Dean's World

And a homage.

For the handful of people who perhaps didn't know,

Few people on the planet could do an unscripted five-minute nonstop live comedy duet anywhere near as well as Bud Abbott and Lou Costello.

Bud, the straight man, is the tall guy with the mustache and ballclub uniform. Lou's the short mug with the plug hat. They kept folks in stitches in numerous films and appearances during their heyday in the 1930s-1940s. Lou was super-sensitive about being treated as a clown, which he apparently hated.

"Who's on First" was one of their classic comedy routines, performed during the radio broadcast heyday era of the 1930s, used in part in more than one of their many movies, and reprised on television as late as 1956.

The advent of the comedy team of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis in the 1950s supplanted Abbott and Costello in the new medium of television, and their act faded in comparative popularity.

Costello's life was marked by tragedy when his infant son accidentally drowned in his swimming pool, an event from which he never fully recovered. Abbott was racked with physical problems the pain of which drove him to excess alcohol consumption. Costello passed away first, leaving an increasingly disconsolate Abbott, who was never again able to put together much of a comedy act.

Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI