When Caesar Was King: How Sid Caesar Reinvented American Comedy

“For many viewers, Caesar was television,” writes The Promise and the Dream author Margolick in this lively biography of comedian Sid Caesar (1922–2014). Caesar grew up in Yonkers, N.Y., where his parents ran a struggling luncheonette and rooming house. After a boarder left behind a saxophone, he learned to play it and began performing, moving into comedy shortly after. He was “the unlikeliest of comics: introverted, ill at ease, tongue-tied,” Margolick explains, but early on, people were eager to see him first at resorts and clubs across the U.S. and then on TV. He had “a sophistication born of native intelligence and curiosity” that struck a chord with audiences, Margolick writes, and shaped a comedic style marked by humorous mannerisms, animated facial expressions, and a unique ability to produce sound effects and mimic foreign languages. In the early days of television in the 1950s, he starred in the variety program Your Show of Shows alongside Imogene Coca. With 20 million viewers tuning in weekly to watch him perform sketches and film spoofs, Caesar became “TV’s initial homegrown star.” He went on to perform in other shows like Caesar’s Hour and Sid Caesar Invites You, but ratings fell as television expanded into new markets and the audience changed. Years of doing live TV also exhausted Caesar, who dealt with alcoholism and a pill addiction. Margolick poignantly assesses the influential comic’s career, noting he was TV’s “first great victim and suffer[ed] its most precipitous fall.” Fans will be riveted. (Nov.)