Andrew Dice Clay
From OAPedia.com
Andrew "Dice" Clay is a standup comedian who became a popular guest on The Opie and Anthony Show from 1999-2002. At first, Anthony would do impressions of Dice on the show pretending that Dice was now a janitor at the station. His impression was so great that people actually believed it was really Dice. Soon, the real Dice started appearing on the show, and he wound up introducing a certain meaty-breasted comedian to O&A - Jim Norton - whose stand-up career was propelled by Dice, after he opened for Dice for 3 years.
O&A also goofed on Dice's exceedingly eccentric behavior, such as making an appearance at Ground Zero months after the September 11th attacks, and long after any other celebrities chose to do so (see Quantum Dice). Their playful ragging on him made for some of the best radio.
After O&A moved to XM, Dice chose not to appear on the show, saying he had to talk to Opie first before appearing, which he never did. Soon, Dice started trashing O&A from out of the blue, and appeared on Howard Stern's show making up an excuse why he didn't do O&A anymore. There were also some jokes made about Opie's dead father. When Dice called up Brother Wease's radio show, Wease got O&A on the line to confront him, but Dice immediately hung up. Despite the falling out, Dice was still the subject of great radio bits, such as Andrew Dice Gay.
On May 20, 2008, Dice appeared on the show again in his first appearance since O&A came back on the air in 2004. Because Dice was working on an HBO series with Jimmy titled Down and Dirty, he was asked to appear on the show again and he attempted to resolve things with Opie and also with Club Soda Kenny, who used to work for Dice but hadn't seen him in a few years. Dice explained that the jokes that were made about Opie's father on Howard's show were made by Howard only and he wasn't a part of that (although listeners pointed out that he was, indeed, a part of it).
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Bio
Andrew Dice Clay was born Andrew Clay Silverstein (September 29, 1957) in Brooklyn, New York.
"Dice" is one of the crudest stand-up comedians ever to grace a stage. But from his meager Brooklyn roots through his struggling years at the Comedy Store, he remained focused on his goal of becoming the greatest comedian of all time. At his peak popularity in the late '80s, Dice became a household name; he was consistently selling out arenas and stadiums, a feat unheard of for a stand-up comedian. But in the early '90s, his career hit a wall. He became a lightning rod for dissent in the growing climate of political correctness, going from mainstream to outcast.
The stage act of this stand-up comedian-turned-actor reaped controversy for being over-laden with obscenities and was considered to be misogynistic by feminists and most thinking people. Andrew 'Dice' Clay nevertheless found the shtick to propel him to stardom after years of performing in small clubs with an appeal to the urban/suburban teenaged white boys, confused about their roles as men in the changing times. Clay, decked in a leather jacket, with a dangling chain, spoke in Brooklyn slang and used so many nasty words and disgusting references that he was banned from MTV after an appearance on "The 1989 MTV Video Awards".
Insults
Dice would often insult members of his audience while they were actually there, and made many so uncomfortable that they actually left his shows. At this time, his most popular routine involved the subversion of traditional Nursery Rhymes, including "Jack and Jill went up the hill" and Little Miss Muffet, turning them from child friendly rhymes into sordid sexual encounters. It was these rhymes that subsequently became both Dice's breakthrough into the mainstream as well as the routine that he most despised.
Dice's Nursery Rhymes
- "Little Miss Muffett sat on a tuffet eating her curds and whey. Along came a spider, who sat down beside her and said 'Hey, what's in the bowl, bitch?'"
- "Jack and Jill went up the hill, each with a buck and a quarter. Jill came down with two-fifty... that fucking whore!"
- "Little Boy Blue... he needed the money!"
- "Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack burned off his fuckin' dick!"
- "There was an old lady who lived in a shoe. She had so many kids... her uterus fell out!"
- "Old Mother Hubbard went to the cupboard to get her poor dog a bone. She bent over, Rover took over and gave her a bone of her own."
- "Mary Mary quite contrary... trim that pussy, it's so damn hairy!"
