Editing Andy Kaufman (section)

===Foreign Man and Mighty Mouse===
<blockquote>...Bijan Kimiachi, an Iranian immigrant who was Andy's roommate at the now defunct [[Grahm Junior College]] in Boston, who was, like him, studying television production (though he says here Andy was studying television performance). Kimiachi speaks with a marked accent—he says he had trouble speaking to people then, and also that he was probably Andy's only friend at that time. By the roommate's common consent, Andy adopted Bijan's accent (and perhaps his voice as well)<ref name="chrisknipp/TYVM-2023">{{cite web |last1=Knipp |first1=Chris |title=Alex Braverman: Thank You Very Much (2023) |url=https://www.chrisknipp.com/writing/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=5560 |website=Chris Knipp • com |access-date=5 May 2025}}</ref></blockquote>

Kaufman first received major attention for his character Foreign Man, who spoke in a meek, high-pitched, heavily accented voice and claimed to be from "Caspiar", a fictional island in the [[Caspian Sea]].<ref name="cabaret"/> As this character, Kaufman convinced [[Budd Friedman]], owner of the New York City comedy club [[The Improv]], to allow him to perform on stage.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://improv.com/history/|title=History of the Improv|website=Improv}}</ref><ref name="zoglin">{{cite book|date=2008|last=Zoglin|first=Richard|title=Comedy at the Edge: How Stand-up in the 1970s Changed America|url=https://archive.org/details/comedyatedgehows0000zogl|isbn=978-1582346243|publisher=Bloomsbury USA|access-date=August 3, 2016|url-access=registration}}</ref>

As Foreign Man, Kaufman appeared on stage at [[comedy club]]s, played a recording of the theme from the ''[[Mighty Mouse]]'' cartoon show while standing perfectly still, and [[lip sync|lip-synced]] only the line "Here I come to save the day", with great enthusiasm.<ref name="cnn2012"/> He proceeded to tell a few (intentionally poor) jokes and concluded his act with a series of celebrity [[impersonator|impersonations]], with the comedy arising from the character's obvious ineptitude at impersonation. For example, in his fake accent Kaufman announced to the audience, "I would like to imitate [[Jimmy Carter|Meester Carter]], de president of de United States" and then, in exactly the same voice, say "Hello, I am Meester Carter, de president of de United States. T'ank you veddy much." At some point in the performance, usually when the audience was conditioned to Foreign Man's inability to perform a convincing impression, Foreign Man would announce, "And now I would like to imitate the Elvis Presley", turn around, take off his jacket, slick his hair back, and launch into a rousing, hip-shaking rendition of Presley singing one of his hit songs. Like Presley, he took off his leather jacket during the song and threw it into the audience, but unlike Presley, Foreign Man immediately asked for it to be returned. After the song's finale, he would take a simple bow and say in his Foreign Man voice, "T'ank you veddy much."{{citation needed|date=January 2017}}

Parts of Kaufman's Foreign Man act were broadcast in the first season of ''Saturday Night Live''. The Mighty Mouse number was featured in the October 11, 1975, premiere, while the joke-telling and celebrity impressions (including Elvis) were included in the November 8 broadcast that same year.<ref name="snl-s1">''SNL: The Complete First Season, 1975–1976''. DVD recording.</ref>