OT - Vintage Female Comedians - Any Signature Props or Clothes?
Diomede
Posts: 15,086
Groucho Marx had his cigar, and he had his black tape mustache and eyebrows. Charlie Chaplin's 'little tramp' had his hat and cane. Lots of male comedians have a signature prop or article of clothing that serves as an identifier. What about classic female comedians? Carol Burnett pulled on her earlobe and did her 'tarzan call' but those are not really signature props that I could model. Can you think of classic female comedians who had an identifier like Groucho's cigar or Chaplin's hat and cane?
Here are some names of vintage female comedians just to get the ball rolling, but I can't think of identifiers. Can you think of an identifier for these funny ladies? Can you think of other funny ladies who did have an identifier?
- Mae West
- Lucille Ball - (maybe her red hair counts as an identifier?)
- Carole Lombard
- Joan Blondell
- Madeline Kahn
- Carol Burnett
- others?
*** - a pic or a link or a screenshot could be both fun and helpful. Here is Mae West.
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Aha - Here is one. Phyllis Diller.
An exhibit at the Smithsonian American History Museum has a set of her gloves and cigarette holder. I would add her wig to the cigarette holder to get Phyllis Diller's identifier. Others?
Here is a Carol Burnett I did a while back in the gallery with the products used listed:
All credit for these two characters being reasonable good caricatures of Carol Burnett & Phyllis Diller go to the PAs that made them, 3D Universe, DO (Edie 8 is a DAZ Original so I'm not sure who made), PedroFurtadoArts, vykohria, along with an assist from J.Cade for her toon Bette Davis skin shader materials sets.
Thank you, @nonesuch00. The caricatures look great. Deserved credit to you and to the PAs, because the PA shapes without context are meaningless. Great renders.
I thought of a couple more examples, but I wonder if younger audiences would get these references. Ruth Buzzi's curmudgeon and Gilda Radner's news columnist Rosanne.
These are all from 50+ years ago. The vast majority of people under 30 don't know who they are. I talk to actors who are in their 20s and 30s auditioning for different tv and movie productions who've never seen The Sound of Music or The Wizard of Oz, or even know who Barbra Streisand or Johnny Carson are - they're definitely not going to have heard of female comedians whose careers peaked around 1972. Chaplin's Little Tramp outfit, Mae West's 1890's silhouette and hats, and Groucho Marx's black tape facial hair and cigar are relics of silent films and vaudville.
The trademark looks of female performers that people in their 20s and 30s are going to recognize are from the pop music world, like Ariana Grande's ponytail. Even performers like Adele and Lady Gaga and Madonna are considered old.
Cable television and Internet streaming services have fragmented the audience. In the 20th century, everybody watched reruns of sitcoms, endless broadcasts of old Hollywood movies, and everyone listened to the radio. Now you can't see a rerun of a sitcom unless you subscribe to very limited cable show packages, or pay a hundred dollars for a box set of DVDs.
Excellent points, @Fauvist. My immediate project involves the comedians of long ago, so that is why I asked for suggestions related to those. But the whole topic of famous comedians is an interesting topic to me. Do modern people like Wanda Sykes or Sarah Silverman have identifying props, or recurring caricatures with identifyable wigs/clothes/posture? Are there many examples of more modern comedians who have developed a readily identifiable character and used it in repeated performances - to the exclusion of others? I mean that Harpo Marx, WC Fields,etc remained in essentially the same character for a very long career. Arguably, Bob Newhart plays the same character as a Chicago psychiatrist as he does owning a Newngland Inn. The problem from my perspective is that his character has no identifiable prop or costume. I consider that different from a comedian who adopts a variety of very different characters/makeup/costume for different performances, such that no single one is identified with the comedian.
BTW - Lots of young people who have never seen the Wizard of OZ? Amazing. And in my view, sad. When I lived in DC, the park service put a giant screen up on the National Mall and showed old movies. When they showed Wizard of Oz, people twenty and thirty years younger than me showed up in costume and recited the dialogue along with the movie. I guess I am so old now that people in their twenties and thirties would not even have seen the movie. They have missed out on a great one.
@Diomede, great choices you made!
I don't know why it would matter why the comedians talked of here in the thread go back 40+ years. If that's what you know & what fits the theme, it's a go. The goal of the thread isn't to go viral with the newest hipsters. There are other places to do that for those inclined to try. I like Wanda Sykes but even she is considered a relic by some standards.
I think one of the reasons why early television, movies, and music are so excellent is that there were literally millions of years of liguistic evolution and oral traditions that were repeated for who knows how long to a very few people generation after generation and then came the printing press, video and sound recordings and broadcasts and suddenly all that old great work had a huge audience never possible before.
I also think that professional entertainment can have negative effects in dissuading people from being a harmless clown in their daily life or even trying to develop those skills for fear of not measuring up to those professionals on TV but there is a lot to be said for getting a harmless chuckle at work or at home but it's not a natural talent, it takes experience and observation.
