Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - 103. Orson Bean

Episode Date: May 16, 2016

Actor, comedian and raconteur Orson Bean is perhaps best known as a longtime game show fixture and frequent guest on talk shows, but he also appeared on Broadway and in popular films such as "Anatomy of a Murder" and "Being John Malkovich," working alongside icons like Boris Karloff, Helen Hayes, Jimmy Stewart, Phil Silvers and Dustin Hoffman. Gilbert and Frank also talk to Orson about his years on the Hollywood blacklist, his friendship with Stan Laurel, his fondness for Ed Sullivan and his personal correspondence with Groucho Marx. PLUS: John McGiver returns! Jack Paar takes a powder! Will Jordan does Sabu! Jack Klugman nails Willy Loman! And Jayne Mansfield upstages Walter Matthau! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bet mode activated. The Scorebet app here with trusted stats and real-time sports news. Yeah, hey, who should I take in the Boston game? Well, statistically speaking. Nah, no more statistically speaking. I want hot takes. I want knee-jerk reactions. That's not really what I do. Is that because you don't have any knees? Or... The Scorebet. Trusted sports content. Seamless sports betting. Download today.

19 plus. Ontario only. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or the gambling of someone close to you, please go to connexontario.ca. Navigating adulting isn't always easy. You're not just working, you're working late. And dinner dates are all, what's your five-year plan? And you're thinking, paying off the bill for this fancy pants meal, probably. So when you need to break free from responsibility

and experience something that feels more you, reach for Kraft Dinner. Because when you're starved for moments that bring you back to who you really are and what you really love, that's when it's gotta be KD. When you gotta do you, it's gotta be KD. Shop now. Hi, I'm Gilbert Gottfried and this this is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast.

I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadre, and we're once again recording at Nutmeg Post with our engineer, Frank Ferdarosa. Our guest this week is an actor, comedian, television personality, author, humorist, and storyteller who's appeared in hit Broadway shows, including Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter, successful movies like Anatomy of a Murder, Inner Space, and Being John Malkovich, as well as numerous television shows, including The Ed Sullivan Show, The Twilight Zone, Naked City, The Love Boat, Ally McBeal, Will & Grace, Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman, Two and a Half Men, Desperate Housewives, and Modern Family. desperate housewives, and modern family. He's made over 200 appearances on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and was a frequent panelist and celebrity contestant on dozens of game shows,

including To Tell the Truth, Watch My Line, I've Got a Secret, Stump the Stars, tell the truth, watch my line, I've got a secret, stump the stars, match game, password, and a $10,000 pyramid, just to name a few. In a long distinguished career, he's worked with everyone from Boris Karloff and Peter Lorre, to Walter Matthau, to Art Carney, to John Cusack, to Sarah Silverman. You want more? He's also a best-selling author of three books and a direct descendant of former president Calvin Coolidge. Please welcome to the show a fixture of my childhood and Frank's

and one of showbiz's greatest raconteurs, Orson Bean. Holy horse pussy. I can hardly wait to hear myself. Okay.

Now, to start off, and the main reason, I think the only reason we wanted you on the show is to clarify. We spoke to one of your old pals, Dick Van Dyke. Yes. And Dick Van Dyke revealed that you and he would go to the zoo together a lot. You know, I did a one-man show recently. Dick Van Dyke came to it and he says, do you remember we used to go to the zoo a lot? to it. He says, do you remember we used to go to the zoo a lot? I said, Dick, I have no

memory of going to the zoo ever, much less a lot with you. And now he's telling other people that we went to the zoo. Well, according to Dick Van Dyke, he says that the two of you were inseparable, of course. You would go to the zoo every day

and you would go to the monkey cage. Stop making me horny. And do you know, do you remember anything about a monkey? Because Dick Van Dyke said that you and he would visit the zoo every day and watch a monkey who would jerk off in his cage. All monkeys jerk off. You don't understand that. Dick thought he was seeing something special. You have a monkey, the monkey's going to jerk off and come on you. You can't. That's what monkeys do.

I kept trying to tell dick i said then monkeys oh no look he's joking i said i know so this proves darwin's theory once and for all and and i i think of all great legendary comedy teams yes i think the one that everyone wants to know about is Lowe, Height, and Stanley. Lowe was a dwarf. Height was a giant. And every time I worked with them,

they had a different Stanley. They said, fuck him, we ain't paying him a hundred bucks a week. We don't want to pay nothing for a normal-sized guy. They did a comedy knockabout act which ended with Height's giant thumb stuck against

Lowe's nose, which elicited a bit of laughter from the great unwashed. So the giant and the midget would fight and Stanley would just kind of be there. He was the middle. He was the straight man in the middle.

But the odd thing I found was that the giant fancied himself an intellectual and thought I was one too. I was doing stand-up comedy, but he thought I was an intellectual and he would try to discuss Schopenhauer with me. I tried to carry on as best I could, but I had nothing to say about Schopenhauer. Now, years later, I had occasion to work with yet another giant. Now, how many people do you know, Gilbert, that have worked with one giant? I mean, so I was in, I replaced Anthony Newley in a Broadway show called The Roar of the Grease Make the Smell of the Crowd. Newley had the conceit of of the grease make the smell of the crowd. Newly had the conceit of casting a giant in the show.

And the giant befriended me and he was an intellectual too and tried to discuss Nietzsche with me. Now, I got a call from the stage manager one day. We had quite a run in the show and he said the giant is leaving

and so we want you to come in and read with a new giant. I said, a new giant? You're going to have to close the show. How are you going to? He said, please come in. I was at the Schubert Theater. I arrived on Schubert Alley.

To my absolute astonishment, there were 17 or 18 giants all waiting to audition. Who knew? And so anyway, the new giant did not turn out to be an intellectual and the show ran a while longer. But why would this giant have left? They said he wanted to go back with the circus. He wanted to go again on the road with the Ringling Brothers Circus and sit in the sideshow and be stared at. Who would have done that when he had a pretty good part in a Broadway show, but the wanderlust got him, Gilbert, and he wanted to go back on the road with the circus. That's my giant story, and it's better than the monkey's jerking off story. Gilbert's a sucker for any dwarf story, Orson, or any monkey story.

Yeah, well, there's plenty of dwarf stories, but you won't find many giant stories. No. Outside the Bible. And now we need a joke from Orson Bean. An old guy goes for a checkup. The doctor says, Mr. Mendelsohn will need a sample of your urine, your feces, and your sperm. He says, take my shorts. Take my shorts.

Or the man in charge of the cemetery says, lady, your husband is not buried here. There's only one Feldman and it can't be your husband. The name is Rose Feldman. She says, that's him. Everything is in my name. That's another great one. Orson, let's go way back because I heard you say you watch a lot of interviews with you doing research, you were a class clown as a kid. You're not going to go back that far, are you? I'm going back.

