Commentary : COMIC RELIEF IS NO ROUTINE BENEFIT

Comic Relief, the four-hour comedy telethon that took place at the Universal Amphitheatre on Saturday and was televised live throughout the country on HBO, raised an interesting philosophical question: Must aesthetic or critical standards be waived when a performance is donated to charity?

After all, what difference does it make if, in this case, a large group of prominent American comedians gets together for a program that is only intermittently funny, or comedically successful, when proceeds for the event will go to aid the homeless of America?

They’re there for a cause--fund raising--and if the event is a success, as this one appears to have been, how can you quibble about whose routine worked and whose didn’t? What does it mean to offer a highly subjective opinion on the artistic quality of an enterprise when its existence means that a hungry child may be fed.

In the name of humanity, you can’t knock a program that, co-host Billy Crystal reported, brought in $10,000 a minute in telephone pledges. Still, you have to be a bit skeptical about the aura of righteousness that surrounds similar programs, such as Band Aid and Live Aid, which have become the trend right now (and show business is nothing if not a hothouse of trendiness).

You can’t slight the laudable conscience of entertainers who try to fill a vacuum. But are we dealing with a new entertainment genre here, whose mantle of humanitarianism puts it beyond criticism? Are well-meaning entrepreneurs in these instances forcing a shotgun marriage between entertainment and human suffering?

Robin Williams and Whoopi Goldberg were co-hosts along with Crystal, and all appeared in skits together (Crystal and Williams together as Vegas chorus boys was one of the highlights of the show).

In the wake of her disappointment at not winning an Oscar, Goldberg was poised and well-spoken, though not especially funny (she appeared in two skits, one about a homeless woman on a bench interviewed by Michael J. Fox as a social worker; the other as a Latina domestic to Crystal’s 80-year-old Jewish man). Like Crystal, she’s the comedic counterpart of a character actor; they both build up their portrayals slowly (will we be seeing Crystal’s Sammy Davis Jr. five years from now?). Neither is a match for Williams’ presence of mind, his spritely comedic timing and energy. No one is. The stage axiom “Never work with children and dogs� now needs the amendment, “or with Robin Williams.�

Garry Shandling came on to do his number about being single (the mirror over his bed reads “Objects appear larger than they really are�); Dick Van Dyke narrated a film clip about the homeless, which concluded “Anybody can be homeless at any time� (indeed we saw a picture of what looked like a working man, his wife and two young children, and had we not been told that they were homeless, we would not have guessed).

Henny Youngman did a few one-liners. Martin Short, Catherine O’Hara and Harold Ramis appeared in a skit about a job interview in which Short’s Ed Grimley appeared uncharacteristically sexist and mean-spirited (did Short have a hand in writing this?). A segment from “Not Necessarily the News� followed. Richard Dreyfuss came on to tell us how lucky we were to know that we’d be driving to a home. Madeline Kahn did her “Blazing Saddles� parody of Marlene Dietrich.

Bob Hope gave a plug on film, looking as though he’d been stopped for a statement between holes on a golf course. Carl Reiner interviewed Sid Caesar’s Teutonic total authority on everything (they received a big hand, but the routine hasn’t weathered the years).

Penny Marshall came on to tell us, among other things, that virtually every woman between 17 and 70 who is homeless and on the street has been raped. And in one of the evening’s examples of schizoid juxtaposing, Pee Wee Herman followed with his kidstuff, in this instance hauling out medical toys from his Dr. Pee Wee bag and gleefully examining a young woman from the audience. Minnie Pearl, the “Hee Haw� comedienne, did not go over with the ampthitheater’s audience of industry and self-consciously smart Coast types.

Bob Zmuda, former writer and creative producer for Andy Kaufman and Comic Relief’s organizer, came on to explain where the night’s proceeds would go. According to Zmuda, all donations will be given to the National Health Care for the Homeless Program, which is funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Pew Memorial Trust, which means that Comic Relief doesn’t have to deal in administrative overhead. Medical care and counseling are the objects of the program, not housing. This was confusing to at least one observer, since the thrust of the program strongly implied that the homeless would be given shelter.

Zmuda couldn’t remember Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s name for a moment, so the introduction was delayed. But Bradley came on with a proclamation from the U.S. Conference of Mayors, which declared March 29 Comic Relief Night nationwide.

“There are over 2 million homeless in the United States, and over 40% of them are women and children,� Bradley said. “Most of them have been this way for less than a year. This is a new phenomenon. These aren’t derelicts or winos. These are simply people down on their luck.�

Indeed, a number of the film clips were heart-rending, including a family of four from Seattle whose car had been burglarized. We saw children in the streets of Los Angeles--young children--and learned that the homeless kids in L.A.’s Skid Row number 1,000. We saw a young orthodox Jew in a yarmulke working in an office; his boss said he would not have hired him had he known the man was homeless. A 41-year-old construction worker walked the street. A bespectacled woman said she had no idea that becoming homeless could happen to her.

So the evening went. Comedy routines spliced with heartfelt appeals, none more so than that of Dick Gregory, who came on and with quiet dignity said, “As the years (of my performing) went on, things seemed to me less funny. . . . (Fighting for my beliefs) cost me in my career, but in the world I lived in I was well-rewarded. The most devastating thing about the homeless is that they’ve lost hope. We’re not asking you to give up your leisure time. We’re just asking you to have compassion for women and children.�

Joe Piscopo; Steve Allen; Gilda Radner (on film); George Carlin; Harry Anderson; the Firesign Theatre; some members of “Saturday Night Live� in a clever sketch featuring Dr. Ruth; Tony Danza (who told us “When you’re a success you have time to be a nice guy�); Jerry Lewis (who drew the night’s only standing ovation, before he did a cutesy impression of a 5-year-old); the Schmenges (John Candy and Eugene Levy); the aggressively infantile Howie Mandel; Paul Rodriguez; a suave Dennis Miller (the only comedian who edged into politics); and the fiercely tormented (at least in his act) Bob Goldthwaite rounded out the comedy program (David Letterman provided a film clip that seemed all-purpose). Doc Severinsen’s orchestra provided the music.

Some of the material was well-done and well-received (Carlin did his classic routine on “Stuff�). Some of it was a trial (the program was conceived in November, but much of the writing seemed haphazard). The evening was also characterized by significant absences, such as Eddie Murphy, Richard Pryor and even Mort Sahl.

If the cause was paramount and the cause was just, one still missed at least one voice questioning why the richest country on Earth allowed these terrible social conditions to happen. Too, one wondered if a new Calvinism weren’t sweeping through show business with the maxim “Boredom is permissible if it’s created in the name of good works.�

A 90-minute version of Comic Relief will be presented on HBO on Sunday, April 9, 15 and 25. (The live four-hour version was offered free to HBO affiliates on an unscrambled feed, making it available to most basic-cable subscribers.)

Incidentally, “A Comic Mission,� created and produced by Billy Riback and consisting of 10 lesser-known comedians who play the Comedy Store and the Improvisation, performed at the Los Angeles Mission on Saturday night.