Editing Jack Handey

{{Use mdy dates|date=April 2023}}
{{Short description|American humorist and writer (born 1949)}}
{{Infobox comedian
| name =Jack Handey
| image = 
| birth_name =
| birth_date = {{birth date and age|mf=yes|1949|02|25}}
| birth_place = [[San Antonio, Texas]], U.S.
| other_names = 
| medium = {{hlist|Television|print}}
| website = {{URL|deepthoughtsbyjackhandey.com}}
| genre = {{hlist|[[Surreal humor]]|[[one-line joke|one-liners]]|[[deadpan]]}}
| awards = 
| spouse = Marta Chavez
| years_active = 1980–present
}}
'''Jack Handey''' (born February 25, 1949) is an American [[humorist]]. He is best known for his "Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey", a large body of [[Surrealism|surrealistic]] [[one-liner joke]]s, as well as his "Fuzzy Memories" and "My Big Thick Novel" shorts, and for his [[deadpan]] delivery.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/jack-handey-deploys-drone-strikes-in-the-war-against-cliches/article13682794/|title=Jack Handey deploys drone strikes in the war against clichés|last=Mclaren|first=Leah|work=[[The Globe and Mail]]|date=August 9, 2013|access-date=November 3, 2015}}</ref> Although many assume otherwise,<ref name=Sacks2009/><ref name=TM2002/> Handey is a real person, not a [[pen name]] or character.

==Career==
Handey's earliest writing job was for a newspaper, the ''[[San Antonio Express-News]]''. He lost the job after writing an article that, in his words, "offended local car dealerships".<ref name=TM2002/> His first comic writing was with comedian [[Steve Martin]]. According to Martin, Handey got a job writing for ''[[Saturday Night Live]]'' (SNL) after Martin introduced him to the show's creator, [[Lorne Michaels]].<ref name=Coyle/> For several years, Handey worked on other television projects: the Canadian [[Sketch comedy|sketch series]] ''[[Bizarre (TV series)|Bizarre]]'' in 1980, the 1980 Steve Martin television special ''[[Comedy Is Not Pretty!]]'', and Lorne Michaels's short-lived sketch show on [[NBC]] called ''[[The New Show]]'' in 1984. Handey returned to ''Saturday Night Live'' in 1985 as a writer.<ref name=Sacks2009/>

===Deep Thoughts===
Handey's "deep thoughts" were first published in an untitled essay in ''[[Omni (magazine)|Omni]]'' magazine in November 1983.<ref>{{cite web |title=Omni Magazine Archive |url=https://archive.org/details/omni-archive |website=Internet Archive |access-date=December 10, 2021}}</ref> In April 1984, ''[[National Lampoon (magazine)|National Lampoon]]'' published a piece titled "Deep Thoughts". Additional Deep Thoughts appeared in the October and November 1984 editions, as well as in the short-lived ''[[Army Man (magazine)|Army Man]]'' comedy magazine, while more appeared in 1988 in ''[[The Santa Fe New Mexican]]'' newspaper. The one-liners were to become Handey's signature work, notable for their concise humor and outlandish hypothetical situations. For example:

*If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason.<ref name="Berkley"/>
*The crows seemed to be calling his name, thought Caw.<ref name=Handey1993/>
<!-- Editors: Please add additional Jack Handey quotes to Handey's Wikiquote collection rather than to this article. -->

Handey's work next showed up in the [[Michael Nesmith]]-produced TV series ''[[Television Parts]]'' in the format which later became famous on ''Saturday Night Live'' (though in ''Television Parts'', Nesmith provided the narration). Some of these segments appeared in the compilation video of that program, ''Doctor Duck's Super Secret All-Purpose Sauce''.

Between 1989 and 1990, Deep Thoughts were shown during commercial breaks on [[The Comedy Channel (United States)|The Comedy Channel]] with Handey's narration.
 
