Comedy Is Having To Say You're Sorry

I figure cartooning is basically safe stand-up. No heckling, no eggs thrown, no offering up finely-honed gags to a crowd that rewards you with icy stares, no Tuesday nights playing to three people, one of whom forgot to replace the batteries in his hearing aid, one of whom is an alcohol-besotted narcoleptic, and one of whom is a friend you dragged away from "Deal Or No Deal" to lend moral support. Anyway, I owe this cartoon to Michael Richards, who generously called me out of the blue a few years back to tell me he appreciated an L.A. Times article I wrote lambasting Leonardo di Caprio.