Rich Little: Still making a great impression

Rich Little has turned his gift for comedic impersonation into a very large and seemingly unstoppable career. He is chatting with Tracy Smith. Is it true that when you became an American citizen the judge asked you to do so with the voice of John Wayne? Yes, he said "I." I'm going to swear when it will be John Wayne, so I stood up and said, "Well, sir, I swear allegiance to the flag of the United States and don't burden me in case you're wondering

little

rich

guy is alive and well any day now." ". night, so are a lot of his old friends, well, this is George Bush Sr., okay, okay, I got you, I got you good right now he's in Las Vegas selling out the reduced capacity shows at the Tropicana laugh factory, but At 82, Rich Little has been in show business longer than some of his audience members have been alive Scary Tales Can Come True It Can Happen to You If You're Andrew Cuomo There's a Play I Did Early on from my career bus stop the walls of his house are hung with photos of people he met along the way some of the biggest names of the last century it's sometimes hard to believe you knew all these people yes, it is, it's a I mean, here's a picture of John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, me and Glenn Ford, you know, you can't get any bigger than that.

The Canadian-born artist began to imitate his teachers at school and sneaked into the cinema with a tape recorder so he could listen over and over again to the voice of a celebrity who once got him kicked out of a cinema where the film was being shown. Jimmy Stewart from 1954, The Far Country and I told Jimmy about this when I met him he said you you you did that and I said yes and he said red you should have contacted me I could have sent it I sent you the movie I'm a countryman My name is Hubert h humphrey well my name is ed shalom my name is

rich

and i have to look it up but by the 1970s he had become a fixture on television especially game shows does it take physical dexterity to do what what are you doing?

We are doing

little

rich, they have called him Mr. Everyone, but he says that he can actually do about a hundred voices very well. Can you make voices for everyone on this wall? Well, first of all, there's Catherine Pepper and you know everyone poops and then there's Clark Gable. Look here. scarlett atlanta ain't burning, those are the brave ones, they're playing a late night game on sean connery from the hunt for red october and bob hope right here and ben crosby ho ho old man bingo how it feels w.c ah yes yes my countrymen, for Of course he has also done it with almost every president, from Richard Nixon to Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, George Bush and George Bush, and this summer he will be in New York appearing in an off-Broadway play as Nixon about what would have happened if he hadn't resigned.

Do you have a favorite impersonation, yes, I would say Ronald Reagan Will because he was a

great

friend of mine, we got along very well together, I was even in his rooms at the White House for lunch, in fact, when the Reagans left Washington for good and flew . home to California's wealthy, Little was one of the first to greet them when they landed. I think my

impression

of President Reagan is getting better and better because every time I do it, sir, I have this terrible need to run away with Nancy. The truth is the paradise of imitations of him.

It wasn't always just for laughs when David Niven filmed this movie, he was terminally ill and his voice was barely above a whisper, so a lot of what viewers heard was really rich, I mean I'm sure the sergeant is totally updated. In my somewhat checkered career, but perhaps the most well-known personification of him was the legend of the tonight show, Johnny Carson. Little was a regular on the show for years and even guest hosted several times until the show abruptly stopped saying what happened to tonight's show. Well, I was. I'm never sure, either I said something to upset someone or Johnny got tired of me imitating him, I don't know, but suddenly he wasn't on the show anymore and I tried to figure out why, but I never found out.

They met again after Carson left in a chance meeting at a Malibu restaurant and when he approached the table he said Richard, are you

still

pretending to be me? And I said, of course, he said, really, I said well, yeah, John, I mean people. I love it, it's one of my best

impression

s. Well, I thought you knew I'm no longer on the air. Maybe they forgot me. I said no, no, they haven't forgotten you at all. Oh my god, I'll do it. for years, which is true because I'm

still

making

them. The world's biggest crossword puzzle addict died yesterday and tomorrow they are going to be buried eight feet deep and three feet wide.

These days, Rich Little still holds onto Johnny's memory and those of dozens. of others alive, this is carol changs and after almost 60 years his voices come naturally to her, the difficult part, he says, is trying to keep his own voice from fading when you get to be as old as me . Now it is more difficult to appear on television. I'm excited to be on this show today because this is probably the first time I've been on network television in 30 years in 30 years, are you missing out? Yes I believe it. I think what happens is when you get older, people.

I don't really want to cast you on a show, maybe they think you're not funny anymore, you know, I don't know, so this is very exciting for me, I hope everything works out, I have no doubt that maybe it will. that's all folks