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elleng

(130,156 posts)
Fri Apr 12, 2013, 01:58 PM Apr 2013

Jonathan Winters, R.I.P.

Maude Frickert, for example, whom he played wearing a white wig and a Victorian granny dress, was inspired by an elderly aunt who let him drink wine and taught him to play poker when he was 9 years old. . .

As channeled by Mr. Winters, Maude Frickert was a wild card. Reminiscing about her late husband, Pop Frickert, she told a stupefied interviewer: “He was a Spanish dancer in a massage parlor. If somebody came in with a crick in their neck he’d do an orthopedic flamenco all over them. He was tall, dark and out of it.” . .

More influential than successful, Mr. Winters circled the comic heavens tracing his own strange orbit, an object of wonder and admiration to his peers. “Jonathan taught me,” Robin Williams told the correspondent Ed Bradley on “60 Minutes,” “that the world is open for play, that everything and everybody is mockable, in a wonderful way.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/13/arts/television/jonathan-winters-comedian-dies-at-87.html?pagewanted=1&_r=0&hp


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Jonathan Winters, R.I.P. (Original Post) elleng Apr 2013 OP
A very funny man. Graybeard Apr 2013 #1
Yes, indeed. He was sort of like jazz music - you never quite knew what was coming next but Flaxbee Apr 2013 #2
Vintage Jonathan Winters csziggy Apr 2013 #3
THANKS, ziggy!!! elleng Apr 2013 #4
He was a genius at improv..... AnneD Apr 2013 #5
I just found out he died Beringia Oct 2013 #6

Graybeard

(6,996 posts)
1. A very funny man.
Fri Apr 12, 2013, 02:28 PM
Apr 2013

Madcap and chaotic are two words that come to mind.

There was always an element of danger listening to him work. One never quite knew where he was going with a riff or how far he would take it.

RIP and thanks for the laughter.

Flaxbee

(13,661 posts)
2. Yes, indeed. He was sort of like jazz music - you never quite knew what was coming next but
Fri Apr 12, 2013, 03:06 PM
Apr 2013

Last edited Fri Apr 12, 2013, 03:40 PM - Edit history (1)

it was always interesting and usually very funny.

How sad. I liked his lunacy. I wish there was more of it in the world.

Lol - from his obituary:
"Her son [Winters] continued talking to himself and developed a repertory of strange sound effects. He often entertained his high school friends by imitating a race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway."

csziggy

(34,120 posts)
3. Vintage Jonathan Winters
Fri Apr 12, 2013, 03:24 PM
Apr 2013


Bonus - Jonathan Winters on David Letterman 1986. Robin Williams comes in 7:30 through the second part.


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