NationStates Jolt Archive

http://uk.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idUKN2339172520080623

Comedian George Carlin, a counter-culture hero famed for his routines about drugs and dirty words, died of heart failure at a Los Angeles-area hospital on Sunday, a spokesman said. He was 71.

Carlin, who had a history of heart problems, died at St. John's Health Center in Santa Monica about 6 p.m. PDT (2 a.m. British time) after being admitted earlier in the afternoon for chest pains, spokesman Jeff Abraham told Reuters.

Known for his edgy, provocative material, Carlin achieved status as an anti-Establishment icon in the 1970s with stand-up bits full of drug references and a routine about seven dirty words you could not say on television. A regulatory battle over a radio broadcast of his "Filthy Words" routine ultimately reached the U.S. Supreme Court.

(Reporting by Dean Goodman; Editing by Patricia Zengerle)


What a shame. Thanks for the laughs, man.

Rip

For some reason I thought he'd be around for a bit longer.

R.I.P.

The first time I saw him was when he was on Shining Time Station. Little did I knew back then that he was a Comedian who was more adult. :(

RIP. :(

He is one of my favorites.

RIP, man.

This one's for you man....

shit, piss, fuck, ****, cocksucker, motherfucker, and tits

Fuck No!

I'm so bummed.:(

RIP

The greatest comedian I've ever heard.

Shit
Piss
Fuck
****
Cocksucker
Motherfucker
Tits

(Trust me, George would understand)

I'll never forget those 7 words you can't say on TV, the 2 Commandments, and of course why football is better than baseball.

I'm going to take the self-righteous pleasure away from certain people by posting this:


Who? He must be a local celebrity or something:rolleyes:





(I know who he is btw) RIP

:(

"Rat shit, bat shit, dirty old twat! 69 assholes tied in a knot! Hooray! Lizard shit! FUCK!"



One of the best...he will be missed.

Has anyone ever heard his version of the Aristocrat? Best damn version there ever was.

"Rat shit, bat shit, dirty old twat! 69 assholes tied in a knot! Hooray! Lizard shit! FUCK!"

That is win.

Well motherfucking shit.

7 Words!!! (http://youtube.com/watch?v=BTyzTJTNhNk)

R.I.P.

The first time I saw him was when he was on Shining Time Station. Little did I knew back then that he was a Comedian who was more adult. :(
Shining Time Station was my first introduction to the genius that was George Carlin. As I grew older I listened to his routines and came to love his stuff.

Aw man, this sucks.

He was one of the first comedians I ever heard or saw. An icon. Now a corpse.
I'm bummed.

Rest in Peace George Carlin. From the first time I saw an HBO special of his he was my favorite comedian and I am a proud owner of When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops (book of his). Shame he had to go.

If there's any upside to this though, it's that at least now Heaven/Nirvana/Paradise/The Afterlife is exponentially funnier.

For some reason I thought he'd be around for a bit longer.
He'll be around longer than you or I, my friend ;)

71 years is a pretty good run. Good going, man. Good bye, and seriously, thank you. You took Lenny Bruce's ball and ran with it.

He was pretty good. I had his "Wonderful Wino" 45 back in the day.

Forgot about this:

Thanks to our fear of death in this country, I won't have to die. I'll pass away. Or I'll expire, like a magazine subscription. If it happens in a hospital, they'll call it a "terminal episode". The insurance company will refer to it as "negative patient care outcome". If it's the result of malpractice, they'll say it was a "theraputic misadventure". I'm telling ya, some of this language makes me want to vomit. Well, maybe not vomit. Makes me want to engage in an involuntary personal protein spill
http://youtube.com/watch?v=h67k9eEw9AY&feature=related

"Therapeutic Misadventure"? Oh, I'm going to have to remember that one.

Rest in peace. And hopefully one day the FCC won't censor television.

:(

My single favorite comedian. My muse. He would've been my hero if I didn't know how much he disdained such concepts.

Here's the first part of his last HBO special, "It's All Bad For Ya". If you're diligent, you can watch the whole routine piece by piece:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxXkJoSgeXo&feature=related

Suffice to say, He isn't up there in Heaven smiling down at us. If there's a Heaven, and if by some miracle he's in it, he's probably hitting on Mother Teresa. Remember folks; "It's all bullshit and it's bad for ya."

:(

Edit: Finding the rest is more challenging than I thought so:

Part 1 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxXkJoSgeXo&feature=related)
Part 2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yhiiZAz3MY&feature=related)
Part 3 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1VhzGa2jDs&feature=related)
Part 4 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA_fA2j_Qvw&feature=related)
Part 5 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BU5EycsEf6Y&feature=related)
Part 6 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdR7vVK0o7w&feature=related)
Part 7 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxoKMzLCzh0&feature=related)

I can't find it in all one sitting anywhere. If I do, I'll post that instead. Enjoy.

damn, another childhood hero dead.
list:
steve irwin
Timothy Treadwell
Grateful Dead
and now GC

RIP. George Carlin was my favorite comedian. I have all of his books and 6 of HBO specials.

