Sample Wisecracks From Yakov Smirnoff

“On the Fourth of July in Russia we had fireworks too. They’d put you against the wall and fire. It works.”

“In Russia, they don’t fire warning shots in the air. They shoot right at you as a warning to the next guy.”

“Raisa Gorbachev likes to dress well. It’s part of Russia’s new effort at Western-style PR, where it’s important to look good. Madam Chernenko, on the other hand, was so ugly that when she threw herself on her husband’s coffin, everyone was afraid she’d wake him from the dead.”

“In America there’s the phrase, ‘It’s raining cats and dogs,’ which I couldn’t figure out at first. I thought, ‘umbrellas won’t help.’ I could hear the windshield wipers say ‘Oh no, not the Dobermans!’ ”

“I went into a restaurant. They said, ‘How many in your party?’ I said, ‘Two million.’ ”

“ ‘Yep’ in Russian means sex. When I came hear and heard ‘Yep, yep, yep,’ I thought, ‘What a country!’ I met a girl who said, ‘I’m a yuppie.’ ‘Me too,’ I said.

“In Russia we never had things like powdered milk, where all you have to do is add water. There’s powdered orange juice too--all you add is water.

“Now there’s baby powder. I’m making my family tonight.

“Yep!”