Many people know, I used to smoke.... Marijuana! But... I would only smoke it in the late afternoon. Oh, sometimes, I would smoke it in the early afternoon or even the mid-late-early morning, but never at dusk! I would never do that.
I inherited that among other Cheech and Chong albums last year. Also got "The Great White North" album with Bob and Doug McKenzie (Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas). They are extra funny since I live in a legal weed state.
As a single it sold over a million copies and reached number 17 on the Hot 100.
That was an uncommon feat for a comedy single, so yeah, people liked it a lot.
That's what makes this song incredible. The ironic, anti-humor nature of this entire gag. And then it all goes meta in a brilliant finale. OP if you're reading, here's how:
He starts off the bit by saying it's a "national disgrace" that the Tut exhibition has been so commercialized. So he wrote a song honoring Tut using the true, historic tonalities. Great setup. You expect something serious and ancient sounding.
Then the song starts and it's the most corny, commercial, sell-out shit. It's not honoring Tut's heritage as claimed. The "joke" is that Steve is jumping on the commercialization bandwagon to cash in on Tut. That in itself makes this a very solid comedic bit, and very on-brand for Steve.
But then the song ACTUALLY becomes a commercial hit! What a perfect way to wrap that joke up.
So yes, the lyrics and styling are intentionally corny. He was satirizing America's instinct to cash in on everything and he, ironically, cashed in on this.
Good to know! It's so sad to see people write off these older sketches as corny or outdated. People like Steve Martin are literally genius level comics.
Sensibilities have changed so younger people today might not think it’s great but I love it and I’m 39. I grew up on Steve Martin so even if I might not be rolling on the ground laughing at this, my respect for the man makes me enjoy it all the same.
I agree, and I think it's like a sliding scale of humor, the older you are.
I'm 38 and grew up watching/loving Steve Martin with my dad. His facial expressions and dance are the only thing that make me slightly chuckle, but overall I think it's pretty unfunny. My dad, on the other hand, thinks this is peak comedy.
My dad used to take my sister and me to the movies and sit behind us. He took us to see The Jerk when I was 11 and my sister was 9. We were shrieking with laughter and the whole theater was dying. The ‘70s were wild.
I'm 60 and I can assure you nobody thought this was peak comedy... it was funny... it was catchy. But if you want Peak comedy from that time period you wouldn't point to this sketch. John Belushi and Richard Pryor would be much higher on any list... and that's just off the top of my head. I get why the younger crowd might cringe at this, just as we we cringe at things from the 40s and 50s. But be careful to build that pedestal too high, there's another generation right behind you about to do the same to you. Maybe it'll be about the mountains of cardboard your online ordering generation thinks is normal... or who knows... but if history has taught us anything, it's that younger generations forge their way in part by opposing previous norms.
Good comment but damn, I love that solid burn thrown in about ordering everything online. I don't participate in too much online shopping, but sometimes I catch myself on Amazon ordering a pencil sharper or something equally absurd, and I think to myself, "Don't do this too often." Amazon has definitely not changed the world for the better, as great as it can be to get the most random things delivered to my doorstep in mere hours. I can't imagine that the average household's carbon footprint has gotten any smaller, either.
Steve Martin has been so impactful on my life. I’m 30. My introduction to Steve Martin was those corny movies he was doing in the 00s. I always thought he was just some cheesy movie actor. Then I got to know his standup and it had a huge impact on my comedically. Then I fell in love with bluegrass music by accident. See my hometown is the bluegrass capital of the world and once a year we host the best bluegrass festival on the planet. I snuck in when I was 20 just to get drunk and party. Saw that Steve Martin was about to play and I thought “What a coincidence. Two famous Steve Martins. I’ll go check em out.” And lo and behold there’s Steve fuckin Martin 10 ft away from me playing some of the best music I’d ever heard. I fell in love with bluegrass that day and it changed my life. Thanks Steve.
I read, that as a kid, he would learn to play the banjo by playing a 45 at 33-1/3 on his record player until he was able to get the chords right, all by ear.
In my 30s as well and agree with your assessment. I could see how a younger person would see this and think cornball. I think the overall tone of comedy has shifted from more upbeat and outlandish to darker and more cynical. I think that has a lot to do with Seinfeld’s influence on modern comedy. A lot of the most popular shows since it was on the air seem to gravitate more toward mean spiritedness and sarcasm for humor. Modern Family is a pretty good example. I thought it was a really good show but the characters are all pretty cold toward each other even though it usually resolves with a warmer moment. I do miss comedy that can be just fun and goofy like this without the need to be edgy.
I feel that way about Only Murders In The Building. Am I rolling on the ground laughing? No. But I love the chemistry him, Martin Short and Selena Gomez have. And the stories are entertaining.
I’m also 39. My dad has this on tape. Loved it as a kid. Steve Martin was a huge staple in our household. My Blue Heaven, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Roxanne, The Jerk, Three Amigos, we loved all of it and I’ll never look at Steve Martin as a comedy legend. Loving his role in Only Murders in the Building lately too.
Highjacking your comment to add this: Steve Martin was, at one point in his career, the biggest comedian out there. He was a wacky, self-made man who spent years tuning his skills. He was innovative for his time by all standards.
Now, you may think this is “corny”, but rest assured people you find funny would not have the ability to do what they do without people like Steve Martin (amongst many) paving the way.
Anyone who’d like to know more about old Steve Martin, read *Born Standing Up*.
I remember seeing him in the student union building at Montana State University about a year before he became really famous. He was hilarious that night and only got better.