All right. But before you did comedy, you had a hypnotism act? Well, I broke into the business doing a magic act. Magic act. And I went to see a hypnotist once, and he didn't know I was in show business and when he called for volunteers, I said, I would like to know what it's like

to be hypnotized. So I put my hand up and he called me up with several other people. Now, I wasn't hypnotized. He said, your eyes are growing heavier. My eyes were not growing heavier.

He says, you're growing sleepier. I was not growing sleepier but I didn't want to fuck up the guy's act. So I feigned heavy eyes, and I feigned sleep, and I feigned going under. And he had me hop around and make noises like a chicken, and the audience went nuts. And he said, now you're coming awake. You will arise. You will be completely refreshed. And I feigned becoming completely refreshed. And I sat down. And everybody at the next table, this was in a nightclub, said, how did it feel?

Was it really? What did it really? And I realized that probably the other people, too, had feigned going under. Because you became a celebrity for the evening. Now, suppose I had said to the person at the next table, no, I just did what he told me. I didn't want to say you're a schmuck. You fell down. You made a jerk of yourself.

You ruined your suit. But by pretending I had gone under, I was a celebrity. So I got the idea of getting people up and whispering to them, do what I tell you. It's all a gag. And they did. They got their thumbs stuck on their nose. And I said, pretend you can't get it.

Pretend you can't. And the people went nuts. No one ever gave my secret away. I like the story, too, of the club owner. Was it Rocky and Chippy, the mob guys, where one of them got offended because you revealed that you didn't have a real hypnotist act, that you weren't an actual hypnotist? This was a club in Boston. Rocky Palladino and Irv Chipman, an Italian and a Jew, reputed, as the Boston Globe said, to have underworld connections. So Rocky took a shine to me.

I worked in his club, and he thought, wow, this kid can hypnotize anyone. So one day a guy came up, and it turns out he was a friend of Rocky's. And when I whispered to him, do what I tell you, he sneered. Rocky was not amused. I left Boston and moved to Philadelphia. Years later, I ran into him. After Philly, I went to New York and got a big break and was all over the television, and he said,

Beans, he used to call me Oscar Beans. Oscar, if it wasn't for me you'd still be in boston get the fuck out of here now what big gangsters did you know i never knew bigger than rocky paladino rocky paladino was called to testify in the key father hearings the key father hearings was wow was the biggest thing uh that brought television to life. All over America, people had a little black and white set in their office. This was before many people had TV. And they watched Estes Kefauver, Senator, say,

Now, Mr. Paladino, on or about the 14th of September in 1946, did or not you encase the feet of an unfortunate man named julio gonzalez in concrete and to drop him into the charles river senator i respectfully decline to answer on the grounds of my fifth amendment mr paladin and on like that so he came back and he was a big celebrity from having worked on tv and monkeys do jerk off tell Tell us about your early act. So you did magic. You did card tricks. You did the eucalyptus tree that you made out of newspaper.

Do I have that right? Little magic trick kept me out of the big money for many years. And then you started writing your own act. You started writing jokes. You started writing comedy. What was your big opening line? The Harvard joke? I had a crew cut and a three-button suit.

I was 20 years old. I said, good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Orson Bean. Harvard, 48. Yale, nothing. The silence was profound. It just happened. It took me a while to get that joke when I did the research. And you were friends with the crazy Buddy Hackett. Buddy Hackett would always tell you a joke.

He wouldn't say hello. Last time I ran into Buddy, he says, a share. I says, a what? A share, a sooth share. I said, his car breaks down. He says to the seer. I says, a what? A seer, a soothsayer. His car breaks down. He says to the farmer, can you put me up? He says, certainly. In the morning, the soothsayer says, I can speak to the animals. The farmer says, that's not necessary. He says, while I'm making your breakfast, he says, if you want, you can go speak to the animals. The seer comes back. He says, the cows tell me that

you've changed the rhythm on the milking machines it hurts their others the farmer says that's astonishing he says the horses tell me you've tightened a bit and it hurts it's my god yes i he says the sheep tell me the farmer says those liars don't listen to a word they say this is like an audience at the Moose Club in Altoona. Oh, yeah. The Moose Club was a place you used to play, right? Yes, yes. Don't remind me.

Tell us about the Latin Quarter and the Blue Angel and the Vanguard and some of those places. I worked with Shoshana Damari, the Israeli nightingale. the Israeli nightingale, and the audience that she drew, international jewelry, was not amused by me with my crew cut in Harvard 48, you know, nothing. I did not get many laughs, but I did get to have my way with Shoshana Damari. Shoshana Damari looked like the concubine of Cyrus the Persian. She was direct from Israel, and she smelled of incense when she walked in the room, and she was direct from Israel and she smelled of incense when she walked in the room and she was dark with dark ringlets on her hair and thrillingly beautiful

in a Middle East kind of way and shortly before our engagement was over which was six weeks and before she returned to Israel she accompanied me home and at the antepenultimate moment she threw her arms

in the air and said fuck Shoshanna it was quite a thrilling moment until I discovered after she left that she had fucked the band

the bartender and the hat check girl she's dead now so it's okay to tell the story it's okay it's okay The bartender and the hot check girl. She's dead now, so it's okay to tell the story. It's okay. It's okay. Now, my wife was arranging this interview with you, and she said that you said to her about me,

I love him more than you do. I do, Gilbert. When your wife and my wife die, I'm coming for you. And it's California, so we can do it. And can you tell us who your wife is? My wife is Allie Mills. For the past 10 years, she's been on a soap opera called The Bold and the Beautiful. She was brought on to play the daughter of Betty White.

And there was a dying scene, and Betty White died in my wife's arms. And for the first time in the 25 years the show had been on, it won a daytime Emmy. So they kept Allie on, even though Betty White's character was dead and she's been on it for ten years. But she's perhaps even better known for playing Norma Arnold, the mother on The Wonder Years. Sure. And Ali is there with you. See, we should be talking to her, not you.

Absolutely. Did you used to do a bit about Hitler being hired as a nightclub singer? I know Gilbert would appreciate this. No, I didn't. There was various jokes. There was a guy named Abby Greshler who was an agent. Oh, sure.

Yeah, and Abby booked the Palace Theater. And a manager calls him up and says, Abby, have I got an act for you? This is the best. He says, what's the act? He says, just trust me. He's going to fill the play. What's his name? He says, the boy is going to.

He says, what's the guy's name? He says, Hitler. He says, Hitler. He says, all right going to fill the place. What's his name? He says, the boy is going to, he says, what's the guy's name? He says, Hitler. He says, Hitler. He says, all right, he made a mistake. Unbelievable. Now, you worked with both, you worked with Boris Karloff. I did. Yeah.

