George Gobel
George Gobel | |
---|---|
Born | George Leslie Goebel May 20, 1919 |
Died | February 24, 1991 | (aged 71)
Resting place | San Fernando Mission Cemetery |
Occupations |
|
Years active | 1950–1988 |
Spouse |
Alice R. Gobel
(m. 1942) |
Children | 3 |
George Leslie Goebel (May 20, 1919 – February 24, 1991) was an American humorist, actor, and comedian.[1] He was best known as the star of his own weekly comedy variety television series, The George Gobel Show, on NBC from 1954 to 1959 and on CBS from 1959 to 1960[1] (alternating in its last season with The Jack Benny Program). He was also a familiar panelist on the NBC game show Hollywood Squares.
Early years
He was born George Leslie Goebel in Chicago on May 20, 1919,[2] the only child of Hermann and Lillian (MacDonald) Goebel. His father, Hermann Goebel, who was then working as a butcher and grocer, had immigrated to the United States in the 1890s with his parents from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.[3] His mother, Lillian (MacDonald) Goebel, was a native of Illinois, as was her mother, while Lillian's father, a tugboat captain, had immigrated from Scotland.[3]
Even before his 1937 graduation from
Television
Gobel debuted his comedy series on NBC on October 2, 1954.
Gobel and his business manager David P. O'Malley[12] formed a production company, Gomalco, a composite of their last names. In addition to Gobel's own series, the company produced the first four years (1957–61) of Leave It to Beaver, as well as the films The Birds and the Bees (1956) and I Married a Woman (1958), both starring Gobel.
The centerpiece of Gobel's comedy show was his monologue about his supposed past situations and experiences, with stories and sketches allegedly about his real-life wife, Alice (nicknamed "Spooky Old Alice"), played by actress Jeff Donnell (for the first four years of the series' run). Gobel's hesitant, almost shy delivery and penchant for tangled digressions were the chief sources of comedy, more important than the actual content of the stories. His monologues popularized several catchphrases, notably "Well, I'll be a dirty bird" (spoken by the Kathy Bates character in the 1990 film Misery), "You can't hardly get them like that no more", and "Well then there now" (spoken by James Dean during a brief imitation of Gobel in the 1955 film Rebel Without a Cause and as part of the closing lyric in Perry Como's 1956 hit record "Juke Box Baby"). Gobel's show used some of television's top writers of the era: Hal Kanter, Jack Brooks, and Norman Lear. Peggy King was a regular on the series as a vocalist, and the guest stars ranged from Shirley MacLaine and Evelyn Rudie to Bob Feller, Phyllis Avery, and Vampira.
Gobel labeled himself "Lonesome George," and the nickname stuck for the rest of his career. The show sometimes included a segment in which Gobel appeared with a guitar, started to sing, then got sidetracked into a story, with the song always left unfinished after fitful starts and stops, a comedy approach (akin to one used by Victor Borge) and the Smothers Brothers. (Tommy Smothers noted that Gobel "was my motivation when I got into comedy originally",[13] observing that "he didn't do jokes—he did timing and played the guitar."[14]) Gobel had a scaled-down version of the Gibson L-5 archtop guitar constructed to suit his own smaller stature.[15] Several dozen of this "L-5CT" or "George Gobel" model were produced in the late 1950s and early 1960s. He also played the harmonica.
In 1957, three U.S. Air Force
From 1958 to 1961, Gobel appeared in
Gobel was also a skilled guitar player, and as such was issued a specially designed electric guitar in his name commissioned by the Gibson Guitar Company in 1959 - the George Gobel Model. Gibson chose "George Gobel" as a model name, as Gobel was one of the most well-known television personalities at the time with a nationally broadcast show five nights a week. Gibson believed its new model guitar would enjoy greater exposure on national television, as opposed to naming the model after a lesser-known jazz musician, for example. Gobel accompanied himself with this guitar on a number of his comedy routines.
TV guest appearances
Gobel was a guest on various TV programs, including: The Andy Williams Show;The Red Skelton Show; The Dean Martin Show; The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford; The Bing Crosby Show; The Dinah Shore Show; Death Valley Days; Wagon Train; The Carol Burnett Show; The Donny & Marie Show; and Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show, and made cameos on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In. An episode of My Three Sons in December 1960 was titled "Lonesome George", in which Gobel played himself. He appeared on F Troop as amateur inventor Henry Terkel in the 1966 episode "Go for Broke".
