Some friends got tickets to a George Carlin show years ago, and I went along, at the time, for the fun of it. I’d seen some of Carlin’s work on TV, and I knew of his cultural (or counter-cultural) significance, but I didn’t fully appreciate his genius.
And then I saw him. And heard his effortless brilliance and cunning insights first hand. I’d seen plenty of stand-up, but I’d never seen someone make an audience think and laugh at the same time, about subjects most comedians wouldn’t dare touch.
Carlin, one of the most prolific talents of his generation, will certainly be missed.
George Carlin, 71, the much-honored American stand-up comedian whose long career was distinguished by pointed social commentary that placed him on the cultural cutting edge, died last night in Santa Monica, Calif.
He had long struggled with health problems and a heart condition dating to the 1970s, and according to Associated Press and other reports had checked into the hospital on Sunday after experiencing chest pain.
Carlin’s comedy career spanned a half-century, staring with years as a disc jockey in the 1950s and culminating with his selection last week by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts to receive this year’s Mark Twain Prize, a lifetime achievement award presented to an outstanding comedian.
Over that time he evolved from the more straight-laced member of a comedy duo formed with Jack Burns, into a social satirist whose routines deliberately tweaked the social and cultural edge — mocking religion, sexual prudery and American society.
“Deliberately tweaked” is a polite euphemism. If the role of religion, sex, and politics in the United States were a sleeping bear, Carlin thought it best to poke that bear with a stick. “I think it is the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and cross it deliberately,” Carlin would say.
We were all better off for it.
In terms of Carlin’s impact, he not only wowed audiences and inspired countless imitators, Carlin also leaves something of a legal legacy.
It was a career that both tracked the changes underway in the 1960s and 1970s, and helped mold them. His 1972 album “Class Clown” included the signature “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television” — an expletive-filled bit that led the U.S. Supreme Court to clarify rules for what could be said on radio and television and when.
In the spirit of 1950s comic Lenny Bruce, whose monologues wore down the significance of offensive language through repetition, Carlin’s routine took a list of words which, ostensibly, could not be said on television, and worked them into contexts that ranged from the Bible to a housewife in the kitchen.
Carlin was arrested for performing the monologue live in Wisconsin, though the charges were dropped by a judge who found the material indecent but protected under the First Amendment.
However when a New York radio station aired a similar bit by the comic, a complaint to the Federal Communications Commission ended with a Supreme Court ruling which, in fact, upheld restrictions on language that was “patently offensive,” not just obviously obscene.
While the media landscape has changed markedly since that 1978 ruling — the content available on cable television and the Internet makes Carlin’s monologue seem almost quaint — the controversy secured his reputation as a social critic.
And while there plenty of worthwhile items about Carlin’s life in the media this morning, and plenty of great reactions, I found this especially entertaining:
Although some criticized parts of his later work as too contentious, Mr. Carlin defended the material, insisting that his comedy had always been driven by an intolerance for the shortcomings of humanity and society. “Scratch any cynic,” he said, “and you’ll find a disappointed idealist.”
Still, when pushed to explain the pessimism and overt spleen that had crept into his act, he quickly reaffirmed the zeal that inspired his lists of complaints and grievances. “I don’t have pet peeves,” he said, correcting the interviewer. And with a mischievous glint in his eyes, he added, “I have major, psychotic hatreds.”
Carlin is survived by his wife, Sally Wade; daughter Kelly Carlin McCall; son-in-law, Bob McCall, brother, Patrick Carlin and sister-in-law, Marlene Carlin. My condolences to his family and friends.