Bob Newhart
Bob Newhart
George Robert Newhart, better known as Bob Newhart, is an American stand-up comedian and actor. Noted for his deadpan and slightly stammering delivery, Newhart came to prominence in the 1960s when his album of comedic monologues The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart was a worldwide bestseller and reached number one on the Billboard pop album chart—it remains the 20th best-selling comedy album in history. The follow-up album, The Button-Down Mind Strikes Back! was also a massive success, and the two...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTV Actor
Date of Birth5 September 1929
CityOak Park, IL
CountryUnited States of America
The first time I got up in front of an audience was terror, abject terror, which continued for another four or five years. There still is, a little bit.
Because of the spin-meisters and the focus groups and the way politics is run now. It's run by polls and focus groups. So it's even more true today, I think, than it was some 40 years ago.
I've been married forty-five years. I think laughter is the secret.
When I started out in 1960, I thought it might possibly last a couple of years. I never expected it to last 42. I take great satisfaction in that longevity.
I gave up accounting. I went in for about six months writing ad copy. I was fired from that, and then another guy and I did a kind of poor man's Bob and Ray kind of syndicated radio show. Then I decided to stick it out and see what happened. I'd give it a year, a year became two years, and then two years became three years, and then along came the record album.
I worked in accounting for two and a half years, realized that wasn't what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, and decided I was just going to give comedy a try.
The show went through several stages before it went on the air,
People stayed home on Saturdays to watch CBS, ... I don't know why or how the networks abandoned Saturday nights. Maybe cable has had something to do with that. I don't know, but I do know that at one time Saturdays were big for the networks.
I wouldn't want that man as my psychologist.
The Bob Newhart Show: The Complete Second Season
That idea came from my wife (Virginia), ... You know, 'Dallas' had done the thing about one season being nothing more than a dream. We managed to keep it a secret until we actually shot the show. You should have heard the audience when they saw me and Suzanne in bed.
When you're going for a joke, you're stuck out there if it doesn't work. There's nowhere to go. You've done the drum role and the cymbal clash and you're out on the end of the plank.
More and more, as I get older, people come up to me and say, 'Thank you for all the laughter.' And my standard answer is, 'It was my pleasure.' But that's the truth.
I love portraying the totally indifferent person.