- "Hickory Dickory Dock, this chick was suckin' my cock. The clock struck two, I dropped my goo and dumped the bitch on the next block."
- "Jack Sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean. So Jack ignored her flabby tits and licked her asshole clean."
- "Little Bo Peep fucked her sheep,blew her horse,licked his feet,she ate his ass so very nice,tongued his balls not once but twice." OH!
- "Little Jack Horner,sat in the corner,eating a pizza pie,he shit pepperoni,blew his friend,Tony, and wiped his mouth off with his tie."
The Day the Laughter Died (CD)
Clay would then go on to record what some regard as his masterpiece. The two CD set The Day The Laughter Died, lasting just under two hours, hit the Top 40 Album Chart and is considered the first ever comedy concept album. The concept, according to Clay, was to perform "the worst show possible". Clay went in front of a paying audience with no planned material and insulted the audience, as a whole as well as individually, for nearly two hours. Many members of the audience, even by the standards of a Clay show- left, and the entire concert was released without any edits. The album was produced by Beastie Boys and Slayer producer Rick Rubin.
Acting career
In 1988, he appeared on an HBO Rodney Dangerfield comedy special, then headlined his own HBO special, Andrew 'Dice' Clay: The Diceman Cometh. Clay was hot, and the controversy was only helping to pack 'em in. When the backlash hit in 1989-90, it was somewhat unexpected. When his first starring role in a feature, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane (1990), did not sell tickets, the luster was fading. Clay had two best-selling albums, Dice (1989) and The Day the Laughter Died (1990), but by 1991, after the release of Dice, a concert film, the establishment had little interest in him.
The controversy continued the following year when Clay's booking as the guest host on the final show of the season of Saturday Night Live caused cast member Nora Dunn to boycott the show in protest of his remarks about women. Dunn never returned to the cast, but Clay's gig was pretty much up as well. He disappeared for several years, returning in the mid-1990s trying to become a TV sitcom star.
He tried to mend fences with Andrew Dice Clay: For Ladies Only, a 1992 HBO special, but to little avail. The 1993 feature Brain Smasher...A Love Story was a failed attempt to turn Clay into an action hero. For much of the next two years, he virtually disappeared, returning in 1995 in the TV-movie No Contest (HBO). Clay, now billed as Andrew Clay, attempted to remake his image, dropping much of the 'Dice' persona by co-starring with Cathy Moriarty in the CBS sitcom Bless This House (1995-1996), loosely inspired by the far superior The Honeymooners. While Clay was still tainted, and the result failed to win in the ratings war, there was a glimmer that the Diceman changeth. He resumed his stage act, still cocky and self-confident, still foul-mouthed, but leaving the subject of women alone. He returned to series TV as a surly record company executive in the UPN sitcom Hitz (1997).
Later works
Following the show's failure, Dice returned to comedy with his HBO special Assume the Position and his 1999 album, Face Down, Ass Up. His audience was smaller than ever before due to the fall from grace of so called "Assault comedy" following the deaths of Sam Kinison and Bill Hicks.
After a fallout with Howard Stern in 1997, Dice went on to be one of the hottest things on the O&A show from 1999-2002. Some of his most memorable moments were: A long fued with comic Jay Mohr over stealing material, Dice calling from Ground Zero and rambling about his "hat", the "which way" bit, and coming up with dozens of "radio terminologies" still used today. Dice and Stern worked out their differences on Howard's Sirius radio show on March 22, 2006.
CNN appearance
In one particular interview before a supposed comeback, Dice used several profanities on a live CNN cable news program. The video of this episode is available online in many collections of outrageous moments in American television history and "funny video" collections. Comments made on the show include "where are you getting your fucking information" and "Jesus fucking Christ." The channel was not fined by the FCC because it was on cable.
Today
Today, Dice does his thing beneath the media radar, still outselling most comedians nationwide. And as it turns out, he's a dedicated family man. He is also working on a new CD entitled Filthy Animal.
See Also
External links
- IMDB.com: Andrew Dice Clay
- Rotten.com: Andrew Dice Clay biography (includes some jokes)
- Video of CNN Interview

