Mark Russell

Joseph Marcus Ruslander (August 23, 1932 – March 30, 2023), better known as Mark Russell, was an American political satirist and comedian. He is best known for his series of bimonthly comedy specials on PBS television between 1975 and 2004. His routines were a mix of political stand-up humor covering current events and musical parodies in which he accompanied himself on his trademark American flag-themed piano. Early life Mark Russell was born Joseph Marcus Ruslander and grew up in Buffalo, New York, the son of Marie Elizabeth (Perry) and Marcus Joseph Ruslander. He graduated from Canisius High School in Buffalo. After high school, his family briefly moved to Florida, then to Washington, D.C., where he enrolled at George Washington University, but stayed for only a month before joining the United States Marine Corps. Career Beginning in the early 1960s, he was a regular entertainer at the Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C. and did his first PBS show in 1975. He was a regular on the 1977 CBS variety show The Starland Vocal Band Show. From 1979 to 1984, he was a correspondent on the NBC reality TV show Real People. Russell's song parodies employed melodies from old standards with new humorous lyrics pertinent to the subject matter. For example, in 1990, following the execution of the Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu, Russell did a parody song on his show to the tune of "Chattanooga Choo-Choo". ("Pardon me, boys / Are you the cats who shot Ceauşescu?") Russell himself admitted that most of his jokes and songs are very topical and have "a shelf life shorter than cottage cheese".