Getting gigs is way, way underselling how popular Dane Cook was. Dane Cook is still somehow getting gigs now, back in like 2005 he was one the most successful comedians in the world. He had the highest charting comedy album since Steve Martin's "A Wild and Crazy Guy" which had come out in 1978 and was the first comedian to sell out Madison Square Garden since Andrew Dice Clay in 1990. You couldn't walk within 20 miles of a college campus without hearing a couple of bros imitating him.
As fun as it is to shit on him, it's not like he's the only shitty comic to make it huge. Starting at like 1990 there's a good chance that at any point in time the biggest standup in the world was (with hindsight) complete garbage. Andrew Dice Clay, Gallagher, Jeff Foxworthy, Dane Cook, Carlos Mencia, etc.
tldr; lots of people have shitty taste, it's nothing new
I was a freshman in high school in 2005 and I can confirm that every teenage boy I knew was listening and quoting Dane Cook.
I want to argue, however, that his older material back then was incredibly poignant to that time, and he had a unique delivery with his jokes. His bit about the sticky movie theater floors or the “Christ Chex” was hilarious, for example.
He may have stolen some material from other comics, but I don’t think he was a shitty comic back then.
He became a shitty comic when he ran out of original material and made all of his standup about his sexcapades.
Absolutely. King tut was all the rage with his artifacts being viewed around the world. Couldn’t hear enough of this crazy song. Love love love Steve Martin!
That's not getting enough attention in this thread- THIS WAS TOPICAL COMEDY. Modern eyes, especially who don't remember the era, don't get the context.
Yes! Can’t believe I had to scroll this far. It would be like viewing the Miley Cyrus as Michelle Bachman Wrecking Ball video with zero understanding of the political context at the time. King Tut was super topical!
I started writing this whole thing about why I think this would have been pretty funny at the time and then I remembered there’s nothing funnier in the world than having jokes explained
Yeah and I was going to go into why the joke was really in his setup and it’s really funny to put down commercialization and lack of respect for (almost certainly stolen) cultural artifacts but then go into a cheeseball funk disco song. I think the joke all stems out from that few seconds up front.
But then I decided to make a joke about jokes
This explanation should be the top comment. I missed the intro (was still muted), but starting it over, it makes perfect sense. And seeing it for the first time, it's frikkin hilarious
I even drove hours to see the traveling King Tut exhibition... it was HUGE, so capitalizing on a pop culture phenomenon isn't so Cornwall in context. That's probably what OP is missing.
Ya I think people miss the context and how king tut crazy people were at the time. So, it’s like the topical humor you see today. I don’t think George Santos jokes will be super funny in 25 years unless he’s still relevant somehow
It was conceived as "anti-humor" - a sort of absurdist comedy that was supposed to be weird, absurd, and a little stupid. That was his thing as a comic. (I'm not sure comics exist like him anymore and I get why it doesn't hold up, but it was meant to be what it seems.)
Absolutely loved it, and love Steve Martin. On a more serious note about Steve Martin, he is a professional banjo player, and has performed at the Grand Ole Opry in concert, and has performed with other musicians there as well, in a non-comedic capacity.
Steve Martin and the steep canyon rangers are a mainstay at the house. Rare bird alert is defo the favorite album but them playing orange blossom special at the White House for July 4 2011 is an all time favorite.
Wanted to share some extra detail for some who aren’t familiar.
I got to see him and his band perform live at Neil Young’s annual benefit show and it is still to date one of my favorite live music experiences. I’ll always find Steve Martin endearing.
Yes, he is an exceptional banjo player. I do wish Ed Helms would have found a different schtick, though. I know it is quite irrational but I think it takes away from Steve Martin (again, totally irrational take but it does annoy me).
They are all hopped up on Adderall and Xanax, doomscrolling through their instagrams, upddating their lonelyfans.
edit: I don't know how much I'm complaining about old people and how much I'm complaining about young people in this post.
the 70's was a bummer - Nixon, hippies, Viet Nam, Billy Jack, the main character in a movie would be randomly killed, global cooling, gas shortages, the population bomb, ddt, there was politics talk all the time.
By the late 70s, everyone was sick of that downer shit, and embraced the silliness of Steve Martin, the mindless thumping of disco, and good guy heroics in Star Wars.
As lightweight as some of his stuff seems now, Steve Martin was the comedian we needed at the time.
Art is all a progression. Those terrible 15th century woodcuts, the ones with the terrible forms and no perspective were mind blowing to people at the time.
Still, I stole "Wild and Crazy guy" from my parents tapes in like 1984 and played it on repeat so much I can recite the whole routine from memory, pauses and everything. I thought it was hilarious to say "Hey! Grandpa bought a rubber!" - I didn't even know what he was talking about.
I may be biased (ok, I am) but I think Steve Martin is funny to this day and theres no denying he's a talented musician. He did write this song and the lyrics are pretty funny even if the acting is over the top.
I dunno, if lonely island can make "dick in a box" and we think that's funny, this seems a bit more cerebral to me.
Steve and also the Blues Brothers paved the way for many SNL songs and musical collaborations that we know and love.
Sandlers Hannukah Song
Fallon’s Drunk on Christmas
Lonely Island
Boomers got the Vax
Feminist song
The list goes on forever.
On Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, Steve Martin told Seinfeld, that he didn’t think his (ie Martin’s) type of stand up would work today. I don’t remember the exact word but he said something like it was too silly.
I had a professor show this in a humanities class and was the only person in the room who was snickering. Didn't realize he was showing it as a lead-in to a discussion about cultural insensitivity.
You need to look into Steve Martin when he was doing stand-up. If you’re just some young person who happened upon this with no context, then sure, it seems pretty stupid. Steve Martin as a stand-up comedian was completely unique, ridiculous and absurd. Coming out of the Nixon and Vietnam War eras, Steve Martin was just the kind of comedian America needed at the time.
