King Tut, the Fonz, and a Very Large Cardboard Pyramid

Steve Martin debuted “King Tut” on Saturday Night Live in April 1978, backed by a band billed as the Toot Uncommons — in real life, members of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. A comedy bit became a real hit single and sold over a million copies.

The clip on Dueling History is the road version. Martin took the bit out on tour in 1979, and that is Henry Winkler in the background — the Fonz, at the absolute peak of Happy Days — hauling a giant diorama of the Egyptian pyramids across the stage. That is the entire part.

The joke had a real target. Treasures of Tutankhamun was touring America at the time and people lined up around the block for it. The gift shops did as well as the galleries. Martin was never making fun of the boy king. He was making fun of what the twentieth century did with him.

And that is the part worth handing to students. Tut took the throne around age nine and was dead by about eighteen. He ruled for roughly a decade, changed little, and later pharaohs deliberately left his name off the king lists. He is the most famous ruler of the ancient world for exactly one reason: Howard Carter found his tomb nearly untouched in 1922 — and it was untouched because Tut was too minor to be worth robbing properly.

Put it next to the Roman emperors video and you have a discussion. Seventy-two men ruled the world and are mostly forgotten. One teenager ruled almost nothing and ended up on the lunchboxes. Being remembered and being important are not the same thing.