reflective music
[laughter]
[Robin] They do these things before you have a child.
They have a thing called amniocentesis,
where they scan down, and, actually,
you get to the point where you go...
[gasps] "My God, it's a boy,
and he's hung like a bear!"
The doctor drew me aside-- "Mr. Williams,
that's the umbilical." "Shit!"
[laughter]
"No.
Don't cut it. Let him dream for a day!"
Every time a man goes for a complete
physical examination, for some reason,
the doctor grabs him by the balls and says, "Cough."
I want to know why.
What's he looking for?
"Oh, you got night blindness, huh?"
"Got a tennis elbow, huh?"
"What do you got? A trick knee?"
Doc, get your hands off my balls, okay?
Thank you.
- [crowd cheering] - [woman shrieking]
upbeat music
Pull this lady off of me!
- I'm off the mat. - [man] Sorry.
[Binder] For nearly five decades,
the Main Room of The Comedy Store
has been the favorite laboratory
in stand-up's constant quest to find out
what would and wouldn't send torches and pitchforks
streaming up the hill.
Men are obsessed with women's nipples.
They'll just play with them for hours.
You can be asleep, and they'll still be at it.
- You know... - [laughter, applause]
[cheering]
They don't understand that there's a very fine line
between eroticism and nausea.
It's like, "If you don't stop playing with my nipples,
I'm going to throw up. Please."
"Touch them briefly, fuck me, and go home."
[Binder] In this era, Whitney Cummings
is the reigning queen of American stand-up--
clever, unique, and irascibly charming,
with incandescent stage presence.
She has all the tools to be on top,
but what's really put her there is her work ethic.
She takes the job of being funny deadly serious.
One thing Whitney puts a lot of time into these days
is her podcast, Good For You,
a mix of comedy and confession
with stand-up and people from all walks of life.
A big part of her life is the Store.
She's deeply embedded in the Store family.
Not only is she universally loved there,
but her love for the place and the people shines
the minute she arrives backstage.
When did you first come to The Comedy Store?
I first came to the Comedy Store--
I wanna say 2002.
I would ask people, like,
"What's this bloodstain on the wall?"
I would see, you know, like, razor cuts on the tables
from doing cocaine and stuff, you know, so--
[Binder] "What's that bullet hole?"
[Cummings laughing] Totally.
You just hear these stories, where you're just like,
- "What was going on here?" - It was crazy.
Our generation was taught,
"Just be clean so you can get on TV.
Get a clean five. Get a clean ten."
No one wanted you doing dirty jokes.
No one wanted you ripping curtains down.
No one wanted you breaking the rules.
You had to abide by the rules so you could get that TV set.
You know, The Comedy Store is really where you went
when you were ready to, like, go to war
and find out who you are and break open.
I mean, that's where I got good as a comedian.
That's where my bar was set.
pensive music
rock music
I always heard, like, "Oh, there's a different kind
of comedian at The Comedy Store."
Every comic I ever looked up to,
any comic that ever inspired me, all worked here--
Dice, Kinison, Roseanne,
Jim Carrey, Damon Wayans.
I was just afraid of The Comedy Store.
exciting music
[laughter]
[cheers and applause]
[whining] Don't you think we should talk
about our sexual problem?
[laughter]
I was married for two [...] years!
Hell would be like Club Med!
I mean, who wouldn't want to be here
with Kinison and Rudy Sarzo and Billy Idol
and people snorting coke and going around the corner
and eating pussy and ass till six in the morning?
Like, where do I sign up?
The sex, the drugs-- it was phenomenal.
I remember times, you and I,
we'd be up at Mitzi's living room
with Richard Pryor and Robin, and we were just young guys.
Just awe. Total awe.
There were awesome people coming through here
all the time.
It was like being on Mount Olympus,
and we were like, "Ah, Zeus is coming in tonight.
He's gonna throw some lightning bolts and shit."
I call it...
the angry Saint Bernard.
- [growls] - [laughter]
It was like a sexual circus here.
You know, you'd go upstairs, and you'd open a door,
and somebody's getting a blowjob--"Oh, I'm sorry."
