For Better or Werts : TV Worth Watching

TRIBUTE: Seven Words About the Late George Carlin

I could joke that those are the seven right there. (And they're not even dirty!) But why should somebody like me try joking while invoking one of the smartest comic minds (and mouths) of all time?

George Carlin was the king of social satire, and spoken rhythms, and the kind of delicious wordplay writers like me only dream of emulating. To mark his death Sunday at the much-too-early age of 71, I did my best to celebrate his specialness in an appreciation just posted at Television Without Pity's BrilliantButCancelled.com.

Take a look at that tribute here. And then take a look, and listen, to the master himself. NPR's Fresh Air ran a wonderful Carlin appreciation today, with vintage interview excerpts you can hear here.

You can also watch Carlin's most recent HBO special, last March's It's Bad for Ya!, via digital cable's HBO On Demand. (Check your on-screen program guide.) Or see some of his earlier 13 HBO standup hours repeating on the HBO Comedy channel -- 1984's Carlin On Campus late Monday/early Tuesday (June 24) at 1 a.m. ET, and 1978's George Carlin Again late Wednesday/early Thursday (June 26) at 1:10 a.m. ET. HBO promises to schedule a larger Carlin tribute, but it wasn't finalized by midday Monday, so keep an eye on HBO's web site for details. [UPDATE: See just-announced HBO airtimes at the end of this post.]

You can also catch Carlin in Kevin Smith's 1999 film Dogma, savaging one of Carlin's favorite targets, organized religion. Dogma airs next on Starz Edge Wednesday (June 25) at 10:45 a.m. and 9 p.m. ET, plus Saturday (June 28) on Starz Cinema at 3:30 a.m. and 6 p.m. ET.

Episodes of Carlin's 1994-95 Fox sitcom The George Carlin Show can be seen, online, at AOL's In2TV streaming site.

UPDATE - posted Monday at 4:30 p.m. -
HBO's newly announced tribute slate of Carlin encores this week:

Airing on HBO2 (all times ET):

WEDNESDAY, June 25 -
8 p.m. - George Carlin at USC (1977; first HBO special)
9:30 p.m. - George Carlin Again (1978)
11 p.m. - Carlin at Carnegie (1983)
12 midnight - Carlin on Campus (1984)
1 a.m. - George Carlin: Playin' With Your Head (1986)

THURSDAY, June 26 -
8 p.m. - George Carlin: What Am I Doin' in New Jersey (1988)
9 p.m. - George Carlin: Doin' It Again (1990)
10 p.m. - George Carlin: Jammin' in New York (1992)
11 p.m. - George Carlin: Back in Town (1996)
12:05 a.m. - George Carlin: You Are All Diseased (1999)
1:10 a.m. - George Carlin: It's Bad for Ya (2008)

Airing on HBO:

FRIDAY, June 27 -
9 p.m. - George Carlin: It's Bad for Ya (March 2008)

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Diane Werts has been glued to the tube since she can remember, growing up in a household where the TV came on first thing in the morning and stayed on till bedtime and beyond. She worked for the USA Film Festival, then for The Dallas Morning News writing about everything from Shakespeare to macrame art to rock music (and has the hearing loss to prove it). She moved to New York's Newsday to edit their glossy TV magazine, then returned to writing about television, specializing in its stranger permutations. She's a past president of the Television Critics Association.

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