So Long, Bob Newhart

Bob Newhart is dead, and that’s all right. There’s no cause to mourn: he was an incredibly famous, wealthy man, and lived a long good life. He was almost a hundred. He had a huge house in Los Angeles. He spent almost his entire comedy career being universally recognized as one of the most important people in his profession.

In fact, it’s surreal to even be writing the phrase “Bob Newhart is dead,” because it’s surreal to think of him as just some guy. He wasn’t just a comedian, he wasn’t just a stand-up. He was one of the architects of the entire thing modern TV, modern American comedy is. He was like a president, like Neil Armstrong: so important and foundational to the landscape that he transcended concerns of mortality. He was the kind of guy they make statues of, the kind of guy they name parks and awards after.

At a glance, you know, to someone born after the year 2000, he didn’t seem like it. Or maybe it’s more accurate to say he didn’t advertise it (which is funny because he started in advertising and was very shrewd about maintaining and controlling his public image). He’s so quiet, so retiring, sometimes almost-whisper quiet, that you can barely tell he’s there. At any moment, it seems like he could outright junk the lines he was reading and just fall asleep in front of you.

But it’s important to know how radical that actually was. Comedians simply didn’t do that. It was a new concept in comedy, and a concept that, once invented, felt like it had always existed. 

He was a virtuoso of control, choosing which notes not to play, and watching him perform actually is like watching a great jazz performance. The pleasures are slow to unravel. They take and require patience. There are no quick or easy laughs. Whatever it is Bob Newhart is doing is miles and miles away from whatever Adam Sandler is doing, which is not an insult to Adam Sandler. They’re just playing different instruments. I mean, there’s a reason he’s idolized by pretty much every major name that came after him, from Norm Macdonald to Conan and Letterman. Those men simply would not have had their careers if Bob Newhart hadn’t come before them and demonstrated a different way to perform comedy in public.

This will sound tangential, but it’s not. And I’m not going to name names here. I worked with a film executive once who I absolutely adored because he was intelligent and never talked down to me and he was a supernaturally active listener. I admired him for being able to be that and still find money and get projects financed, make them actually exist, without pulling his hair out or screaming.

One day in a meeting I noticed something he had that Bob Newhart also had, and I think it’s the key to his genius. When the stakes were really ratcheted up, when people were hysterical or melting down or just being showbiz stubborn, he would get quiet. As quiet as he could. It was often a legitimate struggle to hear him. Because of that, you had to pay attention to him 100% of the time. You had to hang on his every word.

Newhart was the king of this. The crazier the stakes of a scene, the more absurd the scenario, the calmer he got. Because this forced your attention, he could get laughs out of a barely existent smirk, a smirk so minimalist you weren’t even sure he was smirking or if you were imagining it. He could almost carry a script without talking at all, with just knowing exactly when to sigh or how to pick a phone up. It really made you appreciate that people in comedy are usually working too hard, and you’re seeing them working. Comedy doesn’t need to be all spectacle. The camera is more subtle than that. 

And you know what? It made him come off really fucking cool. He didn’t need it. Every time he was ever on camera, he came off like he could just leave the stage and never come back. Like he might just retire right then and there and move to New Mexico like Gene Hackman.

The Bob Newhart Show is one of my favorite comedies ever. I’ve probably spent thousands of hours in the company of that show. But to this day I’m not exactly sure why. Sure, it’s got a perfect cast and Suzanne Pleshette is one of the most gorgeous women to ever live. The opening credit sequence is low-key one of the most stylish in the history of television. The whole thing projects a quiet confidence and charisma. And as a big time insomniac, the soft melody and rhythm of the show is guaranteed to lull me to peaceful sleep and not have my usual programming wall of insane nightmares.

But there’s some other X factor. Truth be told, I don’t laugh at the show much, or very hard. Maybe just a chuckle now and then. It definitely doesn’t have the joke density of something like Arrested Development. 

I like to think it’s the patience. That show was never in a hurry for you. Somehow, it was never stressed out. It was just doing its thing, and you could pay attention or not. It never needed you. Before The Bob Newhart Show sitcoms were roundly not just terrible but profoundly childish. This felt like finally talking to an adult, with professionalism and maturity. After something like Bewitched or My Mother, The Car, that felt almost heroic.

(And shout-out to the end of Newhart, one of the most revolutionary television endings ever. The sort of instant before-and-after moment that makes TV rewarding. It’s exactly as good as advertised, a joke that took 18 years to finally get to the punchline.)

Bob was grown up. He was cool, even suave in his way. He pretty much invented deadpan comedy and very few of my favorite comedians would be here without him. Now he’s gone. That’s fine. He had one hell of a run and he got to enjoy it. Rest easy, pal.

P.S. Bob Newhart was a comedian. Let’s end on a joke. I love this gag he did with Conan at the Emmys. I think it’s the individual funniest joke in award show history, and his face is doing 95% of the work. I won’t spoil it.