There was a guy, Lenny Schultz, who would bring out a pig--
a live pig-- and the pig got loose,
and it was kind of like pre-Howard Stern going insane.
- [Binder] Right. - [Felicia] For a person
that never fit in anywhere,
it was like, "Fuck. I have found Misfit Island."
rock music
[man] How does it feel to be the mother of comedy?
Oh, stop that! I don't want that.
[Cummings] I remember the first time I saw Mitzi.
All of these super macho comedians
were lining the hallway, you know,
roasting each other, like, "Fuck you. Fuck you"--
everybody yelling at each other.
super masculine energy.
And then as soon as Mitzi came in,
they all got really small and really obsequious to her.
And they're like, "Mitzi, do you need anything?"
I mean, they would literally bow.
They would bend over.
[Marc] She was sort of the queen of the situation--
in some ways, some sort of, like, dark,
weird mother figure.
Mitzi would ask you to do something.
You'd go, "Really? Yeah, of course.
I'll kill him."
It was the childishness of it.
It's a very steady way
of giving the children--
children a place to grow and work out.
Where she was the mama bear,
and that had its... pluses and minuses.
She could do things that were so wonderful for you
and then turn around and do something that was un--
you had no explanation for.
The comedians that she thought she founded
were, you know, her special people.
She was heartless on some people.
She was just heartless.
You're not ready for the Store yet.
- No? - I remember one time
in her office, and Barry Diamond calls up.
And she puts him on speakerphone and goes,
"Shh."
And he starts crying, literally.
"I didn't get any spots. I didn't get any spots.
I didn't--" "Oh, well, call later.
I'll see what I can do."
And I just looked at her, and I go,
"Boy, do you enjoy that."
But she said, "Yeah, I do."
I would go over to the house and I would give her massages,
like everybody else, and, you know, I would, uh--
- [Binder] Bobby. - Yeah?
[Binder] You're the only one I've ever heard
that had to give her a massage.
[laughs] That's not true at all.
- [Binder] No, I swear to God. - That is absolutely not true.
- [Binder] No one ever gave-- - That is absolutely
- not fucking true, Mike. - [Binder] I swear to God.
I've never heard anybody ever gave her a massage.
I would massage her sometimes.
I remember Mitzi used to always get mad.
She'd go, "You guys can't mess around with the waitresses."
I'd go, "Well, why not, Mitzi?
You mess around with the comics."
[both laugh]
I can name you the comics that ate her pussy.
- [Binder] Okay, I--I-- - I mean, she's probably here--
- I mean, her soul. - [Binder] Yeah, yeah, I know.
- I mean, her vagina-- - [Binder] No--okay, vagina.
- Yeah, yeah. - [Binder] I know comics
- ate her vagina. - Yeah, yeah.
[Binder] But I never knew one guy
that went over and gave her a massage.
You bastard.
The one who broke her heart, that was the love of her life
was Steve Landesberg.
When she broke up with Landesberg,
she started screwing around with all the comics.
You made it pretty fast, though, it seems.
One week, I was in the Main Room.
Pryor used to fuck with me. "You fucked Mitzi, didn't you?
Well, nobody get in that motherfucking room that fast.
You fucked her, didn't you?"
She said it to me several times,
that her life started at 40.
The life before that didn't exist to her.
So when she got the Store, you know,
she got to live the college girl that she was
when she was, you know, young--the Bohemian Mitzi.
My mom was very trusting to you guys.
"This is my home. This your home.
Come on in. Drink whatever you want.
Eat whatever you want. Fuck whoever you want."
That ecosystem at the time,
I can only imagine how incestuous that would get
with all the trauma bonding and...
- [Binder] Yes, yes. - ...the alcohol
and the addiction and...
[Binder] And we were so close to her.
- Mitzi loved comedians. - Yeah.
You add that to her broken heart.
We were partying till late at night every night.
I have never really dated a comedian,
but I'm in love with every comedian.
Like, all my friends are successful,
hilarious, famous comedians, and I have to go on dates
with normal people, and I'm like,
"Ugh, you're bombing."
