Comedian Bob Newhart, deadpan master of sitcoms and telephone monologues, dies at 94

LOS ANGELES — Bob Newhart, the deadpan accountant-turned-comedian who grew to become probably the most common TV stars of his time after putting gold with a traditional comedy album, has died at 94.

Jerry Digney, Newhart’s publicist, says the actor died Thursday in Los Angeles after a sequence of quick sicknesses.

Newhart, greatest remembered now because the star of two hit tv reveals of the Nineteen Seventies and Nineteen Eighties that bore his identify, launched his profession as a standup comedian within the late Fifties. He gained nationwide fame when his routine was captured on vinyl in 1960 as “The Button-Down Thoughts of Bob Newhart,” which went on to win a Grammy Award as album of the 12 months.

Whereas different comedians of the time, together with Lenny Bruce, Mort Sahl, Alan King, and Mike Nichols and Elaine Could, often acquired laughs with their aggressive assaults on trendy mores, Newhart was an anomaly. His outlook was trendy, however he hardly ever raised his voice above a hesitant, nearly stammering supply. His solely prop was a phone, used to fake to carry a dialog with somebody on the opposite finish of the road.

In a single memorable skit, he portrayed a Madison Avenue image-maker attempting to instruct Abraham Lincoln on tips on how to enhance the Gettysburg Handle: “Say 87 years in the past as a substitute of fourscore and 7,” he suggested.

One other favourite was “Merchandising the Wright Brothers,” by which he tried to influence the aviation pioneers to begin an airline, though he acknowledged the gap of their maiden flight may restrict them.

“Properly, see, that’s going to harm our time to the Coast if we’ve acquired to land each 105 toes.”

Newhart was initially cautious of signing on to a weekly TV sequence, fearing it could overexpose his materials. Nonetheless, he accepted a horny provide from NBC, and “The Bob Newhart Present” premiered on Oct. 11, 1961. Regardless of Emmy and Peabody awards, the half-hour selection present was canceled after one season, a supply for jokes by Newhart for many years after.

He waited 10 years earlier than endeavor one other “Bob Newhart Present” in 1972. This one was a state of affairs comedy with Newhart taking part in a Chicago psychologist residing in a penthouse together with his schoolteacher spouse, Suzanne Pleshette. Their neighbors and his sufferers, notably Invoice Day by day as an airline navigator, have been a wacky, neurotic bunch who supplied a really perfect counterpoint to Newhart’s deadpan commentary.

The sequence, probably the most acclaimed of the Nineteen Seventies, ran by way of 1978.

4 years later, the comic launched one other present, merely known as “Newhart.” This time he was a profitable New York author who decides to reopen a long-closed Vermont inn. Once more Newhart was the calm, cheap man surrounded by a bunch of eccentric locals. Once more the present was an enormous hit, lasting eight seasons on CBS.

It bowed out in memorable type in 1990 with Newhart — in his outdated Chicago psychologist character — waking up in mattress with Pleshette, cringing as he tells her concerning the unusual dream he had: “I used to be an innkeeper on this loopy little city in Vermont. … The handyman saved lacking the purpose of issues, after which there have been these three woodsmen, however solely one in every of them talked!”

The stunt parodied a “Dallas” episode the place a key character was killed off, then revived when the loss of life was revealed to have been in a dream.

Two later sequence have been comparative duds: “Bob,” in 1992-93, and “George & Leo,” 1997-98. Although nominated a number of occasions, he by no means received an Emmy for his sitcom work. “I suppose they suppose I’m not performing. That it’s simply Bob being Bob,” he sighed.

Over time, Newhart additionally appeared in a number of films, normally in comedic roles. Amongst them: “Catch 22,” “In and Out,” “Legally Blonde 2” and “Elf,” because the diminutive dad of adopted full-size son Will Ferrell. Newer work included “Horrible Bosses” and the TV sequence “The Librarians,” “The Massive Bang Concept” — which received him his solely Emmy — and “Younger Sheldon.”

