Who Can Save Us From Russia? Yakov Smirnoff Is Still Available
BRANSON MO NEWS: Tonight shouldn’t be a jittery gig. Only about 100 gray-haired, nice-as-pie comedy fans have made it out to the Five Star Dinner Theatre, here in Hot Springs, Arkansas, population 37,000. Before the show, the owner will lead a rendition of “Happy Birthday to You” for an audience member, and afterward, “master magician” Scott Davis will take the stage.
But tonight’s headliner isn’t a local. It’s Yakov Smirnoff, Ronald Reagan’s favorite comedian.
For a man who hasn’t been heard from since the early 1990s, this isn’t just another Friday-night show—it’s a critical step toward his big comeback, or at least he hopes so. “I’m probably the only person on the planet that is kind of happy that the [new] Cold War is happening,” he says. “I’ve been waiting for 25 years.”
Smirnoff was the king of Cold War humor, the lovable Russia-born comic who disarmed US audiences with his “What a country!” punchlines as Reagan and Gorbachev piled up their nuclear warheads. He cracked up talk-show hosts by lampooning the Evil Empire with gags like “On the Fourth of July in Russia, we had fireworks, too. They’d put you against the wall and fire. It works.” And this: “There are no things like American Express [cards]. They give you Russian Express: ‘Don’t leave home.’ ”
But the fall of the Soviet Union toppled Smirnoff’s career. As pop culture moved on, America’s comrade in comedy plunged into obscurity, and his subsequent attempts to reclaim the spotlight failed again and again. Until . . . maybe . . . now?
I’m probably the only person on the planet that’s kind of happy the new Cold War is happening. I’ve been waiting 25 years.
As US/Russia relations have returned to the national water cooler, Smirnoff has …
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