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Classic comedy routine plays Palace Grand

Pat Cooper is a comic in the old stand-up, Borscht Belt tradition of Shecky Greene and Buddy Hackett.

By LOGAN NEILL
Published June 16, 2006

Sure, there are plenty of aspiring comics out there who spout edgy, outrageous rants on, well, just about every subject you can think of. But few are as original as the 74-year-old Italian Brooklynite, who performs Saturday and Sunday at the Palace Grand in Spring Hill.

As comedians go, Cooper is old-school. The Borscht Belt stand-up tradition that produced comic peers such as Shecky Greene, Buddy Hackett, Norm Crosby and Jackie Vernon enabled him to assert himself into the role of a crabby, loud uncle who gripes about every aspect of Italian-American life, from mom's spaghetti sauce to his own "Italian football wedding."

"Show business as I knew, you had to be funny," Cooper told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette a while back. "Young comics today, it's all about the sex and the drugs. They can't do anything else. They don't have the range."

As much as he might be dismayed by the current comedy scene, however, Cooper is happy to still be a relevant funny man. His gift for gab has taken him all over the world in his more than 50 years in the business, from numerous appearances on variety shows such as The Ed Sullivan Show and The Tonight Show to juicy roles in popular movies such as Analyze This and Analyze That. And in recent years he has become radio talk show host Howard Stern's perfect on-air foil.

Born Pasquale Caputo in 1929, Cooper followed in his father's footsteps to become a bricklayer, a job he held for several years before he began honing his stagecraft in nightclubs and bars. Finally, in 1963, he got a call to do a spot on the Jackie Gleason Show.

Cooper recalled to writer Charles Salzburg how the popular host eased his jitters just before the telecast.

"I was standing there, my back against the wall, and Gleason passes by,'' Cooper said. "I was scared to death. He stops, looks at me and says - and remember, this is before he'd ever heard my act - 'Kid, you're the greatest. You know how I know that? Because I'm the greatest, and if you're on my show then you must be great, too.' And then he just kept walking."

That break put the young comic on the map. He became a favorite guest of Johnny Carson and Merv Griffin and eventually even earned the prime role as show opener for Frank Sinatra.

These days, Cooper spends about 40 weeks a year on the road performing in nightclubs and cabarets. Based in Las Vegas, he has appeared several times in Hernando and Pasco counties at venues operated by the Sessa family, including the Show Palace Dinner Theater and the Palace Grand.

"I love what I do,'' Cooper told interviewer Rich McLaren. "I can't say when I'll ever quit, but trust me, when I decide I don't have it, when it doesn't interest me anymore, I'm getting out. I don't want to end up embarrassing myself."

Logan Neill can be reached at lneill@sptimes.com or 352 848-1435.

[Last modified June 16, 2006, 07:13:22]