[Wally_Kalbacken]

I thought he was an interesting character - Jackie Gleason. He grew up in circumstances that were very rough - an effective abandonment that you would think would lead to great insecurity, and then he worked his way up with humor that played against those circumstances. The lunch bucket bus driver, Ralph Kramden was classic. Some of his pantomime of bums and hobos worked, as I remember it from my childhood. His Reginald Van Gleason III send-up was very funny schtick.

The last thing I recall seeing of him was a 60 Minutes interview done in the mid 80's -not long before he died. You had the sense that all the booze and smoking had produced the expected result, and it seemed he wasn't that happy. Which was unfortunate given all the laughs he had provided.

[Captain Peter Blood]

It seems a number of comedians that make so many laugh, are, in the own personal lives, very unhappy people.

Supposedly Edmund Kean the great early 19th century English actor said this on his deathbed, “Dying is easy. it’s comedy that is hard”.