BILL COSBY
Eight o’clock.
GROUCHO
We’ve got plenty of time. Why are we rushing like this?
ERIN
Because we’ve got to be there at eight o’clock.
GROUCHO
But it’s only seven.
ERIN
It’s seven-thirty!
BILL COSBY
Isn’t she nagging us enough now? She going to get worse now? Going to nag, nag, nag more?
GROUCHO
Just call her Nagasaki.
GEORGE BURNS
George Burns was known to a small circle of intimates for “cracking up” Jack Benny. “Jack was George’s best audience,” Groucho told me. “He could always make Jack crack up. He could make him laugh so you could see tears in his eyes.”
“Jack and I aren’t leaving because we’re both booked,” George told Groucho and me at lunch one day. But shortly afterward, Jack Benny died, before he was able to make his return to films in The Sunshine Boys. Jack Benny’s part went to the man he would have certainly chosen for it. In the part of the old vaudevillian, George Burns won his first Oscar.
On receiving the Oscar, George said, “If you stay around long enough, you become new.” Groucho commented, “If you stay around long enough, you become you.”
Though George Burns modestly appraised his place in the Burns and Allen team, with “I just had to stand there,” his performance as a straight man was of inestimable importance to their success. And performance it was, for George Burns was always an actor. When they first started out, it was George who told the jokes, and “Gracie was the straight woman, but whatever she said, they laughed because her delivery was funny.” George Burns gallantly relinquished the greater glory of getting the laughs throughout their career together, which spanned vaudeville, radio, movies, and television. They began as a vaudeville team in the early twenties and, after a few years together as an act, married in 1926. George characterized their start in vaudeville as a “disappointment act, which meant you sat home with your grips packed, and if some act got sick, you got called in.”
Groucho and George had shared that experience of vaudeville with Jack Benny, George Jessel, and others no longer here. George told us, “I know more dead people than alive people. I’ll sure know plenty of people there, if there is there.” When Groucho and George were together the conversation usually turned to vaudeville, which George Burns contrasted with television:
“Then with seventeen good minutes, you could work for seventeen years.”
A combination of restraint and enthusiasm, George was buoyant and even boyish when we had lunch, his vital appearance giving no hint of the open heart surgery he recently had undergone. Groucho’s young nurse, Julie, was there too. In his dry, gravelly voice, George greeted Groucho with, “Hiya, kid.”
After George Burns had left, nurse Julie commented, “I thought it was so wonderful, if we did it again for dinner, I’d probably have a heart attack!”
I
Tell me about your first meeting with the Marx Brothers.
GEORGE BURNS
Now, when I first met the Marx Brothers they were already stars. I didn’t get to know them then. I met the Marx Brothers when I worked with Gracie, when I was already doing well. I wasn’t doing as well as they were doing. We were just a little standard man-and-woman act. That’s when I met Jack Benny, too. He was doing very well. He was a monologist.
GROUCHO
I met Benny before you did.
GEORGE BURNS
Yeah. He was getting about $450 a week. That’s what he was getting. And Gracie and I were getting about $350—the two of us. And he got that alone.
I
Did you ever play on the same bill with Jack Benny?
GROUCHO
I played with Benny.
GEORGE BURNS
Yeah. I played with Benny twice.
GROUCHO
We played the whole Orpheum Circuit together.
GEORGE BURNS
I played with Benny once at the Palace Theatre. And he wanted to do a bit with me. So I went out on the stage, and I stood there. I was supposed to read the first line, and I didn’t. I just stood there, and looked out. He’s waiting for the first line, and I wouldn’t read it. And he says, “Aren’t you gonna say anything?” and I said no. He says, “Then what did you come out here for?” I said, “I wanted to see you work. I like the way you work.” That was the end of Benny. He fell down, and I walked off the stage. But Groucho’s known Jack Benny longer than he’s known me. And he met Gracie before I met her. The Marx Brothers played on the bill with them. She did an Irish act.
GROUCHO
That’s right. I was having dinner with her when you met her.
GEORGE BURNS
I don’t think you had dinner with Gracie when I met you.
