There's nothing quite like a good old fashioned roast

Do I have a fun job, or what? Toward the end of next month I get to jet to Connecticut and roast Harry Reid at a dinner party! Well, that kind of work is right in my line; still, I have to pinch myself. Senator Schumer’s office is helping to plan the party, so I should probably figure a way to make the evening warm for Schumer too, at no extra charge.

A few days ago, as guest speaker at a distinguished club here in the village, I mentioned the fact that I had been invited to roast the Democratic Senator from Nevada, and human nature being what it is, the room stood as one man, (and a few very capable women), wanting to help!

“Hey, Sam! Harry Reid was born in Searchlight, and he’s still searching for the light!”
Amusing as it was, I shall draw a curtain of charity over the rest of the scene.

Coincidentally, Mark Twain gave the first celebrity roast, by accident. He was invited to speak at John Greenleaf Whittier’s 70 birthday gathering of the Boston Brahmins in 1877. But Sam misjudged his audience, and his humor fell so flat that by his own account, “The silence weighed 40 pounds a square inch. It was the flattest failure there ever was.”

So it is with great respect and some trepidation that I accept this assignment. I have learned over the years, that there is a vast difference between a comedian and a humorist. The comedian’s job is to make you laugh, usually at somebody else’s expense.

The humorist’s job, on the other hand, is merely to show you the good natured side of the truth. The humorist is not looking for a laugh. The humorist is looking for a nod of acknowledgement, the hint of a smile.

To paraphrase Twain, “Laughter, without a thread of philosophy woven into it, is but a sneeze at humor; genuine humor is replete with wisdom. And if a piece of humor is to last, it must do two things, it must preach and it must teach. If this is done effectively, that piece of humor will last forever — which is 30 years.”

There’s plenty of time to put together an effective program, and I’m sure my friends and neighbors here in the village and in Virginia City, where I end up pontificating on occasion, will be only too willing to help fill my quiver with arrows.

The classiest roasts I have seen were the Dean Martin celebrity roasts of some 40 years ago. Perhaps I’ll review a few of those, should somebody be kind enough to share them with me.

I understand the gravity of the assignment, that of roasting the majority leader of the United States Senate, and I intend to fill the bill, but then Mark Twain was never known to be predictable, so if you’ve got a suggestion to help warm up the room for Harry next month in Connecticut, don’t hesitate to stop me in the post office and bend my ear…

McAvoy Layne is an Incline Village resident.