Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 29, 1995 TAG: 9503290037
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MANUEL MENDOZA DALLAS MORNING NEWS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Known best as the heavily accented cabbie Latka Gravas on the sitcom ``Taxi,'' Kaufman redefined stand-up comedy during his many appearances on ``Saturday Night Live'' and on Letterman's old ``Late Night'' program.
Whether playing irascible lounge singer Tony Clifton, imitating Elvis Presley or taking a Carnegie Hall audience out for milk and cookies, he challenged conventional notions about what was funny, about what could pass for entertainment.
Today, he might be called a performance artist, but in the late '70s, he was considered a comedian even though he refused to tell jokes or even to try to make the audience like him. Inviting hatred or at least disdain, he encouraged people to misunderstand him. Most did.
Of course, because of that approach, he never got famous. And if not for ``Taxi,'' Kaufman would be even more obscure, especially now that almost 11 years have passed since his early death.
His memory lives on via ``Saturday Night Live'' reruns on Comedy Central, a video documentary called ``I'm From Hollywood'' and his answer to ``My Dinner With Andre,'' a home video dubbed ``My Breakfast With Blassie.''
R.E.M. paid homage to him in its 1992 song ``Man on the Moon,'' and performance artist Laurie Anderson includes a story about him on her new spoken-word album, ``The Ugly One With the Jewels and Other Stories.''
But a mass rediscovery of Kaufman's put-on-oriented, off-the-wall style could begin with ``A Comedy Salute to Andy Kaufman,'' an hourlong special of clips and tributes airing tonight on NBC (10 p.m., WSLS-Channel10).
Among those lauding him are his ``Taxi'' co-stars Marilu Henner and Judd Hirsch and comics Rodney Dangerfield, Jim Carrey, Dick Van Dyke and Michael Richards.
Kaufman, a native New Yorker who had been doing a character called Foreign Man and an Elvis impersonation in such New York clubs as the Improv since the late '60s, might never have gotten on television if not for ``Saturday Night Live'' producer Lorne Michaels.
Michaels gave him his national TV debut on the first ``SNL,'' which aired in the fall of 1975. Standing next to an old phonograph, dressed in a layered outfit of turtleneck, collared shirt and sport coat, Kaufman moved the needle onto a recording of the ``Mighty Mouse'' theme and then just stood there, eyes darting nervously, as the song played.
When the superhero uttered his one line - ``Here I come to save the day'' - Kaufman gestured in the air with his left arm, bent his legs back and forth like a chicken and lip-synced the words.
On subsequent ``SNL'' appearances, Kaufman did Foreign Man, a bit he had perfected in the clubs. As always, he stayed in character. Foreign Man, who had a vague Eastern European accent, would attempt to be funny by doing impressions of Archie Bunker and Jimmy Carter.
But the impressions were neither accurate nor funny because Foreign Man didn't alter his voice or deliver a funny line. He would only say stuff like, ``I'm Jimmy Carter and I'm the president.''
The one impersonation that Foreign Man had down pat was Elvis. In the clubs, Kaufman would walk in as Foreign Man, dressed in a pink suit and carrying a briefcase, do his poor impressions and then emerge as the Vegas-period Presley. Stunned audiences were led to believe that a shy immigrant had somehow learned how to do Elvis well.
Kaufman's second-most-famous bit after his ``Taxi'' character (which was based on Foreign Man) was wrestling women, which both drew wide attention and killed his career in the early '80s. It was hard to tell whether his anti-feminist rants were sincere, but it was clear that his love of professional wrestling - the ultimate example of is-it-real-or-is-it-fake? - was as real as his passion for Presley.
Calling himself the Intergender Champion of the World, Kaufman toured the country offering money to any woman who could beat him in the ring. None did. He would rile the crowd by saying women belonged in the kitchen, echoing the first feminist backlash (which began with Bobby Riggs' 1973 tennis match with Billie Jean King).
Even after Kaufman developed lung cancer in 1983 and died less than a year later at age 35, some people thought it was just another put-on.
by CNB