GROUCHO
She never ate?
GEORGE BURNS
No, you had dinner with Gracie, but you didn’t meet me. I didn’t know you then. When you had dinner with Gracie, she was with Larry Reilly. Isn’t that right?
GROUCHO
That’s right. She was a good dancer.
GEORGE BURNS
Gracie and her sisters might have been the greatest Irish dancers in the world. You know how they judge Irish dancing? Irish dancing is very, very tough. You dance on a platform with the judges sitting underneath, and it’s the taps that count. Your personality has nothing to do with it.
GROUCHO
How lucky.
GEORGE BURNS
The old Irishmen sit under the platform, and you miss a tap, they say, “Out!” That’s all, they just listen. It’s only taps, because Irish dancing is from the hips down, that’s all. Tough dancing. I don’t think I’d come in first. I was always a right-legged dancer. I couldn’t move my left foot.
GROUCHO
Did you ever get the hook?
GEORGE BURNS
Yeah, I got mine at the Bowery. But did you ever get the hoop? You know what the hoop is? The kind you spin. They used to have them on sticks. The guys with the hoops would sit in the front row, and if they didn’t like you, they’d catch you and pull you over the footlights. How ’bout that? Wasn’t that nice? That was worse than the hook. With the hook, they just pulled you offstage.
GROUCHO
Once I went to the Dewey Theatre with Harpo. And we didn’t have any act. And we didn’t have any talent, but we put on funny makeup. The manager came back and says, “Wash your dirty faces and get the hell out of here.”
I
Did you ever get on the stage?
GROUCHO
No. We stood in the wings, and I was wearing this funny makeup. But we never got on the stage.
GEORGE BURNS
I also played the Dewey Theatre. They tore it down to make the Jefferson Theatre out of it. On the other side of the street was the Academy of Music. Anyway, I’m playing the Dewey Theatre and I’m doing this skating act. And the other act is just about getting finished, and my partner, Sam Brown—it was Brown and Williams, my name was Williams—he had to go to the bathroom, and he couldn’t go because the act was on their last number. That meant we had to go on the stage. So he wee-weed in the wings. In those days the orchestras were level and the stages were pitched. See, now the orchestras are raised and the stages are level, but in the other days everything was downhill. So, when he wee-weed, it went into the footlights. It started to smoke and stink. Needless to say, our act stunk a little worse than the others.
GROUCHO
I’m gonna tell about Harpo.
GEORGE BURNS
Go ahead.
GROUCHO
We played Henderson’s in Coney Island…
GEORGE BURNS
I played it too.
GROUCHO
And that was the first time Harpo had ever been on the stage, and he shit in his pants. He was so nervous.
GEORGE BURNS
Well, I’ll tell you something: you
gotta be good to be nervous. That’s number one. And you gotta be able to go to the bathroom, too. That’s number two. But I never got nervous, because I was never good. I was lousy. I finally got to be somebody when Gracie retired, because when Gracie was alive and she worked, I didn’t have to be good.
GROUCHO
You were the straight man.
GEORGE BURNS
I wasn’t even a straight man. I was retired while I was with her. I’d go on the stage and say, “How is your brother?” She’d stand and talk, and talk and talk and get laughs. And I’d stand there and smoke my cigar. You know, we played Oklahoma City, and the papers came out and said Gracie Allen was a brilliant actress. And she’s got a great future. She could be a great star if she ever worked alone. That was the review in the paper. That’s how good I was.
Then after Gracie left, I didn’t want to retire, see? So I learned a lot of songs, a lot of jokes, I always could dance a little bit. If you can dance, you get off the stage, and it’s easy to get on. You just smoke and say, “Hello, folks.” You’ve got an exit, you can work. So then I started to do something. But while I was with Gracie, I knew all the mechanics off the stage, ’cause I had four or five television shows that I owned. So I knew that backstage business, but I couldn’t do it on the stage. I don’t know why. I just stuttered, stammered, anticipated everything. And for instance, I used to go on the stage and say to Gracie, “I want to talk to you.” I’d point my finger. Know what I would do when the music would start to play? I’d stand backstage with my finger pointed. And walk on and say, “I want to talk to you.” That’s how pathetic I was.
