Making a Monkey Out of Benchley

“I can't bring myself to say, 'Well, I guess I'll be toddling along.' It isn't that I can't toddle. It's just that I can't guess I'll toddle.”

Today marks the 117th anniversary of the birth of great American wit, writer and satiric filmmaker, Robert Benchley, founding member of the Algonquin Round Table of the 1920s, and close friend of Harpo Marx, Charlie Chaplin, George Kaufman, and a million other heroes of mine. Oh, and Benchley himself also happens to be something of an icon to me. And I am not the only one. You only have to look at Benchley’s distinctive “so painful it is funny” mock-nervous speaking style to know that, had there not been Benchley, there would not have been Woody Allen or Bob Newhart.

Born in Worchester, Mass, on September 15, 1889, Benchley was the only child born on that day in his home city… this started a trend of being an individual, as well as making unique appearances. Benchley’s works includes hundreds of printed stories, essays, collected works, quips and bon mots. He was also behind around 46 of the funniest short films ever made, including the Oscar-winning How to Sleep (1935).

A product of solid middle-class roots, Benchley still had the insecurity and tragedy that is required of all American humorists: When his beloved older brother Edmund died in the Spanish-American War, his mother’s first reaction was: “Oh, why couldn’t it have been Robert?!?” Although she regretted saying it almost immediately, the comment became legend in the family, and one can easily see how Robert became a famous wit; it was either that or start hollowing out bullets and find a bell tower.

Famous for his New Yorker, Harvard Lampoon, Hollywood and publishing successes, Benchley always considered himself a lazy man, and not even a very good writer (his response: “But by the time I found out I couldn’t write, I was too famous at it to stop.”) However, today, aside from starting something of a writing dynasty including son Nat (The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming, 1966) and grandson Peter (Jaws, 1975), Robert Benchley also remains one of the foundational founding fathers of modern comedy and humour writing.

So, he is greatly missed since his death in 1945, but not forgotten. Don’t mourn. Instead, “get out of these wet clothes and into a dry martini.”

(Who else could have made such a line? The bastard… he does make one jealous.)
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