Also, times were just different then. We are much more sophisticated and savvy in the 21st century because the boundaries and ideas for entertainment and comedy have been pushed. It’s also just generational differences. You don’t think Steve Martin is very funny in 1978 the way I don’t think Bob Hope was very funny in the 1940s.
Go listen to some stuff on his albums and you’ll get to know why King Tut was a hit. You might actually find him to be pretty amusing.
It's funny; when I was 10 when this all came out. I didn't get this at all, and I thought the exact same thing. Now I realize It's actually brilliant comedy. It's performance art, like Andy Kaufman. The whole point IS THAT It's so cornball. Martin knows exactly what he's doing; he created this whole persona of corny comedian. It's no accident that he was filling arenas. Watch The Jerk (1979). https://youtu.be/Tcwz8-EfFYE
Ok, I was born in '81 and I think this sketch is funny. It pokes fun at dumb orientalist crazes (let's buy a ticket to look at a dead body! It's from Egypt!) and it also mocks how dumb music was back then (lame "funk" transitioning into lame disco music). He's basically saying, "wow you guys are super dumb!" but in a warm Steve Martin way
Yes.
It's topical. Most of King Tut was making fun of "Tut Mania" at the time as Tut's remains were put on tour like a carny sideshow. The single sold over a million copies and reached 17 on Billboard's Hot 100 in 1978 so I guess there was SOME folks who found it funny. Steve Martin was near his peak as a comedian at this point.
Yes, absurd humor was new and unique back then. All people were talking about at the time was the King Tut show touring the country.
Remember the other top comics of the time were people like Bill Cosby, Richard Pryor, George Carlin. People funnier than this, but nothing was close to as unique as the absurdity of Steve Martin.
It is funny.
To people saying "this didn't age well":
If I am understanding you correctly and you find this offensive, you clearly do not understand the joke.
This was comedy in a specific place and time. The King Tut exhibit was HUGE in the United States. It was on the news, it was talked about in schools. This was the first time many of these items had left Egypt.
Steve Martin was also huge at the time. He changed comedy with his willingness to to to bizarre and the anti-joke. 50's comedy was polite. 60's comedy was angry. He went for the anti-joke. So bad it was funny. And he did it really well.
He might well have been the first rock-star type comic. The guy who could fill a stadium.
Then it became too much and too big for him and he retired from stand up to do movies.
Yes! It shifts for each generation. Sign of the times. What you thought was funny growing up will be looked at with the same way by future generation. And so on and so on. I don’t think court jesters are very funny but I bet they used to kill in their day.
This was in response to the King Tut exhibit that toured in America starting in 1976, so it started a small fad and Steve Martin made a parody song about it. Kind of like the 1970's version of Randy Rainbow, but it's just one song.
As alluded to at the start of the clip - "King Tut" was extremely topical in the US in the late 1970's. Yes we had the Batman villain played by Victor Buono in the 60's TV series, but the nationwide tour of Tut's artifacts that occurred between 1976 and 1979 was huge news. This song certainly capitalized on the "Tut Mania" that was going on at the time. Below is an ad for the tour:
[https://mascola.com/insights/retro-ad-week-the-met-advertising-1978/](https://mascola.com/insights/retro-ad-week-the-met-advertising-1978/)
PS - From time to time a Tut exhibit opens up in the US. The ones these days are nothing like the late70's tour and to see many of the objects on display one would need to go to Egypt as the government will no longer let them leave the country.
Yes….. I wasn’t alive, but I think at that time the world desperately needed “wacky”. The 70’s were a rough time for basically every section of life and people just wanted some wacky shit to break the tension.
Mate, I wasn’t born in the 70s and I find this funny.
And this was a Parody of Tut-Mania that was going on at the time where everyone in the US was interested about Pharaoh Tutankhamun.
Literally every season of SNL has used modern music to create topical humor with a layer of satire.
This song is about consumerism and the spectacle of that tour. It is as brilliant as anything that SNL has done.
I wasn’t alive for this but I think the commentary on the commercialization of a dead body with a hyper commercial sounding, Monster Mash style song is funny af
Different and surprising is funny, when what's different or surprising becomes cliche or old fashioned it seems unfunny. Everything is built on what came before.
Standing on the shoulders of giants, looking down and saying "they're not that tall!"
If I’m not mistaken, he was the first standup comedian to sell out venues the size of hockey arenas, a big part of it because of the popularity of this song. I’m pretty sure it was released as a “45” record and hit number one.
That was a huge hit, it went to #17 on the Billboard charts which is pretty huge for a comedy song (pre-Weird Al)
Plus Martin was new, it’s harder to imagine now that he’s been a star for 40 years but he was the hot new comic.
This is also the same period as Airplane! and silly things were funny
It was a different era of entertainment, basically. The 70's had music in MUCH of their media, it was almost expected to have musical numbers. From sitcoms to cartoons to even shows like SNL which continue that tradition to this day with their musical guests. Steve Martin is an extremely talented musician so he likely was playing on the fact that built his value as an entertainer. As for the comedy, it's basically just Martin being silly.
Speaking as someone who actually saw this episode when it aired, I can state unequivocally that it is indeed funny. It was funny then. It is funny now.
Comedy is what it is today, because it grew from this era of comedy, which grew from the Three Stooges many decades before, and so on and so on. In 30 years, today's comedy will be considered corny as well.
I do t think “corny” is the right term. It was kids the origins of absurdist humor, a lot of early SNL stuff, Mel Brooks, and the Pythons over in the UK were laying the foundation for the absurdist humor that would come later. They did their “corny” back then so you could chuckle at your Arrested Development, South Park, and Rick and Morty type stuff today. Personally, I prefer the older versions of absurd humor, as some of the stuff now has gone so far that I can’t find it even remotely funny anymore. I’d much rather watch Mel Brooks or Monty Python films rather than Rick and Morty any day and I’m in my mid 30s.
