NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #188 (6/22/2024): THE NEW ARISTOCRATS JOKE

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #188 (6/22/2024): The New Aristocrats Joke

airs June 22, 2024 on Dave’s Gone By.  youtube: https://youtu.be/7MDjLR7zDuE

Shalom, Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for late June 2024.

Just like new plots for movies, there’s really no such thing as a “new” joke, just old jokes packaged in a different way. For example: Why did the fireman wear red suspenders? Because he was shopping at Kohl’s, and it was all they had — plus it was on clearance. Why did the chicken cross the road? Because he heard all these people telling jokes about him and he got curious. 

Old Manischewitz: new bottles. So here’s a naughty little joke called “The Aristocrats” that’s been around for decades. Gilbert Gottfried made it famous, and they even did a documentary about it. But I doubt you’ve heard my version.

A guy goes into a talent agent’s office, and he says, “Buddy, have I got an act for you!” 

And the agent says, “Don’t waste your time. Novelty is dead. Nobody watches “Got Talent” anymore. I’m sorry, but — ”

“No, no, no,” says the guy. “This is huge. My family, my friends, strangers — it’s spectacular!”

“You’re wasting your time,” says the agent. “I’m not interested.”

“You will be!” says the guy. “Just gimme a chance. Please!”

The agent sighs and says, “All right, fine. Show me what you got.”

“Thank you!” says the guy. “It’s incredible, I promise!”

So the guy claps his hands, and shouts, “Allahu Akbar.” Suddenly thousands of Arabs appear. He blows a whistle, and the Arabs start attacking Israel. They’re firing rockets, they’re launching missiles, they’re hurling bombs and grenades.

Meanwhile, one group of Arabs go to an Israeli kibbutz where they’re having a music festival. And the Arabs start mowing down Jews with machine guns and rifles. They’re killing women, they’re hacking up children, dogs, pets, birds. And they’re shooting the men and then defiling the corpses and cutting off heads and pissing down the necks. Another group is taking hostages. And they’re torturing them, punching and kicking and stabbing and dragging and frogmarching them into tunnels.

And the women hostages are getting raped. Oh, they’re fucking these women with gun barrels and fists and korans. And they’re fucking the child hostages, too. They’re using dead kids as dildos to ass-fuck the live ones. So there’s blood and cum and baby teeth spraying every which way.

Meanwhile, the living hostages are dragged into daycares and hospitals and elementary schools, where the hidden Arabs are firing rockets and explosives to kill more Jews. This while thousands of other Arabs are butchering and killing and shitting on synagogues and smearing themselves with IDF soldier blood.

“But wait, there’s more!” says the guy to the talent agent. “That’s when all these college students come out and they run on campus with tents and banners and costumes. And they’re all screaming, `Death to Israel’ and `Free Gaza’ and `Stop the Palestinian Genocide’ while dancing around and crying and fucking each other even though they haven’t bathed in a month. And some of them break into hundred-year-old buildings and smash windows, trash furniture, crap on books. And then campus presidents come over, and they just watch. They don’t do anything; they just stand there like a 19th century French tableaux.”

But meanwhile the hostages are still dying in the tunnels, the Arabs are slaughtering every Jew in sight, the students are blocking highways, vandalizing Jewish homes, and jumping on subways to threaten anyone who looks like a kike. That’s when all these other countries around the world come in and start sanctioning Israel and banning Israelis from having passports. And the left-wing media applauds this and weeps for the refugees whose vote for a terrorist government started all this shit in the first place. 

And meanwhile the terrorists murder and torture and rape and kill and kill and kill and kill in a ritual orgy of sadism, savagery, and Islamic frenzy. 

With that, the guy in the office blows his whistle and says, “Well, what do you think?”

The talent agent sits for a minute and finally says, “Wow, that’s quite an act. By the way, what do you call yourselves?”

The college students all start cheering as the guy straightens himself up, Jewish blood still dripping from his sleeves, and says, “Hamas!”

Funny joke, ha? This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches in Great Neck, New York.

(c)2024 TotalTheater. All rights reserved.

