Name: Bob and Ray on Letterman, December 28, 1982
Uploaded: 2016-02-04T03:44:27.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Bob and Ray on Letterman, December 28, 1982' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-02-04. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Bob and Ray on Letterman, December 28, 1982' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-02-04. Transcript available.

We got a good one for you tonight.
Two of the greats in the world of comedy, Bob and Ray, are here tonight.
Hi there.
You folks have joined us on a fine evening.
My first two guests tonight are two of the funniest and most respected
performers in all of comedy over the years.
They have created their own alternative universe, I'm sorry, alternate universe,
full of slightly twisted characters.
It's an honor to welcome them back to our show.
Please now say hello to Bob and Ray.
Thank you.
Every Christmas the bookstores seem to be full of bigger and bigger volumes.
We don't get a chance to look them all over.
And for you history fans in particular, we've spotted one book this year that
hasn't even been reviewed.
And we'd like to recommend it to you to look over and see what you think of it.
The author is here with me.
And he has signed our guest card.
I can't make out that too.
Bonfiglio L. Rumpelmeyer.
Is that...
No, no.
I have terrible handwriting.
What is your name?
Alfred E. Nelson.
All right.
Now, this book is entitled The History of the United States.
Yeah.
It's a big book.
It's got a lot of pages.
It's heavy, isn't it?
It's a complete history of the United States.
And I started this project last February and got it through just in time for
the Christmas season.
Do it all yourself, did you?
Well, my wife helped me.
Nice thing.
I think rushing that way to get a book this size out may have presented some
complications.
It's profusely illustrated.
Yes, we have lots of wonderful pictures in there.
And I see you have some of them blown up here.
We have some at random here we'd like to show.
Now, here you have...
Is that better?
Yeah, that's it.
You have Abraham Lincoln riding to his inauguration in an automobile.
Did you check on that?
That's the first time I noticed that.
Was that in the book?
Yeah, that's one of the things we blew up at random.
Wow.
You didn't check on it or anything about that.
Well, I tell you, when I start on a project, I sit down with a typewriter and I
just go.
And everybody knows.
So why?
What's the big thing about it?
Well, all right.
Now, let's see.
Who cares?
The big thing.
Now, here's another one.
You have the father of our country.
Well, there he is.
But you have his name...
Nelson Washington.
Well, that's a Freudian slip.
That's my last name.
Well, look.
Why don't they put rubber on the end of pencils, you know?
I know.
You're going to sit here and nitpick this whole book?
You would have think that...
Look, look at all the pages I got here.
You have, what, four pictures?
Pages aren't everything.
I mean, you thought you would have picked that up when you proofread the book.
You did proofread it, didn't you?
No, I just skimmed through it fast to see if they're all there.
I think you had the publisher of Poor Rich's Almanac was Benjamin French.
That should be Franklin.
Did I say that?
Yeah.
Well, here again, you know, what's the big deal about it?
So, I was typing fast.
Look, here's the first capital of the United States.
That's a mistake.
That certainly is.
Not only Bailey's, but yours.
Right, sure.
Now, when did these errors first come to your attention, Mr. Nelson?
After the book was published, some of my friends started to call me on the
phone and kind of make a monkey out of me, you know?
I said, well, Nelson, you've done it again, you know?
I'm joking around with you anyway.
Right, sure.
Here's another example of your sloppy work.
What can I say?
You know, if you're going to take a book this size and take out four pictures
and make me a monkey for that.
Well, look, did you do any research at all for the book?
Well, you know, as much as I can remember.
You did it out of memory?
Sure.
Could I ask you how far you went in school, Mr. Nelson?
Eighth grade.
Eighth grade?
Yeah, but we had very intensive history courses.
Well, even so.
They made you study like the Dickens.
Yes.
That doesn't qualify you to write a history of the United States, 1,100-page
work, even if you're a genius.
Oh, it looks good to me.
Listen, this book is leather-bound.
I don't care what it's called.
It's gold-embossed.
It will look beautiful on anyone's coffee table.
The worst part of it all, Mr. Nelson, is I understand it sells for $89.95.
Right.
And it comes in a velvet case with three ribbons to tie it into.
Well, I just want to tell you that if any child came to me asking about history,
I would never show them this as a reference work.
Well, I'd never show in your program again either.
That's the way you want to be.
That's okay with us, Mr. Nelson.
Well, listen, this is okay with me, too.
Thank you for dropping by.
Thank you.
Sign out on the way out, please.
No.
David.
Thank you very much, gentlemen.
Very nice to see you again, sir.
Very nice to see you, sir.
Very interesting and educational as well.
Entertaining and educational.
Well, Arthur is entitled to mistakes.
Sure.
In all of the years that you gentlemen have been performing, and I don't mean
to make it sound like it's...
Have you ever worked in Las Vegas?
No, never had.
Ever had any desire to work in Las Vegas?
No, never had that desire either.
You ever worked in nightclubs?
We had one disaster at the town casino in Buffalo, which is no longer there.
That was right after we came to NBC.
They thought we'd go well in a situation like that, and we didn't.
Well, we had a handicap.
They billed us as the happy sons of old Aaron, because we happened to open up
there on St. Patrick's Day.
So we weren't the happy sons of old Aaron, although I am Irish descent.
They also billed us with Billy Ward and the Dominoes, just as rock and roll was
beginning to take over.
So it wasn't too compatible.
