One of the funniest long-running gags in comedy was Richard Lewis, who died on February 27 at age 76, insisting that he was the person who minted the expression “… from hell”: the lunch from hell, the father-in-law from hell, the colonoscopy from hell, the whatever from hell. He seemed intent on making sure everybody knew that was his thing. A few years back, he brought up inventing the phrase with me. I asked him if he truly believed he was the guy who got everybody else saying it, and he told me, earnestly, “Yeah, I do. I really do.” He did such a good job talking about it that today, when you read any obituary for him, it’s sure to mention that the comedian was to “… from hell” what Nikola Tesla was to the alternating current.
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