Mr. Warmth Is Hotter Than Ever

Don Rickles still packs Las Vegas showrooms with his unique brand of insult comedy. On April 17, he brought that same knack to the Leonard H. Goldenson Theatre, when the Television Academy presented “A Conversation with Mr. Warmth.”

Hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, the swiftest Academy program sell-out in recent memory featured a generous selection of excerpts from the HBO documentary Mr. Warmth: The Don Rickles Project, which premiered last December. Joining Rickles and Kimmel on stage was the show’s director-producer, John Landis. The special included footage of Rickles’ act, which had never before been filmed, clips of classic TV appearances, comments from dozens of fellow comedians and other performers and reflections from Rickles himself. The Goldenson conversation was no less memorable: three weeks away from his eighty-second birthday, “The Merchant of Venom” peppered the talk with zings, hilarious anecdotes and imitations of Jerry Lewis, Larry King, George Burns and Jack Benny.

Landis, who had known Rickles since he was an 18-year-old gofer on the comedian’s 1970 film Kelly’s Heroes, said he got the idea for the special after attending Rickles’ eightieth birthday celebration. “I looked around and thought, ‘I don’t think enough people know Don’s place.’ What he does is unique. He doesn’t tell jokes. He creates an ambiance.” He broached the idea to Rickles, “and after twenty minutes of abuse, Don told me that his son Larry was attempting to do a show.” Larry became one of the documentary’s producers.

Asked by Kimmel why he believes he’s been able to get away with remarks that would be offensive from anyone else (in his filmed act, for instance, he tells an elderly patron to “go home and die!” and makes various ethnic comments), Rickles replied that, “I’m never mean-spirited. It’s an attitude. When I say it, people know it’s from my heart, it’s full of fun. I’ve never said something I’ve regretted.”

He’s had people looking out for him along the way, such as his late manager Joe Scandore and his late mother, Etta, “a Jewish Patton.” Recalling a 1972 engagement at New York’s Copacabana, he related how his mother approached mobster boss Joey Gallo at his table before the show and said, “Joey, darling, tell your boys to put their guns on the table. I don’t want my sonny boy to talk unless I can see the guns. Thank you, darling.” The boss and the boys complied. “Unfortunately,” Rickles added, “later that night they were all wiped out [elsewhere].”

He’s a family man at heart, expressing love for his wife, Barbara, children and grandchildren, the latter two boys who call him “Pop-Pop Potato Head” for his voiceovers as Mr. Potato Head in the Toy Story animated films; he just signed on for Toy Story 3 and his voice will be part of an attraction at Disney theme parks in Anaheim and Orlando.

Mr. Warmth also proved to be Mr. Humble when it came to showbiz colleagues, expressing gratitude that he’d been allowed to become close to the notoriously shy Johnny Carson — “He was the kind of guy that, to show emotion was difficult for him. I feel so lucky [that he was a friend]” – and recalling “my biggest thrill. I’m a Jewish kid from Jackson Heights, Long Island, and I’m at 57th Street [in Manhattan] with my mother, seeing [the marquee] at Radio City Music Hall: Don Rickles, Frank Sinatra and the Count Basie Orchestra.”

Of course, he couldn’t resist one zinger: “I said to Frank, can you believe you’re working with me?”

Rocci Chatfield, activities committee co-chair with Pete Hammond, produced the event. Robert O’Donnell is director of activities for the Television Academy.