Misery Loves Comedy Page #6

this thing, which is to

sort of be slightly, kind of,

a little bit cheeky, like,

we're comedians, you know?

You know, I'll have a little dig at

you and you have a little dig at me,

but it's all done

with good humor.

And Coogan comes out and he... he

introduces himself to both of us

and he's very sweet

and he says, "Oh, I...

I've seen your show

'The Office' and I'm a big fan."

And then he said,

"If my career is ever on the skids,

I'd love for you to

write something for me."

And my mouth... I just went, "Well,

you'd better get in touch now, then."

But, like,

for no reason, like...

His career was going

from strength to strength,

it was... like, it was just...

What?

And he sort of went...

He kind of... "Eh?"

And he sort of was... And Ricky just

looked at me, like, that's a weird...

And I would...

No, I just... no...

"Obviously, you don't... your career

is going so good that you don't...

"It's ironic,

I'm saying, you don't...

"It was absurd. You don't need

to get in touch, 'cause..."

And I just...

I think he went, "Right."

And they kind of tried to have a

conversation for a little while

and then, he went, "Sorry,

I... sorry, what did you mean?"

And I went, "I'm sorry, I...

"What I meant was,

your career is clearly great,

so you don't need to

get in touch with us."

"But why would you say that?"

"No, but that... yeah."

And it just...

and it kind of...

it just fizzled out, you know,

and we just went off

into the day.

And I don't... I've never

really been able to, you know,

never had the opportunity to sort of

explain myself or apologize to him.

He must have just thought,

"What a dick."

I'd like to be able

to try and make a point

and then still be able

to tell a joke

about f***ing getting sh*t on

you dick or whatever, right?

And I love that Carlin

can say something so precise

and so well and then,

"Now I'm gonna talk about

farts for five minutes."

He had the same hard line

when it came to farting,

if that makes sense.

But as I said,

I only became

a huge fan of Carlin

when I realized how hard it was

to be really good at this.

Groucho, Groucho,

Groucho, Groucho.

Not so many people talked Zeppo

or Chico, but I loved Harpo.

I loved... Because Harpo,

to me, was insane,

and there was

an unpredictable nature.

He'd just, you know,

be cross-examining the passport guy

and he'd just jump on

the thing and start, you know,

doing the pens

like it was a plane,

and then start chasing women.

And I thought, this guy,

because I don't know,

literally, there's no way I can

look away for five seconds

because I'll miss

some transition.

Lenny Bruce decides

that that kind of

philosophical honest speech

is gonna be called

stand-up comedy.

And right from that moment,

you've created Pryor and Carlin.

We don't know who

they're gonna be, you know,

but they have to happen.

I remember seeing Richard Pryor

on an "Ed Sullivan Show."

Yep.

In which the routine was about

the toughest kid in school.

And for no reason at all,

the toughest kid in school

would like point at ya

and say, "You, after school,

I'm gonna bite

your foot off."

And you'd have to believe him

because he'd be walking around

with a big shoe

hanging out of his mouth.

I mean, that was

his routine for the...

for "The Ed Sullivan Show."

Ed Sullivan. Yeah.

The actual routine was,

"You, after school,

I'm gonna bite

your dick off."

And you had to believe it because he

walked around with a dick hanging...

I mean, no, it was pretty funny

when you realized that.

I mean, my favorite

is Richard going to Africa

and sitting...

sitting in the coach

with the African guy,

and he says, you know,

"The man smell,"

and he does this thing and it

was like...

And this whole...

and it was like,

"Oh, I'm watching the smell,

I can see it."

But then he says,

"And then I looked at him,

and he was like...

You stink, too."

And I thought, "Oh!"

Okay!

And I understood.

Richie Pryor, who had

a big acting career,

did his greatest acting

in his stand-up,

where he would break your heart

and involve you in story.

I mean, you know, and you could

see it in his concert films.

Extraordinary, realistic acting.

And with movies, it was...

He just didn't give it that kind of

dimension that he did to his stand-up.

Richard was in love

with Pam Grier,

okay, like every guy

was in the '70s.

And he got his hands

on an old tape

of some of my dad's stuff

that wasn't so funny,

that wasn't that good.

They sit down and Richard says,

"Oh, I got some stuff, I got...

Y'all gotta hear this,

this is some great sh*t."

And he starts playing

some of my dad's old material

and my dad's getting hot, right?

He's kind of

shitting all over him,

my dad finally

just says, "F*** this!"

And he gets up

and he lays out Richard,

takes both girls, and splits.

Now, I'm not lying.

I didn't make this story up.

This story was told to me

by... by "Growing Pains,"

by Joanna Kearns, man.

Like, I'm sitting in the trailer

and about right near

the end of the story,

I think she realizes,

"Oh, sh*t, he was married

and this is his son,"

and, like, goes into

this reserved, kind of...

But he was... he was

a very sweet man.

The news came on and they said

that Freddie Prinze

had just killed himself.

A comic could make

so much of a big...

make a big splash

in this world, you know,

and so many people are affected

by somebody

who makes them laugh.

It's an important job.

And for some reason, his passing

was the thing that

sent me out to L.A.

I was in Rochester, New York.

I was an absolutely

nobody, part-timer,

just jack of all trades, would

do whatever the radio station

asked of me and one day,

Sam Kinison walked in.

The mic went on

and he just spoke his mind

and he was outrageous,

he was funny.

Uh, he was sensitive at times

and a lightbulb

went off in my head

where I realized, "Oh, my God,

I could do this different.

Just you gotta just be yourself.

And, uh, and just...

I started blowing off all...

Everything I knew about

radio after that day.

I think the only vision

I had of it,

and many people

I believe say this,

is of "The Dick Van Dyke Show"

and the writer's room

of Buddy and Sally, and, um,

uh, Rob Petrie

thinking of ideas.

I used to sit home

and I used to watch it.

And I look at this

guy Rob Petrie,

and, you know, he was married

to Mary Tyler Moore,

he had a very nice house

up in New Rochelle,

he had a kid named Ritchie,

and he spent his days

at work lying on a couch,

just, you know, joking around

with Buddy and Sally

and I went,

"I think I want to do that."

I feel like I had a vision of,

"Oh, I'll write."

Somehow I'll get in a office,

but I think it was more

I just want to be around

people who do comedy

or say funny things.

As a got older, when Letterman

came on in high school,

then I had an idea,

I would like to write

for the Letterman show

and live in New York,

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