During my cruise ship lectures that recall my years working for Bob Hope, I’m often asked, “Did Bob Hope write any of his own material?” My answer is “No, but he could have if he didn’t hire writers.” In fact, in his earliest days in vaudeville, he did write some of the lines he used as an emcee -- and was a consummate ad-libber.
Bob Hope began his vaudeville career as a dancer and by accident became a standup comedian. He was asked by a theater owner to fill in for the show’s emcee who had failed to show up. Between his introductions, Hope added some jokes he had heard and his comedy career was born.
Hope was naturally quick and witty in real life so the transformation from dancer to comic was pre-ordained. That quickness of wit never failed him and it’s no surprise that he was a superb ad-libber.
In 1979, he was delivering a monologue in China with the help of an interpreter. He delivered this line: “Then we visited the Forbidden City. What opulence! It looks like Caesar’s Palace without the slot machines.”
The interpreter turned to Hope and asked, “What’s a Caesar’s Palace?” The Chinese speaking members of the audience may have been in the dark, but as you would expect, the line got a huge laugh from the Westerners.
Hope recovered quickly and ad-libbed: “It’s a little place that takes the money the IRS didn’t get.” That’s a pretty quick ad-lib, but he was yet to exhibit his true ad-libbinbg skills. He continued: “Yesterday, I visited your Marble Boat at the Summer Palace.
A boat made entirely of marble. At first they said it wouldn’t float — and then Billy Graham showed up.”
Again, the interpreter paused and asked: “Who is Billy Graham?” And in one of the quickest ad-libs I had ever heard, Hope replied “Billy Graham is an advisor at Caesar’s Palace.”
Another example. One early evening, while scouting locations in Shanghai’s shopping district, our small group had been walking with Hope for several blocks. It was obvious that we were noticed by hundreds of passersby, but only as visiting Westerners. Nobody recognized Hope as the mega-star he was in most of the rest of the world.
Then from around a corner materialized a group of squealing teenagers waving what appeared to be autograph books. As they ran toward us, Hope said, “You chaps go on ahead, and I’ll catch-up after I take care of these —”
At that moment, the girls rushed past him and into a department store that looked to be having a sale on Junior Miss kimonos. They were waving coupon books.
Watching them rush by him, Hope looked slightly embarrassed. He saw that I had noticed his surprise so I felt I had to say something. I said “Well, Bob,” I said, “now you know how it feels to be a nobody.”
Without breaking stride, he shot back, “How do you stand it?”
On an NFL special one year, Don Knotts was a guest so we wrote a spot for him called “Moose Terwilliger, Chief Referee.” Dressed in a striped shirt with a whistle around his neck, Don was explaining to Hope the secrets of officiating.
Toward the end of the segment, Hope asked: “Do losing teams ever blame your officiating?” Don responds proudly: “Well, after one game where I made a few bad calls, they presented me with the game ball.” Hope continued: “Oh. They’re good sports then.
Don responded with this line: “Not really. It had to be surgically removed.” A consummate visual comedian, Don appeared as though he was actually undergoing the procedure right there on stage.
Then Hope, who had been playing the straight interviewer, paused momentarily to deliver this ad-lib: “Boy, you’re lucky it wasn’t the Championship Trophy.”
As you would imagine, hearing this response for the first time, Don gave Hope what I characterized as not a double-take but a quadruple take. It was the only real laugh line Hope had in the entire routine, and he had given it to himself!
Hope was himself a very funny man which explains why he felt so close to his writers and always enjoyed our company.
Excerpted from THE LAUGH MAKERS: A Behind-the-Scenes Tribute to Bob Hope's Incredible Gag Writers (c) 2009 by Robert L. Mills and published by Bear Manor Media -- www.bearmanormedia.bizland.com/id370.html
FREE SAMPLE CHAPTERS + Photos: www.laughmakers.blogspot.com
An unabridged audio version read by the author is available at: http://teach.learnoutloud.com/Browse/Arts-and-Entertainment/Film_-Music_-Radio_-TV_-and-Pop-Culture/The-Laugh-Makers/33067
A native of San Francisco, Bob Mills served in the Navy from 1956 to 1959, graduated from San Francisco State University in 1962 and the University of California Hastings Law in 1965 and practiced in Palo Alto, California from 1966 until becoming a television writer in 1976, whereupon he ceased all contact with lawyers. He wrote for the "Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts" 1976-77; "The Bob Hope Show" 1977-92 In 1973, he married his wife, Shelley, with whom he lives in Studio City, California.
He writes a daily topical blog entitled "Dr. Digit's Hollywood Memory Blog" online at www.bereftontheleft.blogspot.com. He is a volunteer reader at Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic in Hollywood and hosts a weekly program entitled "Inside Television" for Los Angeles Radio Reading Service for the Blind in Northridge, California, streamed online each Tuesday at 0820-0900 Pacific at www.larrs.org. Each New Years Day, he co-hosts a three-hour audio description of the Pasadena Rose Parade broadcast to 52 radio stations for the blind reaching 2.7 million listeners via NPR satellite. He's also a substitute co-host of "Access Unlimited" heard on Tuesdays 2:30 to 3:00 pm Pacific on KPFK, 90.7 fm Los Angeles, 98.7 fm Santa Barbara. Streamed live and archived at www.kpfk.org
In 2009, his book THE LAUGH MAKERS: A Behind the Scenes Tribute to Bob Hope's Incredible Gag Writers was published by Bear Manor Media in both a print and an audio version read by the author. Sample chapters: www.laughmakers.blogspot.com An unabridged audio version read by the author is available at: http://teach.learnoutloud.com/Browse/Arts-and-Entertainment/Film_-Music_-Radio_-TV_-and-Pop-Culture/The-Laugh-Makers/33067 He is an emeritus member of the Writers Guild of America and holds memberships in two organizations: Yarmy’s Army, a group of veteran writers and entertainers who meet monthly for dinner and produce fund-raisers for worthy causes including the Motion Picture and Television House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, California, and in The Pacific Pioneer Broadcasters, a social club made up of former radio and television professionals that meets bimonthly for lunch and a celebrity “roast.”
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Was Bob Hope Funny Off Stage?Friday, 05 March 2010 During my cruise ship lectures that recall my years working for Bob Hope, I’m often asked, “Did Bob Hope write any of his own material?” My answer is “No, but he could...
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