'I Speak Jive': 12 Tales of an Airplane! Joke That May Not Be Well-Received Today

      “Oh stewardess? I speak jive,” stands out as the most unforgettable line from Airplane, a comedic classic brimming with humor. Here's the tale of a joke that might not resonate today.

      To provide some context for those who haven't seen Airplane: The jive jokes start when two passengers, portrayed by Norman Alexander Gibbs (credited as "First Jive Dude") and Al White (credited as "Second Jive Dude"), engage in a dialogue filled with so much slang that the film includes translations for the audience.

      The humor escalates when Barbara Billingsley, famously known as "the whitest white lady on the planet" (more on that later), offers to assist flight attendant Randy (Lorna Patterson) in deciphering the men’s complaints.

      Billingsley, noted in the credits as “Jive Lady,” opens with the iconic line, “Oh, stewardess? I speak jive,” but is promptly dismissed.

      Here are 12 anecdotes about the creation of the Airplane jive scenes.

      The Inspiration for the Airplane Jive Scene Came from Shaft

      MGM – Credit: C/O

      Jim Abrahams, who co-wrote and directed Airplane with his brothers Jerry Zucker and David Zucker, shared in a behind-the-scenes commentary that “the entire idea of jive dialogue stemmed from when we went to see Shaft,” referencing Gordon Parks’ 1971 blaxploitation-action film starring Richard Roundtree.

      “We watched it and didn’t grasp what they were saying,” Abrahams explained.

      They decided to incorporate jokes in Airplane about slang that would confuse white audiences: “So, as three nice Jewish boys from Milwaukee, we tried our best to write jive talk into the script,” Abrahams stated.

      The Initial Airplane Jive Talk Script Was Deficient

      (L-R) David Abrahams, Jerry Zucker and David Zucker during the Airplane commentary. Paramount. – Credit: C/O

      David Zucker noted that when Gibbs and White auditioned for their roles, “they arrived with an entire routine of jive talking, and we found it hysterically funny.” Al White explained in Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker’s insightful 2023 book Surely You Can’t Be Serious: The True Story of Airplane that while reading the script, “I couldn’t make heads or tails of the actual dialogue… they requested jive as a language, which it is not.”

      He and Gibbs decided to refine it. White consulted two language books, one authored by J.L. Dillard, a linguist known for expertise in African American vernacular, and then aimed to interpret the writers’ script into “jive”—using authentic words. He described it: “It’s not nonsense. It does convey meaning.”

      Al White Invested Significant Thought Into the Airplane Jive Scene Rewrites

      Al White in Airplane. Paramount – Credit: C/O

      An example of Al White’s contributions demonstrates his refinement of the jive dialogue.

      At one juncture, White’s Second Jive Dude tells Gibbs’ First Jive Dude (Arthur): “That gray matter back, lotta performers down, not take TCB-in’, man!”

      White elaborates in Surely You Can’t Be Serious on how he formulated this phrase: “I needed a substitute for the word ‘remember,’ but I couldn’t find it in either book, so I thought, ‘Well, how about gray matter? That’s the thinking part of the brain, and ‘back’ as in remember back. I can say ‘Gray matter back.’

      “And from there, I was implying that many performers stayed down and weren’t attending to business on the technical side… man!”

      The film translates this jive as “Each of us faces a clear moral choice.”

      Al White Was Also a Very Dedicated Theater Actor

      Al White, left, and Norman Alexander Gibbs in Airplane. Paramount – Credit: C/O

      As you might have gathered, White was quite passionate about his craft. He spent several years with San Francisco’s distinguished American Conservatory Theater company, participating in over 17 plays, ranging from Shakespeare to Tennessee Williams, who served as the playwright in residence at the time. In 1975, he even traveled to the Soviet Union with the troupe as part of the U.S.’s bicentennial cultural exchange initiative.

      After Airplane, his roles included performances in August Wilson’s Gem of the Ocean. (Barbara Billingsley attended one of his shows and sent him a card praising his work.)

      Meanwhile, Norman Alexander Gibbs boasts TV credits such as The Bionic Woman, Colombo, Roots: The Next Generations, and Hill Street Blues, along with film credits including Runaway Train and Blue Thunder.

      The Airplane Behind the Scenes Commentary Features a Jive Callback

      Paramount – Credit: C/O

      In the commentary for the Airplane home release, someone wittily added subtitles while Al White and Norman Alexander Gibbs discussed their roles in the film