¡Feliz Cumpleaños, Paul Lynde!

AKA Paul Edward Lynde.*

Born June 13, 1926.

He was always one of my favorite comedians though I am embarrassed to admit how long it took me to realize he was gay. Then again even the most homophobic of my classmates thought of him mainly as being "the sarcastic guy." (It really was a different time back then. Not necessarily more innocent -- I remember too many fellow students who were all too fond of the word "faggot" to pretend otherwise -- but different.)

Anyway, I always loved his character of Uncle Arthur on the TV show Bewitched and I even liked him as everyone's favorite cartoon villain in The Perils of Penelope Pitstop. I even liked him in such dubious efforts as the cartoon show Where's Huddles? and the live-action sitcom The Paul Lynde Show.

I am not so sure that I would like him so much today because of the repetitiveness of his latter roles. Then again if it were not for his personality, I might not have appreciated the sarcasm of British comedy that much. Nor would I have watched so many syndicated reruns of Bewitched.

* Birth name.