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From: Gary & Bonnie Arnold <>
Subject: Red Skelton
Date: Mon, 05 Oct 1998 17:21:47 -0700


Sorry folks, but since I started this, I had better explain. Red
Skelton was perhaps the funniest of American comedians. He started out
in movies in the 1930s with different stars, like Lucille Ball (of I
Love Lucy fame).

He graduated on to television in the 1950s, but is reputed to have
voluntarily refused to continue on with it due to the amount of
anti-family material, explicit material and foul language.

He was the sort of comedian who could laugh at himself, often laughing
at the punch line of a joke before he even delivered it. He had many
standard characters - Freddy the Freeloader, Klem Kadiddlehopper, the
mean little kid, and several others that simply escape me at this time.

Red did many tours of Britain, including command performances which were
televised extensively. He not only wrote many of his own jokes, but
also wrote his own music which was performed on his stage shows.

In addition, he was an artist, and his paintings of clowns are world
renowned and fetch a very high price.

If you have never seen him perform, and love to laugh, try and find a
video of one of his stage performances - it does not matter which! I
guarantee that you will have tears running very quickly. In addition,
you can let the kids watch it without any worry about the language or
content.

Red died, I believe, last year, and this is one fan who misses his
humour. Sure glad it's been recorded for us to watch in perpetuity.

Mary, you said you love a good joke...well, you will just love Red
Skelton.

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