—> https://davesgoneby.net/?p=83531

-> https://youtu.be/7MDjLR7zDuE

—>  https://shalomdammit.wordpress.com/?p=2653

–> https://wordpress.com/post/davelefkowitzwriting.wordpress.com/10739

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THEATER – SKIT: Old Gilbert

OLD GILBERT

(©2022 David Lefkowitz. This audio skit was first broadcast on the April 16, 2022 episode of Dave’s Gone By. Listen here: https://davesgoneby.net/?p=29913)

DAVE: Ladies and gentlemen, we’re very proud here at the Dave’s Gone By show to introduce a special guest – one of the absolute legends of comedy. He’s played every possible stand-up venue as well as appearing on television and in the films, The Aristocrats, and, of course, Aladdin. He’s a bit older now but we’re honored to have with us in the studio, Gilbert Gottfried. Gilbert?

GILBERT: Thank you, Dave.

DAVE: Gilbert, can you tell us about that moment at the Hugh Hefner roast when you made the 9/11 joke, realized you were in trouble, and just pivoted to the most offensive joke in the world?

GILBERT: Thank you, Dave. You know, I’ve spent many years doing comedy. And you have moments that are good and moments that are not so good. 

DAVE: Uh huh.

GILBERT: So I was doing the Hugh Hefner Roast for the Friars Club. 

DAVE: Yes.

GILBERT: Now, Hugh Hefner — I don’t know if you know this, but Hugh Hefner used to publish a magazine called “Playboy.” And there’d be girls in there with no clothes on. And he got famous from this, from making a magazine with nude women in the pages. 

DAVE: Yes.

GILBERT: Marilyn Monroe was in there. A lot of women.

DAVE: But you were mentioning the roast?

GILBERT: Yes. Now, back in my day a “roast” was what you did to a chicken or a side of beef. And it was very tasty, and you could have it Kosher or not. 

DAVE: Uh huh.

GILBERT: But for a comedian, a roast is when other comedians come up and make fun of you. They tell jokes and the jokes are all about mockery of the person being joked about. 

DAVE: Right.

GILBERT: So they’re telling jokes about Hugh Hefner. Who made this magazine, Playboy. 

DAVE: Right. With the naked women.

GILBERT: You know it?

DAVE: Yes, you just — But the whole Aristocrats thing.

GILBERT: Yes, I’m telling jokes to Hugh Hefner. And no one’s laughing. Which I’m used to.

DAVE: Ha!

GILBERT: So I thought, uh oh… let me tell the dirtiest joke in the world. (pause) And that was it. 

DAVE: Right, wow, yes. Um, so I’m sure a lot of our listeners would love to know how you got your most famous role in the Disney film, Aladdin. 

GILBERT: Ah, Aladdin. So my agent gets a call from Walt Disney. Not actually Walt Disney, he’s been dead a long time and frozen somewhere.

DAVE: (laughs) Right.

GILBERT: But Walt Disney made a studio. And this studio made movies like The Little Mermaid, and The Jungle Book, and Song of the South. 

DAVE: Yeah, they don’t really mention that one.

GILBERT: What one?

DAVE: Song of the — doesn’t matter. What about Aladdin?

GILBERT: So they say to my agent, “Hello. We’re making this new movie called Aladdin, and we think Gilbert Gottfried should play the parrot character.

DAVE: Uh huh.

GILBERT: Now, there’s an irony here. Because animals don’t talk in real life. But they do in some Disney pictures. 

DAVE: Yah..

GILBERT: But parrots can talk in the real world. They can say dozens of words and even imitate a person singing. 

DAVE: Right.

GILBERT: So in this movie for Disney, unlike others of their movies where animals talk but not in real life, I would be playing a parrot that talks in the movie just like a parrot might talk in a pet store. I thought that was very interesting.

DAVE: Right. So…in doing the voice for Aladdin, did you just use your regular comedy voice or did you tweak it to be more cartoon-like? Or did they process your voice in post-production — make it higher or cuter or something like that?

GILBERT: (pause) What was the question?

DAVE: How did you come up with the voice for Iago?

GILBERT: Well, of course, I wasn’t on the screen. 

