Search - Don Rickles :: Hello Dummy

"The Merchant of Venom"

Annie Van Auken | Planet Earth | 04/21/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"As long as there's been stand-up comics, there's been hecklers and show-offs interrupting their acts. The best comedians have a prepared arsenal of put-downs and squelches that's used to deflate these miscreants. In the 1950s, nightclub comic Fat Jack E. Leonard was more famous for his insults than for "material." Whether influenced by Leonard or not, Don Rickles raised excoriation to an art form.



One night in 1957, Frank Sinatra caught Don's act in Miami and he too was a target of unsolicited razor sharp barbs. Instead of being insulted however, Frank embraced the master of ad hominem attacks and helped Rickles become a Las Vegas headliner.



This CD of HELLO DUMMY! is of a Don Rickles performance recorded in 1968 at the Hotel Sahara in Las Vegas, NV. Highest Billboard Hot 100 chart position: #54.



In typical scattergun fashion, Don hurls bricks at every ethnic group, religion, race and sexual orientation. He singles out a few attendees for special attention, often to their obvious embarrassment. At show's end Rickles graciously thanks the audience for being such good sports, assuring us that everything was in jest and not meant personally. It's a friendly yet incongruent conclusion to a one-sided war of words.



TOTAL TIME: 35:48"