David Stairs
Professor Irwin Corey (1915-2017)
Determining who was the world’s greatest authority used to be easy. It was Irwin Eli Cohen, aka Professor Irwin Corey, and he told us so.
Corey, who died in 2017 at age 102, was for decades the king of nonsense stand-up. I remember his appearances in the 1960s on mixed entertainment shows like Ed Sullivan, where the Beatles also made their American debut. But Corey’s career extended far beyond that, into the ’70s and 80s with frequent appearances on Carson’s Tonight Show. (He apparently only appeared once on Letterman, a vestige of his blacklisting in the ’50s according to Corey).
How can a comic become the “world’s foremost authority” you’re probably wondering, and that’s a good question. It helps to be called “one of the most brilliant comedians of all time” by Lenny Bruce. In his schtick Corey would stumble onstage, dressed in a shabby suit and sneakers, hair messy, seemingly lost in thought, then raise a finger, say “However…” and launch into a parody of double-talk erudition that was impossible not to laugh at. Kenneth Tynan described Corey as “…a cultural clown, a parody of literacy, a travesty of all that our civilization holds dear, and one of the funniest grotesques in America.”
After such longstanding expertism, it seems it might be difficult to find Corey’s replacement. But, like Nature which abhors a vacuum as the saying goes, one has appeared as he was bound to. His name is Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr. He is 53 years old, began his career as a rapper, and goes by the stagename Snoop Dog, christened as a child by his mother after Snoopy, the beloved Peanuts beagle.
Raised as a singer in a Baptist congregation, Broadus began rapping in the sixth grade. Years of trouble with the law, including stints with the Rollin’ 20s Crips and arrests for possession landed him in prison in his twenties. Discovered by Dr. Dre and performing as Snoop Doggy Dogg, in 1993 Broadus released his first album, Doggystyle, on Dre’s Death Row Records. Acquitted of murder in 1996, and following the death of his friend Tupac Shakur, Snoop began to drift away from the gangster scene he’d been an early part of.
Over the years Broadus collaborated with a variety of artists, including Tupac, Katy Perry, Pharrell Williams, Eminem, and even Bollywood movies. He was part of the hip hop Superbowl LVI halftime show. A guest on multiple television shows, Snoop has a cameo in the video game Call of Duty, and has appeared at a number of professional wrestling events.
A familiar face on Corona Beer and T-Mobil commercials, in September 2024 Snoop became a coach on Season 26 of The Voice. A lifelong proponent of the 420 lifestyle, it makes sense that he has invested in a broad range of marijuana-based business activities. This has also proved problematic as he has suffered numerous arrests and visa-bannings for possession charges over the years.
Snoop looking at everyone
As an avid sports fan, Snoop is a follower of numerous college and professional teams, wearing their swag to games. He is also part of an investment group that purchased the NHL’s Ottowa Senators. He coached his son Cordell’s football team, and Cordell had football scholarship offers from a number of universities, ultimately committing to UCLA. This has everything to do with the interest in hiring Snoop as a sports color commentator, culminating with his stint working for NBC Sports during the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Although he projects a different sort of clownery, these plus many other pop cultural activities, including reality shows, podcasts, continued recordings, and innumerable media appearances qualifies Broadus to assume Irwin Corey’s mantle as the world’s foremost authority. Eventually, as the honorary degrees begin to pile up, perhaps Snoop will also acquire the academic bona fides. In the meantime, being King of the 420 self-promoters will have to suffice.
David Stairs is the founding editor of the Design-Altruism-Project.