- Yeah. "You're bombing." - You know what I mean?
"You're bombing. Killing me," you know?
- Yeah, yeah. - So I get it.
Were you aware of Tim Thomerson?
I didn't know him well.
Like, I've seen his name on things.
When I got out there, Tim Thomerson was the guy.
- The guy. - If I had any money
and you could buy stock in somebody,
I just would have gone all-in.
funky music
You came out in '75,
and who were the big guys here?
Well, Tim Thomerson was enormous.
I never saw anybody like him--
blond hair, masculine,
good-looking, kind of a surfer.
[Letterman] He was the guy you couldn't follow.
He was just terrific to watch
because he was completely uninhibited.
Oh, the way things is going,
I'm so damn horny, the crack of dawn ain't safe.
You know?
[laughter]
He had just won something called the Lenny Bruce Award
and, of course, knew of Lenny Bruce,
never heard of the Lenny Bruce Award,
and I think it was only bestowed...
- [Binder] One year. - One year.
- [Binder] That's right. - And then it was retired.
Your style was so unique and so different.
Where did it come from?
Certainly, uh, Jonathan Winters
was probably the biggest influence.
I like all kinds of movies--
the Western with the guy: "All right.
Move 'em out there."
[imitates whip cracking] "I'm sorry, Ralph."
[laughter]
I didn't really have an act. I just had--
Charles Bronson, I could do, and...
"Remember, I dug 17 tunnels with my face."
I kind of yelled at people and... [chuckles]
...sort of, you know, gave 'em a bunch of guff.
By the way, are you people all on Valiums or something?
Are you people from Encino? Let's lighten it up, okay?
Really funny. Had that Stagecoach bit.
Talk about a guy who never really had an act.
He never had an act.
There was no-- that I could see, really--
- He had Stagecoach. - [Binder] Stagecoach.
[imitates whip cracking]
[imitates hooves clomping]
[imitating air whooshing, arrow thwacking]
And then the tagline with the Peckinpah thing
came from, you know, The Wild Bunch.
[continuous gunfire]
[laughter]
[imitating slow-motion gunfire]
He was kind of dangerous, remember?
- [Binder] Yeah. - You thought,
"He's really funny, but...
he might do something crazy tonight."
[laughter]
But I think his mindset was primarily on being an actor.
- [Binder] Yeah. - Hi, I'm Kenny.
- Hi. - soft music
Orbit program is locked in.
- Good. - And guess what.
What?
I've almost finished my needlepoint.
[audience laughs]
It's lovely.
[Binder] Now, over here, this is what I wanted to show you--
this picture of you.
You were the cover of LA Weekly here.
LA Weekly, 1970--what is that?
'72 or '3 or something.
- I always wanted that. - [Binder] You want this?
- I always wanted that picture. - [Binder] Here.
- Here. - [Tim] Oh, bitchin'. Really?
Yeah, Mitzi's gone.
You can take whatever you want now,
and that's the great thing about The Comedy Store.
If you haven't seen him before,
you're gonna get a kick out of Bad Sam, okay?
Sammy? Where are you, Sam?
[cheers and applause]
Before I was your little son,
before I was your baby,
your dependent...
I was a free spirit in the next stage of life.
I walked in the cosmos
not imprisoned by a body of flesh
but free in a body of light.
I knew all things.
There were no questions, only answers.
No weaknesses, only strength!
I was light! I was truth!
I was a spiritual being! I was a God!
But you had to fuck and bring my ass down here!
I didn't ask to be born!
I didn't call you up, say, "Please have me!
Can I work at Winchell's someday?"
I don't have shit!
You fucked! You had me!
Now you want me to pay my own way?
[shrieking] Fuck you!
rock music
It's a very evangelistic style.
It's not really that different from the way I used to preach.
[Binder] He's from a family of preachers.
His father was a preacher. His brothers were preachers.
Comedians right now, they're really good
and polished and smart and thoughtful,
and they go deep, but he just, like, ripped into your chest,
almost like going to see Iggy Pop or something.
- [Binder] Yeah. - Like, "Something might
happen right now."
