Jeff Dunham and Walter. You’ve seen them, surely. If not, Google them. YouTube them. Click your remote around Comedy Central and a few other channels.
Jeff is the straight man, hand firmly up Walter’s keister, moving the dummy’s mouth without moving his own. But this dummy, Walter, I just can’t place him. He’s like someone I know. So familiar. It has been bothering me.
My Uncle Ernest? No. Walter’s more like an angry Sam Drucker (for you Boomers who watched “Petticoat Junction” and “Green Acres”). Or Phil Silvers (now I’m reaching way back into the rerun bin). Maybe Ed Sullivan? Ehhh, possible but not exactly.
Okay, I know. Walter looks like Dick Cheney with a sense of humor (and someone else’s hand up his rear moving his mouth, for an ironic change). No, wait, I’ve seen this dummy on the Supreme Court, or was it a court show on TV? Or was it Dick Vitale on a basketball court? I know I’ve seen this guy before.
No, no, I got it. Is it Senator Craig, the distinguished gentleman from stall number four. What’s that tapping sound?
Walter has a slight resemblance to a minister, maybe, until he opens his foul mouth (okay, he doesn’t open his mouth, Jeff does, but that’s just semantics).
I have known a few CEOs who were like this character; a couple of weathermen, maybe, on local TV stations in countless cities across America. That could just be the bowtie, though.
This is frustrating. He has the tact of Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog (on Conan O’Brien) and the wardrobe of Jesse Helms, the humor of Archie Bunker and the hair of, well, he has no hair. He’s bald. Okay, yes, I wasn’t going to say it but he does bare a resemblance to Rudy Giuliani. No joke, Google Rudy and put his pic next to Walter’s. Uh huh. Scary, isn’t it?
I would have said Fred Thompson, but Walter looks more like Rudy than Fred. Walter doesn’t look at all like Mitt Romney or Obama or Hillary (unless you shaved Hillary’s head, but her funky laugh is funnier than some of Walter’s jokes – listen for her laugh in an interview). Shaving several women’s heads might produce a Walter in the bunch. But shaving Rosie O’Donnell wouldn’t do
it, however. How about Nancy Grace? Now we’re talking.
If you turn your head ever so slightly, Walter does look like that guy – the hurricane expert – on The Weather Channel. Dr. Steve Lyons? Dr. Steve seems so much nicer, and I’ve never seen anyone moving his lips.
This is the allure of dummies: They look like all kinds of people we know – especially on TV. And TV is where one dummy looks like the next one. It’s hard to tell the dummies without a program.
So many dummies, so few ventriloquists.