Between 1991 and 1998, ''Saturday Night Live'' included Deep Thoughts on the show as an interstitial segment (between sketches). Introduced by [[Phil Hartman]] and read live by Handey (neither actually appeared on screen), the one-liners proved to be extremely popular. Hartman intoned "And now, Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handey...", and peaceful [[easy listening music]] played while the screen showed soothing pastoral scenes, much like a [[New Age]] relaxation video. Handey then read the Deep Thought as the text to it scrolled across the screen. They became an enduring feature of ''SNL'', which often had multiple Thoughts in each episode, and made Handey a well-known name.

===Other SNL work===
Other Handey creations that appeared on SNL include the [[Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer]],<ref name=Sacks2009/> "Fuzzy Memories" which depicted reenactments of a twisted childhood memory and aired in the late 1990s, and the short-lived "My Big Thick Novel", which were spoken excerpts from a very long book in the style of "Deep Thoughts" and which aired during SNL's 2001–03 seasons.

Handey is also credited with creating [[Toonces the Driving Cat]], the cat who could drive a car, although not very well.<ref name="toonces">Carman, John (February 14, 1992). "We Paws for This Message", ''[[San Francisco Chronicle]]''.</ref> The recurring skit originated in 1989 with [[Steve Martin]] and [[Victoria Jackson]] as the crash-prone kitten's owners. In 1992 NBC aired a half-hour Toonces special. Handey, who lived with a real cat by the same name, once said he could not remember exactly how he dreamed up the premise. He said, "It was just one of those free association ideas you write down and look at later and think, 'Maybe.{{' "}}<ref name="toonces"/>

===Further writing===
In early April 2008, Handey published his first collection of magazine humor pieces, ''What I'd Say to the Martians and Other Veiled Threats''. [[Associated Press]] critic Jake Coyle wrote, "With absurdist musings such as these, Handey has established himself as the strangest of birds: a famous comedian whose platform is not the stage or screen, but the page."<ref name=Coyle/> Handey subsequently became a regular contributor to ''The New Yorker'' Shouts and Murmurs section.<ref name=TheNewYorker/>

On July 16, 2013, Handey's first novel, ''The Stench of Honolulu'', was released by publisher [[Grand Central Publishing|Grand Central]].<ref name=Kirkus/>

==Personal life==
Handey was born in [[San Antonio, Texas]], in 1949.<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Olendorf |editor1-first=Donna |title=Contemporary Authors |date=1994 |publisher=[[Gale Research Inc.]] |location=Detroit |isbn=978-0-8103-5551-4 |page=185 |url=https://archive.org/details/contemporaryauth141donn/page/184/mode/2up}}</ref> He graduated from Eastwood High School in [[El Paso, Texas]], where he was the editor of the school newspaper, ''Sabre''.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Handey |first=Jack |date=January 1, 2002 |title=Deep Thoughts About Me |url=https://www.texasmonthly.com/the-culture/deep-thoughts-about-me/ |access-date=April 5, 2022 |website=Texas Monthly |language=en}}</ref>

Handey and his wife, Marta Chavez Handey,<ref name="Berkley" /> live in [[Santa Fe, New Mexico]].<ref name="Handey bio"/> Previously, the Handeys had lived in the [[Chelsea, Manhattan|Chelsea]] neighborhood of [[Manhattan]], [[New York City]].<ref name=TM2002/>

