Orono crowd enjoys Newhart’s dry humor

Concert goers to the Maine Center for the Arts Tuesday night found a way to beat the heat and humidity of mid-July in Maine.

Soon after the near-capacity crowd had filed into the air-conditioned Hutchins Concert Hall, the jazz combo A Train took the stage and put the evening, in the title of one of their songs, “In a Mellow Tone.”

The smooth eight-member Maine group, a coastal club favorite, spotlighted the talents of pianist Patty Wicks, vocalist Diane Linscott, alto saxophonist John Cooper and trumpeter Pat Michaud.

After a six-song, half-hour set, A Train sounded some fanfare, and on came the evening’s star attraction, Bob Newhart.

Newhart showed all the poise and confidence of the comedy legend he has become over a 30-year career. His facial expressions and accents made even the most mundane situation seem funny. He played his own riffs, stopping on a topic for a note or a measure, then moving on again.

Newhart got the audience rolling immediately with some local material about his flight into Bangor: “I visited the local FAA facility: It was a federal office, so it was open. It must be a little disconcerting to call the tower, only to hear `We’re not in. At the tone, leave the name and message, and we’ll get back to you as soon as we solve this workers’ comp thing.”‘

Newhart, a nervous flyer, added that Mexico’s Aero Nuevas is one airline he won’t fly: “In 30 years of flying, I’d never had airbags pop out because of cabin depression. Then it happened about two months ago on Aero Nuevas. I guess the stewardesses had never seen them before either, because they kept trying to hit them with sticks.”

Newhart, an Irish-German Catholic, spared no nationality or religion, but did it in such a nice way as to offend no one.

He was exceptionally hard on televangelists: “They finally got all the makeup off Tammy Bakker, and found Jimmy Hoffa underneath.”

He closed the first set with a short film autobiography, capped off by the famous ending of his “Newhart” series.

He finished the show with an encore of Sir Walter Raleigh explaining tobacco in a phone conversation with the president of the West Indies Company.

The audience ended up largely on its feet, showing how much they appreciated “the button-down mind” of Bob Newhart.