No, no.
Okay.
We have more to talk about with Bob and Ray.
We're going to take a look at an old commercial.
Oh, great.
For an old beer here in New York City.
We'll be right back after this with more of Bob and Ray.
Thank you.
Welcome back to the show.
Bob and Ray are here, and I mentioned a beer commercial that you gentlemen did.
What was the beer still in the production?
Fields beer, yeah.
And essentially a New York state beer, New York City beer?
Well, it was mostly in the East, Massachusetts, New York, Philadelphia area.
And was this some sort of breakthrough advertising or a new idea for these
folks?
Well, it was the first soft sell in television advertising, actually, Fields
beer.
It was the first commercial that attempted to sell a product with a little bit
of humor.
And they used about three quarters of time for animation, for entertainment,
really.
Yeah.
We were the voices.
What year was this, approximately, that you first made?
About 54.
Uh-huh.
1954.
All right.
And we have an old commercial.
Is there anything you gentlemen should explain to us before we take a look at
this?
Well, this was a result of a lot of letters that they received.
What one is this?
This is Bert's Offenses.
Oh, yeah, right.
And Bert had been, he was the shorter of the two.
He'd been kind of a little raucous and kind of got on a few people's nerves to
the point of their writing.
And this was to calm them down.
So people actually responded to this commercial and then this commercial was
produced.
Actually, interesting enough that the Peel's Brewery at that time ran ads in
the paper and TV guide stating the time of day that the people could tune in to
see these commercials, which is unheard of, actually.
So this was a very popular, yeah.
Very popular commercial.
Did they sell a lot of beer as a result of this deal?
They must have.
They ran for eight years.
Okay.
Now, this would be, is this black and white, I'm guessing?
Yeah, it's black and white.
All right, we're going to take a look here now at a, I guess, a 30-second, 60-second
commercial for Peel's Beer with Bob and Ray.
This is Bert Peel.
And this is Harry Peel.
Peel's tastes best of all because it's driest of all.
Remember that, viewers.
Peel's...
Excuse me, Bert.
Friends, my brother is so enthusiastic over our wonderful beer that, well,
sometimes, without meaning to, he offends an occasional viewer.
Offends?
Well, I'm sorry, Bert.
We've had some letters, and a lady in New Jersey said that you...
I'm sorry, and you go ahead.
No, no.
I've tried to tell people how delicious our beer is, how it will bring
happiness into their nice homes.
Somehow, I've offended.
You tell them, Harry.
They like you, your personable.
I am offensive.
Goodbye, consumers.
Well, I'm sorry he's so sensitive, I never should have...
Bert!
Bullseye!
And up to that point, commercials were really hitting people over the head with
stuff.
They pretty well were, I guess, if any of us can remember back that far.
Sure.
It was now fight dander of 12 effective ways.
One, two, and a list of 12 ways to fight dander.
Not the beer, of course.
That was a different deal.
There was also commercials you did for another product out west.
I don't know if this is a national product.
No, this is west coast.
Well, after we got going with Bert and Harry, we got into animation, and we did
several in that form.
This was one of them for a soup company.
Okay, and this is, um...
It's the only one where we ever could use our own characters, the McBeeby twins.
Okay.
We'll talk together.
Now, this is for Anderson's split pea soup?
Yeah, right.
Okay, now, where do they go?
Is that just a California product, or...
I think so.
Okay.
Take a look again.
You know the date on this.
And here with me are the non-identical twins, Happy and Fee Wee.
Hiya, soup fans everywhere.
The gentlemen here are going to demonstrate how we split peas for our soup,
rather than crush them and lose the play-doh.
You notice the intricate machinery, the pieces of the...
And I thought so, that one was a duck.
That's right, an automatic reject feature about that.
Quality hasn't held up to you all.
What year, what year was that roughly?
Probably 59.
Around 59, yeah.
And these were the famous McBeeby twins.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I don't know whether you want to...
I don't know if I can do it on this side.
I'm using it.
You all know.
Oh, it's always a pleasure to be here.
This program with you, David.
Visiting with you.
Visiting with you.
And looking at some of those old turkey commercials of ours.
Certainly brings back a lot of memories.
To us.
To us.
To us.
Is that...
Is that...
Oh.
I'm sorry.
Oh, I was going to...
What do you gentlemen have coming up now?
Well, I'm going to do some more public radio that we did a bit of this past
year.
I'll do more of that this spring.
Putting another book together.
Hope to have that out for next Christmas.
By Alfred Nelson.
Kind of a follow-up.
Yeah.
I did the work you already did.
Now, tell me about the...
Was the Bob and Ray train going around?
What was that?
Oh, the trophy train.
The trophy train, yeah.
We had that all summer over at the museum here.
We told you about that last time we were here.
Yeah.
And what were some of the items people could come and see when the train came
to their town?
Most of them were yours.
Oh, my confirmation suit.
My...
My glove when I was in the eighth grade.
Yeah.
My first basements mitt.
High school graduation.
Yeah.
I had mine in there.
Geez, that's exciting.
It is.
Yeah.
Oh, you could see everything in 48 seconds.
Oh, wow.
And probably a real moneymaker for you guys, huh?
Yeah.
No, not a cent.
Thank you very much for being back here, gentlemen.
And have a good New Year, as it were.
Bob and Ray, ladies and gentlemen.
Thank you.
We'll be right back after station identification.
Thank you.