Opinion: If Richard Lewis didn’t exist, nobody would have thought of inventing him

It was the news from hell. Last week, at the age of 76, the legendary American comedian Richard Lewis succumbed to a heart attack. His lifelong friend and comedy soulmate Larry David broke with tradition and opted for sincerity in a statement that read simply:

“Richard and I were born three days apart in the same hospital and for most of my life he’s been like a brother to me. He had that rare combination of being the funniest person and also the sweetest. But today he made me sob and for that I’ll never forgive him.”

Lewis, like Richard Pryor or John McEnroe or Jarvis Cocker, was always absolutely himself. His stand-up comedy was undeniably influenced by Lenny Bruce and yet he was unmistakably Lewis as he prowled the stage, all in black, mining his darkest impulses and neuroses for laughs. The kvetching Jewish addict with the rock star chic and astonishing hair could never have been AI generated because his foibles were all too human. If he didn’t exist, nobody would think to invent him.

After years on the road, it was David’s Curb Your Enthusiasm that provided the perfect final act for Lewis. The pair met initially at a Jewish summer camp in their teens and loathed one another before becoming reacquainted on the New York comedy scene of the 1970s. When they eventually made the connection to camp and recalled the animosity, they laughed and became lifelong friends. This capricious fluctuation between love and hate would define their friendship for half a century, on screen and off.

In his very first scene in the very first episode of Curb, the die was cast. Richard Lewis playing Richard Lewis confronts Larry David playing Larry David about insulting his girlfriend. The former insists he loves his best friend since they “have enough good stuff in the bank to get over this” before insisting on an apology and a call “by sundown”. Since the sitcom’s scenes are improvised, Larry latches onto this phrase and immediately asks if his friend is Gary Cooper. Lewis, the actor rather than the character, cannot help but smile before confessing, “I’m trying not to laugh but that’s funny.”

It is one of the realest depictions of friendship in all of art, something I once felt compelled to tell the self-styled “Prince of Pain” on the website formerly known as Twitter. Imagine my surprise when Lewis responded to my tweet with a direct message consisting of three emojis: a thumbs up, a clap and a heart. Resisting the urge to tell this hero he’d given me the clap, I replied, “You’re a living legend, thank you”. A minute later came the response of a man who might have been struggling with his health but never lost his comedic instincts: “Living is good enough x”.

Lewis was only able to appear in one episode in the penultimate season of Curb as a result of those health problems yet it provided a moment as full of love and darkness as the man himself. As Larry and Richard attend a political fundraiser, the pair, by now in their 70s, begin to bicker. Eventually, struggling to contain genuine laughter, Larry asks, “When are you gonna die? Will you please die?”

The troubled comedian initially felt he would be unable to take part in the season at all but knew his friend would accommodate him if he felt up to it. That scene could only have happened between two best friends, improvising while playing versions of themselves, after a lifetime of experiences together. It comes from a place of love and thus both men cannot help but laugh at the sheer audacity of the death comment. We might have instinctively felt Lewis was not long for this world but more obvious was the fact that these two titans absolutely adored each other.

In the show, as in life, the pair would constantly bicker before resuming their friendship as though nothing had happened. Not for nothing does one exchange in the show conclude with the immortal words, “F*** you and I’ll see you tomorrow.” For Lewis the man though, it’s sunset and there is no tomorrow. Lewis the character, however, will remain relevant for as long as there are complicated friendships. In other words, he lives forever.

• Darren Richman is a journalist.