When he realized that audiences applauded his stiff demeanor and wrong notes rather than his musical ability, Benny became a stage comic and often used his violin-playing as a means of getting laughs. His first appearances were as a teenager, playing the violin in vaudeville (see entry under 1900s-Film and Theater in volume 1). This may be because his roots were in the midwestern town of Waukegan, Illinois, rather than in the immigrant "melting pot" (racial, social, and cultural mixture) of New York City, where exaggerated Yiddish accents and Semitic jokes were more prevalent. Unlike other Jewish entertainers of his time, he did not adopt an ethnic approach to comedy. In one of his classic comic sketches, Benny is held up by a burglar who demands, "Your money or your life." After his characteristic lengthy pause, Benny responds, "I'm thinking about it." In another classic bit, when asked his age, Benny always said he was "thirty-nine," a line that grew funnier as the years passed and he was well into old age.īenny was born Benjamin Kubelsky. Benny's humor focused on the made-up persona of a wisecracking penny-pincher (one who is very conservative, often cheap, with his or her money). He was known for his subtle sense of comic timing, which relied on a long pause and a frozen, pained expression in order to milk laughs. Jack Benny was one of the most popular and influential comedians of the twentieth century.
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