Some decades ago, "Uncle Dirty" was kind of an alternative George Carlin. Say, a more Jewish George Carlin. If a college campus couldn't get George, how about "Uncle Dirty?" That's where I first saw him; doing a college show.
Afterwards, we were talking about comedy and politics. I mentioned that my favorite comedian was Mort Sahl. He said that political comedy didn't interest him. He told me a joke that I guess didn't quite fit in with his flowing routine on stage.
I don't remember it word for word, but it goes something like this:
A widow arrives at the funeral parlor to view her husband in his casket. She looks down, and she's aghast. "How could you do this?" she asks. "What's wrong with you?" The owner solemnly says, "I'm so sorry, please tell me what's wrong. I will do my best to help you." The old lady says, "Look at this suit. A double-breasted pin-striped blue suit! My beloved husband NEVER wore such a monstrosity! Look at these other bodies," she says, pointing to a few others laying in state. "They all have nice suits!"
The funeral director places a calming hand on her shoulder. "We'll do everything we can for you. Don't worry." She says "Don't worry? You butchers! You horrible grave robbers! All I ask is a simple black suit. Not double-breasted." The funeral director bows his head. "Go around the corner, get yourself some coffee. We'll take care of it."
The agitated woman returns in about ten minutes, and goes to the casket. There is her husband, in a very nice black suit. "Now that's what I wanted all along," she shouts triumphantly. "That's fine." Then she says, "How did you do this so quickly?" The funeral director sighs: "We just switched heads."
"Uncle Dirty" then told me that as far as he was concerned, political humor was pointless because you just get another jerk coming in who will be pretty much the same. "It's switching heads," he said.
I hadn't thought of this in a long time. Not until today. I wonder about the truth of that joke. Is it possible that somebody's been switching heads with Aretha Franklin? Every day she's in a different outfit.
What, you may ask, is the point of re-dressing a corpse over and over? Her dress gets sweaty after a whole day of mourners filing by?
Why was she not clad in one of her fabulous fur coats, the size of a baseball stadium tarp? There would've been enough left over to create a very nice casket lining.
How many people returned for another look the next day, and would've said, "What, the SAME DRESS??"
As she lost a lot of weight in her last year, it's possible switching heads is the solution. After all, it's a bit unseemly to strip a corpse and change her dress, and possibly her underwear.
Maybe I'm not up on necrophilia, but I haven't heard of dressing up a celebrity corpse in different costumes to amuse the line of mourners.
It's possible they just took her famous head and put it on some other nicely-clad body, and added some fingernail polish. While there have been photos of her laying in state, as the Queen of Soul or the Queen of a country should, there are no views of her face. Surely they must be proud of doing a good job on it. Enough for her relatives to say to the funeral director, "You made her look...you made her look...you made her look like a NATURAL WOMAN..."
Too soon? No, no, the first letters of funeral are FUN...and her fans were having a great time standing on line waiting to take a look over her dead body.
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