The Ninth Card Of Christmas

This is my friend Karen Lorshbough… again. In the 90’s, Karen worked for a company in NYC that supplied entertainers for parties, promotional events and lots of Mitzvahs, both Bar and Bat. Among other events, she worked the opening of Trump Tower on 5th Ave and Trump Plaza in Atlantic City.

This picture was taken at the home of Princess Grace’s eye doctor in Harrisburg, PA. The party was given in Prince Albert’s honor. Known as the most eligible Prince in the world, the 32nd ruler of Monaco had a blonde date who they all assumed was hired from a modeling agency since he ignored her the whole night.

While you sit around and think your life sucks and if only, if only, you were a royal and life would be different, look at the Grimaldi’s.

The youngest, Princess Stephanie, has three children from two different men. Her first marriage ended after a year when her husband was spotted cavorting with a Belgian stripper. She had a third child in 1998 but refused to name the father. She also dated an elephant trainer and the head of the Circus Knie, a Swiss troupe with whom Stephanie and her children traveled. In 2003 she married an acrobat with the same circus. For years she was accused of driving the car that killed her mother.

Prince Albert has two illegitimate children from two different women. If he dies without a legitimate heir, the throne passes to Princess Caroline, who has been married three times and has four children by two different men. After her second husband died in a boat crash, she married the Prince of Hanover and had one child with him, who is the Princess of Hanover. You think your kids don’t get along, imagine that one of them is born royal.
“I’m a princess and you’re not.”
“Are not.”
“Am too.”
“Are not.”
“Am too.”
“Princess, come give Mummy and Daddy a kiss before you ride to hounds with Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip. You other kids polish her tiaras and feed her pony."
"See, I am a princess."
"Are not."

Yes, I know the three children of Prince Rainier have a lot of money and a privileged life but that doesn’t bring their mother back or amend their unfortunate choices of significant others. Shit, if that’s all it takes I would make an excellent Grimaldi.

After Karen got the pictures back from the party, she decided to send one to Prince Albert along with this note:

Dear Prince Albert of Monaco (or so you said)
Enclosed is a picture of the night you proposed. So where’s the ring?
Anyway, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
Love, Karen

He sent her a Christmas card with the official family photo, signed by the entire lot of them. No ring.

Karen was lucky, someone who sent text emails to Princess Stephanie ended up in prison and was deemed ‘disturbed’ by the courts. I should call Karen because now that I think about it, I haven’t heard from her in a while.

End of chat.

The Eighth Card Of Christmas

I used to run into Mary Ellen Hooper, 1998’s ‘Best Female Comic’ at the 12th Annual American Comedy Awards, at every airport in the country, or so it seemed. We were always either arriving or leaving clubs that we each had played over the years, so there was plenty of comparing, contrasting, lots of air kissing and “Gotta run.” Sometimes we ended up on the same plane and didn’t know it until we landed at LAX.

One of my favorite Mary Ellen stories is about The Improv’s. Notoriously sexist, The Improv chain has always been booked by women who hate women. (Translation: women who didn't pursue their dreams dumped their anger and frustration on those of us who did) They mistakenly thought that women didn’t do well in the headliner spot. But Mary Ellen was headlining all over the country at every club but The Improv’s, where she was only the featured act. (Comedy clubs have an opening act, a feature or middle act and then the headliner)

She got a call from the Brea Improv to open for Richard Jeni, a very funny comedian who insisted on a female opening act.

Sidebar: I’m sure he thought that a female comic would be easier to follow than a male comic. I love ya Richard, but yawn.

Mary Ellen went out that first night on the gig and crushed. She got a standing O and never had to middle The Improv's again.

She now tours regularly with 3 Blonde Moms along with two of my favorite comics, my good buddy Joanie Fagan and Helen Keaney. You can see them on the E! Channel or check them out when they come to a town near you.

End of chat.

The Seventh Card Of Christmas

The Christmas card I received from the comedy team of Carl and Buzz reminded me of why I love comics. Nothing is too sacred to destroy. A laugh is a laugh is a laugh.

