Updated: Comedian Garry Shandling, Dead At 66; His Doctor Refuses To Sign Death Certificate

Posted March 25, 2016 5:34 PM ET; Last updated March 27, 2016 10:37 PM ET


Garry Shandling

[From article]
Shandling’s primary physician refuses to sign the death certificate because he has not yet determined a cause of death, according to TMZ. The physician admits he hadn’t seen Shandling in more than a year, but that the actor was healthy as far as he knew.
The LA County coroner will now launch an official investigation to determine the cause of death. Bloodwork from the ER where Shandling was pronounced dead has already been taken into custody,
while investigators have subpoenaed Shandling’s physician for his medical records.

http://pagesix.com/2016/03/27/garry-shandlings-doctor-wont-sign-his-death-certificate/?_ga=1.11226036.1407506085.1437464951

Garry Shandling’s doctor won’t sign his death certificate
By Lindsay Putnam
New York Post
March 27, 2016 | 8:13am

* * *

[From article]
Comedian Garry Shandling, known for “It’s Garry Shandling’s Show” and “The Larry Sanders Show,” died Thursday. He was 66.
Los Angeles Police officer Tony Im told the Associated Press that Shandling died Thursday in Los Angeles. Im said officers were dispatched to Shandling's home Thursday for a reported medical emergency. Shandling was transported to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
A coroner's official said late Thursday that Shandling's death appears to be from natural causes and no autopsy is planned. Lt. David Smith told the Associated Press there has been no official cause of death determination yet, but medical records will be used to determine how the 66-year-old comedian died.
An innovative and eccentric humorist with pillowy lips and a voice that always seemed on the verge of a whine, Shandling claimed to disdain too much logic cluttering his life.
"The answer isn't gonna be in the facts," he told The Associated Press in 2009. "It's gonna be in intuition. That's how I work creatively. I'm always teaching people that the answer to that creative question is right here, in the room, between us here."
More to the point, it was dealing with the questions he confronted in himself.
Born on Nov. 29, 1949 in Chicago, Shandling was raised in Tucson, Arizona. On arriving in Los Angeles as a young adult, it was a short hop from a brief stint in the advertising business to comedy writing and stand-up.
Then in the 1980s, he began to experiment with TV comedy, and to toy with the sitcom form, with his first series, "It's Garry Shandling's Show," a Showtime project that made no bones about its inherently artificial nature: the actors in this otherwise standard domestic comedy routinely broke the fourth wall to comment on what they were up to. Even the theme song began with the explanatory lyrics, "The theme to Garry's show...."
Then, in August 1992, Shandling created his comic masterpiece with "The Larry Sanders Show," which starred him as an egomaniacal late-night TV host with an angst-ridden show-biz life behind the scenes.
It was just three months after Carson had retired from "The Tonight Show," where Shandling had appeared as a stand-up and occasional Carson stand-in. It seemed a wry but deeply felt homage to the King of Late Night.
His films included "Hurlyburly" in 1998, "What Planet Are You From?" in 2000 and "Zoolander" in 2001.
He hosted the Emmy Awards in 2000 and 2004.
On the latter occasion, he spotted Donald Trump in the audience and congratulated the billionaire developer for hosting the Emmy-nominated "The Apprentice."
"Nice to see a man who's paid his dues, worked hard," Shandling said. "We all know what it feels like to have to build 80-story condos and gambling casinos just to get our foot in the door in show business."
In his own business dealings, Shandling became one of the rich and famous targeted by private eye Anthony Pellicano, who was sentenced to prison in 2008 on convictions of racketeering and more than six dozen other counts, including conspiracy, wire fraud and wiretapping in the Hollywood wiretaps case.
Pellicano was accused of wiretapping stars such as Sylvester Stallone and bribing police officers to run names of people, including Shandling, through law enforcement databases.