In an often-replayed segment from a 1969 episode of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, Gobel entered after Bob Hope and Dean Martin, walking onstage with a plastic cup with an unidentified drink. Gobel remarked to Carson about coming on last and having to follow major stars Hope and Martin. He quipped to Carson, "Did you ever get the feeling that the world was a tuxedo and you were a pair of brown shoes?", to which Carson, Hope, Martin, and the audience came unglued with laughter. After the laughter died down, Carson asked Gobel about his career in World War II as a fighter pilot. Gobel feigned bewilderment at why people laugh when he says that he spent the war in Oklahoma, pointing out with mock pride that no Japanese plane ever got past Tulsa, deep in the center of the continental U.S.[8] Gobel also began to get some unexpected laughs, being unaware that Dean Martin had begun flicking his cigarette ashes into Gobel's drink. Observing all of this, Carson finally asked rhetorically, "Exactly what time did I lose control of the show?!"
Gobel had employed the tuxedo joke at least once before, on the June 22, 1957, episode of his show. He complained that the TV director and crew treated him "as if they were a tuxedo and I was a pair of brown shoes." On that occasion, the gag received a respectable, but not overwhelming, response.
In 1972, the television game show
Films
When ratings soared on The George Gobel Show (rated in the top 10 of 1954–55),
Gobel's television success did not translate to the big screen, though. His The Birds and the Bees performed so poorly at the box office that release was delayed on his second movie,
Gobel was considered for the voice of Winnie-the-Pooh by Walt Disney, but turned it down after reading the books and finding Pooh to be "an awful bore."[19]
Death
George Gobel died on February 24, 1991, about a month after surgery that was intended to improve his mobility after a series of strokes left him unable to walk.
Filmography
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1956 | The Birds and the Bees | George "Hotsy" Hamilton II | |
1958 | I Married a Woman | Marshall "Mickey" Briggs | |
1977 | The Day It Came to Earth | Prof. Bartholomew | |
1978 | Rabbit Test | The President of the U. S. | |
1984 | Ellie | Preacher |
References
- ^ a b "George Gobel". Variety. March 3, 1991.
- ^ "TCMdb Overview".
- ^ a b "The Fourteenth Census of the United States: Population—1920", digital image of original census enumeration page, January 7–8, 1920; Chicago City (Ward 27), Cook County, Illinois. United States Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Washington, D.C. FamilySearch, online genealogical database provided as a public service by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah. Retrieved June 6, 2017.(subscription required)
- ^ "Roosevelt at a glance". Chicago Sun-Times. June 15, 1994. 95
- ^ "CPS Alumni-Journalists & Media Personalities-George Gobel". Cpsalumni.org. Archived from the original on December 24, 2010. Retrieved March 16, 2010.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ "For Gobel, KMOX Was A Step On The Ladder", St. Louis Media History Foundation, archived from the original on October 4, 2013, retrieved October 4, 2013
- ^ a b Folkart, Burt A. (February 25, 1991). "TV Comedian George Gobel Dies at 71". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved June 8, 2022.
- ^ a b "The Tonight Show 1969". YouTube. Archived from the original on February 27, 2020. Retrieved March 31, 2020.
- ^ The George Gobel Show - 2 October 1954, Gomalco Productions, 1954, retrieved October 17, 2023
- ^ "Most Outstanding New Personality Nominees - Winners 1955 Emmy Awards - Television Academy".
- ISBN 978-0-3074-8320-1. Retrieved June 8, 2022.
- ^ "Gobel and O'Malley Sell Comedy Series To C.B.S. Television". The New York Times. June 5, 1957. p. 71. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
- ^ "Tommy Smothers Interview". American Masters. Retrieved November 7, 2023.
- ISBN 9780307490728. Retrieved November 7, 2023.
- ISBN 978-1-57424-047-4. Retrieved November 10, 2023.
- ^ "Let It Ride". IBDb.
- St Louis Post-Dispatch. p. 3D. Retrieved June 8, 2022.
- ISBN 978-0-3853-5421-9.
- ^ "Legacy Content". Laughingplace.com.