He was the greatest.

Theres some of his work at the bottom of this article: http://news.aol.com/entertainment/television/tv-news-story/ar/_a/legendary-comedian-george-carlin-dies-71/20080623021509990001?icid=100214839x1204409159x1200197070

RIP.

I've only been introduced to George Carlin in the summer of 2006, when we'd lie in the grass around the public pool and listen to the GC recordings a friend had made. My favorite' still "Jammin' in New York":

"The next sentence I hear is full of things that piss me off. "Before leaving the aircraft, please check around your immediate seating area for any personal belongings you might have brought on board." Well, let's start with "immediate seating area." SEAT! It's a god damn seat! Check around your seat! "For any personal belongings..." Well, what other kinds of belongings are there besides personal? PUBLIC belongings? Do these people honestly believe I might be traveling with a fountain I stole from the park? "... you might have brought on board." Well... I MIGHT have brought my arrowhead collection! I didn't. SO I'M NOT GOING TO LOOK FOR IT! I'm going to look for things I BROUGHT on board! It would seem to increase the likelihood of my finding something, wouldn't you say?"

People add words when they want things to sound more important than they really are. "Boarding process." Sounds important; it isn't. It's just a bunch of people getting on an airplane! People like to sound important. Weathermen on television talk about "shower activity". Sounds more important than "showers." I even heard one guy on CNN talk about a "rain event". I swear to God, he said, "Louisiana is expecting a rain event." And I thought, "Holy shit, I hope I can get tickets to that!"

Aww. Rufus :(

I think I'm gonna cry...

But really, I guess the third heart attack was just too much...:(

I loved the Richard Pryor/ George Carlin heart attack competition bit...

"Richard had a heart attack, so I had a heart attack...Then Richard blew himself up, and I said 'Fuck that I'm gonna have another heart attack' "

I'm starting a cult...George will be back soon to pick us up...I know it...

One of the all time best.

Rest in peace!

His soul is trapped on a roof somewhere, like all good Frisbeetarians.

*pays respects*

Well, damn! :(

Rest in peace George. And thank you for all the laughs you gave me and so many over the years. You will be fondly remembered.

One wonders what'll be on his headstone. Something along the lines of 'Get the fuck off my grave', one assumes.

One wonders what'll be on his headstone. Something along the lines of 'Get the fuck off my grave', one assumes.

Maybe:
Hey everybody it worked!
I told a lie and said
'If this is not the truth,
may God strike me dead!"

Maybe:
Hey everybody it worked!
I told a lie and said
'If this is not the truth,
may God strike me dead!"

"Sometimes on the quiet moonlit nights, I lie here and think about all the frequent flyer miles I never had a chance to use."

RIP
And I commend your soul to Joe Pesci.

I should look into getting a purgatory folder going.

damn.
I saw his name in graffiti, what's odd about that is that was in Dundee. quite a long way from the US.

George Carlin, 71, Irreverent Standup Comedian, Is Dead

By MEL WATKINS
Published: June 24, 2008
George Carlin, the Grammy-Award winning standup comedian and actor who was hailed for his irreverent social commentary, poignant observations of the absurdities of everyday life and language, and groundbreaking routines like “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television,” died in Santa Monica, Calif., on Sunday, according to his publicist, Jeff Abraham. He was 71.

The cause of death was heart failure. Mr. Carlin, who had a history of heart problems, went into the hospital on Sunday afternoon after complaining of heart trouble. The comedian had worked last weekend at The Orleans in Las Vegas.

Recently, Mr. Carlin was named the recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. He was to receive the award at the Kennedy Center in November. “In his lengthy career as a comedian, writer, and actor, George Carlin has not only made us laugh, but he makes us think,” said Stephen A. Schwarzman, the Kennedy Center chairman. “His influence on the next generation of comics has been far-reaching.”

In an interview with The Associated Press, Jack Burns, who performed with Mr. Carlin in the 1960’s as one half of a comedy duo, said “He was a genius and I will miss him dearly.”

Mr. Carlin began his standup comedy act in the late 1950s and made his first television solo guest appearance on “The Merv Griffin Show” in 1965. At that time, he was primarily known for his clever wordplay and reminiscences of his Irish working-class upbringing in New York.

But from the outset there were indications of an anti-establishment edge to his comedy. Initially, it surfaced in the witty patter of a host of offbeat characters like the wacky sportscaster Biff Barf and the hippy-dippy weatherman Al Sleet. “The weather was dominated by a large Canadian low, which is not to be confused with a Mexican high. Tonight’s forecast . . . dark, continued mostly dark tonight turning to widely scattered light in the morning.”