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2016/03/24/comedian-garry-shandling-dead-at-66/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+foxnews%2Fmost-popular+%28Internal+-+Most+Popular+Content%29

Comedian Garry Shandling dead at 66
Published March 24, 2016

FoxNews.com

Jackie Mason Profiles Bernie Sanders

[From article]
“[Sen. Bernie] Sanders is the funniest character in the world,” mused Mason. “Usually when you see a Jew in Brooklyn, as he gets older he runs to Florida. Here is a guy instead of Florida, he did something no Jew ever thought of. He said, ‘You know something? I think I’ll go to Vermont!’ If he told you this while he was in Brooklyn . . . that he is going to wind up running for president from Vermont, do you know what would have happened? They would have thought this man has a mental problem.”

http://pagesix.com/2015/10/17/jackie-mason-bernie-sanders-is-the-funniest-character-ever/?_ga=1.208741138.1407506085.1437464951

Jackie Mason: Bernie Sanders is the funniest character ever
By Ian Mohr
New York Post
October 17, 2015 | 10:22pm

Ex-NBC Employee Reveals Cosby Womanizing

 
Bill Denver for New York Daily News Former NBC employee Frank Scotti came forward last week with his insider's look at Cosby's womanizing ways during the 1984-92 run of "The Cosby Show."

[From article]
Cosby, while denying paternity, paid out more than $100,000 to Thompson over the years after their 1974 affair began. Scotti told The News that he believes Cosby was sleeping with all the women who received money.
“I was suspicious that something was going on,” said Scotti. “I suspected that he was having sex with them because the other person he was sending money to (Thompson) he was definitely having sex with.
“Why else would he be sending money?” Scotti asked. “He was sending these women $2,000 a month. What else could I think?”

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/bill-cosby-paid-women-ex-nbc-employee-article-1.2020464

EXCLUSIVE: Ex-NBC employee Frank Scotti claims Bill Cosby paid off women, invited young models to dressing room as he stood guard
Veteran NBC employee Frank Scotti says he helped Bill Cosby deliver thousands of dollars to eight different women in 1989-90 - including Shawn Thompson, whose daughter Autumn Jackson claimed the actor was her dad. The ex-aide also tells the Daily News he stood guard whenever Cosby invited young models to his dressing room, which eventually led him to quitting after years on the job.
BY CHELSIA ROSE MARCIUS, BRIAN NIEMIETZ, LARRY MCSHANE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Sunday, November 23, 2014, 3:00 AM

Timing of These Revelations Was Determined By What?

Why is this man wearing a Columbia University hoodie?



[From article]
In 2007, General Ion Mihai Pacepa, a former Romanian intelligence chief and a defector to the West, wrote an article for National Review, in which he detailed a plot hatched by the Soviet KGB to discredit the Catholic Church. It involved production of a 1968 play titled The Deputy, ostensibly by German dramatist Rolf Hochhuth, which charged that Pope Pius XII had collaborated with the Nazis. Though pretty much discredited right from the start, this claim has been the seed for a series of articles and books that have carried on a drumbeat of accusations about World War II papal anti-Semitism.
[. . .]
But, what has this reflection to do with Bill Cosby?
Whether or not Cosby is guilty -- and, once again, he may very well be (I’m certainly not equating him with Pius XII) -- it strikes me as interesting that we should be hearing so much about his purportedly vicious antics just now.
[. . .]
one of the alleged victims -- actress/producer Barbara Bowman, who claims Cosby raped her back in 1985 -- asked a very pertinent question in an op-ed she wrote for the Washington Post: “Why did it take 30 years for people to believe my story?”
Why, indeed?
But more to the point, why now?
[. . .]
there’s an increasing smell of opportunism around this sad episode in the ongoing Cosby show.

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2014/11/cosbys_last_act.html

November 24, 2014
Cosby's Last Act
By Bill Kassel

More Women Accuse Bill Cosby of Rape

[From article]
A local woman is the latest of more than a dozen women to accuse comedian Bill Cosby of being a sexual predator.
Renita Chaney Hill, 47, tells KDKA reporter Ralph Iannotti she was a 15-year-old model and aspiring actress when she first met Cosby back in the 1980s.
[. . .]
Her appearance in Cosby’s videos was the start of a four-year, on-again, off-again relationship with the actor.
“He would fly me to a number of cities,” including New York and Atlanta she remembers. “He would be busy during the day, then I’d come to his hotel room at night,” she said.
Hill says when she was alone with Cosby the scenario was always the same. Cosby would insist she have a drink even though she was underage. She says she now believes she was drugged.

http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2014/11/20/local-woman-latest-to-come-forward-accusing-bill-cosby-of-being-sexual-predator/

