Richard Belzer, Standup Legend (WOT????)

I get that many people find ASMR-like comfort in the Law & Order franchise, but I was never one of them. SVU was must-see TV in my home of origin, so I caught a handful of snippets of Richard Belzer in his role as Detective Munch. While I acknowledge he was a skilled actor who won millions over in the part, to me he just seemed to lifeless and wooden acting out someone else’s words. This was compared to how I’d known him up to that point, as a standup wildly acting out his own vivid words. Personal words, long stories, meandering first-person bits based on actual events, darkly hilarious vignettes of familial and social brutality.

There is one particular special that growing up I watched, with my siblings, over and over and over. Richard Belzer in Concert. We memorized so many of these bits, constantly shot them back and forth at each other, trading lines, harvesting catchphrases that have survived the Private Sibling Lexicon to this day. I just rewatched it, and it’s crazy how much of it stands up. I kept thinking that he was channeling some uncanny Jewish Richard Pryor vibes, with the long stories of gratuitous everyday violence visited upon him by inane dumdums, the flurry of loud lanky-limbed act-outs interspersed with quiet pensive introspection. The sneaky casual virtuosity of every one of his impressions.

I hadn’t known until watching the great interview below that he actually had a deep connection to Pryor, who was a big supporter and even mentor of Belzer personally and professionally throughout his career.

“Richard Pryor is the greatest standup comic whoever lived or ever will live. He’s like Michelangelo or da Vinci. He defined the art form in a way that’s beyond anybody’s talent…an artistic beacon beyond measure.”

Belzer was one of the few to do it right. The only lack is that I wish he’d done more.

RIP Legend.