No one more brilliant. No no no...genius.

I saw a show, however, where Lawler talked about how they set up the entire feud. And in the book "Man on the Moon" (read it if you haven't already) gives great insight to the wrestling thing.

What could he have done had he lived? The mind boggles.

Never understood the attraction.

I never understood this either. I think it was because this guy attacked Dave?

Andy was the first "performance artist comedy" guy. His stuff wasn't always comedy, but it was sure to make you FEEL something. He was so brilliant at mass scale subversive humor. He did things no one had ever done before...and he changed the face of comedy. The things he did might be tame by today's standars, but he's like Lenny Bruce and Redd Foxx - he paved the way.

The wrestling thing was all planned. He put female plants into the audience and would challenge them to a wrestling match. At the time, no one was sure if it was real or not.

He went on a live TV show (Fridays) and deliberately screwed up to the point that Michael Richards (Kramer) threw the cue cards at him, then started throwing food at him...all on live TV. Everyone was stunned. It wasn't until later that people came out with the fact that it was all planned. Andy was King of the Hoaxes.

He pushed limits. He challenged what we saw as "real." That's the attraction.

I've been trying to find the Fridays episode, but it's hard to get. But you should Google Andy...he did some crazy amazing things.

daphne - "He was so brilliant at mass scale subversive humor."

in a nutshell.

i think many people do not "get" subversive humor. it is more extreme than irony, which eludes some. it also is self-referential. kaufman is mocking himself and whatever medium or institution that is his target. he breaks rules of a mutual agreement that i never had been aware of, until he came along and rocked the boat. suddenly, once i digested him a bit and "got" it (at first i did not know what to think), i realized he was playing a deconstruction game.

consider, young grasshopper, a broken hammer. you could say that a hammer is never MORE of a hammer than when it is broken. It is only then that you are drawn to notice the value and meaning of hammer, even if it is only because you lack it. its brokennes sharpens your concept of its un-brokennes, which is the normal, functional state of the hammer.

andy kaufman gives us broken hammers. he breaks the rules. he breaks the rules, and then goes one better. he keeps it secret. he doesn't give us a coherent concept or narrative of what he is doing, or even who he is. he lets us figure out (if we do) what he has done.

wow. i'm a little chatterbox. i'd intended to write two sentences.

coffee overload.

Yes yes yes...that's it exactly! He forced us to look at what we sheep swallowed and made us question it. He made the people who would shape comedy today question it. His influence sent ripples across the entire genre.

I tend to think that Andy was an accidental genius...that even he did not fully comprehend the effects that his style would have on the deconstruction and eventual reanimation to a more subversive comedy era. It seems to me that he was doing what HE thought was "funny" not what he thought someone else would think was "funny." His "funny" just happened to be brilliant. His comedy style involved us...no one had ever done that before.

Gawd, I love Andy. I hope people continue to realize how important he is to the way we see the things that make us laugh.

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