Inside The Friar's Club Roast of Don Rickles

In the classic 1966 Esquire piece Frank Sinatra Has a Cold, Sinatra and his crew visit The Sahara Hotel in Las Vegas to see “a baldheaded little comedian named Don Rickles, who is probably more caustic than any comic in the country. His humor is so rude, in such bad taste, that it offends no one – it is too offensive to be offensive.” On Monday night, at a Friars Club gala presenting Rickles with a lifetime achievement award, Louis CK echoed that idea. "He takes things people are afraid of and he just fastballs right to it," CK said. "'You're gonna die.' 'You're black.' 'Jews are nuts.' He just says it and you laugh before you even have the idea to be upset about it."

After a 65-year career built on insulting everyone he met, Don Rickles is as beloved as any comedian in the world. This week, he was awarded the first ever Friars lifetime achievement award; according to Friars’ Dean Freddie Roman, “It took one very special, unique and funny man to deserve the honor—that man is Don Rickles.” If it seems odd that Rickles wasn't given the classic Friars roast, it's because he was already roasted by the Friars, back in 1970. “They said we’re not supposed to roast you,” Lewis Black said during the gala. “So what the *&^!#*&^!#*&^!#*&^!# am I doing here? But I know the reason they told us not to roast you is because the only thing that could be more painful than us roasting you is for us to pay tribute to you. This must just be giving you the creeps..”

http://splitsider.com/2013/06/don-rickles-piece-inside-the-friars-club-gala-for-don-rickles/

Don Rickles was indeed a comedian who succeeded in insulting everyone, and became very wealthy without being formally charged with any level of bigotry, because he did it such a way that even the person insulted had to laugh.

Being insulted by Don Rickles was truly a Level of Achievement.

Dr.Don said:

Don Rickles was indeed a comedian who succeeded in insulting everyone, and became very wealthy without being formally charged with any level of bigotry, because he did it such a way that even the person insulted had to laugh.

Being insulted by Don Rickles was truly a Level of Achievement.

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He must never have insulted Parski.

station19 said:

He must never have insulted Parski.

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And you know, that is because Parski has never reached that Level of Achievement.

Parski is very entertaining, I enjoy sparring with him, even if the Mods have PM'd me to back off. You, Parski, and I actually have fun with each other, but the Mods do not want us to have fun here on GopherHole.

I don't know, stalion. Someone can call a person on GH a dildo, a kunt, a retard, and other more vicivious names, and they get free passes, but when some of us try have fun here, we hurt feelings and even have comments deleted and removed. I just don't know.

Caught the Roast of Alec Baldwin. Maybe I need to re-watch some of the other ones....but Alec Baldwin had the worst fake laugh of all time. It was so blatantly obvious what he found to be funny, what he didn't and was fake laughing at, and what jokes kind of pissed him off. I can't remember anyone....either roastee nor roaster that have been that bad.

GetTV had two Dean Martin roasts on last night. One of them roasted Rickles. I think they are so funny.