Louis Nye has died

[Christiern]

Veteran Comic Louis Nye Dies at 92

By JOHN ROGERS,

Associated Press Writer

Comedian Louis Nye, who created a national catchphrase belting out "Hi, ho, Steverino!" as one of the players on Steve Allen's groundbreaking 1950s TV show, has died. He was 92.

Nye died Sunday at his home in Los Angeles after a long battle with lung cancer, his son, Peter Nye, told The Associated Press on Monday.

Nye had worked regularly in nightclubs and on television until only a couple of years ago, his son said. He had a recurring role from 2000 to 2002 in the HBO comedy "Curb Your Enthusiasm" as the father of Jeff Garlin's character.

When he joined Allen's show in 1956 he was already well established as one the era's hippest comics, appearing regularly on radio, in clubs and on early TV shows.

"He has a great business card from that time that lists something like 15 accents that he could do," his son recalled with a chuckle.

On "The Steve Allen Show," which ran until 1961 under various names, he quickly endeared himself to audiences as Gordon Hathaway, the effete, country-club snob who would welcome Allen's arrival with the "Hi, ho, Steverino!" salutation.

"I'm not sure if he improvised that or if it was given to him and he just ran with it as a catchphrase," Nye's son said.

Other regulars on the landmark show included comedians Don Knotts, Tom Poston and Bill Dana.

After the show's run ended, Nye appeared often on TV game shows, in films and as a regular on "The Ann Sothern Show." He was often cast as the second banana, never the lead.

This picture was taken in Harlem (Silver Rail Bar) in 1963. That's William B. Williams on the left and, kissing Louis, Tom Tracy, whose birthday we were celebrating.

[Free For All]

Wow, I'll admit I didn't know he was still around. He was a very funny man; I saw him on many shows when I was younger.

RIP

[chris olivarez]

I enjoyed watching the Steve Allen show and Louis Nye was one of the reasons why. May he rest in peace.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

For all those Riverside completists (who already own all the car racing albums), Nye had a record on Riverside - never heard it myself.

http://www.houg.com/store/LP_Comedy/Louis_...son_Avenue.html

Mike

[Christiern]

I remember the album well. The press kit was elaborate, an attaché case filled with pertinent stuff, including, of course, the album. There were truly funny tracks on there--Martinis and Miltown is a slow song that comes to mind--but I wonder how much of the humor has dissipated with the passage of some 45 years.

[GA Russell]

I was always fond of Gordon Hathaway and "Hi ho, Steverino!" I think there was a gentleness of much of that era's humor that doesn't exist today. For example, I saw Ernie Kovac's name in the paper this morning. Kovacs' humor was nothing like Steve Allen's, but it was gentle nevertheless.

I suspect, and you may disagree, that the main influence on comedy for the past thirty years has been Lenny Bruce, and that is why we are not seeing shows that try to be funny without pushing the envelope.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Perhaps Bruce, but indirectly only because I really don't think that all the shock comics out there have bothered to go back to him. If they go back to anyone they deal with Pryor, Carlin, and Williams rather than the source.

Mike

[Larry Kart]

I have fond memories of those opening Steve Allen Show segments in which Nye played a hipster jazz musician. In one (there may have been only two), having identified himself as a musician and being asked by Steve what instrument he played, Nye replied, "I play meat!" And he proceeded to slap a bunch of steaks around on a table with an air of soulful, crazed intensity. In the other, Nye's response was, "I play ice!" -- which lead to an assault with a pick on large block of ice, again with an air of soulful, crazed intensity. Much later on, in my days as a "night life critic," I reviewed Nye's club act. Sad to say, by this time (the late '70s or early '80s), he either had little left in the tank, or, I suspect, his talents just weren't suited to doing 40 or so minutes of material by himself in front of a live audience. He needed the framing device of a potentially giggling Allen or to be part of a sketch with other actors. To pick a somewhat comparable figure, I don't imagine that Howie Morris of "Your Show of Shows" (Sid Caesar) would have had a nightclub comedy act in him. On the other hand, also in the late 70s or early '80s, I reviewed Imogene Coca in one of the Neil Simon "Suite" plays, and she was still an incredibly funny actress (physically and facially, as well as verbally), at least as good as she'd been on TV with Caesar. In fact, seeing her onstage, some of the physical aspects of her humor were even more effective than they'd been on TV -- for instance, the way (when expressing exasperated rage) she could transform her whole body, or parts of it, into what was, by analogy, a deadly weapon -- like a spear or an arrow. What was so funny here, in addition to the sheer skill of the "business" involved and the suddenness with which Coca would enter and return from this "my body is a weapon" state, is that in order to express her rage so fully her character had to, in effect, surrender her identity as a human being and become a rigid, albeit self-hurled, thing.

[AllenLowe]

there may definitely be a disconnect with Bruce's influence just because so many years have passed, but without him comedy would be a much different thing today - and we can also say the same thing about Steve Allen, whose persona and sense of irony really were the forerunners of what is probably the most dominant contemporary approach (through Letterman, et al) -