DAVE: Right.

GILBERT: You heard the actors, but we recorded all the voices. 

DAVE: Sure, Robin Williams.

GILBERT: Yes, he was in that. 

DAVE: In Aladdin, yes. Do you have any memories…?

GILBERT: Very funny man.

DAVE: Of course. Please, tell us about Robin Williams. 

GILBERT: Well, we weren’t on screen together because we recorded the voices in a control room. But we would kid around.

DAVE: Yeah? Yeah?

GILBERT: This wouldn’t go in the movie, this was just the two of us making jokes. 

DAVE: For sure! Like…?

GILBERT: You know, the movie already had a script. Robin Williams would improvise some jokes that they would add, but we also made jokes that weren’t for the movie at all. Because we’re comedians.

DAVE: Yes.So when you first saw Aladdin, the finished movie, did you sense it would be a smash?

GILBERT: You never know.

DAVE: Ah.

GILBERT: You hope, but you never know. When my agent called and said, “Listen, Gilbert, Walt Disney wants you to play the parrot in their new movie, called Aladdin. And it’s got Robin Williams in it, and it’s just after Beauty and the Beast, and you would be co-starring in a Walt Disney animated film?”

DAVE: Yeah…

GILBERT: Now, back in my day, animation was a cartoon that you might see on Saturday morning or maybe prime time like The Flintstones or The Jetsons. 

DAVE: Right, on a whole other level.

GILBERT: But it’s still the same idea. The animator makes a drawing. And then he makes another drawing that’s almost the same as the first drawing but just a little different. And then you put the drawings next to each other, and it looks like they’re moving. Then you put a whole bunch of these drawings together and you flip them very quickly. And that’s Aladdin.

DAVE: We’ve been chatting with Gilbert Gottfried here on Dave’s Gone By. We’ll be back after this.

GILBERT: Aflac!

DAVE: Save it.

END OF SKIT

*********************************************

NOTES & BACKSTORY:

[April 2022] I wrote this in a flurry (while at my day job — shhh!) on Wednesday morning, April 13, 2022, the day after the death of comedian Gilbert Gottfried. Not only was Gilbert a guest on my (then) radio show, Dave’s Gone By back in December 2011 (listen here: https://davesgoneby.net/?p=4406), but of all the modern comedians post-Carlin, he was the one who could just wreck me again and again, be it in his stand-up act, as a guest on Howard Stern, or doing podcast bits like reading excerpts from 50 Shades of Grey in his Gilbertiest voice.

For those not getting the “joke” of this bit, it’s an homage to Gilbert’s most genius-level moment. He was on the Stern show reminiscing about Groucho Marx’s later-life appearances on the Dick Cavett Show. Howard, Robin, and Gilbert all agreed that while they understood why Cavett would treat Groucho like a national treasure, the comedian’s sell-by date had passed, and his anecdotes were getting clouded over by irrelevancy. Gilbert then effortlessly slid into a Groucho-as-ancient-dotard voice, sidetracking every question with explanations that were maddeningly obvious (“Back in my day, the comedians used to drink tea. They would dunk the tea bag into the water, and eventually the tea leaves would flavor the water, and they could also add sugar to tea. Which few people knew about…”). Priceless.

–> https://wp.me/pzvIo-2nP

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NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #10 (3/27/2011): TSUNAMI TWEET

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #10 (3/27/2011): Tsunami Tweet 

aired  March 26, 2011 on Dave’s Gone By. https://wp.me/pzvIo-2rN. youtube: https://youtu.be/XxqV1jT8YD8

Shalom Dammit, this is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of March 27th, 2011.

My congregation has been asking, “Rabbi, when are you gonna talk about Japan?  It’s such a huge calamity, when will we hear your thoughts about the earthquake, the tsunami, the nuclear plant – where are your words of wisdom?

My dear friends, what can I say?  A tragedy is a tragedy.  What can a human being say about an event that is beyond the scope of human understanding? Granted, I’ll bet some World War II veterans are thinking, “At last!  Pearl Harbor payback!”  But if the world truly worked like that, the tsunami would have hit Berlin. Followed by a tornado, locusts, a polio epidemic and a fast-moving iceberg.