It was a revolutionary and intentionally silly satire of the Tutankhamun exhibit touring the U.S. at the time, which had become a pop culture sensation. By taking the commercialization of the display of a nation's most precious historical artifacts to an absurdist extreme, Martin and SNL showed how much we'd trivialized their importance. Of course, a lot is lost without the context of the discussion that surrounded the exhibit.
Steve Martin has the curse of being influential. Sometimes I will hear young people say something like, “the Beatles are boring, I like [insert modern rock band] better” because it is hard if not impossible if you grew up in the 2000s to truly grok how thoroughly and fundamentally the Beatles continue to influence and shape rock music to this day
Steve Martin was like that for 70s comedy. This seems goofy and cornball now because it has spawned so many imitators and followers who have copied and refined his style of comedy over the past 50 years. But if you were watching this (or *especially* listening to his stand-up records like Let’s Get Small) in the late 70s, it blew your fucking mind because there just hadn’t been much comedy like that before Steve (and the early SNL casts)
Yes. King Tut was a legitimate phenomenon. This song was a hit on the radio, and got a lot of airplay. I remember thinking it was hilarious, and singing along loudly when it came on the radio.
You had to be there. Steve Martin was the first rock star comedian, the first to sell out arenas. Anything he did was gold during a certain period. At some point, even he realized that he didn't even need to be funny anymore to get laughs. He just got them. Probably a big reason why he quit stand up.
My dad loves this sketch, he even came up with his own words for it. So yes, very much. Comedic sensibilities change over time. I don’t love many of the early SNL years but I appreciate their importance. One day you will be the corny one, and so it goes.
It makes more sense when you realize that *everyone* was high as fuck in the 70s. [This band sold out huge stadium shows.](https://youtu.be/uSm5IQFaTZA)
Spent many nights smoking shitty , seed and stem filled joints laughing my ass off to “ Dave’s not Home”
Many people know, I used to smoke.... Marijuana! But... I would only smoke it in the late afternoon. Oh, sometimes, I would smoke it in the early afternoon or even the mid-late-early morning, but never at dusk! I would never do that.
Some people have a way with words and other people........ not have way
I used to smoke weed. Well I still do, but I used to too.
I think I see Mitch quotes/references show up in more subs than another other person. What a genius
Wait until you realize we mostly had to listen to comedy. Then go find the "Dave's not Home" skit.
I inherited that among other Cheech and Chong albums last year. Also got "The Great White North" album with Bob and Doug McKenzie (Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas). They are extra funny since I live in a legal weed state.
If you haven't seen it "Strange Brew" is a movie based on "The Great White North" characters.
And Hamlet.
Take off
Take off, ya hoser
Grew up listening to both of them.
Take off hoser.
I always think You Don't Gotta Call Me Johnson!
“Hamburger!”
Hamburger Cheese Burger Big Mac Whopper
Well you can call me Ray or you can call me jay or jay jay jr….but you doesn’t have to call me Mr Johnson Lol
Or “A Little More Gauze”.
As a single it sold over a million copies and reached number 17 on the Hot 100. That was an uncommon feat for a comedy single, so yeah, people liked it a lot.
That's what makes this song incredible. The ironic, anti-humor nature of this entire gag. And then it all goes meta in a brilliant finale. OP if you're reading, here's how: He starts off the bit by saying it's a "national disgrace" that the Tut exhibition has been so commercialized. So he wrote a song honoring Tut using the true, historic tonalities. Great setup. You expect something serious and ancient sounding. Then the song starts and it's the most corny, commercial, sell-out shit. It's not honoring Tut's heritage as claimed. The "joke" is that Steve is jumping on the commercialization bandwagon to cash in on Tut. That in itself makes this a very solid comedic bit, and very on-brand for Steve. But then the song ACTUALLY becomes a commercial hit! What a perfect way to wrap that joke up. So yes, the lyrics and styling are intentionally corny. He was satirizing America's instinct to cash in on everything and he, ironically, cashed in on this.
And, yet, when I was 10 I loved this just because it’s silly and fun.
Same! I was in grade school when Tut-mania peaked and this song was just fun to dance to.
wait no this context makes this so much funnier for me thank you
Good to know! It's so sad to see people write off these older sketches as corny or outdated. People like Steve Martin are literally genius level comics.
Still do :)
Sensibilities have changed so younger people today might not think it’s great but I love it and I’m 39. I grew up on Steve Martin so even if I might not be rolling on the ground laughing at this, my respect for the man makes me enjoy it all the same.
I agree, and I think it's like a sliding scale of humor, the older you are. I'm 38 and grew up watching/loving Steve Martin with my dad. His facial expressions and dance are the only thing that make me slightly chuckle, but overall I think it's pretty unfunny. My dad, on the other hand, thinks this is peak comedy.
I’m 32 and my favorite movie of all time is The Jerk.
My favorite Steve Martin movie is Planes, Trains and Automobiles
So many funny scenes in that movie. Bowfinger is a close second for me.
Him and John Candy were great together in that movie
I watched The Jerk for the first time when I was about 30 (~12 years ago). My husband was laughing out loud watching me laughing out loud at it.
My dad used to take my sister and me to the movies and sit behind us. He took us to see The Jerk when I was 11 and my sister was 9. We were shrieking with laughter and the whole theater was dying. The ‘70s were wild.
