the series faded.

After the show folded in 1973, Rowan and Martin capitalized on their fame with a series of high-paid engagements around the country. They parted amicably in 1977.

"Dan has diabetes, and his doctor advised him to cool it," Martin told The Associated Press at the time.

Rowan, a sailing enthusiast, spent his last years touring the canals of Europe on a houseboat. He died in 1987.

New role as TV director
Martin moved onto the game-show circuit, but quickly tired of it. After he complained about the lack of challenges in his career, fellow comic Bob Newhart's agent suggested he take up directing.

He was reluctant at first, but after observing on "The Bob Newhart Show," he decided to try. He would recall later that it was "like being thrown into the deep end of the swimming pool and being told to sink or swim."

Soon he was one of the industry's busiest TV directors, working on numerous episodes of "Newhart" as well as such shows as "In the Heat of the Night," "Archie Bunker's Place" and "Family Ties."

Born into a middle-class family in Battle Creek, Mich., Martin had worked in a Ford auto assembly plant after high school.

After an early failed marriage, he was for years a confirmed bachelor. He finally settled down in middle age, marrying Dolly Read, a former bunny at the Playboy Club in London. Survivors include his wife and two sons, actor Richard Martin and Cary Martin.

At Martin's request there will be no funeral, Greenberg said.

Martin lost the use of his right lung when he was 17, something that never bothered him until his final years, when he required oxygen 18 hours a day.

Arriving for a party celebrating his 80th birthday, he fainted and was treated by doctors and paramedics. The party continued, however, and he cracked, "Boy, did I make an entrance!"

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

[OH Nuts!]

He was a good man, very entertaining and I'm going to miss him.

[Penny Lane]

I just watched him in an episode of Coach playing Luther's rival. He was a very funny guy!
RIP Dick