To see him do what he did,
where he didn't give a fuck about the audience--
like, he'd get onstage, and the air would change
because it was menacing.
He was there to shock you
and to change your belief system.
The hair on your back of your neck stood up
when he came in 'cause you didn't know
how dark he was gonna go.
It wasn't just funny.
It was attached to emotion,
which most comics divorce themselves from.
[Sam] I buy it every time. I got to tell you.
I buy it every fucking time. I do, man.
Love comes from behind and goes...
[high-pitched voice] "Come on, come on!
Come on, this is love.
This is love. Come on."
[squeals] "Come on."
[laughter]
"I'm not like the others. No.
This is new love.
Come on, trust me. Trust me.
I wouldn't lie to you ten times in a row, fuckhead.
Come on!
Come on, open the door. Let's see what she's like."
[imitates door creaking open, roaring]
[imitates door slamming] Oh! Oh! Oh!
I thought it was the door to love!
It was the door to hell!
He came out here with Carl LaBove.
- These two guys were so close. - Mm-hmm.
They lived in Hollywood, and they walked back and forth
to Westwood to help Sam be in shape.
They were like brothers.
When Carl and Sam came out from Texas,
Carl LaBove was the funnier of the two.
Carl should have went out on his own.
Carl was always brilliant, like, physically--
he was a great physical comedian.
He would do a bug--butterflies.
- He would do the fly--a fly. - [Binder] Yeah.
- That's what I mean. - I'm telling you, man.
You give a woman coke, she's gonna tell you
her whole life story.
[speaking gibberish rapidly, sniffing]
"And then when I was two"...
[speaking rapid gibberish]
"Are we gonna fuck?" "Uh-uh."
[speaking rapid gibberish]
It's like hanging out with a human fly, man.
Like... [continues speaking gibberish]
[imitates buzzing]
[buzzing stops]
[buzzing continues]
[cheers and applause]
There were a couple of nights when we were in Rascals
that Carl did so well that Sam couldn't follow him.
He was likable. You know what I mean?
He wasn't dark.
I just feel like a hairy guy trapped in a bald man's body.
He got sucked into the Sam Kinison vortex,
and he just took on this dark vibe.
And he started becoming, you know, "Sam's friend."
They were partners in crime, you know.
They went everywhere together.
Sam Kinison was like
the Mike Tyson of comedy
'cause he talked about religion.
He talked about relationships
like no one else has talked about it before or since.
"Jesus."
"Yeah. Yeah."
[laughter]
[laughter, applause]
[whistling]
jazzy music
I came here when I was 17 on a bus, basically.
- [Carrey] That's probably 19. - [Binder] Really?
- [Carrey] Yeah, I think so. - [Binder] Wow.
I think I was--
I had hair on my balls, but it was a comb-over.
[laughs]
When Carrey came out here, it was the first guy I ever saw
get a standing ovation every single night.
And he did impressions. It was all impressions.
He could just say "Clint Eastwood"
and make his face look like Clint Eastwood.
He would do, like, Bruce Dern.
[Carrey] I was going to be the man of a thousand faces,
and I could do James Dean.
[laughter]
[applause]
Henry Fonda was my big closer.
I'm not sure I know how to pick strawberries.
The comics would watch you and get jealous
because you were getting standing ovations...
- Yeah. - ...and they'd go,
"He's not earning it." It's like,
"Dude, they're standing."
I guess Jim thought of it as a very traditional
Rich Little-type act. It wasn't.
It was still super weird.
It was a total crowd-pleaser,
and I thought I was gonna go and die in Vegas.
[Judd] He had done a TV series called The Duck Factory.
It was his big break. He had made a movie,
Once Bitten, where he was the lead,
and it didn't work.
[hisses]
- Holy shit! - Let's get out of here!
[Apatow] And then he started doing parts in movies,
like Peggy Sue Got Married,
but things weren't really happening.
I think all that stuff that started to go downhill,
at that time for Jim,
he just made a decision to be a comic.
"I'm just gonna be a comic from now on."
That's how I work, you know.
I fail the first time out really miserably,
and then I go, "Okay, don't give up, here."