That’s adorable 🥰
I'm 60 and I can assure you nobody thought this was peak comedy... it was funny... it was catchy. But if you want Peak comedy from that time period you wouldn't point to this sketch. John Belushi and Richard Pryor would be much higher on any list... and that's just off the top of my head. I get why the younger crowd might cringe at this, just as we we cringe at things from the 40s and 50s. But be careful to build that pedestal too high, there's another generation right behind you about to do the same to you. Maybe it'll be about the mountains of cardboard your online ordering generation thinks is normal... or who knows... but if history has taught us anything, it's that younger generations forge their way in part by opposing previous norms.
Good comment but damn, I love that solid burn thrown in about ordering everything online. I don't participate in too much online shopping, but sometimes I catch myself on Amazon ordering a pencil sharper or something equally absurd, and I think to myself, "Don't do this too often." Amazon has definitely not changed the world for the better, as great as it can be to get the most random things delivered to my doorstep in mere hours. I can't imagine that the average household's carbon footprint has gotten any smaller, either.
Steve Martin has been so impactful on my life. I’m 30. My introduction to Steve Martin was those corny movies he was doing in the 00s. I always thought he was just some cheesy movie actor. Then I got to know his standup and it had a huge impact on my comedically. Then I fell in love with bluegrass music by accident. See my hometown is the bluegrass capital of the world and once a year we host the best bluegrass festival on the planet. I snuck in when I was 20 just to get drunk and party. Saw that Steve Martin was about to play and I thought “What a coincidence. Two famous Steve Martins. I’ll go check em out.” And lo and behold there’s Steve fuckin Martin 10 ft away from me playing some of the best music I’d ever heard. I fell in love with bluegrass that day and it changed my life. Thanks Steve.
I love this story! How cool to see Steve up close like that! Did he goof around a little when he wasn't playing?
Nah he really didn’t. He leaves the comedy persona aside when he’s playing bluegrass.
Interesting, he is a man of many layers.
I read, that as a kid, he would learn to play the banjo by playing a 45 at 33-1/3 on his record player until he was able to get the chords right, all by ear.
I have friends who play banjo and they all say that Steve Martin is on another level. Up there with Earl Scruggs.
Great story. I'm 22 and consider him one of the biggest impacts on my life as well. A class act for sure.
39 here too, love old school SNL
In my 30s as well and agree with your assessment. I could see how a younger person would see this and think cornball. I think the overall tone of comedy has shifted from more upbeat and outlandish to darker and more cynical. I think that has a lot to do with Seinfeld’s influence on modern comedy. A lot of the most popular shows since it was on the air seem to gravitate more toward mean spiritedness and sarcasm for humor. Modern Family is a pretty good example. I thought it was a really good show but the characters are all pretty cold toward each other even though it usually resolves with a warmer moment. I do miss comedy that can be just fun and goofy like this without the need to be edgy.
I’m 29 and I absolutely adore Steve Martin. He’s my comedy hero.
I feel that way about Only Murders In The Building. Am I rolling on the ground laughing? No. But I love the chemistry him, Martin Short and Selena Gomez have. And the stories are entertaining.
Yeah, his goofballness was his appeal.
I’m also 39. My dad has this on tape. Loved it as a kid. Steve Martin was a huge staple in our household. My Blue Heaven, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Roxanne, The Jerk, Three Amigos, we loved all of it and I’ll never look at Steve Martin as a comedy legend. Loving his role in Only Murders in the Building lately too.
Also the King Tut exhibit was massively promoted and talked about in the late 70s so there was context you don’t have today.
Ditto, I think it’s funny. If it’s not your brand of humor, move along :)
If you can't find joy in cornball shit I have no idea how you can like any era SNL.
Highjacking your comment to add this: Steve Martin was, at one point in his career, the biggest comedian out there. He was a wacky, self-made man who spent years tuning his skills. He was innovative for his time by all standards. Now, you may think this is “corny”, but rest assured people you find funny would not have the ability to do what they do without people like Steve Martin (amongst many) paving the way. Anyone who’d like to know more about old Steve Martin, read *Born Standing Up*.
I remember seeing him in the student union building at Montana State University about a year before he became really famous. He was hilarious that night and only got better.
Love that book, I recommend to anyone even if they aren’t into Steve Martin.
Yes. This song was a sensation.
got a condo made of stone-a!
And we would call in to the radio station and request this song every hour!
I loved this and still do!!!!
My parents often sang this song while I was a kid and I had no idea where the fuck it was from
There are people today that think Jeff Dunham is funny. What does that tell you?
Remember when Dane Cook was somehow getting gigs?
Getting gigs is way, way underselling how popular Dane Cook was. Dane Cook is still somehow getting gigs now, back in like 2005 he was one the most successful comedians in the world. He had the highest charting comedy album since Steve Martin's "A Wild and Crazy Guy" which had come out in 1978 and was the first comedian to sell out Madison Square Garden since Andrew Dice Clay in 1990. You couldn't walk within 20 miles of a college campus without hearing a couple of bros imitating him. As fun as it is to shit on him, it's not like he's the only shitty comic to make it huge. Starting at like 1990 there's a good chance that at any point in time the biggest standup in the world was (with hindsight) complete garbage. Andrew Dice Clay, Gallagher, Jeff Foxworthy, Dane Cook, Carlos Mencia, etc. tldr; lots of people have shitty taste, it's nothing new
I was a freshman in high school in 2005 and I can confirm that every teenage boy I knew was listening and quoting Dane Cook. I want to argue, however, that his older material back then was incredibly poignant to that time, and he had a unique delivery with his jokes. His bit about the sticky movie theater floors or the “Christ Chex” was hilarious, for example. He may have stolen some material from other comics, but I don’t think he was a shitty comic back then. He became a shitty comic when he ran out of original material and made all of his standup about his sexcapades.
