Ha Ha Ha, Hoax Hoax Hoax: Andy Kaufman Bullshit via his Idiot Brother

You know something?

Andy Kaufman wasn't too funny when he was alive. He's even more annoying dead.

Aside from ripping off every ethnic clown that came before him for his "Latka" character on "Taxi" (it could easily have been Jose Jimenez), Kaufman was a comic better heard about than actually seen.

Ha ha ha, he liked to pretend to be an obnoxious lounge singer.

Ha ha ha, he'd lip sync to the theme from Mighty Mouse.

Ha ha ha, he'd pretend to wrestle people, or he did wrestle professional fake wrestlers, or...who the hell cares?

Kaufman was, at best, a "performance artist," which would be a good excuse for not getting laughs. Was Tony Clifton real? Not real? Always Andy? Sometimes Bob Zmuda? That's not exactly entertainment, is it?

Kaufman died of cancer (not very funny) yet despite doing so in a high profile hospital, WITH A DEATH CERTIFICATE, the feeble and unfunny "Andy is still alive" act went on and on.

The latest "Andy is alive" crapola was reported by Fagin-goon Harvey Levin's infantile TMZ squad of snots, geeks and teenage guffawing baboons. Some woman got up in an obscure comedy club (and they've all been pretty damn obscure since 1988 and the days when The Improv and Catch actually booked rising stars) and announced she was "daughter of Andy."

This inane story was picked up by all the lazy newspaper websites that are too short-staffed to do anything but parrot "According to TMZ..." Which makes as much journalistic sense as saying, "According to a fart at Burger King..."

How long would it take before somebody recognized this hoaxing bitch, and put together that she and Kaufman's idiot brother were playing a game? Not long at all.

Michael Kaufman, who was quoted as saying he had some kind of letter from Andy saying he was alive, and who professed to at least believe there was a "50-50" chance the woman sharing the stage with him was his niece and not a prankster, should be ashamed of himself. If a performer's act is so deathly dead that nobody wants to see tapes of it or hear recordings of it, then all the desperate "he's still alive" games in the world will not help.

There should be a law against "hoaxing," but that would also imply there's an effective law against e-mail "spoofs," or other obnoxious activities that waste time and money. This woman might as well claim to be a Nigerian princess, or be from Chase or Paypal asking you to go to a (fake) website and put in your password to correct a "security" problem. If you fall for it, too bad for you. Meanwhile, hooray hooray for TMZ and the rest, who make money off website traffic and don't care what they do to get it.

Face it, Kaufman was not Lenny Bruce. Not Mort Sahl. He wasn't up there taking risks to liberate language or address the abuse of minorities or to point out an emperor with no clothes. All he was doing was a lip sync to Mickey Mouse and other "satires" on what might or might not be the limit to a paying customer's endurance.

Michael Ochs, brother of Phil, has not had to resort to hoaxes, schemes, and the sick "he is still alive" game that Michael Kaufman has played. Phil Ochs can still speak for himself anytime somebody wants to hear one of his records. The fact that not everybody wants to watch an Andy Kaufman video, or see a movie about him, is no excuse to play twisted games that end with "Andy would love this, ha ha ha." Andy, let's remember, and let me say it again, also liked to lip sync to Mighty Mouse.

Hopefully now that his idiot brother and his fake daughter have been exposed, and the death certificate the drooling twerps at TMZ can't find is out there for all to see, we'll have an end to the "Andy Kaufman is still alive" bullshit. To Kaufman's idiot brother, I say this: Go put up some leaflets about the missing Avante Oquendo. Go interview the latest babbling nutjob who did or didn't molest and kill Etan Patz. Or find Ken Bowser (of the award winning Phil Ochs "There But for Fortune" film) and see if there are enough legitimately hilarious clips on Andy to create a documentary anyone would want to watch.

They say the pun is the lowest form of humor. I'd say doing a lip sync to the Mighty Mouse theme is a lot lower, and has even less potential for getting any kind of laugh. In that regard, both the physical Andy Kaufman and his film clips are dead. Concentrate, Michael Kaufman, on seeing if you can revive the latter and get somebody to laugh. As for the "still alive" hoax...it's way past Andy's expiration date...a date you can easily check by looking at...HIS DEATH CERTIFICATE.

