Tom Smothers, who with younger sibling Dick Smothers was one half of the culture-defining, norm-tweaking Smothers Brothers, died Tuesday, December 26, 2023, at his Santa Rosa California, home.
He was 86.
Smothers had announced earlier in the year he'd been diagnosed with stage 2 lung cancer.
“Tom was not only the loving older brother that everyone would want in their life, he was a one-of-a-kind creative partner,” Dick Smothers, 85, said in a statement.
Always the innocent goofball of the two onstage to Dick's straight man, Tom was anything but in real life, a serious-minded, political provocateur who was the driving force behind The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (1967-1969) becoming a flashpoint in the TV censorship wars.
An earlier series, The Smothers Brothers Show aka My Brother the Angel (1965) had been a disaster thanks to its defanging of their act, which was built on sarcasm and shocking content.
An earlier series, The Smothers Brothers Show aka My Brother the Angel (1965) had been a disaster thanks to its defanging of their act, which was built on sarcasm and shocking content.
The later series was a massive hit, but one that got yanked from CBS's schedule under a deluge of complaints from station owners, especially in the South. Tom always blamed incoming President Richard M. Nixon for the unceremonious cancellation.
Though the show's writers — including a young Steve Martin — won an Emmy for their work, Smothers removed his name from the ballot, fearing it was too controversial. He had to wait 40 years until he and his brother received an honorary statuette ... which was handed to them by Martin.
After the show was axed, Tommy entered in a self-described period of political anger, one in which his comedy suffered.
Still, he managed to get to play guitar on his friend John Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance" (1969), a song in which he is also name-checked, along with Timothy Leary and John and Yoko themselves
The brothers did work together again on TV: The Return of the Smothers Brothers (1970), The Smothers Brothers Summer Show (1970), The Smothers Brothers Show (1975), two Tom and Dick Smothers Brothers Specials (1980) and The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour: The 20th Reunion (1988).
On top of those, they appeared on Broadway in I Love My Wife (1978) and toured extensively.
Tom acted on his own, appearing in films including Brian De Palma's Get to Know Your Rabbit (1972), Silver Bears (1977), Serial (1980) and the cult classic Pandemonium (1982). He made numerous guest appearances on TV series, playing himself and also playing, well, people a lot like himself.
Smothers was preceded in death by his eldest child, a son, last year.
He is survived by Dick and their sister, and by his wife, two children and one grandchild.