Local Woman Latest To Come Forward Accusing Bill Cosby Of Being Sexual Predator
Renita Chaney Hill: "The Bottom Line For Me Is That No One Has The Right To Violate Someone Else, No Matter Who They Are"
November 20, 2014 11:15 PM
Ralph Iannotti

* * *

[From article]
Before Cosby was accused of drugging and sexually assaulting a passel of women — I think the number is up to at least 17, but I stink at math — Jackson cried out that this man was her father. And Cosby treated the young lady like roadkill.
Jackson and [Cosby] had a reunion of sorts in 1997. In a depressing trial in New York City, Jackson, then 22, faced Cosby, who’d just turned 60, in Manhattan federal court. The married father of five acknowledged kids had admitted in an interview that he’d enjoyed a “rendezvous’’ with Jackson’s mother. And Cosby, who all but said that he was, at best, a lousy husband and, at worst, a rank hypocrite, testified that he paid the mother and daughter $100,000 over the years to keep his image-crushing extramarital affair a secret.

http://nypost.com/2014/11/20/bill-cosby-should-have-gone-down-as-a-loser/

Cosby should have lost in the 1st case
By Andrea Peyser
New York Post
November 20, 2014 | 11:04pm

Bill Cosby Accused Of Rape

[From article]
The entertainment world is rife with famous men who use their power to victimize and then silence young women who look up to them. Even when their victims speak out, the industry and the public turn blind eyes; these men’s celebrity, careers, and public adulation continue to thrive. [. . .]
Fixing this problem demands more than public shaming. For Cosby to commit these assaults against multiple victims over several years, there had to be a network of willfully blind wallflowers at best, or people willing to aid him in committing these sexual crimes at worst. As I told the Daily Mail, when I was a teenager, his assistants transported me to hotels and events to meet him. When I blacked out at Cosby’s home, there were several staffers with us. My agent, who introduced me to Cosby, had me take a pregnancy test when I returned from my last trip with him.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/11/13/bill-cosby-raped-me-why-did-it-take-30-years-for-people-to-believe-my-story/

Bill Cosby raped me. Why did it take 30 years for people to believe my story?
Only when a male comedian called Cosby a rapist did the accusation take hold.
By Barbara Bowman November 13, 2014
Follow @BhbowmanBowman
Barbara Bowman is an artist and married mother with two children. She lives in Scottsdale, Ariz.

Explaining Joan Rivers' Popularity

Joan Rivers (r) with daughter Melissa

[From article]
“It means there’s no place to hide,” she said. They can know you anywhere. At the time, the Internet age was just beginning.
Her eye was original. Twenty years ago, when everyone was talking about how wonderful it was that Vegas had been cleaned up and the mob had been thrown out, Joan said no, no, no, they are ruining the mystique. First of all, she said, those mobsters knew how to care for a lady, those guys with bent noses were respectful and gentlemen, except when they were killing you. Second, she said, organized crime is better than disorganized crime, which will replace it. Third, the mobsters had a patina of class, they dressed well and saw that everyone else did, so Vegas wasn’t a slobocracy, which is what it is becoming with men in shorts playing the slots in the lobby of the hotel. The old Vegas had dignity. She hated the bluenoses who’d clean up what wasn’t mean to be clean. No one wanted Sin City cleaned up, she said, they wanted to go there and visit sin and then go home.
[. . .]
Joan would have loved how much she is loved. I think she didn’t quite know and yet in a way she must have: You don’t have strangers light up at the sight of you without knowing you have done something.
But we should try to honor and celebrate the virtues and gifts of people while they’re alive, and can see it.
She was an entertainer. She wanted to delight you. She wanted to make you laugh. She succeeded so brilliantly.

http://blogs.wsj.com/peggynoonan/2014/09/05/joan-rivers-the-entertainer/

4:38 pm ET Sep 5, 2014
Joan Rivers: The Entertainer
Peggy Noonan's Blog

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http://pagesix.com/2014/09/06/cindy-adams-remembers-her-friend-joan-rivers/?_ga=1.67593938.212440808.1402078759

Cindy Adams remembers her friend Joan Rivers
By Cindy Adams
New York Post
September 6, 2014 | 5:41pm

Al Franken Lost His Sense of Humor, He's Become a Career Politician

Al Franken

[From article]
"The Franken campaign strategy is, they've got a lot of money, lot of infrastructure, and that there's a downside to too much exposure," said Carleton College political science professor Steven Schier. "In his prior career, he was known for explosive sarcasm. I think they're keeping him under wraps for good reason. The hostility to Washington is as high in Minnesota as it is anywhere."

