S AHLTY TONGUE

Political satirist
Mort Sabi is still rakin'
them over the coals.

TOM TUGEND SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

Mort Sahl on politics:
"We've gone from -
Camelot to Dogpatch."

ore than 40 years after stand-up satirist
Mort Sahl packed in Berkeley undergrads
and hip San Franciscans at the hungry
i nightclub, his jaundiced eye still surveys
the foibles of his countrymen.
"Watching the movie 'Independence Day,' you
get an idea of where we are when the aliens blow
up the White House and the audience cheers," he
observes. Or, "we now have a generation that hasn't
fought anything but acne."
At age 69, Mr. Sahl's hair is turning gray, but
his bright blue eyes still appraise the audience,
even if it's only a single reporter, and his rolling
laughter still punctuates his sallies.
Next, he turns to the state of the Jews and how
they are portrayed on stage and screen, bearing
down hard on the "please don't hit me" attitude
conveyed by a Woody Allen or Elaine May.
"Look at Neil Simon's plays; there are Jews
there I've never met," Mr. Sahl warms to
his subject. "It's amazing how we re-
treat artistically to cartoon-like fig-
ures: the overbearing Jewish
mother, the Jewish American
Princess. How about the Jewish
Prince? How about all these
guys named Jeff in Italian
suits who run the Hollywood
studios?"
But some things about
Mort Sahl have changed.
The quips still roll off,
challenging the listen-
er's mental acuity,
yet occasionally a
strained note
creeps in.
Take his classic
observation on
three genera-
tions of sexual
politics. "In the
'50s, you had to
be a Jew to get
a girl. In the
'60s, you had to
be black to get
a girl. In the
'70s, you had to be
a girl to get a girl."
Asked to up-
date the quip, Mr.
Sahl responds that
in the materialistic
'80s, you had to be rich
to make out, and in the '90s,
you have to possess power —
someone like Michael Ovitz, for
example — to get the girl.
The answer is OK, but hardly
matches the zing of the original.
Politically, Mr. Sahl has always
been an equal opportunity insulter. "Is
there anyone here I haven't offended?" he
used to ask his audiences.
But judging by a 75-minute interview,
Mr. Sahl now weighs in most sharply

against the liberals, who were his most faithful
acolytes in the olden days.
On people who vote for Bill Clinton: "They go
along with their big brother who didn't inhale, and
downplay their father who hurt his arm in the ser-
vice."
There is more vitality in a radio talk show by
right-wing Watergate felon G. Gordon Liddy than
in today's liberals, he observes.
"Liberals used to be vital; they fought for unions
and the end of the Vietnam war. Then they went
into things like gender bias, and got castrated, in
effect."
What about conservative targets, he is asked.
And he responds, "We all know they are Nean-
derthals who always fear that well take away what
they have."
Do some liberals feel that he has gone over to the
enemy?
"They left me," Mr. Sahl responds. "We've gone
from Camelot to Dogpatch. Do you think that Ad-
lai Stevenson (one of his all-time idols) would rec-
ognize a Mondale or a Dukakis?"
In his view of Hollywood, Mr. Sahl, who has been
an occasional screenwriter and actor, goes Bob
Dole's criticism one better.
'What we get in the movies now are guns, drugs,
violence and ersatz machismo ... There was more
moral resolution in an old John Wayne movie than
in all current movies put together."
And, "they take the profits from the trash and
in the evening have a cocktail party for the Unit-
ed Negro College Fund."
Lying just beneath the surface of Mr. Sahl's bar-
rage of remarks lies a deep personal pain. His only
child, a 19-year old son, died in March under cir-
cumstances which are still under investigation. He
and his Chinese-American wife were divorced five
years ago.
Has Mr. Sahl mellowed with the years and
through his recent experiences?
"I guess as a last resort I had to become human,
rather than being the Mosaic judge on the moun-
tain," he muses. "My wife touched my heart and
my son opened my heart ... I've learned that in-
telligence is a meager defense against your emo-
tional pain." Sahl lives by himself now "but sees a
couple of different people."
He brightens when the conversation turns to Los
Angeles, where the Montreal-born entertainer has
lived, off and on, since he was 8 years old.
Mr. Sahl likes L.A. (and heartily dislikes New
York). He explains his affection for Tinseltown in
his own style.
"L.A. is like a girl you meet at a dance. You get
a rush of passion and go to bed with her. The next
day you see her at another party and she says, 'Nice
to meet you.' She doesn't even acknowledge you.
Every day you get to renew your acquaintance ...
it drives me crazy."
Twenty years from now, he adds, "California will
have gated communities and people in the gut-
ter. Good bye, middle class."
What makes Mort Sahl run? "Social hypocrisy
is eternal," he says. "But when you raise an issue
at a party, everyone is shocked. When you say it
on stage, it resonates." ❑

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