And Arsene Nicken, Old Lace. Yeah, it was the first color cast, the first live color cast in the country. NBC laid a coaxial cable. This was before the days of satellites or anything. And they laid a coaxial cable across the country. And they were able to have color TV live. There was no tape in those days anyway. And so to celebrate it, they put on what they called a special uh a production

of arsenic and old lace which had been a broadway hit musical not musical a straight play and i was on i played the the brother of boris karloff when they made the movie it was carrie grant of all things right you played mortimer i played mortimer and and so i worked with boris karloff and peter lorry and the two old ladies who were characters in this show, were Helen Hayes and Billy Burke. Everyone knows Helen Hayes as the first lady of the American theater, but Billy Burke was the good fairy in The Wizard of Oz. She was Glinda the Good Witch.

Glinda the Good Witch. Come out, come out wherever you are. I think she was married to Flo Ziegfeld. She was indeed. He had picked her out of the are. I think she was married to Flo Ziegfeld. She was indeed. He had picked her out of the chorus. What an amazing cast. Yes, and she called all the munchkins out. Every fucking midget in the country was in The Wizard of Oz.

And then they went back to appearing in carnivals, and their billing was always stars of The Wizard of Oz. A fucking midget. was Stars of the Wizard of Oz, a fucking midget. I worked with an act named Hermione's Midgets. I'm trying to break into the business doing stand-up, and the actor preceded me was a foul-smelling old English drunk named Hermione, and he had three dwarves with him, but the name of the act was Hermione's Midgets. They did a knockabout comedy act that elicited few laughs from the audience. But the worst thing was when the act was through, they ran through the house

trying to sell miniature Bibles to everyone for a quarter. And the people said, get this thing off of me. I don't want the fucking miniature Bible. And then the guy says, now the comedy star of our show. And I came out to an audience that was in distress. Now, can you tell us a little about Karloff and Laurie? Oh Karloff was an angel he was a gentleman it was a long hot rehearsal

and hot studios in an old film studio in the Bronx and and Laurie was miserable we're never going to get a break it's hot in here and Boris would say relax Peter it's all in a day's work and he was the sweetest man in the world there are these big camera things that are weighted so that the camera can go way up in the air

and there's a waiter on the other side and they're called the monster and the guys would yell get that monster over here and Carl LaFoutier I beg your pardon it's not a joke it's it's an anecdote it's it's it's just sooth to be said you've heard the term soothsayer well i just say the sooth you were a kid when you did that show or something ridiculous he was 65 and i. He was 65 and I was 27. I said, I don't know. He was my brother. Was Edward Everett Horton in that show too? He was. I had seen Everett Horton

when I was a kid. He toured in a show in Summerstock called Springtime for Henry, a very sweet gentleman. I used to know the names of all, I went to the movies as a kid. I knew the names of all the supporting players. Everybody knew who Cary Grant was. I knew the names of all the supporting players. Everybody knew who Cary Grant was. I knew the names of Edward Everett Horton and people like that. I knew the name of all the Stooges in the W.C. Fields movies. You know, Grady Sutton

was the half-wit son-in-law. And who was the bank examiner? Remember that famous... Oh, gosh. I'm thinking of Edgar Kennedy, the master of the slow burner. No, that was the guy with the sneeze, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, this was whoever it was I ran into. I said, oh, I

always loved you in the W.C. Beals movies. He tried to fuck me. Did you ever work with the Stooges? I never worked with the Stooges, but I adored the Stooges. I adored the Stooges in all their various incarnations. When the original Curly Joe died, he was replaced briefly by a guy named Joe Besser, who was what they called a Nance comic, the most famous. No, the original was Curly.

Curly Joe was the last. Oh, then, all right, Curly, and then Curly Joe was Joe who was the last one. Yeah, Dorita. His name was Joe, Joe Dorita. It was Curly, then Shemp. But they were really brothers, the original three. They were really brothers. Shemp Howard, Moe Howard, and Curly Howard were brothers.

Oh, yeah. Okay. That's it. That's it. It's been an educational program. What were you saying about Joe Besser being a Nance comic? Yeah, a Nance comic was a term for a sissy comic And there was a lot of them

Back in the politically incorrect days Or politically correct days When you could make fun of sissies And Joe Penner who said I want to buy a duck Oh yeah, Joe Penner That was his punchline Joe Penner was the most famous Nance comic

that I can remember. And Joe Besser was, you nasty man. Now, Milton Berle used to sing a song, he wanted a girl, she wanted a boy, and they're both satisfied with their baby. You could do jokes like that. Not anymore. You'll probably cut that out of this podcast, won't you?

And back then – Not necessarily. Yeah. Back then, I remember growing up and there were these people like Paul Lynde and Charles Nelson Reilly. And you didn't think of them as gay. Sure. You thought of them as eccentric. Rip Taylor.

Eccentric, yes. Paul Lynde was in the center box of Hollywood as gay. You thought of them as eccentric. Yes, Paul Lynde was in the center box of Hollywood squares, and he would do the most outrageous things, like Paul Lynde to block. What is a pullet? And Paul says,

a little show of affection. And then he would culture it by saying, it's an old chicken or something you know so they can play the game he uh paul linda my wife did touched by an angel in uh in salt lake city which is where they shot it from and the guy who picked her up at the plane said that the week before he picked up paul lind and paul had said all right before we go to the studio take me to where the gay bars are. I'm sure there's gay bars in Salt Lake City. And the driver knew where they were and took them there.

And Paul dropped in and had a drink or two. But they had the most brilliant conceit in the Broadway show and subsequently the movie of Bye Bye Birdie of casting Paul Lynde as the all-American father. of casting Paul Lind as the all-American father. And he sang that great song, a hymn to Ed Sullivan. He says, I've got a beautiful wife, three swell kids, and now Ed Sullivan's coming to my house. Ed, I love you. And the music would swell, Ed Sullivan.

As long as you brought up Ed Sullivan, you had a relationship with him. I mean, you were on the show a lot of times, and we were going to get to this. But when you were blacklisted in the 50s, I mean, Ed Sullivan was somebody who actually came to your aid. He did. A lot of people make fun of Ed Sullivan, but he was a great guy. He said, I'll help you when I can. You know, I wasn't a communist, but I was horny for a communist girl and went to some meetings as a result. And I ran for office and got elected the first vice president of AFTRA. And we ran on an anti-blacklist slate.

So the blacklisted, blacklisters, the Red Channels people were furious and they blacklisted me. And Ed himself called and said the booking Sunday night is out I don't know when I'll be able to use you again but I'll help you if I can and I stopped I went overnight I stopped from being the hot young comic at CBS and was incidentally replaced by my longtime nemesis Dick Van Dyke longtime nemesis, Dick Van Dyke. Was there a pilot? Was there an Orson Bean pilot that was canceled?