And he decided, "I'm gonna do no impressions."
And he would kind of die in the middle of a show
that was just packed.
Instead of writing jokes and writing an act,
he would come onstage and just improvise all of it.
How was Mitzi? What was Mitzi's point of view?
She was a little resistant to that,
but she didn't stop me.
One time, she said...
[in Wisconsin accent] "What are you doing?
You're the king of impressions.
What are you doing? You don't get a second chance."
[normal voice] I said, "Well, you know,
they got mad at Bob Dylan
when he went electric," you know.
"I'm going electric," you know, "and I'm gonna experiment.
And if I blow the whole thing, I blow the whole thing."
Mitzi believed in him,
gave him the time to fail
because another act, if she didn't like him--
okay, you go on and bomb like he was bombing at first,
he's out of here.
[Carrey] And I would sweat in the back here,
in the hallway, waiting to go on.
Like, literally bleeding with sweat
'cause I told myself I wasn't gonna repeat
one thing that I had said the night before.
It would all be created in front of people.
As luck would have it,
Mitzi put him onstage every night
right next to Damon Wayans.
[Carrey] He'd wait till I got offstage...
- [laughs] - ...and he'd come up to me,
laughing like that and going like,
"You are the fucking angriest person
I've ever seen in my life."
Jim and I were kind of like brothers in war.
We'd hang out, just talking about
the power we felt of not being afraid to bomb.
I remember one night, that table back there,
there were six guys that were drinking heavily,
and they were heckling me.
I came off the stage,
and I walked up over this and onto the table.
And I grabbed a beer bottle.
Then I smashed it on the side of the table
and I did a whole From Here to Eternity on 'em.
I went "Come on!"
[glass shatters]
Okay, fatso.
If it's killing you want... come on.
And they just recoiled.
And I said, "I didn't think so,"
and I dropped the beer bottle.
Once I started bombing, I always felt,
"Well, at least I'm going to be remembered
for being the worst thing
they've ever seen in their lives."
I remember coming here one night, and he goes,
"This is the worst show I've ever had,
and to punish myself tonight,
I'm gonna go lay in this piano."
I got in the piano,
and I closed the piano on top of myself.
And everybody had to deal with the fact
that there was this--
you know, one of the acts had crawled into the piano.
And between, of course, there would be music, you know.
They played piano music
to get the next act up onstage,
and it would be this muted, muffled piano...
[imitates dissonant notes]
And it's 1:45.
"Our last act tonight"...
and then you hear... boom, boom, boom, boom.
And the piano lid opens up,
and the 20 people that are still here from nine o'clock
when it was a hundred people in this room--
Jim would get out and go, "I've got to go home.
I've punished myself enough," and would get out
and end the joke and walk across the room
and walk out the door.
Then he goes into this very long improvisation.
He starts doing this character that is a burn victim.
It turns into...
Fire Marshal Bill here.
[whistle blows]
Is that a wood-shingle roof you got there?
Keenen was looking for a white guy.
[chuckles]
You know, he was trying to reverse Saturday Night Live,
which is, they had Garrett Morris
and they had, you know, Eddie Murphy.
So he wanted the white guy.
He did this nationwide search, and they couldn't find--
and I said, "Keenen, I know the guy."
They brought Jim in. He auditioned.
And he just-- he blew everybody away
'cause he was fearless,
but he got that fearlessness from, you know,
the way we used to experiment in comedy.
"I know how to make you laugh.
That's fine.
Now I'm gonna show you who I am."
And that's the difference between that lounge act
and superstar Jim Carrey.
The Comedy Store is very special to me.
When I was a teenager, I used to watch people
like Richard Pryor and Robin Williams
on television and think...
[scoffs] "I can do that."
I remember Richard Pryor was in the crowd with Mitzi
in one of the booths that were visible from the stage,
and I just on a whim decided I would be naked,
and I would put a sock on my dick.
[Louie] And, you know, everybody went "What?
Huh? What's going on here?"
- It was funny as hell. - [Carrey] I was, like,
friends for life with Richard.
[Binder] Yeah, right.
Where would I be without this place?
