R.I.P. Garry Shandling, 66

[CentreHice]

Shandling

Okay...enough already!

One of my all-time favourite comedians. The Larry Sanders Show was brilliant...

Thanks for the hours of laughs.....

[CentreHice]

I remember watching this performance at the time. Shandling's first Tonight Show appearance, at the age of 31.

If you did well on Carson, you pretty much had it made it--if you were the real deal. It was yours to lose, put it that way. All doors opened….although Shandling had sold a script to Sanford & Son…and had also written for Welcome Back, Kotter. According to Wikipedia:

Shandling became a stand-up comedian because he was frustrated by situation comedy's "formulaic writing".[7] In 1978, Shandling performed his first stand-up routine at The Comedy Store in Los Angeles. A year later Shandling was one of the few performers to cross the picket line when a group of comedians organized a boycott against the Comedy Store, protesting owner Mitzi Shore's policy of not paying comedians to perform. According to William Knoedelseder, Shandling "was the scion of a family with ... decidedly antiunion views. He had not shared the struggling comic experience. He was a successful sitcom writer trying to break into stand-up, and prior to the strike, Shore had refused to put him in the regular lineup because she didn't think he was good enough. Of course, that changed the minute he crossed the picket line."[10]


So, about 3 years after his first stand-up performance, he got his shot on Carson....and he hit it out of the park..

[CentreHice]

Conan pays tribute to Shandling….