All Hail Caesar

Your Mayor attended another one of those self-gratification-o-fests Wednesday night, and although no trophies or plaques were handed out, the end result was the same.

Sid Caesar created TV sketch comedy. And for his sins, he’s trotted out every so often, in his infirmed state at age 84, to jabber in pigeon French/Italian/German to appreciative audiences who don’t realize how present in the moment he actually remains.

The Museum of Television and Radio offered an event Wednesday evening in which Larry Wilmore (creator of “The Bernie Mac Show� and current contributor to both “The Office� and “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart�) and Mitchell Hurwitz (creator of “Arrested Development�) were allowed to engage in Caesarian-section worship. Ostensibly, the idea was for Wilmore and Hurwitz to explain how Caesar inspired their own work, but that never happened.

Instead, they lobbed Sid the same sort of softballs I served up to him when I interviewed him a few years ago, and Sid responded with the sort of anecdotes he has become particularly adept at delivering, about how great his writers were (and they were), how great his “Your Show of Shows� cast was (and it was), how great his audience was (and it was).

The night should’ve been called “Sid’s Greatest Hits.� When he was asked a question that didn’t fit into the matrix of his legend, Sid simply ignored it and responded with an anecdote he’d espoused many times before: When Hurwitz asked him what network executive “discovered� him, Caesar launched into a protracted, irrelevant story about his service in the Coast Guard. This seems to be a showbiz tradition amongst Hollywood legends: When your Mayor interviewed Jimmy Stewart 20 years ago and asked questions that weren’t part of his traditional hagiography, Jimmy responded with rote responses that involved a word or two from the query, discoursing about the “studio system� or Hitchcock, the sort of answers he’d conditioned himself to cook up to perpetuate his accepted narrative to many interviewers past.

These guys have figured out what people want to hear and these are their answers, regardless of what the questions may be. This is hardly Sid’s fault, but he dissembled into desultory monologues blandly championing his writers, his cast, his audience. He was at his best relating the story about his legendary dangling of Mel Brooks (then, a writer on “Your Show of Shows�) out a window; the audience applauded appreciatively, approving his cruelty.

But here’s my biggest concern: I’ve seen Caesar at a number of events over the past few years, and he’s always worn the same outfit: a blue jacket over a white turtleneck sweater. (On Wednesday, this was accessorized by sweatpants and tube socks and comfy sneakers.)

A legend this legendary deserves a grander wardrobe, one more in keeping with his genius, one that allows him to accept his deserving kudos in a different jacket every so often, a different shirt every damn time.

Hence: My appeal to the Good People of Television: Pledge a few dollars to my Dress Sid Appropriately campaign. Any moneys collected, I promise, will not go to my movement to Unseat Les Moonves; all dollars will go to provide Sid Caesar – who virtually single-handedly created TV comedy, for heaven’s sake - a snappier wardrobe: a black sport coat, for one, a sharp dress shirt. Some combed-cotton dress socks. This can be done on the cheap: I recently patronized Lord & Taylor and purchased a smart button-down shirt at a 40-percent mark-down.

Seriously: This man is a legend. He deserves comfortable new clothes. Help me erase that lame blue sport coat from our collective memory. Pledge now.