There's just--there's no me without this place.
poignant music
I remember one night I was performing in the Belly Room,
just bombing.
I came offstage, and Mitzi was there,
which was like, "Oh, God."
She's like, "Come here." You know, she summons you.
And then you have to bend over to her.
And she grabbed my hand, and she said,
"Honey, you remind me of Roseanne."
And, um... that's all I needed to hear.
- 'Cause she loved Roseanne. - Yeah, she loved Roseanne.
Well, do you ever notice after people get married,
they start going to church
and getting real religious and stuff?
Do you ever notice that?
I guess it's not until marriage that the idea
of eternal damnation becomes a reality.
Mitzi had opened up a room, a little room upstairs
that was strictly for ladies.
She calls it the Belly Room,
where they can incubate and grow.
[Binder] I remember when Mitzi opened the Belly Room.
At first, people were-- women were really upset.
I used to be in that goddamn Belly Room.
I hated that place.
[Byron] All of a sudden, these female comics
were able to find themselves and find their voices.
[Bernhard] I felt completely liberated.
It was a place where people were coming
specifically to see women do what they were doing,
and then it really allowed me to fully realize
my whole take on performing.
What's your name? Ace?
Hi, Ace.
I like everything about you.
I like the fashion risks you took tonight, Ace.
[laughter, applause]
I like you. I like you a lot.
I like you, and yet I'd like to hurt you.
Like to smack your fucking beard off, mister.
In that time, in 1985, '86,
when you were here as a woman at The Comedy Store,
there weren't that many women.
Carol Leifer and Cathy Ladman...
I was in Pennsylvania last week.
I was in the Amish country.
There's a group of people who don't have to think
about what to wear in the morning.
"Well, I guess I'll wear the black hat."
I remember seeing Lois Bromfield drive in
in a convertible-- the blonde, you know, gorgeous.
I honestly believe that alcohol can totally destroy your life.
I believe this.
I had a date with this really neat guy
about three weeks ago, and I was drinking champagne.
And champagne will come up in the middle of a word.
And we're sitting there-- right in the middle of a word.
It was so embarrassing. It was just...
"You know, I'm having a wonderful time."
[laughs]
"Mmm. This is delicious.
You know, I really find you very...
[speaking through belch] ...attractive."
[laughter, cheers, applause]
"That must be my beeper."
[Binder] Did you only play the Belly Room,
or did you play any of the other rooms?
[Goldberg] No, just the Belly Room,
'cause I wander.
[laughter]
Wander, like, telling a story,
then maybe there's something funny,
but then it takes me to something else,
and, you know, takes me forever to get through anything.
[Binder] And you would also get lost in your character.
- Yes, yes. - [Binder] I remember.
That's what I used to remember, watching you in the Belly Room.
I noticed a small staircase
leading up to a big bookcase, and I'm into books.
You know, I got a PhD in literature from Columbia.
- [laughter] - So I...
[laughter]
I know you don't think I was born a junkie.
[Binder] There was one guy that broke right in that time
who was completely different than all these guys.
I would study Steven Wright
and learn how jokes should be constructed.
Like, that's how I learned that jokes are surprise.
Steven Wright wrote one-liners, but he--
they were very much more surreal.
Steven is a little bit more left field
or even walking the foul-pole line.
He invented a delivery style.
Talk about the first Tonight Show shot--
how it went and everything.
You--you got--oh.
We're gonna not only blur that logo out,
we're just gonna blur you out.
- Blur me out completely. - Yeah, it's gonna be--
Just put a squirrel here and animate it.
And don't even have it lined up to what I'm saying.
Would you welcome Steven Wright?
[cheers and applause]
[band playing upbeat music]
[in sullen voice] Thanks.
[laughter]
I had a dream that all the babies
prevented by the pill showed up.
[laughter]
They were mad.
That was my goal in my life, my fantasy--to go on that show.
Tonight Show was why I started doing comedy.
Seeing Johnny and all the comedians--
"Oh, look at these guys," coming out,
five minutes of their funny version
of what happened, then talked to Johnny.
