By David Fortier

Dressed in his Bristol Eastern High School gray and blue, Simpsons writer and show runner Mike Reiss regaled pols, and tossed some sly jabs at members of both sides of the aisle as well, all in good fun at the Crocodile Club dinner at Lake Compounce Friday afternoon.

“I am so honored to be here to share the stage with so many politicians that I’ve never heard of,” he said as part of his opening comments.

He turned to Leora Levy (R), who won her primary against party endorsed candidate Themis Klarides and said, “It must have been something to get that call.” (from President Trump)

“But you know, he called me that day too,” Reiss said. “He called everybody. It was a butt dial.”

Reiss was the guest speaker at the first Crocodile Club dinner after a two-year hiatus, and quickly picked up on the spirit of the event that was instituted in 1875 when Lake Compounce founder Gad Norton thanked state legislators with the event for changing the boundary between Bristol and Southington so his residence would be in Bristol. Then as now no campaigning was allowed, and politicians still do their best to one up each other with their banter. Regarding The Simpsons, Reiss said that he had his hometown in mind from the beginning. In the first episode of the show, Homer loses a game of Scrabble and tosses the whole game into the fireplace.

“My friend’s father did that,” he said. “That happened in Bristol, Connecticut.”

The show won 35 Emmys.

From there he had some fun with Mayor Jeffrey Caggiano, his Jewish ethnicity, the mob, high school classmate Greg Hahn (D) who is running for state senate against incumbent Henri Martin (R), and Bristol’s All-Heart moniker.

In a running joke, he mispronounced Caggiano’s name several times, while segueing over to the mob, and one of Bristol’s many ethnic groups.

He brought in his own Jewish heritage, mentioning that being the only Jew in high school and having a mom who insisted he date someone who is Jewish, left him with the only option of dating his mom.

Toward the end of this routine, he piled on to Bristol’s self-appointed advertising slogan.

“You know the acronym for Bristol All-Heart is BAH,” he said.

He ended with an homage to Bristol, saying that everything he has accomplished he owes to the Bristol Public Library and his wonderful teachers in Bristol public schools.

Reiss spoke against a backdrop of the legendary Lake Compounce bandshell, the facade decorated with white stars. The curtains along both sides of the ballroom where pulled, leaving attendees seated at long tables in cool shadows. Reiss, with his wife Denise at his side, sat across from his former high school English teacher Barbara Wojtusik and her daughter Alisa, a high school classmate of Reiss’s.

At the initial event, legislators enjoyed themselves so much, dining on mutton, corn succotash, watermelon and warm beer that, according to legend, many left crawling on all fours, thus the birth of the Crocodile Club.

This year’s dinner, prepared by Cravings, included the original menu but also a few extras, such as eggplant rollatini, chicken, and salads.

Reiss, who cherishes his ties to Bristol, attended junior high at Memorial Boulevard and high school at Bristol Eastern, before attending Harvard and landing with The Simpson’s, the longest running prime time comedy in U.S. history.

He is a benefactor at the Bristol Library, where he donated funds for a digital cafe. He was grand master of the Mum Festival Parade in 2019.

Legislators tried their own standup routines earlier, as did master of ceremonies Brian Shactman from WTIC. The unwritten rule for the gathering is for speakers to rib each other good naturedly, pushing boundaries but generally in a friendly manner.

Scheduling conflicts left only Republicans on the dais–candidates for governor, secretary of the state, U.S. Congress and comptroller: in order, Bob Stefanowski, Dominic Rapini, Leora Levy and Mary Fay. Joining them on the dais were Mayor Jeff Caggiano and Reiss.

Caggiano welcomed the crowd of 200.

“I used to have to play hooky to come here every year,” he said about the Crocodile Club dinner. “Today’s the first day I get to come here actually for my job.”

He took on his Southington counterparts for not attending.
“Finally, after 167 years, Southington has stopped trying to claim Lake Compounce as their own,” Caggiano announced.

He alluded to the Charter Revision Commission’s recommendation to increase the term for mayor of Bristol from two to four years, and said that if re-elected he will only serve six not eight years.

“If you don’t want to put up with me that long, you should vote for that four-year term,” he said, again in the spirit of the event.

The Crocodile Club dinner is now a fundraiser for the New England Carousel Museum, which works with Lake Compounce to continue the tradition. For information about the Carousel Museum, go to www.thecarouselmuseum.org.

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