A favorite of mine as well. I saw him on the Richard Pryor show way back when (although I don't specifically remember him - I watched the DVDs recently, though). I remember when he appeared on "Happy Days", and was a total fan from the first moments of "Mork & Mindy". I still have his first album - on 8-track - and was there through a large number of the HBO shows, Comic Relief and the movies. I'd truly forgotten how many movies he did. I'm not sure anything ever topped "Garp" for me - if only because of the time it made it's impact in my life. His appearances on talk shows were must-see, and I thought his last series "The Crazy Ones" was deserving of far better treatment.
I do wish I'd seen him live - I remember when he came to town in the early 80s. I was going to go - until I found out how much tickets were, and I said, "Who in their right mind would ever pay 25 bucks to see a comedian????" Yeah - I wasn't always this smart!
Among the true highlights for me were the bits he did with Billy Crystal and Whoopi Goldberg on Comic Relief. Wonderful stuff. Seeing some of the clips today just reinforced what a genius he truly was.
RIP, and thank you.