There was indeed, but it never was aired because I was blacklisted. Luckily, God looked after me before I even believed in him, and I got a Broadway show that ran for a year. The Broadway was never affected by the blacklist because the blacklisters got two sponsors. There were no sponsors on Broadway. The tickets were bought directly by the blacklist because the blacklist has got two sponsors there were no sponsors on broadway the tickets were bought directly by the people but on tv people buy jello and the sponsor sells the maker of jello hires the show and the actors so the blacklist has worked through the sponsors of campbell's soup and things like that anyway a year to the day of Campbell's Soup and things like that. Anyway, a year to the day, Sullivan remembered and called me up.

He said, I think the stuff has passed enough and I can book you again. And he did. He didn't forget. Back in those days, we were told I did a show for 26 weeks before I was blacklisted called The Blue Angel Show, based on a club I was in. And we had entertainers on. And when Pearl Bailey was on, she was African American. In those days, it was called black, and we were told, don't touch her. If your shoulder even touches a black person's shoulder and you're white, we will lose stations

in the South. So I did as I was told, feeling terrible, but that was that. When Pearl Bailey went on the Ed Sullivan show, he threw his arm around and said, how you doing, Pearly? All over the South, stations went away. And the switchboards of the local affiliates lit up.

What happened to the Ed Sullivan show? Well, he touched a Negro. Well, I know, but it's the Ed Sullivan show. That was the end of that nonsense. It was the hottest thing on TV, and he had the clout, and he used it. And did you have close friends affected by the blacklist?

Yeah, I knew a lot of commies. No, I didn't have a lot of them, but, you know, it was a weird experience. I saw actors cross the street to avoid having to say hello to me the doorman at cbs turned away when i passed him that's how that's how rough it was in those days wow the play you were in wasn't just any play we mentioned in the intro was with success spoil rock hunter with uh j Mansfield. Yeah, Jane Mansfield and Walter Matthau. Walter Matthau. Yeah, he had been in about 30 shows,

all of which had closed in a week. He suddenly got in a show that was a hit and he wasn't used to it. It made him nervous. And he was also pissed off that Jane Mansfield got all the publicity. Jane was on the cover of Life magazine twice in one year.

That never happened before from that show. It made us a hit, but it annoyed Walter. He said, that bitch upstaged me again last night. I said, Walter, she's an amateur. She does it by mistake. How come she never once by mistake downstages me? I love Jane, though. She was great.

And you've known Walter a long time. Oh, yeah. Walter and I became friends you'd known Walter a long time. Oh, yeah. Walter and I became friends and went on for a long time after that. But I never saw Jane after the run. But I was the only one that liked her because the others were all jealous of her. I didn't give a shit. Orsi, she called me. Orsi, come in here.

I would walk into her dressing room. She was naked as a grape. She was a farm girl from Texas, had no inhibitions. I never knew where to look. She would say, look out front through the crack in the curtain. Tell me if anybody famous is in the house. If there was a celebrity in the audience, she always gave a better performance. One night Marlon Brando came to see the show.

I knew him slightly. I had met this star and that. There are no strangers in the aristocracy of success. Oh, that story's in your book. Brando coming to see the show. But he wanted to see it. He wanted to see it. He didn't want to see it in Mansfield.

He wanted to meet an actor. Yes. Didn't he want to meet somebody else? Yes. You've done your research, haven't you? You lead me into these anecdotes quite skillfully. I do what I can, Orson. Yes, thanks. Whether I want to tell it or not, I have to now.

You don't have to tell it. I said to Marlon, I did know him slightly, you want to meet Jane? He says, no, I want to meet that guy, Harry Clark. was an old comic from musical reviews. And he had a scene in the show where he pretended he was going to get an Oscar and he grabbed a water cooler from the desk and stood up with his prepared speech. He was based on Harry Cohn, the great Hollywood producer. And with tears rolling down his cheeks,

he said, I came to this country an immigrant boy. The audience laughed, and Marlon Brando wanted to meet him. So I took him up three flights of stairs. I'm shortening the story as much as I can. Not as much as I'd like to. And so he came out, and I said, Harry, I want you to meet my friend Marlon Brando.

Oh, a great friend. And Brando said, Brando was an aficionado of the school of acting where you had to feel it. If you wanted to cry, you thought of the time your dog got run over, something like that. So he said to Harry Clark, that scene where you cried was genuinely moving. Would you mind telling me what did you use? Meaning, had his dog died or something. Harry said, what do you mean, Marlon? What did I use? He says, to cry. He says, oh,

this is good. You can use it. The lights off stage right are very bright, so I don't blink. It really makes your eyes water. Poor Marlon. Went back to his Stanislavsky teacher. Another method actor. And you did another musical on Broadway. i found this

fascinating with with uh godfrey cambridge yeah godfrey was the only black member in the uh in the show and when we toured out of town in uh in uh i don't know where the hell it was some southern state he couldn't stay at our hotel and he had to stay in the cheap hotel over by the bus station wow i mean it was it was rough in those days i remember when i when i broke into the business i worked in in washington dc at the cairo hotel doing my stand-up and in those days if you went to the movies the black people sat upstairs in the balcony. When you tell that story about not touching Pearl Bailey, it reminded me of the famous incident on television, the Petula Clark special with Petula Clark and Bella Fonte. Remember that?

Yes. That was a big deal. What was that? Now I'm prepared to listen to your story. They hugged each other. They hugged each other. It was a big scandal. Yeah. It was a big problem for the network. Well, a lot of women wanted to hug Harry each other. They hugged each other. It was a big scandal. Yeah. It was a big problem for the network.

Well, a lot of women wanted to hug Harry off camera. I was in a show called John Murray Anderson's Almanac, which is a musical review, the last of the big tits and feathers musical reviews, showgirls with feathers in their hair and boobs. And Harry was in it, called a Negro singer in those days. He was gorgeous, of course, and all the showgirls would fight to get at Harry. He was having his way with, as far as I knew, most of them. I remember one time,

two of them actually got into a hair-pulling fight outside his dressing room. Harry had the good sense not to open the door. Nice to be Harry Belafonte in those days, huh, Gil? Yeah, and I think there was a big controversy, that famous scene where... Say it again, controversy. Controversy, Gilbert.