GROUCHO
Remember the Princeton Hotel in New York?
GEORGE BURNS
Yeah, Gracie stopped there. Gracie stayed at the Princeton when she went around with Benny Ryan. Gracie and Benny Ryan were supposed to get married. Bud Hanlon and the Marx Brothers stopped there.
GROUCHO
Berlin used to come in and play the piano.
GEORGE BURNS
I never would go into the Princeton, because Benny Ryan didn’t like me.
GROUCHO
Well, he was going with Gracie.
GEORGE BURNS
He was going with Gracie, and Benny Ryan was a very big talent, as you know. He could sing, he was a great dancer, he wrote great songs. He wrote “When Frances Dances with Me.” You know, he wrote some great songs. He wrote “M-I-S-S-I-S-S-I-P-P-I.” So he was a big talent. He was a great talent in a big act—Ryan and Lee—and I was nothing! Like, I went around with the music under my arm to prove to people I was in show business. But I only got to be somebody in Gracie’s eyes when we were in small towns. In Altoona I looked good. In Schenectady I looked good. But in New York City I looked lousy. ’Cause Benny Ryan was there. But in Altoona I looked like Benny Ryan. So I kept her on the small time for years.
GROUCHO
Where’s lunch?
GEORGE BURNS
It’ll be here. Maybe we already ate it.
GROUCHO
We did yesterday.
GEORGE BURNS
Funny thing about the lunch. I don’t even know if I can have it. If there’s a lot of salt in it, I’m not supposed to…
GROUCHO
We have a fake salt.
GEORGE BURNS
Salt substitute? Any good? (Tastes it) Are you kidding? That’s for sand dancing. You put that on the floor when you run out of sand.
GROUCHO
I can’t dance.
GEORGE BURNS
That’s bad salt. No good. There’s better salt than that. Better phony salt than that. This explodes in your mouth, like little crystals. Taste that. The worst. Here’s a man who’s worth millions of dollars, invites you to lunch with cheap salt.
GROUCHO
You know who’s coming to dinner? Jessel.
GEORGE BURNS
Well, he’s a lot of fun. Good sense of humor.
GROUCHO
I think so.
I
Groucho, you were going to ask about the name of that songwriter you and Bill Cosby were talking about.
GROUCHO
The one who wrote “Darktown Strutters’ Ball”?
GEORGE BURNS
Shelton Brooks. And he wrote “Some of These Days,” too.
GROUCHO
I played with him in Canton, Ohio.
GEORGE BURNS
Did you ever work with a fella called Joe Whitehead?
GROUCHO
The name sounds familiar.
GEORGE BURNS
He was a great dancer and monologist. And I worked with him. On the bill with him was an act called The Gascoynes, who were jugglers or something. And they were very big drinkers. Gascoyne was; he was a big drinker. And Joe Whitehead was also a big drinker. What made me think of it was you said Canton, Ohio, and this happened in Akron.
GROUCHO
That was a split week.
GEORGE BURNS
Yes, it was. Canton and Akron. So, Gascoyne got the DTs, and they sent for a doctor. Joe Whitehead was with them in the room. And when Joe Whitehead came out, I said, “How is Gascoyne feeling?” And he says, “Awful. Just the worst.” And he says, “The doctor said to him, ‘Do you see any pink elephants or green mice?’ Gascoyne says, ‘No.’” And he looked at me, and he says, “George, the room was full of ’em!”
GROUCHO
Imhof was a great act.
GEORGE BURNS
Roger Imhof. The greatest.
I
What was that act like?
GEORGE BURNS
There was a hotel, and this fella’s horse dropped dead right in front of the hotel. So he came in and spent the night. They had one line that I thought was the greatest line I ever heard in my life in show business.
