Columnist Joe Delaney: Rodney gets respect

Joe Delaney

Friday, Dec. 26, 1997 | 9:15 a.m.

Rodney Dangerfield and Harry Basil opened Christmas night to a 90-percent full house in the MGM Grand Hollywood Theatre. Basil opened with a frantic, manic half-hour that was not quite up to his usual high standard for low comedy. But the audience had a good time and rewarded him nicely at the close. Dangerfield was much less mellow than the last time in but managed to cram an hour-plus of laughs into a 45-minute span, less time onstage than usual.

Dangerfield is updated Henny Youngman with a rougher version of all the usual family, growing up, wife and children jokes. Like Youngman, there is always one or two new lines that we have to write down as worth saving. Rodney knows his audience, his timing is on the mark, his material below borderline good taste. In fairness to Rodney, the lady next to me laughed longer and harder than her husband did.

Rodney's method is always go for the jugular vein with the first line, liberal use of profanity as punctuation, but never let them up after he once gets them. It is a juggernaut style, my next-door lady never stopped laughing for the entire 45 minutes, seemingly out-of-breath at times. Her husband laughed, too, but nothing like his wife.

Harry Basil does it better and is much funnier than Carrot Top, who headlines in this room. Basil has also been doing it much longer. It is one of the mysteries of show business that Rip Taylor works here too seldom, Basil is an opening act and Carrot Top headlines and is a TV talk-show regular.

Neither act is really for the faint of heart or of mind, but both Dangerfield and Basil are proficient laugh-makers.