Newhart married Virginia Quinn, recognized to buddies as Ginny, in 1964, and remained together with her till her loss of life in 2023. That they had 4 kids: Robert, Timothy, Jennifer and Courtney. Newhart was a frequent visitor of Johnny Carson’s and appreciated to tease the thrice-divorced “Tonight” host that not less than some comedians loved long-term marriages. He was particularly shut with fellow comic and household man Don Rickles, whose raucous insult humor clashed memorably with Newhart’s droll understatement.

“We’re apples and oranges. I’m a Jew, he’s a Catholic. He’s low-key, I’m a yeller,” Rickles advised Selection in 2012. A decade later, Judd Apatow would pay tribute to their friendship within the quick documentary “Bob and Don: A Love Story.”

A grasp of the gently sarcastic comment, Newhart acquired into comedy after he grew to become bored together with his $5-an-hour accounting job in Chicago. To move the time, he and a buddy, Ed Gallagher, started making humorous cellphone calls to one another. Finally, they determined to report them as comedy routines and promote them to radio stations.

Their efforts failed, however the data got here to the eye of Warner Bros., which signed Newhart to a report contract and booked him right into a Houston membership in February 1960.

“A terrified 30-year-old man walked out on the stage and performed his first nightclub,” he recalled in 2003.

Six of his routines have been recorded throughout his two-week date, and the album, “The Button-Down Thoughts of Bob Newhart,” was launched on April Fools’ Day 1960. It offered 750,000 copies and was adopted by “The Button-Down Thoughts Strikes Again!” At one level the albums ranked No. 1 and a pair of on the gross sales charts. The New York Instances in 1960 stated he was “the primary comic in historical past to come back to prominence by way of a recording.”

Along with successful Grammy’s album of the 12 months for his debut, Newhart received as greatest new artist of 1960, and the sequel “The Button-Down Thoughts Strikes Again!” received as greatest comedy spoken phrase album.

Newhart was booked for a number of appearances on “The Ed Sullivan Present” and at nightclubs, live performance halls and school campuses throughout the nation. He hated the golf equipment, nevertheless, due to the heckling drunks they attracted.

“Each time I’ve to step out of a scene and put a type of birds in his place, it kills the routine,” he stated in 1960.

In 2004, he acquired one other Emmy nomination, this time as visitor actor in a drama sequence, for a job in “E.R.” One other honor got here his method in 2007, when the Library of Congress introduced it had added “The Button-Down Thoughts of Bob Newhart” to its registry of traditionally vital sound recordings.

Newhart made the bestseller lists in 2006 together with his memoir, “I Shouldn’t Even Be Doing This!” He was nominated for one more Grammy for greatest spoken phrase album (a class that features audio books) for his studying of the ebook.

“I’ve at all times likened what I do to the person who’s satisfied that he’s the final sane man on Earth … the Paul Revere of psychotics operating by way of the city and yelling `That is loopy.’ However nobody pays consideration to him,” Newhart wrote.

Born George Robert Newhart in Chicago to a German-Irish household, he was known as Bob to keep away from confusion together with his father, who was additionally named George.

At St. Ignatius Excessive College and Loyola College in Chicago, he amused fellow college students with imitations of James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, Jimmy Durante and different stars. After receiving a level in commerce, Newhart served two years within the Military. Returning to Chicago after his navy service, he entered legislation faculty at Loyola, however flunked out. He finally landed a job as an accountant for the state unemployment division. Uninterested in the work, he spent his free hours performing at a inventory firm in suburban Oak Park, an expertise that led to the cellphone bits.

“I wasn’t a part of some comedian cabal,” Newhart wrote in his memoir. “Mike (Nichols) and Elaine (Could), Shelley (Berman), Lenny Bruce, Johnny Winters, Mort Sahl — we didn’t all get collectively and say, ‘Let’s change comedy and gradual it down.’ It was simply our method of discovering humor. The school youngsters would hear mother-in-law jokes and say, ‘What the hell is a mother-in-law?’ What we did mirrored our lives and associated to theirs.”

Newhart continued showing on tv sometimes after his fourth sitcom ended and vowed in 2003 that he would work so long as he may.

“It’s been a lot, 43 years of my life; (to stop) could be like one thing was lacking,” he stated.

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Former Related Press author Bob Thomas contributed to this report.