Carl Bradley and I met at a backer’s audition for a Broadway-bound show. He was not impressed with my limited knowledge of Sondheim and my inability to sing on key but he gave me a callback anyway. I had mentioned my Costco card in passing and I have a feeling that figured prominently in the callback but maybe I’m just paranoid.

A lot of people may recognize Buzz Belmondo from his eight years on Out of This World and two years on Baywatch. You gotta love someone who goes by the name Buzz.

These two funny guys decided to combine their considerable talents and start over as a comedy duo which of course I found highly suspicious. What’s next, a run at the White House? Although a bitter ex-network executive and a comic from the Philippines would probably do a terrific job since they’re already used to being laughed at.

I once called Carl and said I was thinking of doing a one-woman show about my pretend funeral. I thought I could lie in a casket onstage and then have people get up and speak about me. I thought it might be a little out there and asked Carl what he thought. He loved the idea and sent me a detailed two-page email with his suggestions and a note, ‘As long as you don’t sing.’ See why I love comedians?

End of chat.

The Sixth Card Of Christmas

Bill Rutkoski is another comedian friend of mine who put some muscle into his Christmas cards. And Bing Crosby.

One winter Bill and I were booked to do a standup gig in Burlington, Vermont. As we drove north from New York City I looked longingly at the snow-covered houses and farms that were spread out picture postcard style along the highways. How peaceful it would be to have a normal life in a quiet part of the world, I thought. What a relief to not be driven by something as ephemeral and unpredictable as fame.

Suddenly Bill turned to me and said, “Wouldn’t it be great to be normal and just live in a house in a quiet part of the country and just be a regular person?”

Bill moved to L.A. a few months after I did and one day we got locked into a conversation about how annoying it was when people found out what we did for a living. One of the best things about being a standup comic is making people laugh. But one of the worst things about being a standup comic is listening to the suggestions of accountants, teachers, salesclerks and anyone else who thinks they understand the complexities of comedy.

“I’m a temp; you should do a skit about that.” They did, it’s a movie called The Temp.

“You should see the people at my office; you could do a whole skit about them.” They did, it’s a sitcom called The Office.

“I’m a waiter; you should do a skit on that.” They did, it’s a reality show called The Restaurant.

“I work in an ER; you really need to do a skit on that,” at which point I’ve lapsed into a coma and could really use an ER.

For starters, stand-ups don’t do ‘skits’; that word went out with Vo-do-dee-oh-doh. Improv players do ‘sketches’ and stand-ups do ‘jokes’. And please, let me save you the trouble: Yes, we write our own material and No, we don’t know how we come up with our jokes. And please, please, please don’t tell us a joke and if you must, try not to tell a racist, homophobic, sexist joke and then tell us we can use it. We’re never going to use it.

Bill has since gone into acting full time and told me he stopped telling people what he did for a living. He now just says he sells shoes.

End of chat.

The Fifth Card Of Christmas

Steve Altman consistently made the most creative cards I’ve ever seen at Christmas time.

We met at a club around San Diego over ten years ago. It’s a little fuzzy but I remember that the owner of the club put us up in separate condos and then later that night paid for all my drinks, going so far as to walk over to the bar and get them for me. He also offered to buy me a massage from His Massage Girl, as long as he could watch. He did not offer Steve these perks and Steve was the headliner. I turned him down. Well, not the drinks.

Steve killed that first night and I was glad I didn’t have to follow him. That weekend he ran interference for me with the owner of the club who was only interested in talking to me about how he would be glad to help me with some of my jokes, which female comics were not as funny as me and had I considered wearing shorter skirts on stage? It was a long, long weekend.

To punish me for not returning his attentions, he wouldn’t pay me after my last set until after Steve’s part of the show was over. Steve did an hour and sometimes went longer. I had a lengthy drive back to L.A. in the little gray Ford Festiva, which pretty much doubled the trip time. I pitched a fit and he finally paid me after he deducted the cost of all the drinks he had bought me on that first night.

After that, Steve put me on his Christmas card list for a few years. Then there was a period of time when I stopped getting them. I guess he might have been a bit fuzzy on how he knew me as well. I tracked him down and begged to get back into The Christmas Card Club. He let down the velvet rope.

