Sorry, folks, I’ve been out of town for a while (OOT in industry parlance). But I’m back! And so much to talk about…
1.) Comedian Richard Jeni commits suicide.
2.) Bill Maher, of “Real Time” fame, comments on this on “Larry King Live”
3.) A guy I used to work and play softball with is on the new Fuse Network sketch comedy show “The Whitest Guys U Know,” which just premiered last night and was, I thought, fantastic.
I was always good at writing essays in high school that seamlessly weaved together disparate elements. Let’s see if I still have the skillz.
King asked Maher for his take on Jeni’s suicide– the two had “come up” together through the ranks of stand-up comics. Maher said something along these lines (this is taken from the transcript of the broadcast at the CNN website):
MAHER: It’s hard to stop thinking about it. I knew him from jump street, as we say. We were young comics together, we came up together. I don’t know why he did it. He had a lot to live for, but what it made me think of was – and again, I’m not sure if this is related to career, but this country loves to talk about dreams, especially show business dreams.
And everyone who makes it in show business says, oh, just follow your dream, you can make it. No, you can’t.
Every time – and I’m not picking on her, I love Jennifer Hudson, she is a great star, but she is like everybody who makes it and they say, I had a dream to be a singer.
No, you had a dream to be a star, OK. When you tell everybody your dreams can come true, too, somebody needs to be there to say, no, they can’t. You know what, you have as much a chance of becoming a star in show business as you do of winning the Powerball lottery.
KING: But Jeni, you think it might have been he wasn’t a star? Because he was certainly a fixture, wasn’t he? He wasn’t a superstar.
MAHER: Everyone who starts in show business has a picture where they’re going to end up. It’s not working the improv in Chicago when you’re 49 years old. If the reality doesn’t match that picture, it’s a great disappointment. (italics mine-MFD)
Whoa….
So now last night I saw this guy I used to work with and play softball with on television. He and four other young men formed an improv troupe in Brooklyn in 2001. They slowly put their act together over a period of several years, first in live venues, and then eventually they expanded to include video pieces broadcast via the internet. They were noticed by the Fuse Network, signed to a deal, toured the nation performing and promoting their act, and now they’re on TV.
While watching the show I felt several things. I was happy for my former coworker and teammate, and enormously proud to have once been associated with him, even if in a totally unrelated context. I also felt hope for my own career– here, after all, was very tangible evidence that a career in the performance arts is most certainly possible. Hard work can and does pay off, and opportunities can be created when they can’t be found.
And of course I also felt envy, or at the very least a most fervent longing for my own efforts to someday be similarly validated and celebrated, and the sooner the better. It is this last sensation that most troubles me. It is a mixture of anxiety and anger and fear and jealousy that kept me from a good night’s sleep; a little kid in my belly screaming “when will it be my turn!”
The fact of the matter is, as Maher so eloquently points out, it may never be my turn. If I can’t make peace with this truth then I open the door to the sort of self-inflicted psychological torment that at its worst will make my fate match Jeni’s. And I know from experience that if I let my ambition loose it will sour my art such that I will never be able to access my best possible work.
Fortunately, I have found a master willing to help me stem the tide.
