It's Not Easy Bein' Me Read online

  The next night was my opening night. I was under a lot of pressure now—this guy had been really nice to me, so I wanted the show to be great. Fortunately, it was, so after the show I got to meet Ella Mae.

  She was dressed in farm-girl attire, and she was hot. This girl was so hot that if she smiles at you as she turns you down, you think you did all right.

  I said to Ella Mae after observing her physical attributes, “You’re just oozing sex. I guess when a guy’s with you he comes quick.”

  Then she said, “A lot of them tell me, ‘Don’t move!’”

  * * *

  I like southern girls. They talk so slow that by the time they say no, I made it already.

  * * *

  Chapter Five

  I Needed $3,000 to Get Out of Jail

  The other night, I had a date with a manicurist. We went to a nightclub. We started to hold hands. And while she was holding my hand, she took my other hand and put it in my drink.

  At twenty-eight, I decided to quit show business, get married, lead a so-called normal life. To give you an idea of how well I was doing at the time I quit, I was the only one who knew I quit.

  I married a singer named Joyce Indig, who also gave up the business in hopes of having a normal life. We quickly found out that married life was at least as tough as show business.

  I later learned that it wasn’t show business that was crazy—it was me.

  We got no wedding present from my mother, which was no surprise, because she had always hated and put down any girl I liked. I think that was mainly because she wanted to make sure I’d always support her. When I told my mother I was going to marry Joyce, she looked at me as though I had betrayed her, and then made me promise that I would always support her.

  After Joyce and I were married, I tried to start a nice little family ritual. I decided that we’d take my mother out to dinner every Sunday. That lasted for two Sundays. All through dinner, my mother looked at Joyce with such hatred that from then on, it was just Mom and me having dinner on Sunday nights.

  * * *

  I tell ya, it’s tough to save a buck. Right now I’m supporting two fighters. My wife and her mother.

  * * *

  Being married, trying to start a family, I now needed a steady income, so I went into the home improvement business. I sold aluminum siding and paint on a commission basis at a place called Pioneer Construction in Newark.

  I was doing well, but then the weather turned cold and made it difficult to get jobs in the Northeast, so a couple of us decided to go down to New Orleans to work. I took two guys with me as canvassers and covered everybody’s expenses.

  We did pretty well down there. We worked around New Orleans for two months, then decided to head back to New York. Driving back, we passed through Birmingham and I said to my guys, “Hey, let’s stop here for a few days, give it a shot.”

  After we got a hotel, I approached a siding company that looked like it was reputable. I asked the owner, a guy I’ll call Steve McGill, if I could be a sales rep for him. He said, “Okay, fine.”

  My two canvassers and I went to work the next day. We worked hard, and everything was going great—we were signing up a lot of customers for McGill. After a while, though, I noticed that none of those jobs were actually getting done, so I said to McGill, “What’s happening? I got about fifteen jobs out there, but you’re not doing them.” This was a problem for me because I didn’t get paid my commission until the job was finished.

  “I’ll get to them when I get to them,” McGill said. “I’m pretty busy right now.”

  Yeah, and I was busy, too—paying for three hotel rooms, my car, my expenses…

  “All right,” I said, “as long as you get to them. I mean, they’re three weeks old. You start ’em and don’t finish ’em, it really aggravates people.”

  “I’m doing the best I can,” he said. “About how much you got coming from me?”

  I said, “About four thousand dollars.”

  “Look,” he said, “if you want to end this thing right now, I’ll give you a check for seven hundred and fifty, and we’ll call it even.”

  I was stunned. “In other words,” I said, “you want to burn me out.”

  “That’s my offer,” he said coolly. “If you want the seven-fifty, okay. If not, I don’t know when I’ll get to those jobs.”

  I was really disgusted. I saw no way out.

  That was on a Saturday afternoon. That night, I went to a nightclub. I wanted to have a few drinks, see a floor show or a comedian, maybe forget for a few hours that I was getting screwed by McGill. So I fall into this place, say hello to the owner, and after a few drinks, I feel a little better. In fact, I feel like getting up and telling some jokes to break the mood.

  I tell the owner I’m a comedian, and I’d like to do about five minutes, no charge. He says, “Go ahead,” so I got up on the stage. I was half loaded, but I’d been performing for at least ten years at that point, so I knew what I was doing. I did about seven or eight minutes, and got a big hand as I walked off.

  I’m sitting back at the bar now when the boss comes up and says, “There’s a fellow sitting over there with his wife who’d like to say hello and buy you a drink.”

  I said, “I don’t know, man. I’m not feeling real friendly tonight.”

  “Well, he’s a helluva nice guy,” the boss said. “What can you lose?”

  I said, “Okay, what the hell.”

  So I have a drink with this guy and his wife. The guy said to me, “You’re a funny man.”

  I said, “Thank you very much.”

  He said, “But you look like you’re worried. What’s the matter?”

  I said, “No one can help me with what I’m going through.”

  “Come on,” he said. “What is it?”

  So I told him about McGill.

