NEW YORK — Getting fired from work isn’t usually a cause to celebrate. But the Smothers Brothers aren’t your run-of-the-mill comedians.
The duo has stepped out of retirement to commemorate the day 50 years ago when CBS canceled their show over their political impudence.
Tom and Dick Smothers — aged 80 and 82 respectively — reunited Monday for several appearances at the National Comedy Center in Jamestown, New York.
The two discussed their firing in an onstage discussion and later unveiled a display of archival material they donated to the center, including their iconic red suit jackets, Tom’s guitar and Dick’s bass, scripts and creative papers, and legal documents.
“It’s really an honor to be honored in this way,” Tom Smothers told The Associated Press on the eve of the center’s events. “At least we’re both alive and not having someone speak for us. We can mumble our own way through.”
The brothers weren’t allowed to use the phrase “sex education” or joke that someone was “a known heterosexual.” Dick Smothers says the humor may have been benign, but it was volatile at the time.