Don Rickles last interview with
Johnny Carson in May 1992
"Everything I've ever done in my whole career, people might not know, I've never written anything down on paper." - Don Rickles
A headliner in Las Vegas (Sahara and the Golden Nugget), comedian Don Rickles was a 'peripheral member' of the legendary Rat Pack, basically a court jester, thanks to his friendship with Frank Sinatra who took an instant liking to the insult comic. Rickles was one of the few allowed to kid Sinatra so viciously. “Nobody ever dared with Frank,” Rickles was quoted as saying, “because he had such mood swings and you never knew how he was going to react. But I could tell the minute I saw him that he was going to be in my corner.”
It was often said Rickles was an equal-opportunity offender, he insulted anyone and everyone. From The New York Times: One night, on learning that some members of his audience were German, he said, “Forty million Jews in this country, and I got four Nazis sitting here in front waiting for the rally to start.” He said that America needed Italians “to keep the cops busy” and blacks “so we can have cotton in the drugstore,” and that “Asians are nice people, but they burn a lot of shirts.” He might ask a man in the audience, “Is that your wife?” and, when the man answered yes, respond: “Oh, well. Keep your chin up.”
“An insult comic is the title I was given. What I do is exaggeration. I make fun of people, at life, of myself and my surroundings.” He liked to say, to temper the acidity of his act, “I wish for you, my friends, that for years to come you have what I have—people who care.” He frequently told jokes about his wife being the epitome of the Jewish American Princess stereotype who “likes to lie in bed, signalling ships with her jewelry.”
Because of his effervescent unpredictability, Rickles was a favorite guest star on talk and variety shows like The Hollywood Palace, Dean Martin Show, Merv, The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson and Late Show with David Letterman. Johnny Carson especially proved to be a superior straight man for Rickles' putdowns, his first appearance on Carson's program was in 1965.
After Carson retired in 1992 after 3 decades on the air, Rickles continued appearing on the Tonight show after Jay Leno took over as host. Here's an appearance from 2011:
I always thought Rickles worked better with Letterman than Leno. This is from 2007:
Kids today know Don Rickles as the voice of Mr. Potato Head in the Disney Toy Story franchise. Toy Story 4 was dedicated to the comedian (in addition to animator Adam Burke). Don Rickles died in 2017, he was 90.
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