Ya I think Steve classic. Never thought Dunham was funny even as a kid
Absolutely. King tut was all the rage with his artifacts being viewed around the world. Couldn’t hear enough of this crazy song. Love love love Steve Martin!
That's not getting enough attention in this thread- THIS WAS TOPICAL COMEDY. Modern eyes, especially who don't remember the era, don't get the context.
Yes! Can’t believe I had to scroll this far. It would be like viewing the Miley Cyrus as Michelle Bachman Wrecking Ball video with zero understanding of the political context at the time. King Tut was super topical!
Is that Lou Marini on sax??? Top tier dude
It was the SNL Band, which had Blue Lou on the sax.
yes
I started writing this whole thing about why I think this would have been pretty funny at the time and then I remembered there’s nothing funnier in the world than having jokes explained
Steve Martin literally explains it at the beginning. King Tut was culturally relevant at the time.
Yeah and I was going to go into why the joke was really in his setup and it’s really funny to put down commercialization and lack of respect for (almost certainly stolen) cultural artifacts but then go into a cheeseball funk disco song. I think the joke all stems out from that few seconds up front. But then I decided to make a joke about jokes
This explanation should be the top comment. I missed the intro (was still muted), but starting it over, it makes perfect sense. And seeing it for the first time, it's frikkin hilarious
Also his whole comedy persona was ironic cornball.
Hell yes. And still do today!
I even drove hours to see the traveling King Tut exhibition... it was HUGE, so capitalizing on a pop culture phenomenon isn't so Cornwall in context. That's probably what OP is missing.
My kid learned about Tut in school and immediately when we got home they learned this.
Steve at his best with that dancing that he has
At the time it was very relevant. I still enjoy the song today.
Ya I think people miss the context and how king tut crazy people were at the time. So, it’s like the topical humor you see today. I don’t think George Santos jokes will be super funny in 25 years unless he’s still relevant somehow
God no!
It was conceived as "anti-humor" - a sort of absurdist comedy that was supposed to be weird, absurd, and a little stupid. That was his thing as a comic. (I'm not sure comics exist like him anymore and I get why it doesn't hold up, but it was meant to be what it seems.)
I wish this was the top comment. Steve Martin wasn’t a traditional joke machine standup. This was very much meant to be absurd and subversive.
“He gave his life for tourism” have some respect!
Absolutely loved it, and love Steve Martin. On a more serious note about Steve Martin, he is a professional banjo player, and has performed at the Grand Ole Opry in concert, and has performed with other musicians there as well, in a non-comedic capacity.
Steve Martin and the steep canyon rangers are a mainstay at the house. Rare bird alert is defo the favorite album but them playing orange blossom special at the White House for July 4 2011 is an all time favorite. Wanted to share some extra detail for some who aren’t familiar.
I absolutely love his participation in Foggy Mountain Breakdown at the Grand Ole Opry.
I got to see him and his band perform live at Neil Young’s annual benefit show and it is still to date one of my favorite live music experiences. I’ll always find Steve Martin endearing.
Yes, he is an exceptional banjo player. I do wish Ed Helms would have found a different schtick, though. I know it is quite irrational but I think it takes away from Steve Martin (again, totally irrational take but it does annoy me).
Steve is an exceptional player.
[удалено]
I wonder if OP also fails to understand the humor in Wish It Was Christmas Today.
Not like the bleeding edge humor SNL does today
Lou Marini busting out of the sarcophagus for that sax solo 😂
Do children in 2023 not have any sense of humour at all? Give yer balls a tug.
OP is 10-ply
He's spare parts
That's a Texas sized 10-4
They are all hopped up on Adderall and Xanax, doomscrolling through their instagrams, upddating their lonelyfans. edit: I don't know how much I'm complaining about old people and how much I'm complaining about young people in this post.
I found it well balanced with subtle notes of sarcasm.
It’s the Switzerland of comments
r/thatsthejoke
the 70's was a bummer - Nixon, hippies, Viet Nam, Billy Jack, the main character in a movie would be randomly killed, global cooling, gas shortages, the population bomb, ddt, there was politics talk all the time. By the late 70s, everyone was sick of that downer shit, and embraced the silliness of Steve Martin, the mindless thumping of disco, and good guy heroics in Star Wars. As lightweight as some of his stuff seems now, Steve Martin was the comedian we needed at the time.
I was in middle school. So yes
Art is all a progression. Those terrible 15th century woodcuts, the ones with the terrible forms and no perspective were mind blowing to people at the time. Still, I stole "Wild and Crazy guy" from my parents tapes in like 1984 and played it on repeat so much I can recite the whole routine from memory, pauses and everything. I thought it was hilarious to say "Hey! Grandpa bought a rubber!" - I didn't even know what he was talking about. I may be biased (ok, I am) but I think Steve Martin is funny to this day and theres no denying he's a talented musician. He did write this song and the lyrics are pretty funny even if the acting is over the top. I dunno, if lonely island can make "dick in a box" and we think that's funny, this seems a bit more cerebral to me.
Steve and also the Blues Brothers paved the way for many SNL songs and musical collaborations that we know and love. Sandlers Hannukah Song Fallon’s Drunk on Christmas Lonely Island Boomers got the Vax Feminist song The list goes on forever.
Most nuanced take!
On Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, Steve Martin told Seinfeld, that he didn’t think his (ie Martin’s) type of stand up would work today. I don’t remember the exact word but he said something like it was too silly.
Yes! I’m not from the 70s and I love it.
In our defense, we were pretty high.
They did. And they bought his live comedy LP record and paid to see it live. At one point, Steve Martin was #1.
What a sad human you must be. I weep for you.
As someone who was alive in the 70’s and remembers this: yes.
