CNN/AP: At Kennedy Center, political and media stars mourn Art Buchwald with laughter

[DeepModem Mom]

Media stars mourn Art Buchwald with laughter
March 5, 2007

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Political and media insiders joined family and friends Monday to share a last public laugh and remember the antics of humor columnist Art Buchwald.

Buchwald's family and a selection of heavy hitters from the world of journalism and politics kept the audience laughing for about an hour and a half at a memorial service for Buchwald, who died of kidney failure in January....

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Ethel Kennedy drew a tremendous response from the crowd with an anecdote about selecting Buchwald, who was Jewish, as the godfather to some of her children.

She said he reacted badly when the priest asked him to renounce the devil, running to the back of the church and telling her that he wasn't "ready to renounce Satan" yet.

"May Jack and Bobby take care of you, who took such wonderful care of the children and me," she said....

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Buchwald's friends and family even managed to find humor in his death.

"Dad was probably the only person to ever gain weight while in the hospice," son Joel Buchwald said....The service included a clip from a December 2006 episode of "CBS Sunday Morning," when Buchwald said, "pretty soon people in television and radio and newspapers said 'hey, Buchwald's dying in hospice, go over there. It could be a good story."'

Friend and fellow humor columnist Dave Barry related that Buchwald kept him in stitches while explaining his leg amputation due to circulation problems.

"He talked funny, he wrote funny, he lived funny and damned if he didn't figure out a way to die funny," Barry said....

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/books/03/05/buchwald.memorial.ap/index.html