I like Ruth Buzzi and I had the biggest crush on Roseanne Rosannadanna (and Gilda Radner) because she always had me rolling in the floor laughing until me lungs and stomach hurt with her Roseanna skits. Not just an internet emoji ROTFL but real life ROTFL. My siblings would always look at me like what the hockeysticks? Some of the Three Stooges shorts do the some thing. Another great comedian I also loved seeing was Lawanda Page who played Aunt Ester on Sanford & Son. Another comedienne that could get me to laugh out loud. Same sort of rubber face. Lucille Ball. Mary Tyler Moore, Valerie Harper, Cloris Leachman masterful comedic acting and delivery of not to be believed situation comedy. Mary (almost) always so perfectly polite in so many awfully awkward situations. That forced smile and those perfect manners Mary gave to those that obliviously put her in those situations is great and always so priceless to see that acting. Comedienne gets me to laugh = instant crush.
However, @Fauvist does have a point. In my opinion, not only is the audience fragmenting but story telling tools and computer aid to those stories are reaching a point eventually so that anyone that's keen to tell professional looking produced stories can do so and make a film about their own real or completely fictional story. Hollywood and these game studios will eventually go bust, a short blip in mankind's struggle to evolve technology to serve everyone equitably in a sustainble free market that finally manages to restrain abuses and monopolisation of those resources available for that free market. Closest thing to real equitable communism/socialism is an actual free market that works with sensible basic restrictions to protect human rights and the ecology. No violence and cruelty allowed in making products, selling products, using products. I think music will also fragment to a more natural free market too. With that, the chances of being the equivalent of multi-millionaires or even billionaires from such evdeavors will vanish. That doesn't mean that Carole Burnett and the others listed here and not listed here aren't legitimately funny but almost everyone is legitimately funny in the right circumstances. For the ideal of becoming excessively rich as an entertainer the door will close in the future I think. It's decades, at least 2 decades off I think.
Nothing against the newly famous but I don't even have time to watch all of what the long ago famous did so well but I'll see what I can watch of those old shows. I don't feel the need to experiment watching with new shows too often with such great available tried and true comedy available on streaming television with commercials free. Most people have not seen every episode of a series. At least I haven't.
I'm the same way with music. In fact, when I am in stores and they pipe in music what I hear is music from the 80s & before. It sounds great. I realized though that 5, 10, 15 & 20 year old listening to what is on the radio and the streaming services now are almost certainly not going to hear that music being piped into the stores they visit once they reach middle age and beyond. Not gonna happen. They did try that more recent music piped into stores where I lived about 10 years ago for a couple of years and although I didn't complain myself an overwhelming number of people must of complained because for the past 7 or 8 years they've not piped in that new music at all (not going to mention specific artists in this case).
@Diomede I have never seen Mae West, except in the 70s as a kid when she was on as guest in variety shows and her jokes went over me head then, but not I am going to check her out. Of course, I've heard her a couple of her most famous one liners, which are pretty funny.
A lot of good points. I especially like the suggestion of Lawanda Page. She varied the details of her look, but I think a particular hat, sweater, and purse could convey the reference to people familiar with the show. She had epic comedy battles with Fred. I think Aunt Esther is a great suggestion. I also remember Lawanda Page from Dean Martin celebrity roasts. Very funny lady.
Mae West's career has become sort of a side hobby for me. When I had Turner Classic Movies, I watched a lot of the silent Sunday night flicks and got interested in entertainment in the early 20th century more generally, including stage, vaudeville, burlesque, etc. Mae West was successful enough to eventually control her career, including writing and producing her own stage performances in New York. She was also a brilliant marketer. The story of Mae West going to jail and refusing bail because she wanted the publicity is priceless. Got the governor involved.
Mae West's comedy is not for everyone. If she were in modern times, critics would debate whether she is the ultimate exerciser of female power or if she is perpetuating the patriarchy. Like her comedy or not, most would agree she understood the structure of comedy (double meanings, switcheroos, intentional misunderstanding, etc), and was a gifted writer who applied her craft.
- save a boyfriend for a rainy day, and another in case it doesn't rain.
- I used to be Snow White, but I drifted.
- It is better to be looked over than overlooked.
Mae West trivia - https://www.historytoday.com/archive/months-past/mae-west-sentenced
Found a video compliation of Aunt Esther. Hmm, she doesn't always wear the sweater or a hat. I still think they are essential props because that is what I thought of when she was suggested. Enjoy.
Here clothing is very typical baptist church, for the USA 70s, and her comedy is spot on for that. I've have been dressed down by baptist ladies in real life as if they were channeling Aunt Ester or vice versa. I still laugh at the time when one of my brother's girlfriends visited the church with us and she asked us younger kids if we wanted any crackers and we started laughing as the communion bread was passed by. The lady in the pew in front of us took us down hard! (we as unbaptised kids were not allowed crackers and grape juice when communion came by, NO, NO, NO).