  This guy listened to the whole story without saying a word, then said, “Maybe I can help you. Don’t say anything to McGill, but call me Monday afternoon.” He gave me his card. His name was Al Fontaine.

  It seemed crazy, but I had nothing to lose, so Monday afternoon I called him and he said, “Everything is taken care of. McGill will have a check waiting for you.”

  I thought to myself, I don’t believe it! But I went over to McGill’s, and sure enough, he gave me a check for the full amount—$4,000.

  It turns out that my buddy from the nightclub was a big shot with all the local banks because he ran the largest home improvement business in Birmingham.

  First thing Monday morning, he called the bank where McGill did business and said, “Look. We don’t want guys from up north coming down here and taking jobs from our salesmen. McGill is working with a guy from New York, a real go-getter, and I want to get rid of him. I think it’s best if we tell McGill to pay this guy off immediately and get him out of town.”

  McGill didn’t know what hit him. How did Jack Roy, some stranger from out of town, get to the head man of his bank? It was a mystery that would never be solved.

  Before I left town, I bought the most expensive sweater I could find, and took it over to the office of my new best friend, Al Fontaine. I gave him the sweater, and a big kiss on the forehead.

  That was the first time I kissed a guy—we’ll forget about that guy who’d give me nickels to sit on his lap when I was five—but I felt that this guy had worked a miracle.

  * * *

  I tell ya, southern people, they always think you are hard-of-hearing. Every time you leave they say to you, “You come back, you hear?” And southern people, they think you are horny, too. You get directions, they say, “Just up the road apiece.”

  * * *

  At this point in my life, I hadn’t seen my father in twenty years. I knew that he and my uncle Bunk had moved to Los Angeles, so I decided that my wife and I would take a train ride out to the West Coast to see him.

  I was very curious to see how my father was doing at that stage in his life, how he’d adjusted to not being a performer a
nymore. I knew he had gotten out of vaudeville and made some good money playing around on Wall Street. That had been a long time ago, but I thought, Who knows? He’s liable to be in some Beverly Hills mansion.

  The trip took five days. It was an enjoyable ride with the rumble of the train, playing cards, looking out at all those honey-colored wheat fields.

  When we got to Los Angeles, I looked up my father’s number and gave him a call. He told me to meet him at his job later that day.

  When I got down there, I was shocked to see that he was working as a salesman at a Karl’s shoe store. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say a thing. Here was this guy who had been a top stockbroker, knew everybody, and now he was restocking racks of shoes.

  Not that my father and I had ever been close, but that really got me down. I thought seeing my uncle Bunk would cheer me up, so I got his number from my father and called him.

  My father warned me, “Bunk is not himself.”

  “I don’t care,” I said. “I want to see him. I’m just gonna say hello and leave.”

  So I go to see Bunk, who I hadn’t seen in twenty years. I ring his bell, and he hollers, “Come in!”

  I walked into his bedroom. He was sitting up in bed watching television.

  I said, “Hey, Uncle Bunk, how ya doing?”

  He just kept looking at the TV as he yelled at me, “Sullivan! Sullivan!”

  I figured I’d wait till Sullivan was over. Then I said, “Hey, Uncle Bunk—”

  He cut me off again. He said, “The news! The news!”

  I didn’t have time to wait around until that TV station went off the air, so I decided to go back to my hotel.

  Here’s my first wife, Joyce, on our anniversary, still giving me the cold shoulder.

  Courtesy of the collection of Rodney Dangerfield.

  As I walked out, I yelled to Uncle Bunk, “Hotel! Hotel!”

  In L.A., as usual, my father had a lady friend. He told me in his sixties there were plenty of women available whose husbands had died. He was going with his L.A. girlfriend for about a year when he decided to take a trip to Florida.

  My father’s girlfriend said, “Phil, you must stop by and see my girlfriend in Texas. I’ve told her so much about you.”

  He looked at her picture and said, “Okay, I’ll say hello when I’m passing through.”

  My father pulled up in her driveway. It was a lovely house and a nice town. He stayed with her for four years—then he continued his trip to Florida.

  * * *

  With my ol’ man, I got no respect. He told me to start at the bottom. He was teaching me how to swim.

  * * *

  My home life wasn’t anything to brag about either. In 1949, after Joyce and I had been married for ten years, she gave birth to our son, Brian. Six months later, Joyce and I got divorced. I loved my kid, but I couldn’t stand my marriage.

  While my home life was falling apart, I started getting closer to my father. I would occasionally fly down to Florida and spend a few days with him. Of course, my father had a lady friend down there, but now that he was in his seventies his priorities had changed. Now he looked for only one thing in a woman—she had to have a car.

  One day I was driving around with my father down in Miami. We came to a red light. All of a sudden my father says to me, “This is the place to live.”

  I looked around and didn’t see anything special, so I said, “Why?”

  He said, “Well, there’s two supermarkets right over there, and back a block, there’s two more.”

  Elderly people who live in Florida have the same problem every day—how to kill time. There was a barber down there who had a sense of humor. He put a sign in his window. ONE BARBER. PLENTY OF WAITING.