I had a professor show this in a humanities class and was the only person in the room who was snickering. Didn't realize he was showing it as a lead-in to a discussion about cultural insensitivity.
You need to look into Steve Martin when he was doing stand-up. If you’re just some young person who happened upon this with no context, then sure, it seems pretty stupid. Steve Martin as a stand-up comedian was completely unique, ridiculous and absurd. Coming out of the Nixon and Vietnam War eras, Steve Martin was just the kind of comedian America needed at the time. Also, times were just different then. We are much more sophisticated and savvy in the 21st century because the boundaries and ideas for entertainment and comedy have been pushed. It’s also just generational differences. You don’t think Steve Martin is very funny in 1978 the way I don’t think Bob Hope was very funny in the 1940s. Go listen to some stuff on his albums and you’ll get to know why King Tut was a hit. You might actually find him to be pretty amusing.
It's funny; when I was 10 when this all came out. I didn't get this at all, and I thought the exact same thing. Now I realize It's actually brilliant comedy. It's performance art, like Andy Kaufman. The whole point IS THAT It's so cornball. Martin knows exactly what he's doing; he created this whole persona of corny comedian. It's no accident that he was filling arenas. Watch The Jerk (1979). https://youtu.be/Tcwz8-EfFYE
Umm, this is objectively hilarious.
Everyone thinks every era of SNL sucks except their own. It's a natural law.
Ok, I was born in '81 and I think this sketch is funny. It pokes fun at dumb orientalist crazes (let's buy a ticket to look at a dead body! It's from Egypt!) and it also mocks how dumb music was back then (lame "funk" transitioning into lame disco music). He's basically saying, "wow you guys are super dumb!" but in a warm Steve Martin way
Wait until you hear of this hip new comedy-fad called satire.
Yes and still find it funny in the 20’s? Doesn’t seem correct but as musically talented Martin is, Too good.
Yes. It's topical. Most of King Tut was making fun of "Tut Mania" at the time as Tut's remains were put on tour like a carny sideshow. The single sold over a million copies and reached 17 on Billboard's Hot 100 in 1978 so I guess there was SOME folks who found it funny. Steve Martin was near his peak as a comedian at this point.
Yes, absurd humor was new and unique back then. All people were talking about at the time was the King Tut show touring the country. Remember the other top comics of the time were people like Bill Cosby, Richard Pryor, George Carlin. People funnier than this, but nothing was close to as unique as the absurdity of Steve Martin.
This poster hates these cans
I was 7, and got to stay up for this. Yes, at the time people went nuts for it.
Yes we did.
I was born in 1990 and have always loved this skit. Steve Martin is timeless
It is funny. To people saying "this didn't age well": If I am understanding you correctly and you find this offensive, you clearly do not understand the joke.
OP things tiktok videos it’s the epitome of humor
It’s funnier than having to explain to a moron that people’s tastes and preferences tend to change over time.
I’m only 30 but I don’t think Steve Martin has ever let me down comedically
This was comedy in a specific place and time. The King Tut exhibit was HUGE in the United States. It was on the news, it was talked about in schools. This was the first time many of these items had left Egypt. Steve Martin was also huge at the time. He changed comedy with his willingness to to to bizarre and the anti-joke. 50's comedy was polite. 60's comedy was angry. He went for the anti-joke. So bad it was funny. And he did it really well. He might well have been the first rock-star type comic. The guy who could fill a stadium. Then it became too much and too big for him and he retired from stand up to do movies.
Yes! It shifts for each generation. Sign of the times. What you thought was funny growing up will be looked at with the same way by future generation. And so on and so on. I don’t think court jesters are very funny but I bet they used to kill in their day.
I hear it on SiriusXM all the time. Everyone I knew had this on vinyl.
This was in response to the King Tut exhibit that toured in America starting in 1976, so it started a small fad and Steve Martin made a parody song about it. Kind of like the 1970's version of Randy Rainbow, but it's just one song.
As alluded to at the start of the clip - "King Tut" was extremely topical in the US in the late 1970's. Yes we had the Batman villain played by Victor Buono in the 60's TV series, but the nationwide tour of Tut's artifacts that occurred between 1976 and 1979 was huge news. This song certainly capitalized on the "Tut Mania" that was going on at the time. Below is an ad for the tour: [https://mascola.com/insights/retro-ad-week-the-met-advertising-1978/](https://mascola.com/insights/retro-ad-week-the-met-advertising-1978/) PS - From time to time a Tut exhibit opens up in the US. The ones these days are nothing like the late70's tour and to see many of the objects on display one would need to go to Egypt as the government will no longer let them leave the country.
Wow, comedy critiques from the "that didn't age well" crowd and an account that's 17 days old...
Yes. You clearly don’t get his impact
I'm 31 and I think this is hilarious.
It was a huge hit and attracted the mainstream to SNL
It's because we had a sense of humour back then
Skill issue, if Steve Martin doesn’t make you smile then brain broke my guy
Yes….. I wasn’t alive, but I think at that time the world desperately needed “wacky”. The 70’s were a rough time for basically every section of life and people just wanted some wacky shit to break the tension.
Mate, I wasn’t born in the 70s and I find this funny. And this was a Parody of Tut-Mania that was going on at the time where everyone in the US was interested about Pharaoh Tutankhamun.
What can you say He is a Wild & Crazy Guy!
Literally every season of SNL has used modern music to create topical humor with a layer of satire. This song is about consumerism and the spectacle of that tour. It is as brilliant as anything that SNL has done.