==Bibliography==
{{Incomplete list|date=June 2017}}{{bots|deny=Citation bot}}

===Books===
* ''Deep thoughts: inspiration for the uninspired'' (1992) Berkley, {{ISBN|9780425133651}}
* ''Deeper thoughts: all new, all crispy'' (1993) Hyperion {{ISBN|1-56282-840-1}}
*''Deepest Thoughts: So Deep they Squeak'' (1994). Hyperion, {{ISBN|0-7868-8044-9}}
*''Fuzzy Memories'' (1996). Andrews McMeel Publishing, {{ISBN|0-8362-1040-9}} – a collection of "stories from Handey's childhood"
**''Fuzzy Memories: CD-Rom'' (2003). Disc Us Books Inc, {{ISBN|1-58444-078-3}} - An Emersa*Plus Reader/Viewer [[E-book]] that contains all of the text and pictures from the original book plus "new memories," 28 videos of "Jack's home movies", and 60 audio files of Jack reading selected stories.  
*''The Lost Deep Thoughts: Don't Fight the Deepness'' (1998), Hyperion, {{ISBN|0-7868-8305-7}}
*''What I'd Say to the Martians and Other Veiled Threats'' (2008), Hyperion, {{ISBN|978-1-4013-2266-3}}
*''The Stench of Honolulu: A Tropical Adventure'' (2013), Grand Central, {{ISBN|978-1-4555-2238-5}}
*''Please Stop the Deep Thoughts'' (2017), Berkley, {{ISBN|978-0-692-38541-8}}
*'' Escape from Hawaii: A Tropical Sequel'' (2023)

===Essays and reporting===
* {{cite journal |author=Handey, Jack |date=November 24, 2008 |title=The plan |department=Shouts & Murmurs |journal=The New Yorker |volume=84 |issue=38 |pages=62 |url=http://www.newyorker.com/humor/2008/11/24/081124sh_shouts_handey <!--access-date=2009-04-16-->}}
* {{cite journal |author=Handey, Jack |author-mask=1 |date=July 22, 2013 |title=Guards' complaints about Spartacus |department=Shouts & Murmurs |journal=The New Yorker|volume=89 |issue=21 |pages=33 |url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/07/22/guards-complaints-about-spartacus |access-date=October 29, 2014}}
* {{cite journal |author=Handey, Jack |author-mask=1 |date=October 21, 2013 |title=Luau |department=Shouts & Murmurs |journal=The New Yorker |volume=89 |issue=33 |pages=39 |url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/10/21/luau <!--access-date=2017-06-09-->}}
* {{cite journal |author=Handey, Jack |author-mask=1 |date=May 4, 2015 |title=Execution days |department=Shouts & Murmurs |journal=The New Yorker|volume=91 |issue=11 |pages=33 |url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/05/04/execution-days |access-date=June 30, 2015}}
* {{cite journal |author=Handey, Jack |author-mask=1 |date=August 3, 2015 |title=Apocalypse |department=Shouts & Murmurs |journal=The New Yorker|volume=91 |issue=22 |pages=29 |url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/03/apocalypse-shouts-and-murmurs-jack-handey |access-date=March 21, 2016}}
* {{cite journal |author=Handey, Jack |author-mask=1 |date=April 2, 2018 |title=How the neighborhood has changed |department=Shouts & Murmurs |journal=The New Yorker |volume=94 |issue=7 |pages=37 |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/04/02/how-the-neighborhood-has-changed <!--access-date=2018-07-09-->}}
* {{cite journal |author=Handey, Jack |author-mask=1 |date=May 30, 2022 |title=My torture ideas |department=Shouts & Murmurs |journal=The New Yorker |volume=98 |issue=14 |pages=25 |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/05/30/coming-up-with-torture-ideas-is-harder-than-you-think <!--|access-date=March 10, 2023-->}}<ref group=lower-alpha>Title in the online table of contents is "Coming up with torture ideas is harder than you think".</ref>
———————
;Notes
{{reflist|30em|group=lower-alpha}}

==Television writing==
*''[[Comedy Is Not Pretty!|Steve Martin: Comedy Is Not Pretty!]]'' (1980)
*''Prime Times'' (1983)
*''[[The New Show]]'' (1984)
*''Television Parts Home Companion'' (1985) - sequel to ''[[Elephant Parts]]'' by [[Michael Nesmith]])
*''Doctor Duck's Super Secret All-Purpose Sauce'' (1986) - another sequel to ''Elephant Parts'' by Michael Nesmith
*''[[Saturday Night Live]]'' (1985–1998 and 2001–2002)