Some of the songs on this album, Santa Lane, are Reindeer’s Garden, Here Comes the Son, Beclause and Mean Mister Macy. That's Bing Crosby bringing up the rear, walking behind Steve.

P.S. I’m off the list again, out of the club. I’m pretty sure Studio 54 was easier to get into.

The Fourth Card Of Christmas

This picture was inside the last Christmas card I got from Clark Henley. He was the first friend of mine to die of AIDS and the best friend I ever had. We met in San Francisco and were inseparable for years and when I eventually moved to New York, we spoke regularly on the phone. He always sent me postcards from his travels because he knew I had a huge collection of them. He was generous, thoughtful, kind. And funny. Endlessly funny.

His HIV+ diagnosis was a blow. It was 1986 and AIDS had just been in the New York public awareness since 1983 and only because The Village Voice did an extensive story on it. I wasn’t really clear on what the disease was or how it ravaged the body and I wasn’t alone in my ignorance. There was no AZT cocktail back then, no Diana, Princess of Wales touching HIV-infected people in front of international cameras. No one knew much about it except that it seemed to be a death sentence. When Clark got full blown AIDS I told him that if or when it got really bad I would come and take care of him for as long as he wanted. Every time we talked I mentioned that he only had to say the word and I would drop everything and fly to San Francisco. He said okay. We had a deal. Clark would call if he needed me.

Presuming he was all right I never bothered to make sure. To double check. I was so wrapped up in my standup career that I didn’t take the time to call his other friends or his family to see if he was, in fact, okay. The late 80’s were the boom years of standup. There was so much work I could’ve opened a club in my living room and had a full house every night. I was working constantly and it seemed that Clark and I spoke less and less but I never questioned why. He was living his life, I reasoned. He was okay. I zoomed ahead in standup with fifty dollar gigs at The Duplex and late night MCing at The Improv, a weekend at The Comfort Inn in Niagara Falls. Yes, there was a gig there. I was happening, people. I was on my way. Clark would call if he needed me.

Clark had my sister’s address in his daybook, but not mine. He knew mine by heart. So when the family sent out death notices, they sent one to my sister. That’s how I found out.

What kind of person had I become? What kind of friend was I? How could I have thought that my ridiculous career was more important than a person I cherished and loved?

The weeks that followed swallowed me whole. Why didn’t it ever cross my mind that Clark might have been protecting me from his pain or from possible infection if I went to take care of him? Those were the days when people thought that if you touched someone with AIDS, you got it. Did Clark think that? Why didn’t he call me and talk to me about it? Was he even too sick to call? More importantly, why didn’t I call him? How could I have been so incredibly passive, so pathetically shallow and self-involved in my own boring little world of MeMeMe?

I’ve never been that selfish again. If anything, I’m more than there for all my friends. I go above and beyond because one day I didn’t.

Clark always refused to call me Suzy. He called me Susan because he said I was most definitely not a Suzy.
“Like Susan Hayward, that’s how I think of you.”
“Why?”
“Because everything you do is very, very dramatic.”
“Well sure, if you’re gonna count that.”

Clark came from a wealthy Bay Area family and never had to work a day in his life so he had plenty of time to be creative. The Christmas tree in the background of this picture is entirely decorated with elephants. I think of him at least once a week. And always will.

End of Chat.

The Third Card Of Christmas

Joy Behar sent this card out one year, a photo of her and Richard Simmons who is either kissing her shoe or hiding from his boyfriend. Or her boyfriend. Or a decent hair care product. (The picture is crooked on the card so don't get all up in my face over my photo shopping skills which P.S. I don't have anyway)

Joy and I have been friends since we started doing standup in NY back in 1983 at Comedy U on University Place. One of the first jokes I wrote was: My first sexual encounter was a rape. Thank God he didn't press charges. Joy walked over to me after I did the joke and said, “Get rid of it, rape is not funny.”

"Joy, it makes me out to be the bad guy."
“Yeah, still not funny.”
“But I need this joke; I don’t have a lot of jokes.”
“And never going to be funny....”
“But I....”
“....in anyone’s lifetime.”