TYPO POSITIVE : Gore Vidal and a Homosexual's Choice Of Whiskey

The Daily Mail breathlessly reports that two distant relatives of Gore Vidal want his money, and say he was a gay pedophile.

Vidal's homosexuality seemed to prey on the writer's subconscious...check the Freudian typo in a quote about "single malt" scotch.

SHARE WHAT YOU SEE?

I see a waste of money for Google's daily waste of time.

Every day, Google's opening page chances to reveal some "clever" spelling of GOOGLE and some "cute" puzzle, animation or other "game."

It's supposed to make me think kindly of a spy ring that coordinates Google payments, Google g-mail, Google blogs, Google searches, Google spy maps...in order to rival the FBI for intrusive nefariousness.

It's supposed to make me stop wondering why their compounds resemble Scientology hives, and why their leaders are corrupt. That would include Herr Schmidt, who has to defend his "tax avoidance policies," and why his company is regularly fined by governments for copyright infringement and other abuses. He was also the star of a headline "8.2 Billion Dollar Love Rat," pointing out that the 58 year-old "do no wrong" uber-leader resists any crackdown on easy-access to porn but has an open marriage and is out to screw anyone and everyone he can.

Google's cutie-pie logos and animated games are supposed to make me stop wondering about Google's fist-in-ass relationship with a creepy site called "Chilling Effects," which is basically a reverse of the Jews in the ovens idea. It's copyright holders sent into the deep freeze. Any complaint sent to Google is forwarded, for all to see, at "Chilling Effects," the better for anonymous "we like free" hackers to play their "pirate" games and harass those that expect to be paid for the use of intellectual property.

"Share" what you see, is Internet-speak for "steal everything and call it freedom of speech." That's the Google way. It isn't just some penny ante website called "Zero Paid" that laughs at writers, artists, photographers, movie makers and anyone else trying to earn a living in a crowded, difficult field. It's goo-goo good ol' Google, the billion dollar company that is greedy for more. Oh, and let's not forget YouTube, where they don't pay anything for most of the content, and a few pennies for the freak "gone viral" videos of a fat Korean doing a stupid dance

Soon "share what you see" won't be an option. Your computer will blink on without you touching it, a camera will "share" whatever you're doing, any videos will appear on YouTube, and all photos will be opted into a Google search. Your bank account will be hacked. The good news? Your identity will be stolen, so you can start fresh with a new one. Claim to be an illegal immigrant. The government will give you food, shelter, even a cellphone. If you're offered free Internet access, here's three words of advice: PULL THE PLUG.

Shed Few Tears for The Onion

"Giant burrito to solve all of Area Man's problems for 6 precious minutes."

Har har har.

That's the lead article for THE ONION.

If you think NPR radio is exciting, and anything "Sedaris" a scream, then you had to laugh over the Giant Burrito.

This article was quoted as one of the many knee-slappers you WON'T be able to get off one of those eyesore kiosks on the sidewalk. See, THE ONION is going all digital.

Well...tragedy is comedy with no more time left.

Ye of little real sense of humor, shed a tear for the print version of THE ONION, the freebie newspaper that has been dolefully doling out hilarious "fake news" for 25 years.

The publishing industry has been going through what they call a "sea change." To give you an idea of just how badly the publishing industry is doing, the phrase "sea change" continues to be used. Such is the lack of imagination and literacy...and the inability to pay anyone to come up with a better phrase.

Bozo Bezos over at Amazon is squeaking his red rubber nose at the thought of even more Kindle sales, and who knows, one day I might actually buy some kind of "reading device" or one of those half-size tablets, and be another monotonous mug on the bus, staring at a retina-killing screen...with one lazy eye wandering to check if there's anybody nearby who might steal it. I wouldn't hear 'em coming, since my ears would be Bose-plugged against a cell phone shouter and screaming baby (usually the same person)

At the risk of being called a Luddite and having to look up the word to check if it's really an insult, I think a newspaper should BE a newspaper. Even if it's called The Onion. I think you should be able to read something without wasting electricity. Also, if you don't like something in a newspaper, you can ball it up with your fist. You can have the satisfaction of tossing it in the trash, and maybe even telling someone else that you don't get a belly laugh just because somebody used the phrase "giant burrito."