And Johnny Carson changed my life twice,
because once, from watching him--
16 years old, I started.
So then when I went on the show,
then he affected my life the second time.
But so the phone rings in the afternoon,
and Jim McCauley's saying, "Yeah, you wanna go on?"
I said, "What do you mean? From that five minutes
two weeks ago?" "Yeah, yeah."
And, you know, was a quick ten-minute conversation
and I hung up and it was completely surreal.
I called people I knew. No one was home.
And how old were you?
- You were only about 25, 26... - I was 26.
- [cheers and applause] - Good to see you, Steven.
How's it going?
Wonderful.
Did they just let you out for this evening?
[laughter]
Yeah, I have an hour left.
[Johnny] That's... [laughs]
That's wonderfully inventive stuff.
- Thanks. - Really.
Is this your first time on national television?
First time on national television, yes.
Yeah.
How do you feel about it?
Uh...
what?
- [laughter] - I'm in shock.
[Johnny] Did it do--did it go the way
- you thought it would go? - Yeah, it's--it's, uh...yep.
- Yeah. - [laughter]
Yeah, this is the place that I performed in.
[Binder] Yeah. This is a tough room.
When we were working out here, this was the easier room.
But these guys today say this is the harder room.
Why?
The Comedy Store Original Room
is the toughest comedy room in America.
That's my favorite place to do new stuff,
but it's also the scariest place.
Everybody has sweat on that stage.
You literally can't see anything.
It's almost disorienting.
It's like an interrogation lamp.
I like knowing that it can go sideways here
and that I don't really understand why sometimes.
bluesy music
[Wright] Wow. Sam.
[Binder] Were you around when Sam Kinison was around at all?
Just a little bit. He was always very nice.
Wasn't he amazing?
- Were you friends with him? - Yeah.
Sam always used to think that you took a lot of his stuff.
I can see how.
A lot of people have said that to me.
Yeah.
Do you know this guy?
[Steven] Yes, that's the guy--
that's the only guy I ever slept with.
[Cummings] One night--this must have been, like, 2006.
Once every couple months, they'll be just a random panic
at The Comedy Store in the hallway.
And that means someone's there.
And, like, a white Cadillac pulled up,
and then, like, a bunch of other cars pulled up.
And then people were just, like, sprinting around.
Like, the waitresses are sprinting, like--
just--there's chaos.
And it was Dice.
rock music
[Binder] Remember how big he got?
Yeah, he was filling 20,000 seats.
Little Miss Muffet sat on her tuffet...
[cheers and applause]
...eating her curds and whey.
Along came a spider. He sat down beside her.
- He said... - [all] "Hey.
What's in the bowl, bitch?"
Oh!
You know, today anybody becoming big, it's--
"I got 400,000 followers.
I got 300,000 f"--
I didn't follow nobody.
Everybody just followed me into those arenas.
There was no social media.
[Bob] When he started, it was all tapes.
It was systematic, hydromatic, and he'd go around
and smoke the cigarette.
[laughter]
I saw him at Pips in Brooklyn.
His material was all clean.
He was doing impressions of Sylvester Stallone.
[as Stallone] "Hey, yo, Dice."
He would do an impression of John Travolta.
[as Travolta] "What?"
[laughter]
- "Who am I supposed to be?" - [Smirnoff] Elvis.
[as Elvis] Would make my dreams come true
Take it home, man.
[band plays rock music]
[cheers and applause]
I went over to the house, and I said to his father,
"Listen, I think Andrew has a real good shot."
Mitchell Walters saw me playing a little club in Brooklyn
called Pips, and my father, like,
half hung up on the guy all the time
because, like, "Who is he? Who's The Comedy Store?"
Came out to The Comedy Store.
He auditioned. The place went crazy.
[Dice] I was doing the act
where I would turn from Jerry Lewis' Nutty Professor
into John Travolta.
[as Lewis] Actually, ladies and gentlemen,
I'm a human pity.
[normal voice] Take the magic formula,
turn around...
you're John Travolta from Grease.
[Binder] He was just Andrew Silverstein,
and he did all these characters.
And then Dice was just one thing he did.
