One time in a Garfield recording session, Lorenzo Music (the voice of said cat) got into a discussion with another actor about Tommy Smothers. They were talking about the years when the Smothers Brothers had their popular variety show on CBS and the news was filled with stories of Tommy fighting with the CBS execs…leading to the program's eventual cancellation. The other actor said something about how Tom was too dumb to be trying to run a network television show, apparently confusing Tom's screen character with the real person.
Lorenzo, who'd been a writer on that series, corrected him and said, "You have to be real smart to play stupid that well."
I had a few contacts over the years with Tommy Smothers — not enough to call him a friend but enough to see that Lorenzo was right. Tom was a sweet, funny guy who in person was impossible to dislike…and very much unlike the stammering clueless fellow he usually portrayed. He and his brother Dick were also examples of comedians, and there are several, that I didn't fully appreciate until I saw them perform live. They were real, real good.