Robert Klein recently turned 75 — but the Bronx-born comedian says the new Starz documentary about him is no post-mortem.
“When I saw it, I was blown away and a little intimidated,” he says of “Robert Klein Still Can’t Stop His Leg,” titled after the blues-singer shtick of his stand-up act. Directed by Marshall Fine, the doc includes a plethora of archival TV, movie and stage footage from Klein’s 50-plus- year career — even home movies of his 1955 bar mitzvah — plus interviews with a “who’s who” of A-list disciples: Jerry Seinfeld, Billy Crystal, David Steinberg, Bill Maher and Jay Leno.
“We had to pick the best [archival] material we could find to match their praise,” Klein says. “Seeing [Seinfeld and others] say these things was a little bit like Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer and hearing my own eulogy — and then I get to live it. It’s a unique experience.”
While giving viewers a behind-the-scenes look at his offstage life, the documentary is also, in part, Klein’s love letter to his Bronx childhood, growing up in a cramped apartment on Decatur Avenue with his older sister and his parents, all seen here in one form or another. “I didn’t have a terrible childhood; my father was very funny and had a certain intensity in our household,” he says. “My sister and I are totally different but very close. In that little apartment in The Bronx, it was a kind of neighborhood concept. We walked everywhere. Women had shopping carts. The Italian barber who cut my hair as a kid … there was continuity. I would have preferred grass and a backyard but … growing up in that art deco apartment building seemed fine.
“My mother used to go to Alexander’s [on the Grand Concourse] to return something. She never bought anything,” he says. “I remember that little parking lot; you had to wait for a spot. Life was simple then. We took the bus, and the D train was my lifeline to Manhattan. We didn’t have a car until after the war.”
Klein, now living in Westchester, still performs — “I don’t have the schedule I once had, nor do I want it,” he says — and is philosophic about growing older.
“I’ve always been obsessive about age, meaning I always mention it,” he says, referring to his many appearances on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. “‘Well, Johnny, I’m 28 now … I’m 33 now … I’ve just turned 40’ … I always wrote about what is organic, about where is my life now?
“When I was dating women, I wrote about that, when I was married and we had a child [son Allie Klein] I wrote about that. Now what do I write? Colonoscopy material and aging. There’s just no getting away from it. I used to make fun of those ads: ‘Now you never have to open a jar again. JarMaster will do it!’
“Meanwhile, it took me 10 minutes to open the soy sauce.”
“Robert Klein Still Can’t Stop His Leg” airs 10 p.m. Friday on Starz.