Name: Ernie Kovaks Inducted into TV Hall of Fame, November 30, 1987
Uploaded: 2017-01-15T19:30:43.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Ernie Kovaks Inducted into TV Hall of Fame, November 30, 1987' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2017-01-15. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Ernie Kovaks Inducted into TV Hall of Fame, November 30, 1987' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2017-01-15. Transcript available.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Carl Reiner.
My recollections of Ernie Kovacs come in the form for which he was most famous,
a series of blackouts.
Close up on two young actors staying at the Beverly Hills Hotel, both were to
work on a television drama for Playhouse 90.
Ernie and I would drive to work together each morning. He'd drive. I'd cover my
eyes.
He'd come out of the driveway at the hotel doing 60.
Nervous actor to driver. Slow down. Driver to nervous actor. Don't worry, it's
not my time to go.
Nervous actor to driver, maybe not, but what if it's the time of the guy coming
up the driveway? Blackout.
Ernie loved practical jokes, even when they weren't set up.
Interior, Imperial Gardens Restaurant, 1960. Very few of us knew what sushi was
at that time.
I knew. Ernie knew. Jack Lemmon didn't know.
Lemmon joins us late, sits down on the floor with us.
The waitress had set out little dishes of powerful green mustard called wasabi.
It was placed on a slice of radish with a piece of cucumber.
Close up of Jack Lemmon saying, what's that?
And over to Ernie. You're late, but we've saved you an appetizer. Just pop it
in your mouth and enjoy it.
Close up of Jack as he does what Ernie suggests.
And my voice is heard in the background saying, no, a beat too late.
After four bites push in to reveal Jack Lemmon's eyes.
A cartoon come to life.
Pinwheels and lights flashing from the pupils as he reaches for a whole pitcher
of the water.
Blackout.
Ernie Kovacs was an original, and his story reads like a story he might have
made up to keep his audience amused and fascinated.
In the early 50s, this music met the appearance of a creative genius known as
Ernie Kovacs.
He would be the first comedian to make full use of television's potential,
creating an imaginative and sometimes bizarre electronic world all his own.
In fact, if you see something on television today that seems far out,
chances are it existed in the fertile mind of Ernie Kovacs 25 years ago.
Born of Hungarian parents in Trenton, New Jersey in 1919, he was the undisputed
neighborhood clown.
He was always center stage, always seeking laughs, as far back as grade school.
Rarely was his mobile face in repose, as it is in this photograph with his
parents and his brother and sister.
Ernie's ambition was to become an actor, and after high school, he went to New
York City on a scholarship to the Academy of Dramatic Arts.
After a succession of odd jobs and a failed marriage that left him with custody
of his two daughters,
Ernie achieved some success as a radio announcer at WTTM in Trenton, New Jersey.
In 1950, Ernie moved over to television at WPTZ in Philadelphia.
Viewers got their first taste of his wild antics on a cooking show called Deadline
for Dinner.
At one time, he had as many as four different programs on the air.
He appeared from three and a half to five hours daily,
and a typical working schedule would find him in the studio working close to 15
straight hours.
Somebody seemed to have flipped a little fish into my martini.
It was during those hectic years he met and married the lovely musical comedy
star Edie Adams, who also became a member of the cast.
His daughters would come to visit him on the set, as these home movies show,
but unfortunately, these happy times wouldn't last.
His newfound joy was suddenly shattered when his estranged wife vanished with
both his daughters.
Ernie spent over two years on huge sums of money in private detective fees
trying to track down his children.
During this time, no one knew the anguish he was going through as he was making
the nation laugh.
Eventually, he found his daughters in Florida, and he brought them back to New
York City to live with him and Edie in the 17-room duplex apartment on Central
Park West.
As Ernie's popularity soared, he hopscotched from one network to the other,
going from show to show.
In 1956, he was offered a major break by taking on the job of hosting The
Tonight Show.
When the popular comedy team of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis parted company,
Jerry was offered a 90-minute show by himself.
He only wanted to do an hour, and that left a 30-minute space in the schedule
that nobody wanted to fill.
Nobody, that is, but Ernie Kovacs.
He accepted the challenge to follow the superstar with a show that featured
absolutely not a word of dialogue.
The next morning, everyone was talking about this remarkable tour de force that
featured visual comedy as it had never been seen before.
With his face on the cover of Life magazine, Ernie Kovacs was finally a star.
He moved to the West Coast, but brought with him a mountain of problems with
the IRS.
Ernie didn't believe in paying taxes, and he piled up huge debts on business
schemes that read like some of his more incredible sketches.
His approach to money also showed up in his work, and he would spend more than
he was making to get the effect he wanted.
In one case, he spent over $12,000 to get one particular stunt that would last
a total of eight seconds.
On the night of January 13, 1962, a light rain was falling when Ernie Kovacs
lost control of a station wagon and skidded into a utility pole.
He was killed instantly, a week before his 43rd birthday.
Ernie Kovacs was seen on television for a brief 12 years, but he has left us a
rare heritage of laughter,
the kind that will never grow old or perish.
He was a one-of-a-kind personality and entertainer.
And in our lifetime, we are fortunate to have even won Ernie Kovacs.
I'd now like to introduce an occasional member of the Nairobi trio and a close
personal friend of Ernie's, Jack Lemon.
They say that you can really get to know a fella if you share a foxhole with
him.
And thank God I never had that particular honor with Ernie Kovacs,
but I did spend many, many an evening playing gin and poker with him.
I think you can also tell a lot about a guy by the way he plays his hand.
With Ernie, you could never tell when he was bluffing,
because like everything else that he did in his life,
every gesture was a grand one.
It would be a pair of deuces or a royal straight flush.
He'd play him the same way.
He lived expansively and expensively.
But he always had a very keen appreciation for quality merchandise.
Ernie's bottom line when he was working in television
was not how much does it cost,
it was how much does it make me laugh.
Because he had the conceit, if you will,
the confidence to say if it makes me laugh, it's going to make you laugh.
And a great deal of the time, he was right on the money.
And Ernie's death at age 42
was a shock and a terrible shame to all of us who knew him
and all of us who loved him.
Because we admired not only his accomplishments,
but his amazing potential
and typical of his sense of humor and his lifestyle.
You know what that nut has on his tombstone?
Nothing in moderation.
It's on his tombstone.
And his wife, Edie, better than anyone,
knew and appreciated his devotion to family
and his dedication to raising the craft of comedy to a level of arts.
For his courage to defy convention for the sake of laughter,
the Television Academy Hall of Fame
welcomes into the inner circle
the shining wit
that will always be Ernie Kovacs.
You know, Ernie would have loved this.
He really wasn't much for tributes,
but he loved being center stage
when people said nice things about his work.
He was an unusual man.
He lived most of his life on a manic high.
Here was a grown man,
six feet two inches tall,
with a foreboding mustache,
cigar, hat,
and a foreign name.
And all this came with a soft-spoken voice
and vulnerability of a pixelated ten-year-old,
puckish boy wearing a man's body.
Ernie's irreverent style
seemed to have a way of appealing
to the very small child in all of us.
So, Kovacs,
wherever you are up there,
pass out the cigars.
The toy's paid off.
You finally got the big one.
Thank you.
Thank you.