GET BRUCE!(Review)

• Author: ROTHENBERG, ROBERT S.

GET BRUCE! BUENA VISTA HOME ENTERTAINMENT 72 MINUTES, $14.95

What looks uncannily like a creature from Jim Henson's Muppet factory, owns thousands of T-shirts (most of which are, charitably, in questionable taste), and cracks up such comedy icons as Whoopi Goldberg, Billy Crystal, and Robin Williams? The answer turns out to be Bruce Vilanch, the gay comedy writer responsible for much of Crystal's Academy Award opening montages and monologues, as well as routines by celebrity hosts and guests of just about every award show over the past decade or so.

The anonymity of this overweight sprite in his outrageous shirts and the wildest assortment of eyeglasses this side of Elton John has come to an end lately with Vilanch's appearances on "Hollywood Squares" and in various show business documentaries and on TV tabloid programs. Even so, his role in providing gags to stars that help them get through their intros is a fascinating one. When the need is for a joke (or 10), the cry goes out: "Get Bruce!"

Vilanch's meteoric rise to becoming the comics' comic was triggered by his early relationship with Bette Midler when she was an emerging talent in Chicago and he was an entertainment...