She Likes to Watch

Before he ever donned a bag on his head and called himself the Unknown Comic, Murray Langston was a computer operator hoping to break into show business. When he asked what he had to do to get on the show “Laugh-In,” he was told, “Do something unusual and call us.”

So for his first ever TV appearance, Langston did an impression of a fork.

More “Laugh-In” spots followed, and he eventually found a gig on “The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour.”

As noted in Thursday’s Ticket, he became the Unknown Comic because he was broke and embarrassed to be seen on “The Gong Show,” where he made his first appearance for $250.

Langston appears with Kato Kaelin at the Spyglass Inn this weekend. (See more about Kaelin in this blog Friday.)

Though he never would earn more than $150,000 a year, Langston’s Unknown Comic would ironically become a household name in the 70s and 80s. And Langston would form relationships with some of the most recognizable names in show business.

Here’s more from our interview with Langston:

* For years the true identity of the Unknown Comic was a mystery – until Langston removed his bag on an episode of “Real People.”

* Being unknown led the way for others to say they were the Unknown Comic.

“I remember this one time – this was absolutely true – I was at a restaurant at the counter talking to this girl,” Langston said. “Eventually, I said I was the Unknown Comic, and she said, ‘No, you’re not,’ and I said, ‘Yeah, I am.’ And she said, ‘I met him in Chicago and had an affair with him.’ So there she was having sex with some other guy, and I was left holding the bag.”

* Langston appeared on “The Dating Game” as a contestant three times as himself and once as the Unknown Comic. As a contestant, he won every time. “I had the sense of humor going for me so I always won,” he said. “But during that period, I was living with a girl, so I couldn’t go on the dates. So what happened in those days was if one person cancelled the date, the other person just got to go with someone of their own choice. So I ended up walking away with luggage and some union (money).”

* On partying with Elvis at Presley’s Vegas suite: “Every time I made him laugh, my brain would go, ‘You made Elvis Presley laugh.’ It was unbelievable. . . I partied with him until, like, five in the morning. We sat in a circle, and he sang, ‘Are You Lonesome Tonight’ on guitar.”

* On Mickey Rooney: “The first celebrity I met was Mickey Rooney when I was 12 or 13. He was in Montreal, where I’m from, and he was in a restaurant . . . and I went over there and saw him, and he was fairly rude. And it was weird because ten years later, I did a movie with him, and he was still rude. And years after that I did a movie called ‘Up Your Alley,’ about homeless people . . . It was moderately successful for a little movie, and Mickey Rooney heard about it. And I get this call from Mickey Rooney – he wanted me to help him do a low budget movie. But because he’d been rude those first two times, I said, ‘Yeah, well look – let me get back to you.’ And I never got back to him. I didn’t want to work with a guy who was rude.”

* On Sonny Bono: “He was not a nice guy. Sonny Bono and Billy Crystal are two guys who have the same thing, I noticed: They don’t relate to you on a social level if you’re not at their level or above.”

* A quick Cher story: “Every Halloween I played the werewolf – I had those two hours of makeup on – and so the first time I did it, they did my hands all hairy with these ugly nails. So I walked into the rehearsal hall and Cher had her back to me – she was talking to one of the dancers – so I thought I’d scare her. So I sneak up and put this grotesque, hairy hand on her shoulder from behind, and she just looks at it and, quick as a whip, she turns and says, ‘Sonny – your mother’s here!’”

* In the 2002 movie “Confessions of a Dangerous Mind,” ‘Gong Show host Chuck Barris is portrayed as a songwriter, game show host and CIA assassin. Based on Barris’s 1984 autobiography, Barris has been coy during interviews about how much of the story was fabricated.

“Of course, that was all B.S.,” said Langston, who appears in the movie as the Unknown Comic. “(Barris) said he was sitting at a bar before he had his first game show, and he was struggling. A CIA guy actually befriended him and used to tell him, ‘You’ve got the kind of personality to make a good CIA agent.’ Of course, he never did, but years later when he decided to write his bio, he thought it’s be too boring so he said, ‘I wonder what would’ve happened had I taken that guy up’ and embellished it.”

– Pat P.