Say control, and then versi. Controversy. What did you say? Whatever it was, it wasn't in the English language. He coins his own phrases. When, you know, Bojangles. Oh, Bill Robinson. Yeah, he was with that famous scene where he's dancing, holding hands with Shirley Temple.

hands with Shirley Temple. But that was okay because Bojangles was an old, an older black man and that was considered safe. But they were getting complaints. They got a lot of complaints that he was holding a white girl's hand. Well, that was from foolish people. I mean, a normal person would only complain if he held on to the hand of a young woman. That would be normal. I'm giving you more stuff to cut, Frank. Yes. That's okay. What we do is we window it down to the best hour, Orson. Yeah, thank you. Gilbert would find this fascinating. You used to go to, you watch Gleason work. You used to go to tapings of The Honeymooners. Oh, yes.

I was a great friend of Art Carney and Audrey Meadows. I loved Audrey Meadows. She would come in knowing all of Gleason's lines because Gleason had not bothered to learn them. He was such a star, and I say this with all respect. He was a great man and one of the last of the great large comedians i don't mean his girth i mean the fact that he would go for huge laughs and uh but she had to know all of his lines and if he forgot she would feed him and to this day if you watch the honeymooners you can say next i suppose you're going to tell me, Ralph, you invited the boss for dinner. Or now I imagine you're going to say, yeah, let's do that.

And one of Gleason's famous moves on The Honeymooners was he would start patting his belly. Yeah. And that was a way to tell Audrey Meadows that he didn't remember his next line. He seemed to start slapping his belly. Well, she was prepared. And Art, too. I loved Art Carney. I would hang out with Art in the street.

I mean, his role on those honeymoons was the guy who was a sanitary engineer. He worked in the sewers. And when I would walk down the street with Art Carney, fans would come up and say, Hey, Artie, how's things in the sewer? And he would always smile generously. A wonderful guy. I loved Gleason. Gleason let me come and hang out when he was doing his big one-hour variety show

at what was in those days called Studio 50. It's now called the Ed Sullivan Theater. And it's where David Letterman does his show from old to dead until he retired. But before the show went on, there would be a bunch of comics in his room. And he would let me come in. I was a young, you know, wasp. I was a kid. I had a crew cut and all these Jewish comics would say, what are you letting this kid come in here for?

Take an Anne Variety, Tired of Jew comics? Try Orson Bean. I remember you telling a story where you were talking to Anne Bancroft. Yeah. About why she married Mel Brooks. I was sitting with Mel. I knew Mel slightly. Mel Brooks. I was sitting with Mel. I knew Mel slightly.

He and what's his name that played the straight man to the 2000s. Carl Reiner. Carl Reiner would sit on their porch out on Fire Island because he had a house on Fire Island. I had finally made enough money in New York that I rented a house for a month and I picked the part of Fire Island that Mel Brooks was in in the hopes that I would get to meet him. And I would walk by his house every day. And one day he spotted me and he says, hey kid, you're that kid, come up here. And they were doing a precursor of the 2,000 year old man. This was called the second man. It was the same old Jew, but it wasn't the 2,000 year

old man. But this guy was the second in command to people like Moses. He says, yes, I was a stonecutter to Moses. He made 15 commandments, dropped one. After I worked so hard on that, he never said he suddenly was 10 commandments. He was also a sailmaker to Blackbeard the pirate. He says he was a son of a bitch, killed people. He says, I made a new sail, put it up. The son of a bitch climbs up in the rigging, puts his hook in my sail, comes all the way down. A dirty bastard.

Kill people, wreck my sail. So, the second man did not work, so it ultimately evolved into the 2,000-year-old man. I'll keep telling these. You pick out the ones you like. They're all good. No, they're great.

And but you asked Anne Bancroft why she married him. Yeah, Frank found the anecdote. I have to tell it. I was invited to dinner. I was having dinner in a restaurant with Anne Bancroft and Mel Brooks, her husband. And I had a couple of drinks and I said, Annie, what is a gorgeous, classy dame like you married to this ridiculous little Jew? And she said, he makes me laugh. And sure enough, that was the power he had over her. Later in the evening, she dissolved in helpless laughter and almost slid under the table. Mel took one arm, I grabbed

the other, and we pulled her back into the chair. You see, this is because women are power fuckers. Men are youth and beauty fuckers, and women are power fuckers. Your wife married you, Gilbert, because you have the power over her of making her laugh. Well, Annie Bancroft was attracted to the power that Mel Brooks had. Jackie Kennedy married the powerful Jack Kennedy. And when he died, she married the richest man in the world. His power was money. Women don't care what a man looks like. Thank God for you and me.

Women don't care what a man looks like. Thank God for you and me. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast after this. That's the sound of fried chicken with a spicy history. Thornton Prince was a ladies' man. To get revenge, his girlfriend hid spices in his fried chicken. He loved it so much, he opened Prince's Hot Chicken. This is one of many sounds in Tennessee with a story to tell. To hear them in person, plan your trip at tnvacation.com. Tennessee sounds perfect.

This episode is brought to you by FX's The Bear on Disney+. In Season 3, Carmi and his crew are aiming for the ultimate restaurant accolade, a Michelin star. With Golden Globe and Emmy wins, the show starring Jeremy Allen White, Io Debrey, and Maddie Matheson is ready to heat up screens once again. All new episodes of FX's The Bear

are streaming June 27, only on Disney+. And now back to the show. I like the memory course joke, Orson. Can you tell that one? Oh my God, I was just about to ask that one. That's a great one. How the hell do you find...

The guy says, I took a memory says uh she says i took a memory an old jewish as i took a memory course he says it's good this is i remember everything like a memory like a steel trap he says where could i take such a course he says it's from a doctor he says what's the name of the doctor he says believe me i got him he says what's the name of the doctor he says he waits a second says what do you call that flower it's red it's got a long stem with thorns this is a rose yeah she's rose what's the name of the doctor give me the memory you know what what what gets me about all your jokes yes is that you to to me, are like the ultimate goyim. Yeah. And every one of your jokes is, so Rosenthal's talking to his son, Moishe.

I put ten jokes on YouTube. Yeah, we saw them. They're great. My grandson said, Grandpa, nobody tells jokes anymore. People do schtick, they tell lines, but nobody does jokes. They're gone, and you have to preserve them for posterity. So I put my jokes on, and I was written up in a conservative Jewish journal called Commentary by a guy named Norman Podhoritz, and he said, Orson Bean is not a Jew, but he understands Jewish humor better than most Jews. That's quite flattering. Yes. Not amusing, but flattering. Orson, there's so much stuff here on

my cards. I mean, what would you like to talk about? You were one of the founders of the Sons of the Desert, which we were talking about off mic. Let's talk about Donald Trump. That's not. Did you know Stan Laurel? You must have. Stan Laurel, I had the great good fortune to become a friend of Stan Laurel's. I found out, I think, from my old nemesis,

Dick Van Dyke, where he lived, and called him up, and he invited me up. He knew who I was. He knew who all the new young comics were, and I wanted to talk about how did you think up the gag where you and Ollie have the car that falls apart? How did you think? No, he wanted to talk what was happening in comedy. What's being done? What's funny? Who were the new young funny comics? He was very au courant.