I 86’d the joke.

Joy is as funny in person as she is on The View. Funnier actually because she’s got that ABC Daytime Kung Fu Death Grip on her comedy. If you get a chance to see her live, do.

End of chat.

The Second Card Of Christmas

This is a picture of my funny friend Karen Lorshbough with Ringo Starr. She was performing at the 50th birthday party for Barbara Bach, Ringo’s wife, at their home in Beverly Hills. Karen is not only a standup comic and a mime but she is probably the only Silver Friedman impersonator in the free world.

Sidebar: Silver Friedman is the ex-wife of Budd Friedman, the former owner of the L.A. Improv on Melrose. He and Silver owned the Original Improv on West 44th Street in New York City and she got it in the divorce.

Silver has an unusual voice, flat in timbre and somewhat disdainful. Karen was the only comic who ever mastered it, not to mention dared to do it. Silver had a cat named Tits that had free reign of the club. We were discouraged from playing with Tits, which is a line you really don’t want to give a comic.

After Karen moved to L.A., I made her come to my house and record my outgoing message as Silver. During the recording she said, ‘Excuse me, but please don’t touch Tits, leave Tits alone.’ as if she was talking to a comedian across the club. Every comic who called was laughing on the tape and then said, “How in the fuck did you get Silver Friedman to leave your outgoing message? And isn’t that cat dead yet?”

End of chat.

The First Card Of Christmas

I have some insanely creative and inventive friends. These are a sampling of their Christmas cards from the last few years. They are not your average holiday fare, no families dressed up in sparkly, matching sweaters sitting beside a Christmas tree petting the puppy. And no, that is not a euphemism.

One a day for 12 days.

This is a picture of my friend Alan Purcell and RuPaul, who I’m totally obsessed with. Alan is a fashion photographer who has worked New York, San Francisco, South Beach and now calls Hollywood Home Sweet Hell. (He took one of my all time favorite pictures of me which I use on the IMDb website.) This photo was taken at the end of a shoot with RuPaul, and Alan, who also shot it, used it as his Christmas card that year.

Sidebar: I have stared at pictures of RuPaul for Hours. Days. Years. The makeup, those legs, the wigs. I’ve seen Ru in his regular boy clothes in photos and movies and I just want to scream, No Girl, put that skirt back on and let’s curl some eyelashes. End of chat.

On The Road In Canada, Where They Can't Spell

Starting tomorrow.......................The Twelve Cards of Christmas

Ding Dong The Bitch Is Dead Part 1

Kevin Meaney, Colin Quinn, Mario Joyner, Stu Trivax and Chris Rock at Catch A Rising Star in New York, also home to Seinfeld, Joy Behar, me and countless others

Judy Brown has been profiting from comedians for a very long time. She compiled nineteen books of comics’ jokes before Jay Leno made an attempt to stop her.

There is no form of writing harder than joke writing. Joan Rivers hires people to create a new act for her every year. The sitcom Seinfeld used to open with a standup segment. A lot of it came from Jerry but eventually they had to hire someone to write that part. When that cold open was finally dropped, I’m sure no one was more relieved than the guy writing those jokes every week. The lore in our business is that you write five great minutes a year.

Any respectable comic will tell you it takes ten years to become a good comedian. Twenty to become great. And for all of that effort, Judy Brown doesn’t even make reparations to the comics she steals from. But you get the credit, I was told. You can’t pay rent with credit. Well that’s not entirely true because in an effort to save money I’ve put my rent on a credit card. The rent was seven hundred and sixty-five dollars but my monthly minimum payment was only forty-two fifty. That’s one of my jokes. Thank you, I’ll be here all week. Try the veal.

One of the plaintiffs in the Judy Brown case is Sue Pascoe, the widow of Ronnie Shakes. Ronnie was one of the most gifted writers in our field. This was one of his jokes: After twelve years of therapy my psychiatrist said something that brought tears to my eyes. He said, 'No hablo ingles.'

Ronnie died in the 1980’s. And Judy Brown is still using his jokes to depositar dinero en un banco. I’m still all about the Spanish, socio.