Mr. Carlin released his first comedy album, “Take-Offs and Put-Ons,” to rave reviews in 1967. He also dabbled in acting, winning a recurring part as Marlo Thomas’ theatrical agent in the sitcom “That Girl” (1966-67) and a supporting role in the movie “With Six You Get Egg-Roll,” released in 1968.

By the end of the decade, he was one of America’s best known comedians. He made more than 80 major television appearances during that time, including the Ed Sullivan Show and Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show; he was also regularly featured at major nightclubs in New York and Las Vegas.

That early success and celebrity, however, was as dinky and hollow as a gratuitous pratfall to Mr. Carlin. “I was entertaining the fathers and the mothers of the people I sympathized with, and in some cases associated with, and whose point of view I shared,” he recalled later, as quoted in the book “Going Too Far” by Tony Hendra, which was published in 1987. “I was a traitor, in so many words. I was living a lie.”

In 1970, Mr. Carlin discarded his suit, tie, and clean-cut image as well as the relatively conventional material that had catapulted him to the top. Mr. Carlin reinvented himself, emerging with a beard, long hair, jeans and a routine that, according to one critic, was steeped in “drugs and bawdy language.” There was an immediate backlash. The Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas terminated his three-year contract, and, months later, he was advised to leave town when an angry mob threatened him at the Lake Geneva Playboy Club. Afterward, he temporarily abandoned the nightclub circuit and began appearing at coffee houses, folk clubs and colleges where he found a younger, hipper audience that was more attuned to both his new image and his material.

By 1972, when he released his second album, “FM & AM,” his star was again on the rise. The album, which won a Grammy Award as best comedy recording, combined older material on the “AM” side with bolder, more acerbic routines on the “FM” side. Among the more controversial cuts was a routine euphemistically entitled “Shoot,” in which Mr. Carlin explored the etymology and common usage of the popular idiom for excrement. The bit was part of the comic’s longer routine “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television,” which appeared on his third album “Class Clown,” also released in 1972.

“There are some words you can say part of the time. Most of the time ‘ass’ is all right on television,” Mr. Carlin noted in his introduction to the then controversial monologue. “You can say, well, ‘You’ve made a perfect ass of yourself tonight.’ You can use ass in a religious sense, if you happen to be the redeemer riding into town on one — perfectly all right.”

The material seems innocuous by today’s standards, but it caused an uproar when broadcast on the New York radio station WBAI in the early ‘70s. The station was censured and fined by the FCC. And in 1978, their ruling was supported by the Supreme Court, which Time magazine reported, “upheld an FCC ban on ‘offensive material’ during hours when children are in the audience.” Mr. Carlin refused to drop the bit and was arrested several times after reciting it on stage.

By the mid-’70s, like his comic predecessor Lenny Bruce and the fast-rising Richard Pryor, Mr. Carlin had emerged as a cultural renegade. In addition to his irreverent jests about religion and politics, he openly talked about the use of drugs, including acid and peyote, and said that he kicked cocaine not for moral or legal reasons but after he found “far more pain in the deal than pleasure.” But the edgier, more biting comedy he developed during this period, along with his candid admission of drug use, cemented his reputation as the “comic voice of the counterculture.”

Mr. Carlin released a half dozen comedy albums during the ‘70s, including the million-record sellers “Class Clown,” “Occupation: Foole” (1973) and “An Evening With Wally Lando” (1975). He was chosen to host the first episode of the late-night comedy show “Saturday Night Live” in 1975. And two years later, he found the perfect platform for his brand of acerbic, cerebral, sometimes off-color standup humor in the fledgling, less restricted world of cable television. By 1977, when his first HBO comedy special, “George Carlin at USC” was aired, he was recognized as one of the era’s most influential comedians. He also become a best-selling author of books that expanded on his comedy routines, including “When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?,” which was published by Hyperion in 2004.

Mr. Carlin was born in New York City in 1937. “I grew up in New York wanting to be like those funny men in the movies and on the radio,” he said. “My grandfather, mother and father were gifted verbally, and my mother passed that along to me. She always made sure I was conscious of language and words.”

He quit high school to join the Air Force in the mid-’50s and, while stationed in Shreveport, La., worked as a radio disc jockey. Discharged in 1957, he set out to pursue his boyhood dream of becoming an actor and comic. He moved to Boston where he met and teamed up with Jack Burns, a newscaster and comedian. The team worked on radio stations in Boston, Fort Worth, and Los Angeles, and performed in clubs throughout the country during the late ‘50s.

After attracting the attention of the comedian Mort Sahl, who dubbed them “a duo of hip wits,” they appeared as guests on “The Tonight Show” with Jack Paar. Still, the Carlin-Burns team was only moderately successful, and, in 1960, Mr. Carlin struck out on his own.