How many more magazines and newspapers will join the Christian Science Monitor, The Onion, etc. etc. in offering just a "digital" ephemeral publication? And spending more attention on maybe a video game version, or just a set of tweets? And let's not forget that today's anime and meme crowd like an EDGY name...so out goes Newsweek and instead, get your link to THE DAILY BEAST. Arrrrrggh!

Say, that would be so funny, dudes...change The Onion to....Arrrrrggh!

MORTIFIED by a Sahlty Tea-Bagger

I was sitting in the audience and Woody Allen was introducing Mort: "He never disappoints..."

It was true then. A dozen years ago. Now? Maybe he doesn't disappoint if you're a tea bagger. Otherwise, it's pretty disappointing to see somebody whose act still includes anecdotes about Alexander Haig...and who "tweets" the same opinionated un-funny drivel you might hear from any grumpy redneck grandpa after too much beer.

Where's the Sahlty wit here? There's not even any personality behind these numb one-liners. Dennis Miller, the conservative right wing's favorite hipster, would at least have tossed in some improbable hyperbole.

I'm not saying that the pun on "The Bitter Tea of General Yen" is anything to be proud of, but it beats "Mort Sahl is doing nothing," which is how this piece could be titled. He's doing nothing but tarnishing a reputation for being a satirist and an iconoclast. There's nothing too iconoclastic about being in the same fetid Carnival Cruise ship with Rush Limbaugh. There's nothing funny about appealing to couples who look like the models for "American Gothic," only with rifles hidden behind their backs instead of pitchforks.

"Jack Kennedy gave his life for nothing. He died and you did nothing."

Well, Mort if he gave his life for nothing, maybe HE did nothing, too.

Although screwing Marilyn Monroe and Jackie Kennedy (among others) is a pretty good waste of time.

Sort of like screwing Phyllis Kirk and Playboy centerfold China Lee?

Mort of course, did more than just treat women like sports cars...to be ridden and then traded in. He went to work for Garrison after Kennedy died. The results of this was no definitive answer to who killed Kennedy. "He died and you did nothing" could be directed, posthumously, at Garrison...a bony finger pointing at his grave.

Who did Mort tweet this to? Every fan who read it. That kind of mean-spirited bitterness is, to quote another political fossil once considered amusing and now barely remembered, Ross Perot: "that's just sad."

Admittedly, it's tough now for a Mort or a Jackie Mason to have much of an audience, now that Leno, Letterman, Kimmel, Colbert and Stewart give us all the political jokes and social put-downs we need...no cover no minimum. These guys don't need to book the old-time comics, and are not prone too if some of them are going to sit there recycling gags, using out of date references, or just sitting there with a twitchy upper lip and nervous laughter because they aren't up on things the way Bill Maher or Dennis Miller are.

Tweeting is supposed to show that you're still out there ready to fly into town...not that you're stuck at home with a surplus of the eggs you laid. The sulfurous remarks that Mort passes off as something worth reading are no better than the comments that cranks leave on newspaper websites.

You'd expect any anonymous goon to follow an article on Obama with "Who on Earth does this government serve?" or "He couldn't play the president in a school play." You expect more from somebody who was once on the over of Time magazine...even if that was 53 years ago.

When Miley Cyrus sticks her tongue out, She's Really Bitchin'!

Bitches like to stick their tongues out...

Woody Allen's son is really Frank Sinatra's bastard?

How coy. Mia Farrow is saying it's "possible" that the son she supposedly had with Woody Allen is Sinatra's.

"Ronan Farrow" does look like a gay Frank Sinatra. Or a metrosexual one. When you have a weak father banished from contact and a strong, strong mother...that's a recipe for sexual confusion.