And that means in the present, Godfrey. Yeah, we had Chuck McCann on the show too and it was the days when Stan was living in the hotel in Santa Monica

and he would receive guests yes he had a beautiful young wife who doted on him and looked after him women are

power fuckers men are youth and beauty fuckers and it is said that because he never

got to save any money he didn't own any of his films. And when they were being shown all over TV in the early days, he never got a penny from it. But I'm told that this is true, and I don't know it for a fact, but I think it sounds logical, that Frank Sinatra picked up very quietly all of his bills. Wow, I never knew that. I had heard that Frank...

Did you know that, Gil? No. all of his bills. Wow, I never knew that. I had heard that Frank... Did you know that, Gil? No! I don't know if it was true, but I heard it, and I've heard other people say that Frank was very... Frank had a mafia mentality, and the mafiosi were

some of the most interesting people I ever met, and some of the most generous people I ever met. If you crossed them, they would put your feet in concrete and drop you in the Charles River, but if you If you crossed them, they would put your feet in concrete and drop you in the Charles River. But if you didn't cross them, they would do wonderfully generous things for you.

I always liked the mafia. I always liked the godfather. I always felt that he said, I am not into the drugs because it's going to ruin things, so I don't want to get involved in that. But Godfather, we need the politicians in your party. I could do 20 minutes of Godfather dialogue. I can do Enzo the Baker. I am Enzo. Enzo the Baker. You worked with Vito Scotti, by the way, who's in the Godfather in that opening scene. Oh.

That was the song at the wedding. You work with Vito Scotti in the Twilight Zone that Gilbert and I were talking about, Mr. Beavis. Wow. With Henry Jones. Yes. And William Shallard. Now, you work with Dustin Hoffman. I did.

The Star Wagon. Yes, that was the first job Dust ever got paid for it was his first television appearance and i was cast in the lead in a maxwell anderson play and it was the first use of tape tape had just been invented and the and the videotape mechanism uh that was used to fill to tape this show on location all over Connecticut that video tape filled an atlas moving van the same stuff that would would fit in the palm of your hand today took up an atlas moving van and Dusty and I've shot all over Connecticut and it was a play by Maxwell Anderson. And Dustin Hoffman later said to me,

I fucked your wife's sister with the red bush. Wow. You almost buried the lead there. You worked with a bunch of people we've had on this show. Have worked with Phil Silvers. Hermione's midgets I worked with.

Speaking of a bunch of people. But we've had a bunch of people who've all worked with Phil Silvers. Yes. What was he like? He was a worrywart. He was a nervous wreck. I admired him vastly as a comedian, but he was a worrywart he was he was a nervous wreck i admired him vastly as a comedian but he was a nervous wreck and i worked on the show with a with a with a with a guy uh it was uh

sergeant bilko was the name of the show i think you're in the army now i don't remember but his character was sergeant bilko and there was a little character named the actor's name was Maurice Gosfield. Oh, sure. What was the name of the character? Was it Doberman? Doberman. Yeah. And Doberman couldn't remember a line and Doberman would trip and fall down. He says, there was a piece of paper there.

I stripped over the paper. Get him the fuck out of here, somebody would say. He was a pain in the ass, Doberman. Not a nice person. Phil Silvers was a nice person, but very nervous. A nervous wreck. But I adored him.

I like him. Most comics are unhappy. Are you unhappy, Gilbert? Oh, a lot of the time. Yeah, well, most comics are unhappy most of the time. So you're ahead of the game. You have a good-looking wife and you have a podcast. He does.

And so you're only unhappy quite a lot of the time, not most of the time. Phil Chivers was unhappy most of the time. You're the first guest that psychoanalyzed Tim Horson. And you work with an actor, a character actor, who I've always liked, and that's John MacGyver. Oh, yeah, John MacGyver. And if you play your cards right, Orson, he'll do some John MacGyver for you. Do you have John MacGyver stories? He's got an impression.

Oh, do John MacGyver, because no one alive will know what you're doing. He does it almost every week. All right, do it. Everything in this company must be run according to order. Everyone alive will know what you're doing. He does it almost every week. All right, do it. Everything in this company must be run according to order. You will have no slackers allowed in this business. I run this company like a ship, and I am the captain of the ship. Wonderful, Gilbert.

You've made my day. If all of the rest of the podcast had been sheer misery, that would have been worth it. John MacGyver impressions don't come around often. Well, you've got to listen to this show, Orson. They're in big supply here. Oh, and Theodore B you worked with theodore mckell in the same show with uh with john macgyver in fact san francisco fracas yes i knew i know there was a guy who was the very first guy to imitate ed sullivan and uh will jordan will jordan Still around, by the way. Yeah. Is he still around? He was a few blocks from me.

He was pissed off all of his life because everybody took the Ed Sullivan thing from him. And and he ran into a guy one time that he had seen do Ed Sullivan on the Ed Sullivan show. Says, where did you get that? He says, there was a fat Jewish kid I saw. He says, I'm that fat Jewish kid. Jewish kid I saw. She says, I'm that fat Jewish kid. But Will Jordan did the best

impression of an actor called Albert Basserman. Albert Basserman and Maria Uspenskaya She's come up on the show. Albert Basserman makes John MacGyver look famous.

But Will Jordan did a triumphant Albert Basserman routine, and nobody ever knew it was good because nobody knew who Albert Basserman was. He does a great James Mason, too. Well, James Mason, you could say whether it was good or not. Albert Basserman, you wouldn't be sure. That's true. And I remember he used to do Sabu. Oh, yeah.

I want to be a sailor. Equally obscure. That's Sabu from the Thief of Baghdad. I want to be a sailor singing merrily on the flying carpet. He sang that. But Sabu became famous as Elephant Boy. Now, there's a scandal about him and an elephant, but this is a family podcast, and I don't want to go in.

Not really. He was a boy. He was underage, and they shot the elephant, but Sadu's family never recovered and went back to India. Oh, God. What else you got, Gil?

I got plenty of stuff left. Oh, I was afraid of that. Oh, Jack Klugman. Jack Klugman. I love Jack Klugman. What else you got, Gil? I got plenty of stuff left. Oh, I was afraid of that. Oh, Jack Klugman. Jack Klugman. I love Jack Klugman. What an angel. What a good guy, Jack. I worked with his wife a lot on that show.

Oh, Match Game. Match Game. She was famous for being famous, and she incidentally happened to be married to Jack Klugman. Do you remember what her name was? Brett Summers. Brett Summers. Not that famous. I couldn't remember it.

