BOB
NEWHART
versus
BILL HICKS
In one round, weighing in with a new Nick at Nite recording of pre-sitcom material: Bob Newhart!
And in the other corner, weighing in with a Rykodisc reissue: the late (pancreatic cancer, 1994, age 32) Bill Hicks!
Keep it clean, guys - at least one of you.
Ken Richardson
|
Bob Newhart: Button Down Concert |
Bill Hicks: Relentless |
|
| PLAYING TIME | 58 minutes | 58 minutes |
| STYLE OF COMEDY | Benny | Lenny |
| FAVORITE SUBJECTS | Jobs, inventions | Sex, drugs, UFO's |
| FIRST TRACK | "Greeting" | "Greetings" |
| EXCERPT FROM FIRST TRACK | "Tonight's show is kind of to prove that, yes, I did do something before the Bob Newhart Show." | "I'm very tired of staring out at your vacant faces looking back at me and wanting me to fill your empty lives with humor you couldn't possibly think of yourselves." |
| PRESIDENTIAL HUMOR | Abraham Lincoln prepares for Gettysburg. | George Bush bombs Iraq. |
| ON SMOKING | Sir Walter Raleigh tries to describe tobacco to the West Indies Company. | "I now realize I smoke for simply one reason, and that is: spite. I hate you nonsmokers." |
| MOVIE IDEA | Telling King Kong from the viewpoint of an Empire State Building night guard | Casting the terminally ill as stuntpeople in Chuck Norris movies |
| GROUPS OFFENDED | Women drivers | Republicans, rednecks, fundamentalists |
| SAMPLE RISQUE TOPIC | A nude police lineup | "I love pornography." |
| NUMBER OF EXPLETIVES | 0 | 108 |
| IS IT FUNNY? | Hysterical | Hysterical |
Reprinted from STEREO REVIEW, July 1997.