Witty One-Liners Quote by Bert Kalmar

Paranoia, packaged as a punchline. "Don't look now" is the classic stage-whisper that practically forces you to look, a sly little trap that turns the listener into an accomplice before the accusation even lands. Then comes the elegant arithmetic of social menace: "one man too many". It frames the room like a closed system with a strict capacity limit, as if belonging is measurable and someone must be expelled to restore order. The final twist - "and I think it's you!" - weaponizes that faux uncertainty ("I think") while delivering a perfectly direct insult. Polite phrasing, sharp blade.

Bert Kalmar was a Tin Pan Alley lyricist and vaudeville-era joke engineer, and you can hear that machinery here: a setup built on misdirection, a rhythmic escalation, and a payoff that snaps cleanly. The line thrives in crowded, status-conscious spaces: a bar, a party, a backstage hallway. Its real target isn't just the individual being singled out; it's the group dynamic that makes exclusion entertaining. The speaker assumes the authority to decide who counts, and the room is invited to enjoy the enforcement.

There's also a faint echo of early 20th-century masculinity in the phrasing. It's not "person too many" but "man", suggesting a contest of presence and dominance. The humor works because it flirts with threat while staying technically reversible: it's "just a joke", until it isn't.