Comedian Dick Shawn, 57, Stricken
on Stage, Dies

April 18, 1987 | Times Staff Writers

Comedian Dick Shawn died at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla after apparently suffering a heart attack on stage during a performance at UC San Diego. Witnesses said Shawn, 57, was left lying on the stage for nearly five minutes before the audience realized it was not part of his act, and an ambulance was called. A hospital spokeswoman said he received cardiopulmonary resuscitation in the Scripps emergency room, but was pronounced dead at 9:55 p.m.

Guess what. I was there. Honest-to-god. I don't just make this stuff up, you know! UCSD is my alma mater.

I have to say, I don't think Dick Shawn lay there for anything near 5 minutes. That is a really long time. My friends and I were sitting in back and laughed about how it might not be an act. Ha-ha-ha. But then someone who turned out to be a doctor walked to the stage, checked it out, and said, "This man's dead."

Then, with UCSD being the hot-shot med school it is, there were about two dozen earnest med students scrambling to reach the stage. An ambulance crew came in. People were herded out. Next day, we read about it in the papers. Wow.

Dick Shawn, you sure were funny—up to, and beyond, the end.

"Revolutionaries must be realists." ~ Angela Davis

Angela Yvonne Davis, circa 1969

In the mid-1980s, as an undergrad at the University of California, San Diego, I got a job that entailed calling graduates of the university to solicit donations for the Alumni Association.

To perform this job, I would grab a handful of information sheets at the start of each shift, on each of which was a scattering of data that the association had gathered about a particular grad. I would call that grad and run through a script designed to elicit a financial contribution.

I got so I could run the routine pretty quickly and I was persuasive, apparently, because I made the alumni association--and myself--a fair amount of money.

So! One day, grabbing an info sheet and scanning the first name, year of graduation, degree and academic department, I got hold of an "Angela" who looked to be working as a professor somewhere. I started on the script:

Hi, Angela, this is <insert tapu's real name here>, calling for the UCSD Alumni Association. We have in our files that you received your Master's Degree here in the Philosophy Dept. What did you think of your time here and of the quality of education you received?

She spoke amiably about her high opinion of some of the philosophy professors, and how one in particular--Herbert Marcuse--had drawn her to study there. Hah...? Huh?? My minor was Philosophy. I stole a glance at the full name:  Angela Yvonne Davis. Right. I had Angela Davis on the phone and I was about to ask her for a contribution to the University of California. Like, where she had become embroiled in revolution to the point that the FBI put her on the Most Wanted List. Like, where she was when then-Governor Ronald Reagan tried to get her banned from ever teaching in the UC system.

She was in the midst of her second run for Vice President on the Communist ticket and I wanted her to send privileged So Cal surfer students some cash so they could soon join the wealthy business class of their parents.

I started backing down. But Angela Davis cut to the chase for me. She pledged 1000 dollars then and there. Most people pledged 25-100 dollars. She told me she had gotten a first-rate education at the University of California and that she would always respect that opportunity. I thought I would die.

Is there anyone hotter than Angela Davis?