Take This Dismal Comedy Awards Show--Please!

A club owner exiting the third annual Comedy Awards show at the Palladium on Tuesday night, with a souvenir harlequin hat centerpiece in hand, said: “You have to remember that in the beginning the Academy Awards was an awkward show too that took a few years to get straightened out. People didn’t pay much attention at the beginning. You have to give this one a chance.”

A fat chance. Of the dismally burgeoning variety of annual awards shows with which the entertainment industry likes to preen itself, the Comedy Awards show, though a black-tie affair that attracts its share of celebrities and is beamed nationwide over ABC-TV, remains the runt of the litter.

If for the first two years you took into account the show’s growing pains (all along it’s been producer George Schlatter’s brainchild and a product of his shallow taste) and still wondered if comedy really needed a rite of self-congratulation, at the end of Tuesday’s fitful digression you began to think that it did.

So long as most American comedians are out to play the ratings game, they were getting the show they deserved.

On its own organizational terms, the show is still problematic. Its writing is an embarrassment to most of the self-conscious participants who don’t write for themselves. Its categorical choices are as dubious as ever, jamming all kinds of disparate talent into cookie-cutter slots. Whatever Sigourney Weaver was in “Working Girl,” for example, she was not and was never intended to be funny. Yet there she is in the funniest supporting female movie category.

Lily Tomlin hasn’t done stand-up comedy in decades, yet there she still is in the stand-up comedy slot, pitted against Whoopi Goldberg and Roseanne Barr and Tracey Ullman--who’s never done stand-up in America. Dana Carvey wins for best supporting male in TV. Carvey is an ensemble player in “Saturday Night Live,” a comedy variety show. All his competitors--Woody Harrelson, John Larrouquette, Peter Scolari and George Wendt--work in sitcoms.

Some nominees get film and video clips showing them in action. Some don’t. Lifetime achievement winner (male) Red Skelton gets an entire film retrospective played over a taped Frank Sinatra rendition of “Send in the Clowns.” Lifetime achievement winner (female) Katharine Hepburn gets nothing, not even a Hirschfeld cartoon (she was a no-show, along with many others). Time runs out before all the categories are completed.

There were some classy and skillfully handled moments. Neil Simon was a gracious recipient of the lifetime creative achievement award (so many lifetime awards--are the comedy folks expecting Armageddon any time soon?).

Steve Allen was impeccably droll and not the least bit self-serving when he gently reminded us that he was the originator of “The Tonight Show,” and that whatever this tiny Rave magazine was in telling us who was the best club comedian in America, in effect it bore the same relationship to the established glossies that the Pennysaver bore to a book rack.

Skelton’s reception was touching because he showed how much of a trouper he remains, and how little age has withered his comic charms. The Lucille Ball tribute, presented by Tomlin, was only apropos (though her film and TV clip survey was too much like Skelton’s). Gilda Radner got five seconds of an on-screen caricature, and a written acknowledgement that could have fit into a Chinese fortune cookie.

When Mark Russell came on, you began to sense what an industry fiefdom American comedy has become. His talk of Noriega and the Exxon Valdez and all his other national news references went right over this kiss-kiss glitter crowd of decolletage, forced mirth, and restless, calculating glances. Hey, that’s just the news; this is reality!

What was most peculiar and depressing about the show had little to do with pained presentations or Schlatter’s clumsy eagerness to make it a blue-chip event.

From the moment the implacable Bea Arthur came out to say “Let’s all try and behave ourselves and see if this turkey flies,” you sensed that the prevailing spirit was just the opposite of the old show-biz maxim of going out there and giving it all you’ve got.

There were a number of uninspired jokes about George Bush, but the jokers seemed unaware of how easily they’d made the transition from Reagan’s Morning in America cheer to Bush’s seeming incapacity to commit.

Maybe the true spirit of comedy is intractable and everybody knows it, and a show like this can never work. Or maybe it can if everyone decides that this highly imperfect format is the only way to pay respect to one’s peers.

But what started out Tuesday night to be a tribute to American comedy unwittingly turned out to be an indictment of the pusillanimous spirit that fits in with a lot of small talent.

Is this what American comedy has become?

The winners of the third annual Comedy Awards are as follows:

Female Performer in a TV Series, Leading Role: Roseanne Barr in “Roseanne.”

Male Performer in a TV Series, Leading Role: John Goodman in “Roseanne.”

Female Performer in a TV Special: Tracey Ullman in “Tracey Ullman: Backstage.”

Male Performer in a TV Special: David Letterman in “6th Anniversary Special.”

Actress in a Motion Picture: Bette Midler in “Big Business.”

Actor in a Motion Picture: Tom Hanks in “Big.”

Comedy Club Award for Best Female Comedian: Paula Poundstone.

Comedy Club Award for Best Male Comedian: Bobby Slayton.

Supporting Female in a Motion Picture: Joan Cusack in “Working Girl.”

Supporting Male in a Motion Picture: Arsenio Hall in “Coming to America.”

Supporting Female--TV: Rhea Perlman in “Cheers.”

Supporting Male--TV: Dana Carvey in “Saturday Night Live.”

Female Stand-Up Comic: Roseanne Barr.

Male Stand-Up Comic: Robin Williams.

Lifetime Achievement--Female: Katharine Hepburn.

Lifetime Achievement--Male: Red Skelton.

Lifetime Creative Achievement Award: Neil Simon.