The only time "Ronan Farrow" is in the news is when he's bad-mouthing his father, Woody Allen. He actually Tweeted (how brave) on Father's Day some sarcasm: "Happy Father's Day, or as they call it in my family, Happy Brother-in-Law's day."

Nobody really wants to interview this guy about the cushy high-paying no-real-work government jobs he's gotten through his Mia Farrow connections, or how he attends Hillary Clinton parties and rubs soft shoulders with all the other pretty boys who attend the power-dinners in Washington D.C., No, name-change Ronan (that's not what Woody named him) only gets press when he disses Woody. As in: "He's my father married to my sister. That makes me his son and his brother-in-law. That is such a moral transgression."

Snitty, silly and based on a minor legality. "Ronan" seems like the kind of guy who goes into a tizzy at Lord & Taylor because the designer label on the back of his 45$ necktie was sewed with nylon thread instead of cotton.

Yeah, technically Woody married his "sister." But also, technically, Woody never married Mia. So what does the bastard have to say about that? Does he walk around telling everyone he's a bastard?

"I cannot have a relationship with my father and be morally consistent...I lived with all these adopted children, so they are my family. To say Soon-Yi was not my sister is an insult to all adopted children."

Soon-Yi is not only adopted, but of a completely different race. The accusation that Woody's some maniac involved in incest is totally "off the chain," and it's been part of ignorant criticism about him for decades now; "He married his own daughter."

You might feel sorry for "Ronan Farrow," growing up with a choice of lunatics. Mia Farrow is nuts, and also an actress who can lie convincingly, and turn anyone against anyone. And Woody is a genius and there's plenty of selfishness and insanity that goes with genius. I read Mia's book. You certainly can sympathize with the plight of an intelligent, still-attractive (and vain) actress discovering that the guy she's had a long-term relationship with is taking nude pix of her 22 year-old (and not all that attractive) adopted daughter. Just what went on with their adopted daughter Dylan...is a whole different Rashoman.

In her book Mia didn't mention anything about an "open relationship" with Woody that would allow her to fuck Frank Sinatra. So is this an actress's invention or something she finally decided to reveal that wasn't suitable for the book?

It's a bit peculiar that she'd be saying that a 70-something Sinatra could father her child...and not be too concerned about how the widow Barbara Sinatra would take this.

The answer? According to Barbara, apparently channeling Yogi Berra, this is an example of "lies that aren't true."

How extra coy of Ronan to not confirm or deny who is father is. Is that his coquette way of having fun with the reporters flocking to find out more about his life? Or would Mom be angry if he said that he'd never heard her say a word about his paternity being in question and that she can sometimes be caught up in her own world of revenge or confusion?

Woody's wisely not taking the bait, and hoping that after all these years of relative quiet on the subject of his sleeping with a relative, that this brief flare of Farrow will fade away.

I did cover the Farrow-Allen court case, as a photographer, for a few days. There was quite a difference in how they arrived at court. Woody's limo pulled up at the front, and he walked the long, long gauntlet up the steps, somewhat shy and clearly in a state of nervous chagrin, but not hiding. No, he wasn't even wearing one of his idiotic hats. Mia? Her limo pulled into the side entrance of the court building, and she had a statue-like beauty to her, and a statue-like calm. You couldn't tell what was on her mind from her neutral expression...which didn't have much chance to change as she sauntered quickly by.

How nice, to read juicy gossip about people 50 and over, who actually contributed to the world despite their human failings, as opposed to the steady diet of shit about pop stars, rap morons and drug-abusing sports figures. What a small favor, to see a name from the past (when was the last time you saw a Mia Farrow movie) and a familiar current face (Woody actually does get photographed going to parties and events...probably dragged out by Soon-Yi). Woody sightings in NYC are not uncommon, most certainly in Central Park or within a 10 block radius of his apartment. But sightings of Woody alone...not so common. He does tend to be with Soon-Yi, the woman he's been married to for quite a while. That's either love...or the need of a bodyguard with a lot more punching power than he has.