Mort Sahl

Morton Lyon "Mort" Sahl (born May 11, 1927) is a Canadian-born American comedian and actor. He is credited with pioneering a style of stand-up comedy that paved the way for Lenny Bruce, Nichols and May, and Dick Gregory. He also occasionally wrote jokes for speeches delivered by President John F. Kennedy.

Life and career

Sahl, whose father Harry was a court reporter-turned-FBI Administrator, was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.^[1] The family soon moved to Los Angeles, California. Sahl joined the ROTC unit at Belmont High School (Los Angeles, California) and also was on the staff of the school's newspaper, the Belmont Sentinel. Actor Richard Crenna was one of his classmates. After high school, Sahl enlisted in the United States Air Force and was stationed in Alaska. In 1950, he graduated from University of Southern California in with majors in traffic engineering and city management. He then began performing stand up comedy at Enrico Banducci's hungry i nightclub in San Francisco, where his audience sometimes threw peanuts and pennies at him.

Sahl's humor has always been based on current events, especially politics. He broke new ground in the late 1950s and early 1960s by looking to the day's newspaper headlines for many of his monologues rather than relying on one-liners. His trademark is to appear on stage with a newspaper in hand, casually dressed in a pullover sweater.

When John F. Kennedy, a personal friend, became President, Sahl began making jokes that were critical of Kennedy's policies. Television host Ed Sullivan refused to let Sahl tell any Kennedy jokes on his popular The Ed Sullivan Show, which meant Sahl was seldom seen on TV during the next few years.

Following Kennedy's assassination in 1963, Sahl's interest in who was behind it was so great that he became a deputized member of New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison's team to investigate the murder. As a result, Sahl's comedy began to reflect his politics and included readings and commentary on the Warren Commission Report. His earlier anti-Kennedy jokes and his onstage tirades against the Warren Commission, alienated much of his audience. He was effectively blacklisted when his shows were cancelled. Sahl's income dropped to US$19,000 a year. (According to the Inflation Calculator of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, $19,000 in 1964 was the equivalent of $134,000 in 2008.) However, the rising tide of counterculture fueled his comeback.

In 1976, Sahl wrote an autobiography called "Heartland". It is a bitter account of his rise in comedy, his obsession with the Kennedy assassination, his decline in show business, and his long time friendship with Hugh Hefner. In 1979 he briefly hosted an afternoon talk show on WRC Radio, in Washington, D.C.

During the 1980s, Sahl made many jokes critical of his old friend, Ronald Reagan. Sahl and his wife were invited to the White House by Nancy Reagan, where President Reagan roasted him at a White House tribute in front of many other top comedians. Sahl said to television interviewer Charlie Rose of the Reagans, "They are very, very forgiving."

In the 1988 presidential election, Sahl was the most prominent supporter of unsuccessful candidate Alexander Haig.^[2]

Personal life

Sahl was married to Playboy Playmate China Lee from 1967 until their divorce in 1991. They had one son, Mort Sahl Jr., who died March 27, 1996 at the age of 19.

Recognition

Mort is listed #40 on Comedy Central's list of the 100 greatest standup comedians of all time.

Sahl, who is Jewish, received the Fifth Annual Alan King Award in American Jewish Humor (2003) from the National Foundation for Jewish Culture.

Woody Allen has said, "I adored Mort Sahl," and added he would not have become a comedian himself if not for Sahl's example, which proved a comedian could succeed with off-hand intellectual material. He compared Sahl's influence on comedy to the effect Charlie Parker had on jazz.^[3] "I still find Mort Sahl funny," Allen said in 2008. "I was with him the other day, in California, and he’s 81 and he’s teaching at Claremont [McKenna] College. And he said they have a course out there that they offered him to teach, on the Holocaust, and he didn’t take it. He said, 'I wanted to see first how history judges the event.'"^[4]

Work

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Quotations

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About his ideology: "I'm not a liberal, I'm a radical!"

About liberals and conservatives: "Liberals feel unworthy of their possessions. Conservatives feel they deserve everything they've stolen."

About politics and evolution: "There were four million people in the American Colonies and we had Jefferson and Franklin. Now we have over 200 million and the two top guys are Clinton and Dole. What can you draw from this? Darwin was wrong!"

About George W. Bush: "He's the face on the can. But who canned that soup?"

About Richard M. Nixon: "Would you buy a used car from this man?"

About Wernher von Braun: "He aimed for the stars and often hit London."

About cosmetic surgery: "There's so much Botox around now that you can't tell when a Jewish girl is angry!"

About comedy: "It has changed. It isn't funny anymore!"

On the House Committee on Un-American Activities: "Every time the Russians throw an American in jail, the Committee throws an American in jail to get even."

To Otto Preminger about his film Exodus: "Otto — let my people go" (reputed — referring to its 220 minute length)

Asked his motto: "If you can't join them, beat them."

"If you maintain a consistent political position long enough, you will eventually be accused of treason." — From the recording Mort Sahl at the hungry i

Sahl once told a story about flying with JFK on Air Force One. When they encountered some turbulence, JFK commented to Sahl that if the plane went down, everyone aboard would probably be killed, adding that, "Your name would be in very small print!"

References

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Mort Sahl

• Mort Sahl official website
• Mort Sahl at the Internet Movie Database
• Image of Mort & Kenslea Sahl
• PBS American Masters biography
• Mort Sahl on National Public Radio in 2003
• Mort Sahl: The Loyal Opposition, from the website of Robert B. Weide