Sidebar: When I first got to LA, I was sitting in a little café on Santa Monica Boulevard eating frozen yoghurt with my friend Sheila Kay (BIBing, sorry) when this girl walked up to me and said, “Aren’t you Suzy Soro?”
“Yep.”
“I know all your jokes!”
“Oh yeah?” How could she know my jokes? Not to mention recognize me. I had just moved to Hollywood and hadn’t done more than one or two TV shows. Shows like Caroline’s Comedy Hour that three people watched.
“I take standup classes with Judy Brown and she makes us choose a comic we like and then we do their routines in class.” This girl had chosen me. I guess Judy Brown was one of the three people watching Caroline’s Comedy Hour.

When I wrote for a website here in L.A., I asked my lawyer to amend the one-sided contract the editor required me to sign. It didn’t allow me to keep either the content or the name of my column. It also demanded a five year no-compete clause. And in other news from the planet I Don’t Think So my attorney couldn’t take the case because he wasn’t familiar with Intellectual Property Law. He referred me to an IP attorney. These lawyers are in big demand because of the Internet and all the stealing and copyright infringement. Meanwhile, I just purloined Ronnie’s joke off a website and reprinted the AP article without permission. Apparently, I’m part of the problem. End of chat.

Leno, Others Sue Over Joke Book
AP LOS ANGELES (Dec. 1)

The "Tonight Show" host and NBC Studios have sued humor editor Judy Brown and her publishers in U.S. District Court, claiming that her collection of joke books has profited from material filched from his standup routines. Leno and other comics, including Rita Rudner, are seeking unspecified damages and a permanent injunction against Brown's 19 books - mainly compilations of jokes by comedians including Ellen DeGeneres, Joan Rivers and Jerry Seinfeld, according to the lawsuit. "Her books credit the comedians who wrote the jokes, which only serves to make the copyright violations more egregious: The books sell precisely because they include jokes by famous comedians," the lawsuit claims. "Ms. Brown has even sent representatives to comedy clubs to record comedians' routines, so she can then copy the jokes into her books and profit from the original comedic works of others," according to the lawsuit. Brown's books include "The Funny Pages," "Funny You Should Know That" and "Joke Stew."

Spokeswoman Kathy Hilliard of Andrews McMeel Publishing, one of the publishers named in the lawsuit, declined to comment Thursday. She also declined to comment when asked how Brown could be contacted. Messages left at the offices of two other defendants, Sterling Publishing Co. Inc. and Rowman & Littlefield Inc., were not immediately returned. The lawsuit, filed Wednesday, says the plaintiffs contacted Brown and Andrews McMeel Publishing during the summer to request that they stop publication of any past and future "infringing works." "We never heard back from her," said Theodore Boutrous Jr., attorney for the plaintiffs. "We think there's a very important principle at stake: protecting intellectual property of the comedians," Boutrous said. "These jokes are products of a very careful choice of words." The other plaintiffs are comics Jimmy Brogan and Diane Nichols, and Sue Pascoe, wife of the late comedian Ronnie Shakes.

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

BIBs

BIBs. Blank Idea Bloggers. They talk about what they had for lunch and ask you what they should buy at Wal-Mart. Write in your diary and spare me your tedium. Please. And every day? We need to hear from you every day? I don't even like getting mail every day, why would I need to hear from you with the same regularity, especially since you're not sending me checks. Seriously, give it a rest. Instead, do something you're really good at, like ironing.

So P.S. I'm sitting at the computer tonight at 3 a.m. and wanting music. My stereo 5 disc changer is not working so I had to resort to iTunes. But I got bored with those songs that I paid 99 cents for and had to turn on the pedometer. In an effort to stay fully stocked with useless crap I bought a pedometer that talks. It tells you how many calories you've burned, how many steps you've taken and it also plays FM radio. It's better than a boyfriend. Mainly because it can't see how many pounds you've gained. I mean lost.

My Sharona on FM radio. The song that reduces all other dance music to shame. And now I'm a BIB. Kill me, soon.

End of chat.