You see, after his horse died, he came into the hotel, and they only had two rooms in the hotel. But they were taken, so he had to sleep in the lobby. Where he slept, there was a big coal stove in the middle of the lobby; you know, one of those belly stoves they had that they used to put coal in. And the coal was under the bed, so every few minutes they had to wake him up to get the coal. The clerk of the hotel kept waking him up and saying, “How about a game of checkers?” And he said, “I don’t feel like checkers. My horse died, and I loved that horse. I’d like to go to sleep.” He’d go to sleep, and they’d have to get some more coal. And he’d come back again and wake him up and say, “Just one game, one game of checkers.” He said, “I don’t want to play checkers. I loved my horse. It was a fine horse, and he’s dead. I don’t feel like amusing myself with checkers.” And he woke him up again, and he says, “Just one game.” So he says, “Well, okay. We’ll play just one game.” And the guy looked at him and said, “Have you got a board?” (They all laugh, including Burns) That was the great line: “Have you got a checkerboard?” A great act. I followed them for about eighteen weeks on the Orpheum Circuit. How would you like to follow that act? That could be as bad as following the Marx Brothers or W. C. Fields.
GROUCHO
Baby LeRoy was six months old…in a movie with Fields. They had to have a nurse on the set in those days. So when the nurse went to the toilet, Fields took the milk bottle and half emptied it, and put gin in there. They had to stop shooting for three days. Fields said, “The kid’s no trouper.”
GEORGE BURNS
I’ll tell you another story about W. C. Fields. I think it’s an amazing story. You know, when Fields was a young man, he went to England. It was an opening act. He wasn’t a comedian, he was a juggler. He worked with his wife. He was married to this beautiful young girl. Fields was then in his twenties and so was his wife—in her young twenties. His big finish was juggling the cigar boxes, which he kept all through the years after he became a great comedian. Anyway, on the bill was this great English comedian, an elderly man…
GROUCHO
Tate?
GEORGE BURNS
Maybe it was Tate. Tate’s Motoring, or something.
And he went for Fields’s wife, and she went for him. She liked him, so she stayed in England. She never came back to America with Fields. But what Fields did, he stole Tate’s delivery. As long as he took his wife, he took his delivery. Fields got the best of that bargain.
GROUCHO
Once Fields was playing on the Ziegfeld Follies. Ed Wynn was trying to be funny…
GEORGE BURNS
Oh yeah, with the pool thing. Hit him over the head with the pool cue. Ed Wynn was making faces under the pool table. They called it catching flies while you were on the stage. Well, you couldn’t get a laugh if there was somebody in back of you looking around, ’cause the audience would start to look too. There’s no flies there, but there’s no laughs either. So that’s what Wynn was doing—catching flies under the pool table.
W. C. Fields couldn’t imagine why he didn’t get those tremendous laughs, because that pool table did everything. Then they told him that Wynn was under the table. So the next time he went out there he looked under the table, and there was Wynn, and Fields hit him over the head with the back of a pool cue. Needless to say, that was the end of Wynn. From then on, W. C. Fields got his laughs again. And Wynn had a headache for, like, four weeks.
GROUCHO
Fields was a tough guy.
GEORGE BURNS
I used to invite him to my house for dinner, and he’d come, and his vest pocket had four little pockets. And in each pocket he had a drink of gin, in case you didn’t have any gin in your house, because he only drank gin. He always took four big slugs of gin with him.
GROUCHO
He kept thousands of cases of gin in his attic, ’cause he was afraid Prohibition might come back.
GEORGE BURNS
I was doing a picture called International House with W. C. Fields, and Gracie was a guest in a restaurant. There were about six or seven people sitting at the table. Anyway, Fields said something to Gracie, and Gracie hit him with an off-center line, one of her dizzy lines, and she left. He felt he needed a line, and he said to Leo McCarey, who was the director, “Can you think of something that I can say right now after she goes, because I must say something. You know, she leaves me unconscious.”
They were trying to think of a line, and they couldn’t think of one. So I went over, and I said, “Mr. Fields, I think I can help you.” He says, “How?” And I says, “Well, you’ve got a glass of water on the table, and you’ve got a glass of scotch, and you’ve got some black coffee. Why don’t you take two pieces of sugar, put it in the water, mix the coffee, and drink the scotch.” Then he says, “You’re the nicest Jew I’ve ever met!”
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