Bob Newhart, beloved deadpan comedy icon, dies at 94 – National

Bob Newhart, the stone-faced accountant turned comedian, has died at the age of 94. He went on to become one of the most popular TV stars of his generation after achieving great success with his classic comedy albums.

Newhart’s publicist Jerry Digne said the actor died Thursday in Los Angeles after a brief illness.

Best remembered now as the star of two hit TV shows of his own name in the 1970s and 1980s, Newhart began his career as a stand-up comedian in the late 1950s. He became nationally known in the 1960s when his routines were recorded on vinyl. Bob Newhart’s Button Down MindThe album won Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards.

Other comedians of the time, such as Lenny Bruce, Mort Sahl, Alan King, Mike Nichols and Elaine May, often got laughs with their aggressive attacks on modern conventions, but Newhart was an exception. His views were modern, but he rarely raised his voice, speaking hesitantly and almost stammeringly. His only prop was a telephone, which he used to pretend to talk to the person on the other end of the line.

In one memorable skit, he portrayed a Madison Avenue image maker trying to teach Abraham Lincoln how to improve the Gettysburg Address. “Let’s say it was 87 years ago, not 87 years ago,” he advised.

Another popular one is The Wright Brothers’ CommercializationHe tried to persuade aviation pioneers to start airlines, but recognized that the distance of a maiden flight might limit airline operations.

“Well, if we have to land every 105 feet, it’ll take less time to get to the shore.”

Newhart was initially hesitant to sign up for a weekly TV series, fearing that his material would be overexposed. Nevertheless, he accepted NBC’s attractive offer, The Bob Newhart Show It premiered on October 11, 1961. Despite an Emmy and a Peabody Award, the half-hour variety show was canceled after one season, which became a source of jokes for Newhart for decades.

He waited ten years before starting another one. The Bob Newhart Show 1972. This is a situation comedy in which Newhart plays a Chicago psychologist living in a penthouse, with his schoolteacher wife, Susan Pleshette. Their neighbors and patients, especially airline navigator Bill Daley, are a quirky and neurotic bunch who provide the perfect contrast to Newhart’s deadpan commentary.

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Check in with Bob Newhart

One of the most acclaimed series of the 1970s, it ran until 1978.

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Four years later, the comedian simply started another show called: New Heart. This time he was a successful New York writer who decided to reopen the long-closed Vermont Inn. Once again, Newhart was a calm, rational man surrounded by eccentric locals. Once again, the show was a huge hit and ran for eight seasons on CBS.

It ended in memorable style in 1990, with Newhart playing an old Chicago psychologist who wakes up in bed with Pleshette, cowering and recounting a strange dream he had: “I was an innkeeper in some crazy little town in Vermont. … The handyman was missing the point, and there were three lumberjacks, but only one of them would talk!”

The stunt parodied: Dallas An episode where a major character dies, but is resurrected when it is revealed that he died in a dream.

The two subsequent series were relative flops. shotIn 1992-93, and George & Leo1997-98. Although nominated several times, he never won an Emmy for his work on a sitcom. “They think I don’t act. They think Bob is Bob,” he said with a sigh.

Over the years, Newhart has also appeared in several films, mostly in comedic roles. Among them: Catch 22, In and Out, Legally Blonde 2 and elfAs a little dad to his adopted full-sized son Will Ferrell, his recent work includes: Horrible Bosses And the TV series Librarians, The Big Bang Theory and Young Sheldon.

Newhart married Virginia Quinn, known to friends as Jeannie, in 1964, and they remained together until her death in 2023. They had four children: Robert, Timothy, Jennifer, and Courtney. Newhart was a frequent guest on Johnny Carson’s show, and he loved to tease her about her three divorces. Tonight The host said at least some comedians enjoyed long-term marriages. He was particularly close to fellow comedian and family man Don Rickles, whose raucous insult humor clashed memorably with Newhart’s droll understatement.

“We’re apples and oranges. I’m Jewish, he’s Catholic. He’s humble, I’m the loud guy,” Rickles told Variety in 2012. A decade later, Judd Apatow paid homage to their friendship in a short documentary. Rice and Money: A Love Story.

A master of gentle satire, Newhart turned to comedy after growing bored with his $5-an-hour accounting job in Chicago. To pass the time, he and his friend Ed Gallagher began making funny phone calls to each other. Eventually, they decided to record these as a comedy routine and sell them to radio stations.

Although their efforts were unsuccessful, the album caught the attention of Warner Brothers, who signed Newhart to a recording contract and booked her at a club in Houston in February 1960.

“I was a terrified 30-year-old guy coming out on stage and playing my first nightclub,” he recalled in 2003.

During his two-week date, six of his routines were recorded and the album Bob Newhart’s Button Down MindIt was released on April Fool’s Day in 1960. It sold 750,000 copies and was followed by The button-down mindset strikes back! At one point, the album reached No. 1 and No. 2 on the sales charts. In 1960, The New York Times called him “the first comedian in history to become famous through recording.”

Newhart won a Grammy Award for Album of the Year for her debut album, as well as Best New Artist in 1960 and for her follow-up album. The button-down mindset strikes back! It won the award for Best Comedy Spoken Word Album.

Newhart has been booked for several appearances. The Ed Sullivan Show And in nightclubs, concert halls, and college campuses across the country. But he hated clubs because of the drunken, booing crowds they brought to the clubs.

“Every time I have to come out of the scene and put one of those birds in its place, the routine is ruined,” he said in 1960.

In 2004, he received another Emmy nomination for Guest Actor in a Drama Series. emergency room Another honor came to him in 2007 when the Library of Congress announced its addition. Bob Newhart’s Button Down Mind A registry of historically significant sound recordings. Created in 2000, the registry adds only 25 recordings each year.

Newhart hit the bestseller list in 2006 with his memoir. I shouldn’t be doing this! He was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Read Album (including audiobook) for his reading of the book.

“I’ve always likened what I do to being convinced I’m the last sane person on Earth. It’s like Paul Revere going around town yelling, ‘This is crazy,’ but no one pays any attention to him,” Newhart wrote.

Born George Robert Newhart to a German-Irish family in Chicago, he took the name Bob to avoid confusion with his father’s name, George.

At St. Ignatius High School and Loyola University in Chicago, he entertained his fellow students by imitating stars like James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, and Jimmy Durante. After earning a degree in commerce, Newhart served in the military for two years. After his service, he returned to Chicago and enrolled in Loyola Law School, but failed. He eventually got a job as an accountant for the state Department of Labor. Tired of work, he spent his free time acting for a stock company in suburban Oak Park, an experience that led to his phone call.

“I wasn’t part of some comedic conspiracy,” Newhart wrote in her memoir. “Mike[Nichols]and Elaine[May]and Shelly[Berman]and Lenny Bruce and Johnny Winters and Mort Zall—we didn’t all get together and say, ‘Let’s change the comedy and slow it down.’ It was just our way of finding humor. College kids would hear mother-in-law jokes and say, ‘What the hell is a mother-in-law?’ What we did reflected our lives and was relevant to theirs.”

Newhart continued to make occasional TV appearances after her fourth sitcom ended, and in 2003 vowed to work as long as she could.

“I’ve had 43 years of my life, and it felt like something was missing,” he said.