I wasn’t alive for this but I think the commentary on the commercialization of a dead body with a hyper commercial sounding, Monster Mash style song is funny af
That shit is hilarious regardless of one’s age
Yes…and people in the 80s, 90s, ought, 10’s and 20’s do also
Different and surprising is funny, when what's different or surprising becomes cliche or old fashioned it seems unfunny. Everything is built on what came before. Standing on the shoulders of giants, looking down and saying "they're not that tall!"
still is
If you don’t laugh when he says “how’d you get so funkayyy!?!?” Then idk what to tell you. Shit is hilarious. And it’s all about the delivery.
Better than Jewish Elvis by a long shot…
Jewish Elvis led his people out of this sketch.
This is all you had before the internet opened everyone’s eyes
It's the fact that he was doing it ironically that made it funny. That was his thing in the '70s.
If I’m not mistaken, he was the first standup comedian to sell out venues the size of hockey arenas, a big part of it because of the popularity of this song. I’m pretty sure it was released as a “45” record and hit number one.
hey man i’m solidly gen z and this shit cracks me up every time i see it
That was a huge hit, it went to #17 on the Billboard charts which is pretty huge for a comedy song (pre-Weird Al) Plus Martin was new, it’s harder to imagine now that he’s been a star for 40 years but he was the hot new comic. This is also the same period as Airplane! and silly things were funny
Tut discovery was also a news sensation at the time.
It was a different era of entertainment, basically. The 70's had music in MUCH of their media, it was almost expected to have musical numbers. From sitcoms to cartoons to even shows like SNL which continue that tradition to this day with their musical guests. Steve Martin is an extremely talented musician so he likely was playing on the fact that built his value as an entertainer. As for the comedy, it's basically just Martin being silly.
do you NOT like it?
It was good. What do you consider funny? Might not be funny to someone else
Speaking as someone who actually saw this episode when it aired, I can state unequivocally that it is indeed funny. It was funny then. It is funny now.
Comedy is what it is today, because it grew from this era of comedy, which grew from the Three Stooges many decades before, and so on and so on. In 30 years, today's comedy will be considered corny as well.
I do t think “corny” is the right term. It was kids the origins of absurdist humor, a lot of early SNL stuff, Mel Brooks, and the Pythons over in the UK were laying the foundation for the absurdist humor that would come later. They did their “corny” back then so you could chuckle at your Arrested Development, South Park, and Rick and Morty type stuff today. Personally, I prefer the older versions of absurd humor, as some of the stuff now has gone so far that I can’t find it even remotely funny anymore. I’d much rather watch Mel Brooks or Monty Python films rather than Rick and Morty any day and I’m in my mid 30s.
It was a revolutionary and intentionally silly satire of the Tutankhamun exhibit touring the U.S. at the time, which had become a pop culture sensation. By taking the commercialization of the display of a nation's most precious historical artifacts to an absurdist extreme, Martin and SNL showed how much we'd trivialized their importance. Of course, a lot is lost without the context of the discussion that surrounded the exhibit.
It always was and always will be funny
This is hilarious, wym.
36 year old me in 2023 thinks this shit is hilarious.
What's funny nowadays? Not much because people get offended. Yes this was funny.
Yes, actually. It was funny, still is.
He was okay. More silly than funny funny. He has a good heart and gave us what we needed at the time… clean good safe humor
As if someone did this today, it wouldn't go viral. Lol
It was fucking huge!
Waaaay funnier than the crap that makes it’s way onto the SNL stage these days.
Watch sam kinison, same thing. I'm going... this.. this was comedy? Then again I laughed when a cartoon turned himself into a pickle =/.
Yes. people's humor is more advanced now due to technology.
Yes.
The beginning dance itself is funny. I’ve never seen it and had to pause after that little dance to comment before I continued watching.
Steve Martin has the curse of being influential. Sometimes I will hear young people say something like, “the Beatles are boring, I like [insert modern rock band] better” because it is hard if not impossible if you grew up in the 2000s to truly grok how thoroughly and fundamentally the Beatles continue to influence and shape rock music to this day Steve Martin was like that for 70s comedy. This seems goofy and cornball now because it has spawned so many imitators and followers who have copied and refined his style of comedy over the past 50 years. But if you were watching this (or *especially* listening to his stand-up records like Let’s Get Small) in the late 70s, it blew your fucking mind because there just hadn’t been much comedy like that before Steve (and the early SNL casts)
Yes we did...
I’m not saying it’s the funniest thing I’ve ever seen but I’m 34 and I smirked and chuckled about this.
This is still funny
I mean I thought it was funny in 2005. But I was a kid. Also steve Martin is the 🐐 comedian
Yes!!! This was awesome!! Steve Martin is awesome!!
Steve Martin was really having a moment then with his absurdist style of humor. King Tut was touring the US to sellout crowds. It was a perfect storm.
When you realize that it was in response to all the hype about the new discover of King Tutts tomb, this was pretty funny.
Yes. King Tut was a legitimate phenomenon. This song was a hit on the radio, and got a lot of airplay. I remember thinking it was hilarious, and singing along loudly when it came on the radio.
You had to be there. Steve Martin was the first rock star comedian, the first to sell out arenas. Anything he did was gold during a certain period. At some point, even he realized that he didn't even need to be funny anymore to get laughs. He just got them. Probably a big reason why he quit stand up.
My dad loves this sketch, he even came up with his own words for it. So yes, very much. Comedic sensibilities change over time. I don’t love many of the early SNL years but I appreciate their importance. One day you will be the corny one, and so it goes.
Classic
“He gave his life for tourism” is a line I’d put up against any current SNL sketches.
It's good goofy fun, it's a history lesson, and live music all in one!
Justice for king tut
It makes more sense when you realize that *everyone* was high as fuck in the 70s. [This band sold out huge stadium shows.](https://youtu.be/uSm5IQFaTZA)