George Carlin: Playin' with Your Head

George Carlin has been making comedy for many years, and this has to be one of his best works. Here, he talks more in depth about sports, things, battered plants, and other things that are in the great George Carlin tradition. This is something good for anyone looking for a laugh, and great for Carlin fans

I was working with Rocco Urbisci on several projects including Richard Pryor's "JoJo Dancer," when we did the Carlin Special. One day we were discussing casting people for the Carlin show and the producers said they needed someone to play "Pops, the Doorman." Who would be right for it? A few days before I was in the local supermarket and saw Lyle Talbot who was then quite old, but he looked great. I talked with him and was very impressed with meeting someone from the early days of film. When we needed someone to play "Pops," I suggested Mr. Talbot. The shocked response from everyone in the room was, "Is he still alive?" I said yes, and that I had met and talked with him. They called him and he got the role. A few years later I met him again, in the drug store, and told him that it was because I saw him in Gelson's that he was called to play Pops. He said he was moving up to San Francisco to be with his family. I never saw him after that, but I'm happy to know that I got him one of his last jobs in show business! MS

"The Envelope" is a short film written by and starring George Carlin. It was included at the start of George Carlin's fifth HBO special, "Playin' With Your Head". It serves as a tremendously long (and anti-climatic) lead-in to the stand-up performance. Any VHS or DVD copy of "Playin' With Your Head" will also include "The Envelope" at the start. It's hard to think of it as being anything more than a long amusing intro inserted to lead into the actual stand-up comedy performance. But since IMDb lists it as a separate piece, here's my take.

The short film is set as a stereotypical 1930-40s detective story. It's presented in black & white and has bits of the expected slow jazz music, albeit with synthesizer saxophone instead of real brass. Carlin plays Mike Holder, the gumshoe hero. As expected there are dames, henchmen, an attempted murder, and a chase scene. It's hard to say much more without describing the story in full.

"The Envelope" doesn't really have any laughs. In that sense it reminds me of like the SNL skit "Don't Look Back In Anger" where an elderly John Belushi looks over the graves of other cast members. Not comedy, not Oscar-winning; just a comedian having fun trying something else.

Carlin, in a lavender sweater, is pretty manic in this one. He is a great one, but this is not a great one from him.