He outlived his oeuvre.
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Gen X here (since we’re discussing that topic elsewhere 
), and I always thought he was horribly mean (though of course I am down with Mr. Potato Head). I haven’t actually seen any of his comedy in a long time, so maybe I need to revisit it and see what I think now, but you’re not alone.
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I had a friend in high school who idolized and emulated Don Rickles. It was amazing he didn’t get the crap kicked out of him every day. He went to dental school so he could have a captive audience.
RIP Don.
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I’m not really into that type of stand-up humor either, and I’m a shiftless Gen-X-er. What got me into him was his role in X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes. He’s done a lot of good film work.
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and
#“A DEAL DEAL Maybe the guy is a Republican”
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I always found him to be a very lovable guy, even though his routine was that of a derogatory crank. He was basically playing this character, the loud-mouthed wise guy who craps all over everybody.
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And still doing voices for Disney and Pixar as late as last year!
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These days, anyone from my childhood who I haven’t heard of for a while, the default assumption is dead.
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Came for a Kelly’s Heroes ref, leaving satisfied.
Farewell, Mr. Warmth!
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Much like Tim Whatley, who went into dentistry/Judaism for the jokes.
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I don’t care for that style of comedy either, but I do think he was an amazingly talented performer. I feel the same about a number of musicians, writers, and visual artists too.
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No, but that’s probably the way he’d like it 
Unrelated to your question: Don Prickles has made my shortlist of potential pet hedgehog names.
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Aww, the last few weeks I was just going through a bunch of old clips of his on the Tonight Show and roasts. His manic spitballing was just as manic as Robin Williams. People like him and Buddy Hacket I never thought were that funny when I was young but for some reason now I find them hilarious.
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So much awesome.
Nina Hagen is just divine!
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You have me dead to rights for sure. I’m a pretty soft, daudreaming momma’s boy with a soft-spoken, anxious father.I had some friends who were more rough jokers, and some friends who were the butt of it more than their share, and the latter definitely suffered privately. But also, I feel like I encountered one too many “I’m just kidding” guys coming up who underneath were genuinely nasty, insecure and aggressively socially competitive. Not saying Rickles was that guy, but those guys definitely put me off insult humor.
I get the roasting his famous friends stuff. Still not for me, but I get why other people are into it. He loses me completely on the “look at this greasy wop!” Stuff though. I grew up in Maine (the deep south of Canada!) And encountered a lot of very real racists who thought their trotting out of racist tropes as party jokes was all in good fun. It’s hard for me to distance myself from that too.
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Oh, man. So great.
I’ve watched some stuff today and even when he got older, he was still quick as hell.
This is a great appearance, too -
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He was genuinely scary in ‘Casino’.
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This has been making the rounds today, it’s a bit uncomfortable to see Kimmel crying, but his stories about Rickles are great. Don Rickles was basically Al Jaffee’s “snappy answers to stupid questions” personified.
Rickles was also pretty self deprecating, so it was hard to take his shtick too seriously,
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I can’t find it now, but I recently read a short piece explaining how Rickles’ insults were funny whereas lesser comics trying to do the same thing usually come off as mean assholes.
I’m reminded of a Youtube compilation of comics dealing with hecklers. The good ones make their sincere displeasure known but are funny about it; they don’t stop entertaining the rest of the audience. Then there are ones (the vastly overrated Bill Hicks, for instance) who basically stop the show to yell “GET THE FUCK OUT! I’M SERIOUS! THIS IS NOT A JOKE! TAKE YOUR SHIT AND GET OUT!” Which is not funny or entertaining, and is actually much more of a disruption than whatever the heckler was saying.
On an unrelated note, it looks like Ruth Buzzi is now the last survivor of that Sinatra roast dais.
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