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Oct. 10, 2008

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The limitations of scientific miracles

Caroline B. Glick: Lebanon on the brink --- and why it matters

Oct. 8, 2008

Rabbi Berel Wein: The day when the sane talk to themselves

Ana Veciana-Suarez: Many nonobservant Jews are finding religion

Oct. 7, 2008

Gary Rosenblatt: Of politics and prayer

Caroline B. Glick: The ironies of the West's collusion with the Arabs and Iran

Oct. 6, 2008

Rabbi Yitzchok R. Rubin: Mamma to the masses

Jonathan Tobin: Ahmadinejad Isn't Too Impressed

Oct. 3, 2008

Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: The 'living dead' are all around us

Caroline B. Glick: Olmert's parting blows

Oct. 2, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q: Often customers looking for our competitor accidentally enter our store. Can we just serve them without comment?

Jonathan Tobin: Jewish pundit quiz on next year's news

Sept. 29, 2008

Rabbi Eli Gewirtz: Lehman Brothers and the Day of Judgment

Rabbi Leiby Burnham: Apples, Honey and You

Sept. 26, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The shofar and the Echo of Sinai

Caroline B. Glick: A road paved on reality

Sept. 24, 2008

Greg Crosby: Home for the Holy Days

Ethel G. Hofman: Rosh Hashanah Favorites: Old-fashioned taste, reduced calories

Sept. 23, 2008

Caroline Glick: Liberalism or lives!?

Michael Ledeen: Dear President Ahmadinejad

Sept. 22, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q: I gave a check to a local merchant, but it hasn't been cashed in months. Probably they lost it. Do I have to tell them?

Diana West: We are losing Europe to Islam

Sept. 19, 2008

Rabbi Berel Wein: On harvesting success

Caroline B. Glick: It is time to act

Sept. 18, 2008

Rabbi Hillel Goldberg: Is camping the panacea to save Jewry from self-destruction?

Craig Gordon: Was SNL hilarity too much for Hillary?

Sept. 17, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: The Whole World Is Watching

The Kosher Gourmet By Linda Gassenheimer: East meets Southwest in this quick meal: MEXICAN-ASIAN TOSTADOS

Sept. 16, 2008

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. : Into the fire

Everything's Relative : Your Official Jewish Guide to the 2008 USA Presidential Election

Sept. 15, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Enabling risky behavior

Diana West: A day that will live in ... accommodating Islam

Sept. 11, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The skeleton in my closet

Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein: Persecution and systematic destruction of Christians in the Middle East must be stopped

Sept. 10, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: There's Something About Sarah

The Kosher Gourmet by Kathy Manweiler: Who needs Chili's when you have these? Recipes for Mexican that taste great and are dietetic! Our commitment to freedom

Sept. 9, 2008

Daniel Pipes: Must counterinsurgency wars fail?

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.:

Sept. 8, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: How far must one go to help somebody out of a contract?

Barry Rubin: Waiting For Something

Sept. 8, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : How far must one go to help somebody out of a contract?

Barry Rubin: Waiting For Something

March 22, 2007

J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !)

Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review May 10, 2004 / 19 Iyar, 5764

No joke, he stole it all

By Jimmy Breslin


Comedians Alan King, left, and Henny Youngman
hamming it up with a bust of George Burns
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A little known story about how 'providence' saved Alan King, who died yesterday, from disgrace



http://www.jewishworldreview.com | "Where did you get it from?"


"In my office. Comedy writers always came in. I bought jokes by the pound," Alan King said.


"What were these specific jokes?"


"A monologue I was going to use on the Tonight Show."


This was last year and we were talking about plagiarism, theft, making it up, any of the flaws in writers that you see heralded in the daily newspapers at this time.


"Do you remember the monologue?" King was asked.


"No, not the jokes. Not anymore. I remember reading it when he gave it to me. I said to him, 'This is very good. Let me ask you, are you sure it's your own?' He said to me, 'This is my work. It's what I do. I worked hard on this. I thought it would be great for you.' So I said, 'All right.' I read it again. I said to him again, 'You're sure you didn't get this somewhere?' He says, 'It's mine. I told you. I wrote it especially for you.'"


"Then what did you do?" I asked King.


"I paid for it!"


"Where were you going to use it?" he was asked.


"On the Tonight Show. Johnny Carson took nights off and I was going to do the show."


Any other joke stealing wasn't going to kill him. Mostly, it was just like an act in Britain. "I'm a big hit in England. Billy Eckstein told me there was a guy playing in the suburbs who was using everything of mine. One night we went out to see him. The guy took my act word for word. Fool couldn't even time them right. We were on the floor laughing at him. Then he says, 'As I was telling my wife, Jeannette ...' That did it. The bum wouldn't even change my wife's name."


Then he said, "That was all right. This other thing was dangerous."


King was talking about his wonderful new monologue at a time when Johnny Carson did the show that Jay Leno does now, the Tonight Show. Leno is a 15-round fighter. Somebody says he is falling. He comes right back, working like a bricklayer, and he is on top again.


Johnny Carson was the one fastest man on television we ever saw. He had these people on his show like King. I make him about as smart as you'll meet. He comes out of the Milton Berle and Henny Youngman class. I always thought that they were the smartest people I've met in any endeavor of life. They snatch something and turn it around into words so bright they flash and make people laugh. They take some serious dummy and turn him into what he should be, ludicrous.

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All their jokes are smart. There are no dumb jokes. Dumb jokes are not funny. They are the long jokes that politicians and businessmen tell.


The Alan King brigade does it in a sentence or two. I still remember walking out of the Carnegie Delicatessen and the late Henny Youngman waved. "No regards." Then he went back to his coffee.


"So I buy the monologue," King went on yesterday." I pay for it. I read it and start to put it in my mind. I'm going to use it on the Carson show. Alan King walks out with the band playing and I wave and I have my body moves and then I start with a good fresh monologue. That's how I see things coming up.


"So I'm home and I watch the 11 o'clock news. I always watch the news. Then here comes the Tonight Show. It is a rerun from about eight years ago. What's the difference? I watch. Ed McMahon says, 'Here's Johnny!' Out comes Carson. He starts his monologue. Fast, beautiful.


"He starts with the exact same thing the kid sold me.


"I grabbed my copy and followed him. Every word was the same. There was not one original line. This kid who sold me the monologue copied Carson word for word. The show is a rerun. How did he get a hold of a rerun and copy it? He figured nobody would know. Eight years old. Who could remember? Who would watch? He got hit by lightning. They put on the show with me watching.


"What if I didn't happen to watch Carson and then went on the show with the same monologue? I don't know the time difference between seeing this rerun and my date to do the show. But it would've been sudden death.


"I'll give you something worse. What if I went on another show with Carson's monologue? Death.


The kid bent me in half. I'm from Williamsburg. What right does a thief have to beat me? "COMMENTARY' All their jokes are smart. There are no dumb jokes. Dumb jokes are not funny. They are the long jokes that politicians and businessmen tell.'

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