http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/finding-al-franken-20140828

Finding Al Franken
The comedian-turned-senator is running an unusually low-key reelection campaign, trying to avoid scrutiny. Will Republicans get the last laugh?
BY JOSH KRAUSHAAR
August 28, 2014

Comedian Steve Rossi Dies at 82

embed
[From article]
The duo appeared regularly on The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson and The Merv Griffin Show.
They also toured comedy clubs nationwide and headlined shows at major Las Vegas casinos in the 1960s until they split up in 1968, the newspaper reported.

I met them in 1964, in the lobby of the Concord Hotel in Kiamesha Lake New York. I was working as a busboy. It was early afternoon and they looked very tired.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2665557/Steve-Rossi-82-comedy-duo-Allen-Rossi-dies.html

Comedy legend Steve Rossi dies aged 82 weeks after being diagnosed with stage 4 cancer of the esophagus
By ASSOCIATED PRESS and DAILY MAIL REPORTER
PUBLISHED: 02:44 EST, 23 June 2014 | UPDATED: 15:07 EST, 23 June 2014

Black Comedian Calls Audience "White Alcoholics"

Angry: The 40-year-old called his hecklers a bunch of 'white alcoholics', pictured in 2007

[From article]
After being booed by a packed house in Hartford, Connecticut, on Thursday the veteran comedian has now blasted the crowd as a bunch of ‘white alcoholics’.
[. . .]
‘But if North Korea ever drops a nuclear bomb on this country, I swear to God I hope it lands in Hartford, Connecticut.’
[. . .]
Of the awkward silence, Chappelle explained: ‘I wanted to pull a reverse Kramer and call them all crackers or something crazy like that.’

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2411931/Dave-Chappelle-lashes-hecklers--saying-I-hope-North-Korea-drops-nuclear-bomb-them.html

'I hope North Korea drops a nuclear bomb on them!' Dave Chappelle lashes out at Connecticut town after run-in with hecklers
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
PUBLISHED: 19:14 EST, 4 September 2013 | UPDATED: 20:52 EST, 4 September 2013

Jonathan Winters, Dead at 87

Awards: Winters, seen performing in Las Vegas in 1971, won a best-supporting actor Emmy, was nominated again in 2003 as outstanding guest actor, won two Grammys and the Kennedy Center's second Mark Twain Prize for Humor in 1999

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2308252/Jonathan-Winters-dead-Comedy-legend-inspired-likes-Robin-Williams-Jim-Carrey-dies-87.html

Improv comedy legend Jonathan Winters who inspired the likes of Robin Williams and Jim Carrey dies, 87
Winters is celebrated for his hilarious improvisations, misfit characters, mimicry and facial contortions
The actor and comedian earned one Emmy, another Emmy nomination and two Grammys in his time
Was reintroduced to millions of new fans in the final 1981 season of Mork and Mindy where he played the son of Robin Williams
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
PUBLISHED: 14:41 EST, 12 April 2013 | UPDATED: 05:49 EST, 13 April 2013

Obama Jokes

You know the honeymoon is over when the comedians start.

The liberals are asking us to give Obama time. We agree . . . and think 25
to life would be appropriate.
--Jay Leno

America needs Obama-care like Nancy Pelosi needs a Halloween mask.
--Jay Leno

Q: Have you heard about McDonald's' new Obama Value Meal?
A: Order anything you like and the guy behind you has to pay for it.
--Conan O'Brien

Q: What does Barack Obama call lunch with a convicted felon?

A: A fund raiser.
--Jay Leno

Q: What's the difference between Obama's cabinet and a penitentiary?

A: One is filled with tax evaders, blackmailers, and threats to society.
The other is for housing prisoners.
--David Letterman

Q: If Nancy Pelosi and Obama were on a boat in the middle of the ocean and
it started to sink, who would be saved?
A: America !
--Jimmy Fallon

Q: What's the difference between Obama and his dog, Bo?
A: Bo has papers.
--Jimmy Kimmel

Q: What was the most positive result of the "Cash for Clunkers" program?
A: It took 95% of the Obama bumper stickers off the road.
--David Letterman