==References==
{{Reflist|30em|refs=
<ref name=Sacks2009>{{cite book |last=Sacks |first=Mike |author-link=Mike Sacks |title=And Here's the Kicker: Conversations with 21 Top Humor Writers on Their Craft |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_sQUU3ZJ-T0C&pg=PA309 |year=2009 |publisher=Writer's Digest Books |isbn=978-1-58297-989-2 |pages=309–310}}</ref>
<ref name=TM2002>Handey, Jack (January 2002). [http://www.texasmonthly.com/the-culture/deep-thoughts-about-me/ Deep Thoughts about Me: Questions I Am Often Asked (and My Answers)]", ''[[Texas Monthly]]''.</ref>
<ref name="Berkley">Handey, Jack  (1992). ''Deep Thoughts''. Berkley Publishing Group. {{ISBN|978-0425133651}}.</ref>
<ref name=Handey1993>Handey, Jack (1993). ''Deeper Thoughts: All New, All Crispy''. Hyperion. {{ISBN|978-1562828400}}.</ref>
<ref name="Handey bio">"[http://www.deepthoughtsbyjackhandey.com/answer.html Biography]" ''Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey'' website. Accessed June 6, 2008. {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070523105534/http://www.deepthoughtsbyjackhandey.com/answer.html |date=May 23, 2007 }}</ref>
<ref name=TheNewYorker>{{cite magazine |title=Contributors: Jack Handey |magazine=The New Yorker |url=http://www.newyorker.com/contributors/jack-handey |access-date=September 1, 2015}}</ref>
<ref name=Coyle>{{cite news |title=Jack Handey's Thoughts Get Deeper |newspaper=USA Today |agency=AP |author=Coyle, Jake |date=April 12, 2008 |url=http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/television/2008-04-12-2997740568_x.htm |access-date=September 1, 2015}}</ref>
<ref name=Kirkus>{{cite web |title=The Stench of Honolulu |website=[[Kirkus Reviews]] |date=July 5, 2013 |url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/jack-handey/stench-of-honolulu/ |access-date=September 1, 2015}}</ref>

}}

==External links==
{{wikiquote}}
* {{Official website|http://www.deepthoughtsbyjackhandey.com/}}
* {{IMDb name|id=0359532|name=Jack Handey}}
* {{cite podcast |url= http://www.maximumfun.org/blog/2008/05/podcast-jack-handey-author-tv-writer.html |title= Jack Handey, Author, TV Writer and Creator of "Deep Thoughts" |website= Maximum Fun |publisher=  [[The Sound of Young America]] |first= Jesse |last= Thorn |date= May 30, 2008 }}
* {{cite podcast |url= http://www.studio360.org/story/106760-my-speech-to-the-martians |title= My Speech To The Martians |publisher= [[Studio 360]] |date= May 5, 2006 }}
* {{cite web |url= http://www.outsideonline.com/1823536/praise-human-body |title= In Praise of the Human Body |publisher= Outside online |date= May 1, 2005 |first= Jack |last= Handey |display-authors= 0 }}
* [http://www.newyorker.com/search?bylquery=jack+handey Jack Handey's articles] at ''[[The New Yorker]]''
* {{cite web |url= https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/21/magazine/jack-handey-is-the-envy-of-every-comedy-writer-in-america.html?pagewanted=3&_r=0&partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=all |title= Jack Handey Is the Envy of Every Comedy Writer in America |work= [[The New York Times]] |date= July 21, 2013 |first= Dan |last= Kois }}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Handey, Jack}}
[[Category:1949 births]]
[[Category:20th-century American comedians]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American comedians]]
[[Category:21st-century American male writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American novelists]]
[[Category:American humorists]]
[[Category:American male comedians]]
[[Category:American male television writers]]
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[[Category:Comedians from Texas]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:People from Chelsea, Manhattan]]
[[Category:People from El Paso, Texas]]
[[Category:People from Santa Fe, New Mexico]]
[[Category:Primetime Emmy Award winners]]
[[Category:Screenwriters from Texas]]
[[Category:The New Yorker people]]
[[Category:University of Texas at El Paso alumni]]
[[Category:Writers from San Antonio]]
[[Category:Comedians from New Mexico]]
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