Ish Kabibble

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Ish Kabibble (19 January 1908-5 June 1994) was a comedian and cornet player. Born Merwyn Bogue in North East, Pennsylvania, his family returned to Erie, Pennsylvania a few months after his birth.

He studied law at West Virginia University but his comedy antics soon found an audience. He performed with Kay Kyser on Kay Kyser's Kollege of Musical Knowledge (1939-49), and he appeared in ten movies between 1939 and 1950. In Thousands Cheer (1943) he is the band member who tells Kyser the joke about his friend receiving $250,000, and he sings "I Dug a Ditch" in that film. He's also a vocalist in That's Right - You're Wrong (1939), You'll Find Out (1940) and Playmates (1941).

In his 1989 autobiography Bogue explained his stage name which he took from the lyrics of one of his comedic songs, "Isch ga-bibble".¹ The song derived from a mock-Yiddish expression, "Ische ga bibble?", which was purported to mean "What, me worry?" This prompts a curious (and perhaps not coincidental) association of the comedian with the motto of Mad's mascot, Alfred E. Neuman.

Kabibble's distinctive black hair in a bowl cut is said to have been an inspiration for the hairstyle worn by Jim Carrey's character in Dumb and Dumber. Some critics maintain that Jerry Lewis lifted his comedic persona and look from Ish Kabibble, making an otherwise identical character more manic than Ish Kabibble's earlier presentation.

Although Bogue's stage persona was that of a dim-witted person, he was a notable cornet player and also was the business manager for the Kay Kyser Orchestra from 1931 to 1951. With the decline of the big bands, Bogue found a new career in real estate. He died in 1994 in Palm Springs.