Where's Woody?

This is from Matt Weiland's review of Richard Zoglin's Comedy At The Edge (which I've discussed earlier) in The New York Times Sunday Book Review. After noting the book claims George Carlin and Richard Pryor are two of the most influential comedians on 70s stand-up, he writes:

It is strange, though, that Zoglin doesn’t rate Woody Allen, a virtual contemporary of Carlin and Pryor, in their company. The schlemiel as hero, the rapid neurotic delivery, the mix of philosophy and pop culture, the angst over emotional, career and relationship success, the shift in the ’70s from stand-up to writing, acting and directing — is any comedian of the period more influential?

1) This is a book about stand-up comedians in the 70s, a group to which Woody Allen doesn't belong. (The book does set the scene with some Lenny Bruce, but he's famous as a groundbreaking stand-up, while Allen truly made his mark elsewhere.)

2) Allen was a brilliant joke writer, and he was even able to create a character in his act that he later transferred to movies. But as a stand-up, as great as he was, he was old-style. Pryor and Carlin changed their 60's acts completely, making them more personal and contemporary, to become the famous and influential comedians they're known as today. Allen's act, by contrast, was highly artificial jokes about things that never happened.

3) This is a book about stand-up, where Allen's influence was minimal. There really aren't that many comedians who copied his style. Sure, there are joke writers, like Steven Wright, and neurotics, like Richard Lewis, but neither owe that much to Woody. Whereas Pryor and Carlin brought in a whole new generation of comics behind them.

4) The book does mention a third comic who's as influential--Robert Klein. Too bad Weiland doesn't see fit to bring him up.

PS Weiland inexplicably ends with two irrelevant paragraphs complaining that Don Novello is not in the book. Maybe that's because he was not a major stand-up act. Novello, best known as Father Guido Sarducci, also used the nom de plume Lazlo Toth in a series of absurd letters he wrote to big names and corporations. (I guess that shows he influenced Ted L. Nancy.) Some funny stuff there, but notice it's not stand-up.