"Mort" Sahl

[madhair60]

I never found Mort Sahl funny, but I appreciate how influential he was.

I watched a few clips and enjoyed them. I'm more interested in seeing his newer stuff.

[Brundle-Fly]

I explored Mort Sahl more through MortSahlFan's enthusiasm and found him fascinatingly advanced for his time.

Mort Sahl R.I.P.

[jobotic]

Will have a listen to these later

https://archive.org/details/MortSahlMP3AudioCollection

[Barry Admin]

Will have a listen to these later

https://archive.org/details/MortSahlMP3AudioCollection

Check out Mort Sahl at the Hungry i too!

[Bernice]

I'll be honest, I thought he'd already died. 94 years old!

I've caught old 60s clips of him here and there on youtube, never really gone much deeper. He clearly had a real charm on stage, a natural sort of ease, but watching him I don't know if I'm enjoying the jokes or just the general vibe, the window on history. I'll have to check out a bit more this weekend, work through that archive jobotic posted.

[Zetetic]

Will have a listen to these later

https://archive.org/details/MortSahlMP3AudioCollection

Thank you for the link, jobotic.

[MortSahlFan]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7jBYhCZHOg&t=7s

[MortSahlFan]

Realize some of us know him personally. Until the very last breath.

[Utter Shit]

Sounds like you killed him.

[Bernice]

My condolences, MortSahlFan. Still, worth bearing in mind that Sahl lived a far richer and fuller life than any of us cretins.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

Mort Sad 😢

[David Pielingtonburygrot]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7jBYhCZHOg&t=7s

Great link, MortSahlFan. I'm a big fan of Studs Terkel but don't know much about Mort Sahl, what a thoughtful and articulate guy.

[McChesney Duntz]

Pretty strong attempt at grappling with his legacy and his current relevancy:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/27/arts/television/mort-sahl-comedy-legacy.html

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

I know death jokes are a part of CaB but this feels a bit cuntish. Nearly every mention of Mort gets sneered at. MortSahlFan always comes across as enthusiastic about a man who was obviously a well respected & influential comedian.
It's not that difficult to imagine he feels the same way you felt about Norm MacDonald or Rik Mayall.
You stupid bald bastards. Bye!

Well, yeah. You're right. For what it's worth, I wasn't actually having a dig at Mort Sahl the comedian, but it was insensitive of me to be facetious in a thread that would inevitably attract the attention of someone who must be terribly upset by this news.

Genuinely sorry.

[madhair60]

Also FWIW my OP was meant to be knowing rather than dismissive, but I'll cop to the jokes because I find 'em funny.

[Old Nehamkin]

I actually think it's good that he died.

[Barry Admin]

CC isn't really the place for this, sorry folks.

[Cold Meat Platter]

People were making jokes on the first fucking page of the Norm thread.

[Petey Pate]

People were making jokes on the first fucking page of the Norm thread.

Most of those were variations of jokes that Norm himself made, which seems fairer than mocking the death of a comedian that people admit to knowing little about.

It's sad, really, that the pioneering satirist Mort Sahl is best known in Britain for his starring role in Carry On But Stop That Camel.

He seemed to get a decent reception in London a few years ago going by this video.

https://youtu.be/rI5SR1yH1W4

[Cold Meat Platter]

which seems fairer

Thank you, arbiter of fairness.

[itsfredtitmus]

I think he'll make a comeback

[Barry Admin]

Looking forward to a similar 18 pages of discussion about Mort Sahl to balance out the jokes, then.

Continuining on after MortSahlFan said he knew him personally just seems a bit off to me, but whatever.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

He had a kind face.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

He seemed to get a decent reception in London a few years ago going by this video.

That Carry On comment was a joke at the expense of myself and ignorant obituaries. I was deliberately mixing Sahl up with Phil Silvers.

Not very funny, admittedly, but that was the intent.

[Mobius]

I'm sorry for my bad jokes, and Mort Sahl's death.

[Old Nehamkin]

Ace Letterman archivist Don Giller has posted a compilation of Sahl's 3 appearances on Late Night/Late Show:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zddN-YgSfg0

[MortSahlFan]

Ace Letterman archivist Don Giller has posted a compilation of Sahl's 3 appearances on Late Night/Late Show:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zddN-YgSfg0

I saw that. It was very nice of him to upload that.

[peanutbutter]

Can't say I ever  found him very funny in comparison to some contemporaries like Shelley Berman and Bob Newhart but he definitely seemed far closer to hitting the template of what a standup would become (maybe he stopped it from being heavily focused around one sided phone calls!), between that and the contemporary nature of his focuses he was destined to suffer quite a bit in comparison to future acts.

I assume regardless of his commercial decline he was actually reasonably okay financially and persevered for so long mainly because he just loved doing it? 94, seemingly being in pretty good health well and still being able to do what he loved into his tenth decade seems pretty good going.



Anyways, looking forward to seeing the PBS doc on him.

[Johnny Foreigner]

Not bad.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

Mortsahl Kombat
Raoul Mort