John MacGyver, I remember it. More famous than Albert Basserman. Yes, that's true. Yeah, she used to be on every game show. Yes. And everyone knew her, and no one knew why. Because she was famous for being famous, that's all. That's what a lot of people,

when people around the country saw me on my seven years on To Tell the Truth, they didn't know i was starring on broadway they didn't know this they didn't know that they thought that's that guy he's a panelist so i was known as a panelist and so was brett summers that's what we had in common tell us more about klugman i don't know a lot about klugman except i loved him the first i had seen the death of a Salesman about eight or ten times and never liked it, never thought it was a good play. Everybody thought it was the great American play. I saw Jack Klugman play it, and for the first time, I got Willie Loman. I thought, this is a great play. Then, once I decided that it was a great play, my wife took me to see

on Broadway a revival of it with, what was his name? She had to think for a minute. Brian Dennehy. Oh, Brian Dennehy. Yes, he was her old boyfriend. Now, Brian Dennehy is, how can I put this, a large man. He could play Bluto

in the movie. Now, he was wonderful in the play, but Ali wanted me to go back and say hello to him, which I was happy to do and I praised him extravagantly. I saw him looking at Ali and thinking to himself, how did I ever let her go? Now she's married, this goy. How could I have let her go? And what I thought as I looked at this large man that used to lay with my wife, thank God he didn't roll over one night and crush her and not deprive me of the subsequent

use of her. He's from my hometown, you can tell your wife, Brian Dennehy. Well, you see, you have something in common with Frank. What? Williston Park, New York. Brian Dennehy. He's from my hometown. Yeah, I heard that part and I was telling Ali that you and she have something in common. They both knew Brian Dennehy's from my hometown. Yeah, I heard that part, and I was telling Ali that you and she have something in common.

They both knew Brian Dennehy, she in the biblical sense. The idea that Brian Dennehy called you a boy. They don't call biblical references here. Even Old Testament they don't go for. He knew my wife. Can we throw some names at you or just some random names and see where you go with it yeah you've already done John MacGyver and got lucky

you did an episode of the millionaire with an actor named Douglas Dumbril never heard of him who worked with the Marx Brothers oh did he in duck soup is he in duck soup God! Who worked with the Marx Brothers. Oh, did he? Oh, I don't know. In Duck Soup. Is he in Duck Soup? No, he's not in Duck Soup. He's in The Day at the Races.

Oh, that's where. You're thinking of Lewis Calhoun. Oh, I love Lewis Calhoun. He was one. He always played a banker. Yeah. Yes. I knew these people. I knew who played the communists, who played the bankers. Louis Calhoun was always a banker. Now, I sat for seven years next

to Kitty Carlyle, and in those days, with the Marx Brothers, they felt they had to have music. So Kitty Carlyle and Alan Jones were the musical respite in Day at the Races and in A Night at the Races and A Night at the Opera

and Day at the Races, but they were in both those pictures. And that's my, except that I got to know Groucho, and I love Groucho, and I have wonderful letters from Groucho. In the days before email, if you wrote to Groucho, he would answer you. He was an inveterate letter writer. And I have wonderful letters at home from Groucho. And from John MacGyver, too.

John MacGyver's writing to you. Yeah, he never wrote much. But not Albert Basserman. Not Albert Basserman. Fuck him. He wrote in German. What was it like to hang out with Groucho? Oh, I love Groucho.

He was a sweet man. I got to know Groucho because Groucho did a Gilbert and Sullivan thing, the Mikado on TV. Oh, sure. And was TV. Oh, he sure. And was roundly criticized by the critics. I told Groucho that he was wonderful. So he loved me ever since. I am the very model of a modern major general. Because it was natural for him to do that because he did these things like, I'll hail Fredonia, and Margaret Dumont would come out. Sure. Margaret Dumont was always the rich lady, and he would say, she would say, hold me closer,

hold me closer. If I hold you any closer, you'll be in back of me. I must have you for my wife. Although what my wife would do, I can't imagine. Oh, Mr. Flywheel. Well, it was said that she never got them. I don't know if that's true, that she never understood their humor. She never understood Groucho's humor.

She was just a wonderful prop and perfect for it. Yes, I don't think she had much of a sense of humor herself, but she was just a walking prop and perfect for him. All of the women in W.C. Fields' movies and Laurel and Hardy movies were shrikes, shrews, hardens. That's a good word. Yes. Shrike. I mean, W.C. Fields' wife in every movie would say, oh, I rue the day I married you. My mother warned me, but would I listen?

Oh, no. Yes, dear. Yes, dear. I listen. Oh, no. Yes, dear. Yes, dear. And now Frank brought up that you were on the Jack Parr show when he walked out. Yes, I was a regular on with Parr. And I don't think Parr ever cared for me. But, you know, he was a he was a goy, too. He was a wasp. And he had me on. And I happened to be on the night that Jack Parr got all offended because they had censored his WC joke. WC were the initials for water closet, which in turn was a euphemism for toilet.

How times have changed. Indeed. When that would be censored, and he was filled with outrage, and without telling the network or McMahon or any of the people on the show, he got up and left. Now, Ed McMahon kind of was ready to take over and run the show. It was Hugh Downs in those days. Hugh Downs, yeah. Hugh Downs was ready to take over, but I came out and bad-mouthed NBC,

and that's why I never got to take over and run the show, and that's why Johnny Carson did. Long, long silence. Interesting. I didn't know that. Yeah. I was next in line. I was the heir go. But a suit, as they were called, at NBC was miffed at me and said, that son of a bitch will never run this show. Interesting.

That sounds like a line from a movie, doesn't it? That son of a bitch will never, I can't remember what that, it's from something, isn't it? And you. It's John Marley's character saying that he never gets that picture. He never gets that picture. Jimmy Fontaine never gets that picture. Son of a bitch will never – and that is supposedly based on the real life thing that Sinatra didn't get from here to eternity because he was messing around with Kim Novak who was the property of

Cohn. Roy Cohn. And the line that he allegedly says, that Dago, son of a bitch, is fucking my eating pussy. Wow. Another thing for you to cut, Frank. You're going to get this show down to 20 minutes.

Here's some other names for you, Orson, just as long as we're playing memory lane. Jim Backus you worked with? Yeah, Jim Backus. Jim Backus was the voice of Mr. Magoo. Sure. But he was also a great friend of the guy that used to play, this is not a good story because I can't remember the name of the guy or the character he played, but it was that wonderful guy who played Ma Frickert. No, Ma Frickert. Oh, Jonathan Winters. No, now we're back to

Ma Frickert. I was with Jonathan Winters the night he made up Ma Frickert. Oh, tell us about that. That's cool. Johnny and I were both young comics breaking into the business. I worked the Blue Angel, and Johnny worked the club around the corner called the Reuben Blue. And he did this character for me of Ma Frickert. And Lenny, the hired

hand, comes in. And Ma is in a wheelchair. What are you doing in the house, Lenny? I came to see you, Ma. Oh, if I could get this chair over to the mantelpiece, I'd get my dead husband's shotgun and blow you out of here.

