I absolutely adored her. Her appearances on Merv, Mike Douglas, & The Tonight Show certainly informed my sense of humor as a youth. I still leave myself as the main target of my own barbs.
She was underrated as an actress. She remains the warmest & most comedic Dolly Levi I ever witnessed, on Broadway in Hello, Dolly! in 1969 opposite Richard Deacon’s Horace, Phyllis Diller brought her comedic wit along to bounce down those red carpeted steps in her own special way.
Diller loved The Gays: "Gay men have the most wonderful sense of humor, they are willing to laugh. They appeal to me a& I appeal to them."
In the mid-1950s, Diller was a 37-year-old beleaguered housewife from Alameda with 5 children. A real pioneer, she worked advertising, & then started to perform in the nightclubs of North Beach, the bohemian section of San Francisco humming with counterculture offerings: jazz clubs, strip joints, gay bars & beatnik hangouts. Diller made her debut at The Purple Onion. When she came onstage in second-hand evening clothes, highlighted by a ratty fur piece & a cigarette in an elegant holder, the predominantly gay audience was immediately charmed.
Diller returned the favor. Her one-liners skewered her gawky looks & her domestic life, but she never stooped to the homophobic humor of the time, even though gays were an easy mark during the McCarthy era.
Diller: "No, no, no, no… in fact, Joan Rivers & I both absolutely insist that we never would have got started without our gay audience. They were the first to actually accept us as funny women."
She paved the way for Chelsea Handler, Roseanne Barr, Joan Rivers & Ellen DeGeneres. She was the first female standup to headline in Las Vegas. She appeared on Broadway, in films & on TV. In addition to be a performer, Diller was an author, recording artist, spokesperson, gourmet cook, entrepreneur, concert pianist, philanthropist, humanitarian & beloved within the industry.
Diller had a long life, leaving us today at 95 years old.
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