 The life of Bob Newhart, who died this week at the age of 94, may remind us to see some of the glitter that can be cloaked in places that may seem like mere background. He was working as an accountant in Chicago in the mid-1950s where, he used to insist, his motto was, that's close enough. To relieve the tedium of cubicles and calculators, he and a friend began to concoct routines of telephone calls between historical figures.