What are you doing? Don't, don't, don't. Don't stick that thing. Oh, don't. Okay, Ma. I'm going to go back out the barn and turn to that sick heifer, but I'll be back. She says, well, see that you are. That was the original dirty Ma Frickett that he then cleaned up to do on Johnny Carson.

Right. I always thought Ann Blabby, Johnny Carson's Ann Blabby, was sort of a... Ann Blabby came from Ma Frickett, and so did the guy I'm trying to think of. Somebody, Laquette, his daughter became a famous actress. Arquette. Pete Arquette. Oh, Cliff Arquette.

Cliff Arquette. Now, what was his lady character? That was an old character. Oh, yeah, Charlie Weaver is the same actor. Charlie Weaver was the name he used, Cliff Arquette, and his daughter was somebody Arquette, quite a good actress. Roseanne Arquette. And David. And he was doing something with the guy that you asked me the question about years ago, Frank.

Yeah. It was the guy who was the voice of Mr. McGee. No, I've forgotten. Oh, Jim Backus. Jim Backus says to him, look, it's your lunch break. I can't stand the food in the commissary. We're going off the commissary. So he drove Cliff Arquette as Charlie Weaver.

But Charlie Weaver kept the old lady wig on in this convertible. And Jim Backus said, take the wig off. Come on, come on, Cliff. No, he kept it on. They pull up at a red light and Cliff starts talking as the old lady to the man in the next car

waiting at the red light. He says, lovely day, isn't it? The man says, what a beautiful day. Couldn't ask for a nicer day. And he wins, she wins the guy over. And just as the light turned green,

the old lady says to him, how'd you like to get your cock sucked? And Jim Packer says, Jesus, and pulls off, you know, thinking he'll be recognized. He'll be the one that they'll call the cock song. Well, you know, shows are intersecting here because Peter Marshall, we had Peter Marshall on the show last week. Did you? Orson. Peter Marshall on the show last week. Did you? Orson, and he told us that Charlotte Cliff would do

drag in shows and then go on Hollywood Boulevard and walk around in drag. But not just for fun, right? For fun. Not to pick up sailors. Yeah, well, this was another example of it. Ergo, Peter Marshall was probably right.

Marshall was, you know, as you knew, was the host on Hollywood Squares and therefore got to know all of these funny people. Sure. He himself was not. He was half of Noonan and Marshall, and you worked with Tommy Noonan. Yeah, I did. On my first big musical, I was signed to play opposite Marilyn Monroe,

and that was the movie she quit, 20th Century Fox, over. So I never got to play opposite her. But I did get to play opposite Jane Mansfield and a number of other beauties in my day. I never thought Noonan and Marshall, that act was that good. So I was glad that Peter went on to another line of Endeavor host. Now, I heard Jonathan Winters, aside from being crazy on stage, that he was more than a little crazy off stage. He got into the cooking, Sherry, pretty good. And for a long time, that fed his craziness.

But when he joined AA and stopped drinking, he was never quite as crazy or quite as funny. But, God, he was a great guy. And I loved him. I loved him. I used to call him up about once a year in his dotage and say hi to him and he always remembered who i was thank you we were big fans yeah how about here's some more names i'm going to just throw these out bob cummings bob cummings yeah i worked with bob cummings in in that. How to be very, very popular. Yes. And then

I was offered a big show, the lead in a TV show, and turned it down and Bob Cummings took it. It was a show called The Living Doll. Oh, we were talking about that with Julie Newmar. Yeah, why would... Oh, that's right. We had a whole thing about... Julie Newmar was a girl that

men would say of her, I climbed her because she was there. Like Everest. What about Fred Allen? Oh, I love Fred Allen. Fred Allen I became very close to and adored him. He was a great radio comedian, and he had a very dry sense of humor, and he would get away with saying stuff that the censors didn't know was maybe censorable.

He came back from Paris, and he said, French money is printed on the thinnest paper I've ever seen in public, which was a great way to do a toilet joke. Ahead of his time, Fred Allen. Oh, yes. ahead of his time fred allen oh yes this little town this town on the seacoast of new england was so dull that one day the tide went out and never came back that's a good line now i heard fred allen was a very depressed guy yeah well all comics are gilbert you know that you you claim not to be depressed but we know know better. Ask your wife. What do you got, Gil?

What do you got, Gil? Oh, let's see. I already did my John MacGyver. This was fun. Before we let you go, can we impose upon you to do the I ate the bologna routine? Two Irishmen and a Hebrew once went out for recreation. And they took enough provisions along to spend a week's vacation. But they got lost out in the woods.

The nights grew dark and lonely. And at last all of their food ran out. Except a piece of bologna. Now one of them said as he picked up a knife, there's no use in us carving. For if we do, there won't be enough to keep us all from starving. So I suggest we go to bed and tomorrow, said Maloney, whoever has the nicest dream wins the piece of baloney. The following morning when they awoke a quarter after seven, one of them said I had a dream. I died and went to heaven.

St. Peter met me at the gate riding on a pony. No, I don't think you can beat that dream. I win the baloney. The other one said, I had a dream too and mine was a world beater. I also died and went to heaven. Welcome by St. Peter. He rushed to me, held out his hand.

He said, hello, Mahoney. No, I don't think you can beat that dream. I win the baloney. The Hebrew said, I'm dreaming too. It's a dream that couldn't be sweeter. I've seen you both go up to heaven. Welcome by St. Peter. I waited and waited and waited and on.

And I got so lonely. I didn't think he was coming back. So I got up and I ate the bologna. Goodbye, folks. It's all downhill from here. You'll never have a podcast like this again. It'll be about 13 minutes long. Are you still doing your one-man show? Can we plug it?

No, it's over. It's done with. I'm too rich to work. Well, it's great. Put it on YouTube so people can see it. Alright. Thank you, Frank. Thank you, Gilbert. Go home to your wife. She loves you. Orson, thank you for doing this and taking the time.

Thank you. And our love to Hallie, too. Love back at you. Yeah, Hallie says back at you. Hallie. Oh, is your name Hallie? I never knew. I thought you were Hayley Mills. Jesus, all these years have been...

Okay. Goodbye. So, I'm Gilbert Gottfried. This has been Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast with my co-host Frank Santopadre. And it's been once again at Nutmeg Studios with our engineer Frank Ferdarosa. And today on our show, we had the guy who's just done a little bit of everything. Ladies and gentlemen, once again, a thank you to Orson Bean. Thanks, Orson.

Go to dinner. Thank you.