He began work as a cigar salesman, which resulted in a lifelong tobacco-smoking habit. By the time he was released his parents had separated, and Kovacs went back to Trenton, living with his mother in a two-room apartment over a store. While hospitalized, Kovacs developed a lifelong love of classical music by the gift of a radio, which he kept tuned to WQXR. During the next year and a half, his comedic talents developed as he entertained both doctors and patients with his antics during stays at several hospitals. While working in Vermont in 1939, he became so seriously ill with pneumonia and pleurisy that his doctors didn't expect him to survive. Kovacs used his class vacation time to pursue roles in summer stock companies. Ī 1938 local newspaper photograph shows Kovacs as a member of the Prospect Players, not yet wearing his trademark mustache. Many of these movies influenced his comedy routines later. ĭuring this time, he watched many " Grade B" movies admission was only ten cents. When Kovacs began drama school, all he could afford was a fifth-floor walk-up apartment on West 74th Street in New York City. The end of Prohibition and the onset of the Great Depression resulted in difficult financial times for the family. Though a poor student, Kovacs was influenced by his Trenton Central High School drama teacher, Harold Van Kirk, and received an acting scholarship to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1937 with Van Kirk's help. He worked as a policeman, restaurateur, and bootlegger, the last so successfully that he moved his wife Mary, son Tom, and his half-brother Ernest Edward Kovacs into a 20-room mansion in the better part of Trenton. Würzburg via Bremen, arriving at Ellis Island on February 8, 1906, at age 16. Kovacs's father, Andrew John Kovacs, was born in 1890 and emigrated from Tornaújfalu, Hungary, which is now known as Turnianska Nová Ves, Slovakia. He was television's first significant video artist." The Pulitzer Prize–winning television critic, William Henry III, wrote for the museum's booklet: "Kovacs was more than another wide-eyed, self-ingratiating clown. In 1986, the Museum of Broadcasting (later to become the Museum of Television & Radio and now the Paley Center for Media) presented an exhibit of Kovacs's work, called The Vision of Ernie Kovacs. Kovacs also has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his work in television. A quarter century later, he was inducted into the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Hall of Fame.
The 1962 Emmy for Outstanding Electronic Camera Work and the Directors' Guild award came a short time after his fatal accident.
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While Kovacs and Adams received Emmy nominations for best performances in a comedy series during 1957, his talent was not recognized formally until after his death.
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His solution was to hire a taxi driver to come into their apartment with his own key and make breakfast for them both, then take Kovacs to the WABC studios. When working at WABC (AM) as a morning-drive radio announcer and doing a mid-morning television series for NBC, Kovacs claimed to dislike eating breakfast alone while his wife, Edie Adams, was sleeping after her Broadway performances.
Some of Kovacs's unusual behaviors included having pet marmosets and wrestling a jaguar on his live Philadelphia television show. Chevy Chase thanked Kovacs during his acceptance speech for his Emmy award for Saturday Night Live. Kovacs has been credited as an influence by many individuals and shows, including Johnny Carson, David Letterman, Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In, Saturday Night Live, Monty Python's Flying Circus, Jim Henson, Max Headroom, Chevy Chase, Conan O'Brien, Jimmy Kimmel, Captain Kangaroo, Sesame Street, The Electric Company, Pee-wee's Playhouse, The Muppet Show, Dave Garroway, Andy Kaufman, You Can't Do That on Television, MST3K, Uncle Floyd, among others. Kovacs's visually experimental and often spontaneous comedic style influenced numerous television comedy programs for years after his death. Ernest Edward Kovacs (Janu– January 13, 1962) was an American comedian, actor, and writer.