Sunday, May 25, 2008

Goodnight, Dick: LAUGH-IN's Martin passes away

The Flying Fickle Finger of Fate has caught up with Dick Martin, who passed away yesterday at the age of 86.

I was born after Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In stopped production, but WJTM (which not long afterward began using the call letters WNRW and is now WXLV, the local ABC affiliate) used to air reruns of the show at 11 on weeknights back in the early Eighties. That's when I first started watching Laugh-In, on the television set in my bedroom with the door closed and the sound turned down so my parents wouldn't know that I was up late on school nights. Even as a little kid, I thought that Laugh-In was sophisticated and hilarious. It was like having my mind machine-gunned with a nonstop barrage of quips and gags. And at the center of the manic maelstrom that was Laugh-In were Dan Rowan and Dick Martin.

So much that could be said about that show and all that happened on it, but for a tribute I couldn't find anything that more perfectly sums-up Martin and Laugh-In than this clip of him along with Tiny Tim (singing "Tiptoe Through the Tulips")...

Goodnight, Dick. And thanks for all the laughs!

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