During a career that spanned five decades, he emerged as one of the most durable, productive and versatile comedians of his era. He evolved from Jerry Seinfeld-like whimsy and a buttoned-down decorum in the ‘60s to counterculture icon in the ‘70s. By the ‘80s, he was known as a scathing social critic who could artfully wring laughs from a list of oxymorons that ranged from “jumbo shrimp” to “military intelligence.” And in the 1990s and into the 21st century the balding but still pony-tailed comic prowled the stage — eyes ablaze and bristling with intensity — as the circuit’s most splenetic curmudgeon.

During his live 1996 HBO special, “Back in Town,” he raged over the shallowness of the ‘90s “me first” culture — mocking the infatuation with camcorders, hyphenated names, sneakers with lights on them, and lambasting white guys over 10 years old who wear their baseball hats backwards. Baby boomers, “who went from ‘do your thing’ to ‘just say no’ ...from cocaine to Rogaine,” and pro life advocates (“How come when it’s us it’s an abortion, and when it’s a chicken it’s an omelet?”), were some of his prime targets. In the years following his 1977 cable debut, Mr. Carlin was nominated for a half dozen Grammy awards and received CableAces awards for best stand-up comedy special for “George Carlin: Doin’ It Again (1990) and “George Carlin: Jammin’ “ (1992). He also won his second Grammy for the album “Jammin” in 1994.

Personal Struggles

During the course of his career, Mr. Carlin overcame numerous personal trials. His early arrests for obscenity (all of which were dismissed) and struggle to overcome his self-described “heavy drug use” were the most publicized. But in the ‘80s he also weathered serious tax problems, a heart attack and two open heart surgeries.

In December 2004 he entered a rehabilitation center to address his addictions to Vicodin and red wine. Mr. Carlin had a well-chronicled cocaine problem in his 30s, and though he was able to taper his cocaine use on his own, he said, he continued to abuse alcohol and also became addicted to Vicodin. He entered rehab at the end of that year, then took two months off before continuing his comedy tours.

“Standup is the centerpiece of my life, my business, my art, my survival and my way of being,” Mr. Carlin once told an interviewer. “This is my art, to interpret the world.” But, while it always took center stage in his career, Mr. Carlin did not restrict himself to the comedy stage. He frequently indulged his childhood fantasy of becoming a movie star. Among his later credits were supporting parts in “Car Wash” (1976), “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure” (1989), “The Prince of Tides” (1991), and “Dogma” (1999).

His 1997 book, “Brain Droppings,” became an instant best seller. And among several continuing TV roles, he starred in the Fox sitcom “The George Carlin Show,” which aired for one season. “That was an experiment on my part to see if there might be a way I could fit into the corporate entertainment structure,” he said after the show was canceled in 1994. “And I don’t,” he added.

Despite the longevity of his career and his problematic personal life, Mr. Carlin remained one of the most original and productive comedians in show business. “It’s his lifelong affection for language and passion for truth that continue to fuel his performances,” a critic observed of the comedian when he was in his mid-60s. And Chris Albrecht, an HBO executive, said, “He is as prolific a comedian as I have witnessed.”

Mr. Carlin is survived by his wife, Sally Wade; daughter Kelly Carlin McCall; son-in-law, Bob McCall, brother, Patrick Carlin and sister-in-law, Marlene Carlin. His first wife, Brenda Hosbrook, died in 1997.

Although some criticized parts of his later work as too contentious, Mr. Carlin defended the material, insisting that his comedy had always been driven by an intolerance for the shortcomings of humanity and society. “Scratch any cynic,” he said, “and you’ll find a disappointed idealist.”

Still, when pushed to explain the pessimism and overt spleen that had crept into his act, he quickly reaffirmed the zeal that inspired his lists of complaints and grievances. “I don’t have pet peeves,” he said, correcting the interviewer. And with a mischievous glint in his eyes, he added, “I have major, psychotic hatreds."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/24/arts/24carlin.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&hp

One of the best comics ever.

You don't say (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=559404)

You don't say (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=559404)

God Damn it! I looked for a thread, I swear I did!:headbang:

God Damn it! I looked for a thread, I swear I did!:headbang:
Don't worry, we still love you :fluffle:

I've asked the mods to delete this.

I'm bummed out now...
God Damnit! You really piss me off! Couldn't You have just taken Dick Cheney? But, oh no you got to take someone who makes us laugh.

Its times like these I'm glad I'm an atheist, and I would like to thank George Carlin for introducing me to that word. Also, if I have learned anything from watching George Carlin's acts, that he didn't seem like someone who would want to rest in peace. So I suggest changing R.I.P. to D.R.I.P. for Don't Rest In Peace, or at the very least Give Him Hell, George.

He was just here a minute ago...