No, sometimes, as in Japan, these things just happen, and we can only guess at the motivations of HaShem and the universe.  As the Yiddish phrase goes: men tracht, und gott lacht – man makes plans, God laughs.

And speaking of laughter, what I really wish to discuss in this Rabbinical Reflection is the overreactions to reactions to the disaster.  People make a few bad jokes, and the wrath of political correctness is upon them.

I speak specifically of Gilbert Gottfried, beloved voice of the Aflac duck.  He’s fired from that job because of his Twitter tweets or, in his case, quacks. He makes a joke about breaking up with his girlfriend – but it’s okay because, as they say in Japan, another one will be floating by any minute.”

This is funny.  It amuses me. But even if it didn’t, Gilbert Gottfried is not a psychologist; he’s not a scientist; he’s not a schoolteacher.  He’s a comedian. And he’s a comedian best known for making another funny joke that bombed – about September 11th – and then saving the evening by telling yet another joke: “The Aristocrats” – the most vile, crude, sexually explicit, violent, vulgar, perverted, disgusting joke ever written.  And if you want to hear it, give me a call on my cell `cause I have my own version, and it kills. Not to give it away, but in mine, the father brings in two camels and an enema bag. Priceless.

But getting back to Aflac: the insurance company does a lot of business in Japan, so when Mr. Gottfried let his fingers move a little faster than his brain, they gave his career a karate chop.  Do I think this was justified?  No, their judgment was just as poor as his. They may be contractually in the legal right, but can you imagine hiring anyone else to do the same quack?  In fact, if it’s the same quack, Mr. Gottfried can sue for imitation. So it would have to be a different but similar quack.

I could do it: “Aflac.”  “Aflac dammit!” It’s just not the same.

Nobody likes actor switcheroos. The only time it ever worked was when “Bewitched” got another Darrin, and that was only because Dick York was crippled by a bad back.  I only hope, if they do hire another actor, Aflac’s campaign is crippled by a bad hack.

I’m all for sensitivity.  To quote Mel Brooks, “I’ve got sensitivity coming out the blow-hole.” But I’m tired of political correctness running amok. From NPR to Charlie Sheen to that anti-Semite French designer. You can’t have a personal conversation anymore without somebody spitting it back to the media to make you look like a schmuck.

And jokes? To fire a comedian because he makes jokes?  A comic understands better than anyone the natural tendency of humans to mix schadenfreude with “thank God it wasn’t me.”

I hope no one at my temple is so humorless as to target me if I make a joke or two.  Even a shameful, tasteless joke.  Such as: what is the only meal you can get in Japan? A big shake, then tuna melt.

That’s terrible!  Or asking, why is a Japanese supermarket like a Taco Bell burrito?  Neither has any actual food in it.

How dare I find humor in this!  Or in a joke like – What do Japanese power-plant workers have in common with court-martialed U.S. Marines? They both got burned by the corps.

Or what’s the difference between a nuclear meltdown and cancer? Ehhh..about 15, 20 years.

Such dark, unfeeling jokes! Like: did you hear about all the Japanese went through a massive religious conversion. They were Buddhists; now they’re quakers.

Shame!  Shame! How dare I ask: how many Japanese does it take to screw in a lightbulb? None. They don’t need light; they’re all glowing.

What a sick, heartless, joke that is.  Or even worse: Why are they nicknaming the tsunami victims New Kids on the Block? Because they’re washed up overnight.

My friends, I do not tell these jokes to be funny. Thank goodness because, well, you’ve heard the jokes. I tell them in solidarity with Gilbert Gottfried and 50 Cent, and anyone else who saw yet another catastrophe in the world and went, “what can you do but laugh?”

Well, you can give to charity, you can write sympathy cards, you can help mobilize relief efforts; but still, you should be able to have a giggle. Because, like it or not, life is a cycle, and one day the joke will be on you.

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, NY. Domo arigato.

(c) 2011 TotalTheater. All rights reserved.

—> https://shalomdammit.wordpress.com/2011/03/26/rabbinical-reflection-japan-32711/

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