  * * *

  Getting older is tough. I remember the last time I felt an erection. It was at the movies. The only trouble is, it belonged to the guy sitting next to me.

  * * *

  I was glad that I’d gotten a little closer to my father. I wouldn’t say it made up for all the years he’d basically abandoned me as a kid, but it was something. I guess that underneath it all he wasn’t a bad guy. Even though he had walked out on me, still and all I understood him, and there was a part of me that liked him. Knowing my mother, what were his alternatives?

  My old man was really old by now, but he was still pretty sharp. One time I said to him, “You’ve traveled all over the country, must have slept with hundreds of women. You’ve done everything, been through it all. What’s life all about? What’s the answer?”

  He twirled his cigar and said, “It’s all bullshit.”

  You can’t fully appreciate that line until you’re old.

  * * *

  Women my age just don’t turn me on. That’s another problem with getting older. I took out an older woman the other night, and I mean old. I told her, “Act your age.” She died.

  * * *

  Even though I wasn’t in show business anymore, I was still making people laugh and, in a roundabout way, getting paid to do it. I learned that in the aluminum-siding business it’s a big plus if you can make people laugh. In any group, professional or social, people usually gravitate toward the guy with a sense of humor. I learned pretty quickly that I had a much better chance selling a job if I could make the people like me.

  Eventually I went into business for myself.

  I was doing pretty good, but after about a year, I found out that my accountant was doing something illegal with my books. How did I discover this important bit of information? The FBI knocked on my door at about six one morning, unannounced. They arrested me and took me and ten other guys to the courthouse in downtown New York.

  Bail was $3,000—which I didn’t have—so I called my mother. I knew she had the money—because I’d given it to her. Over the years, I’d steadily been kicking her some dough for her savings.

  When I told her my story, and that I needed $3,000 to get out of jail, she said nothing. I couldn’t believe it.

  Finally she spoke. “What am I gonna do?” she said, sounding real pained. “I guess I’ll have to give it to you.”

  “Ma, forget about it,” I said. “I’ll be all right. You don’t have to give me anything.”

  Suddenly she felt a lot better.

  Next thing I knew I was in the backseat of a shylock’s new Cadillac, where I made a deal. Now I had the money to cover my bail.

  When the case went to court, the judge said I had to pay a fine, and he put me on probation for a year. I had to report once a month to the parole officer. After we’d done that for a few months, I said to the guy, “Do me a favor, will ya? You see I’m a legitimate guy. Let me call you on the phone so I don’t have to come down here every month.” He agreed, so I did him a favor. I told him how to get girls. I said, “Hang out at women’s prisons and wait for parolees.”

  I sold aluminum siding for twelve years. I made a decent living, but I wasn’t living. I was out of show business, but show business wasn’t out of me, so I did the only thing that made sense—I created a character based on my feeling that nothing goes right.

  * * *

  Nothing goes right. I joined Gamblers Anonymous. They gave me two-to-one I don’t make it.

  * * *

  Chapter Six

  Why Didn’t You Tell Me You Were Funny?

  We were poor. We were so poor, in my neighborhood the rainbow was in black-and-white.

  Show business was my escape from life. I had to have it. It was like a fix. I needed it to survive. I had gotten out of show business when I was twenty-eight, but if you think funny, you can’t just turn it off. I was no longer performing, but when I’d see something funny, I’d write it down. I kept writing things down and throwing them in a duffel bag. After twelve years in the siding business, that bag was bursting with jokes.

  I was forty years old now, and all my friends thought I was insane to get back into clubs, but I was writing compulsively, trying anything to get a job.

  My first
move was to go to a nightclub I had worked my first time around. It was the Miami Club in Staten Island. The club still had the same owner, Frank Santore, who had known me when I had worked there fifteen years before.

  I had a drink with Frank, who knew that I had quit show business, and told him I’d like to go on that night and tell a few jokes. He said sure.

  When my spot was over, Frank said, “Jack, are you taking dates?” Man, that made me feel good. For a few hours, I was able to forget about my troubles.

  I was back—hell, I was flying, man—happy to be doing what I knew I wanted to do. Now all I had to do was get some more paying gigs. I went to see an agent named King Broder, who booked most of the small nightclubs on Long Island. Performers referred to these joints as “toilets,” but they were places to work, so they looked good to me.

  But Broder wouldn’t book me. He said, “I don’t know you. I’d look ridiculous sending a forty-year-old nobody to a club.”

  So I started working on him, making him like me—just like when I was a salesman. I said, “Okay, I see your point. I tell you what. On Saturday night, I’ll just ride around with you while you check out all your comics in the clubs. We’ll keep each other company, see what happens, all right?” He said okay.

  Come Saturday night, we hit the first club, and Broder’s comic is dying. He’s up there maybe ten minutes, and I’m sitting with Broder at a table, and I say, “Jeez, let me go on after him. What can you lose?”

  Broder says no. “If you go on after him, I can’t win. If you do bad, it makes it worse for me. And if you do good, then the owner will be angry at me for not booking you. You’re not going on.”