Imogene Coca

What, Sid Caesar was from another planet.

Howard, Howie Lawrence, Imogene Coca, Carl Reiner.

Remember the people who wrote Mel Brooks, Woody Allen, Larry Gelbart, Neil Simon.

This was the writers.

Well, the big problem would be that it's played television a lot, and that could always be, uh, a detriment, as you know.

I, despite the fact I produced 10 from Your Show of Shows, it got great reviews, Sid Caesar, Imogene Coca.

I produced it.

We played all over the country, but the biggest problem was the fact that it'd been on television.

You know, they had, um, all kinds of...

Imogene Coca was there, and, and, uh, you know, um, the actor from Mr. Ed, um, Wilbur there, and everything else.

And there was Buddy and Sally.

There was Morey Amsterdam.

Imogene I can think of that's, the only Imogene I can think of, period, is Imogene Poots.

Oh, isn't there an Imogene Coca or something like that?

Mm, that sounds like a nightclub.

[laughs] The Coca Cabana.

... that won there.

Um-

Have you Cordelia, what's it like? [laughs] By the way, Imogene Coca was from Your Show of Shows, and she was also, um, she was, she played the aunt in, um, National Lampoon's...

She was the older lady who died in the station wagon when they were on their way to Wally World.

Its manic epicenter was Sid Caesar, a master of double-talk dialects, ad-libbing, pantomime.

Whether alone or with his most frequent skip partner, Imogene Coca, he could take a basic gag and stretch it to the point of absurdity.

Yet, as fellow cast member Carl Reiner pointed out, the basis of Sid's humor came from an internal source, pain.

Indeed, TV's most transcendent comic was also its most tortured.