Gilbert Gottfried passed away at the age of 67 yesterday, which seems pretty young, especially for a guy who's seemed like he's 90 for the past forty years. He's probably most famous for voicing Iago the parrot in Disney's Aladdin, but those of us who know his comedy, either through his stand-up or appearances on radio shows, it was always a remarkable irony that he ever got within a hundred miles of a Disney production. He had a genius for filth.
In our time of dispiriting political correctness, it is kind of heartening that Gilbert was grinning and harshly cackling right to the end. Something about the relentless monotone of revelling incredulity made his jokes work. The timing was great, too. His version of "The Aristocrats" works mainly for the points where he diverges from the filth for a moment. Because, of course, those are the surprising moments.
Occasionally he could even conjure a bit of atmosphere which I connect to his love of Universal monsters. Surely our world has a great, gaping void for his abscess, I mean absence.
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