On Thursday, May 29, 2008, America lost one of its great screen comics. The legendary and gifted Harvey Korman died at the age of 81, in Los Angeles, due to complications from the rupture of an abdominal aortic aneurysm. We at AMG would like to take a few moments to look back and pay our respects to Korman’s long life and career in showbusiness.

It would be difficult to single out any one “favorite” Korman role or project, for his was a career bedecked with one small gem after another. Few may realize that Windy City native Korman made his entrée into showbiz on two decidedly strange notes: he played a washed-up cheesecake photographer at a nascent publishing house loosely based on Playboy, in Herschell Gordon Lewis’s exploitation romp Living Venus (1961), then trekked out to Hollywood and promptly landed a job voicing The Great Gazoo in The Flintstones, which of course became the single most popular animated program in the United States for years.

It marked a weird and unlikely beginning, to say the least, but gave Korman a foothold and presence in the industry and paved the way for his most successful decade – the 1970s – when he ascended to full-fledged stardom at the hands of two comedy superstars: Carol Burnett and Mel Brooks. Korman arguably demonstrated more perfect screen chemistry with Burnett than any other male comic on the long-running CBS comedy variety program, The Carol Burnett Show (1967-79), so it marked a tremendous loss when Korman bade the show adieu in 1977; Burnett struggled valiantly to replace him, even plugging in Dick Van Dyke for one season, then Ken Berry and Steve Lawrence intermittently. Unsurprisingly, nothing worked, and the show folded not long after. Over the course of its run, Korman had become not only a familiar and beloved presence, but an inimitable one, often co-headlining recurring audience favorites with Burnett such as “Old Folks at Home” and “Ed and Eunice,” which producers later spun off into the long-running sitcom Mama’s Family.

Brooks also utilized Korman to a great degree, and therein lies the actor’s most enduring legacy, in farces such as Blazing Saddles (1974), High Anxiety (1977) and History of the World, Part I (1981) - films in which he fleshed out hilarious characters such as Hedley Lamarr of Rock Ridge, and Count de Monet.

Never again did the actor attain the popularity he achieved on the big screen with Brooks; successive decades were marked by unsuccessful projects such as the failed television series Leo and Liz in Beverly Hills (1986) and The Nutt House (1989), and roles in lackluster big screen ventures such as Munchies (1987) and Radioland Murders (1994). One exception that arose was Paul Bartel’s vastly underrated buddy comedy The Longshot (1986) which cast Korman in a riotous lead opposite longtime comic partner-in-crime and fellow Burnett veteran Tim Conway, as well as Ted Wass, Jack Weston, Stella Stevens and Jonathan Winters.

Here are several of our favorite Korman onscreen moments and scenes, pulled from a variety of projects -

- In Blazing Saddles: Hedley Lamarr’s (Korman) irate and repeated, “It’s pronounced Hedley! Not Hedy!”

-On The Carol Burnett Show: Korman’s famous sketch as the patient of Tim Conway, a dentist who klutzily shoots novocaine into his own arm. This was the sketch in which Korman literally could not keep a straight face or stifle his laughter despite repeated attempts to do so.

-The scene in High Anxiety that has Korman, as mental institution physician Dr. Charles Montague, slipping in false werewolf teeth and repeatedly slinging a recovered patient in the neck with safety pins (to fool sanitarium head Mel Brooks), thus driving the poor fellow back into a state of complete psychosis.

In High Anxiety: Dr. Montague’s sadomasochistic games with Nurse Diesel (Cloris Leachman) who packs whips, chains and assorted weaponry in her closet and wears a steel truss; the sequence ends with Korman screaming repeatedly, “Too much pain! Not enough discipline!”

 
 
The carriage scene, in History of the World Pt. I, that finds Korman’s Count De Monet (”de Monet! Mo -NAY! Say it with me, Mo-NAY!”) arguing with Bernaise (Andreas Voutsinas) about raisins - capped with a ‘Don’t get saucy with me, Bernaise!’ The sequence then depicts the men walking on top of subjects who lie beneath a red carpet as they go to visit the king’s (Mel Brooks) chess game.

 
 
-And finally, a personal favorite (and a sequence that, unfortunately, couldn’t be found online for a video clip): Korman’s dinnertime exchanges with onscreen wife Edie McClurg in The Longshot, laden with snide, wiseass remarks about the meal as the slob crams food into his mouth: “This bread is frozen! I’m gonna break my teeth on this stuff. Say, you got any frozen butter to go with this?” The scene concludes with the bluntness of McClurg’s observation: “You need serious, serious help.”