To his credit, took away the tapes--didn't do 'em.
- So you like impressions, huh? - [audience member] Yeah.
Who gives a shit?
I go, "I'll just become the Elvis of comedy."
And I said it like it was just nothing--
like, just something I gotta get done.
Like, "Next week, I'll become the Elvis of comedy.
It'll be terrific."
[Saget] He found those dirty limericks
and poems and a real "fuck you" to the audience
kind of attitude, like he's a badass guy
who's chauvinistic to women.
But you got a feeling that he wasn't.
When I did that onstage, I'm going, "It's fake."
The reason it's a character is because
I give him zero brains--
not that I'm the smartest guy in reality.
But the reason Dice is still a character
is because, you know, the thinking pattern.
Like, I'd be up there, going, "Are you kidding?
Are they going that crazy for this?"
It was filthy, but it was-- you weren't afraid of him.
All right. Cute girl. How long you dating her?
Almost two years.
Mm, look at those fucking tits.
[laughter, applause]
Now, you can't make like you're embarrassed,
not in that outfit-- no fucking way.
Let me guess what you do for a living.
I don't know. Uh, nothing.
[laughter]
But he was, like, the sweetest guy.
To everybody else, he was Dice,
but if you were on the road with him, he was Andrew.
When he did Ford Fairlane-- what became his first movie--
that was just Dice being Dice.
He never changed.
So even in interviews, he was that guy.
I've got something serious to discuss.
Yeah, what is it? Premature ejaculation?
Ah!
They set up what was supposed to be
the biggest premiere in Hollywood history
at the LA Forum.
They canceled the premiere.
All I remember is, it was a fast drop-off.
He makes all these gay jokes.
I don't see how any man can look
at another guy's hairy ass and want to bang it, you know?
And they're always on parade.
They march up and down the street
with T-shirts and flags.
"I want money for AIDS disease."
Beautiful.
I want money for a new fucking car.
I ain't marching up and down the street.
Get a job, butt-slammer.
And he goes on Arsenio...
You said you're not doing any more AIDS jokes
and there are no gay jokes in this recent project.
Are you maybe admitting that some
of the things in the past are wrong?
No, I'm a comedian, you know,
and I love what I do.
And I think what I do is funny, and there's no reason
people shouldn't be allowed to see that.
It just happened to be at a point in history
where the gays were coming out of the closet.
And the whole gay movement shut Andrew down.
I had to go see Ford Fairlane up on Hollywood Boulevard,
wearing a hood, you know.
Even when it got to Saturday Night Live,
it was like, "Wait a minute.
All these people do character comedy."
Dice is a character onstage.
All this fuss over one stinking show.
I never meant to hurt nobody.
[whimpering]
Look at me. I'm crying like a chick.
[laughter]
That's it.
There's no point in going on anymore.
The Diceman's checking out.
I wouldn't do that if I were you.
[laughs menacingly]
I had to wait, like, an hour and a half to see Lorne.
I was booked to host the show.
I come into his office, and I--
honestly, I couldn't give a fuck who he was.
I sit down, and Lorne goes,
"Ah, it's been a rough day here," you know.
And I go, "Oh," you know.
I feel--I felt awkward.
Like, I lit a cigarette, you know.
And he's, uh--"Yeah, Nora Dunn walked of the show."
And I go, "Oh, I'm sorry."
"I don't know who it is." He goes, "'Cause of you."
I go, "I don't know who she is.
Did I do anything to her?" You know.
He goes, "No, she's a castmate. Don't you watch the"--
I go, "I really don't wa-- I love the show,
but I don't watch it often, so I don't know
who all the castmates are."
OJ is charged with the crime
of maybe cutting people's fucking heads off.
People are outside the courtroom--
"Oh, we love you. We pray for you.
We wanna see you get out."
Andrew Dice Clay tells a fucking dick joke,
people wanna give me the electric chair.
But what about my film?
It did open and was a smash hit,
launching the career
of the most brilliant comedic actor
of his generation...
- Mm-hmm. - Jon Lovitz!
[laughing menacingly]
Jon Lovitz?
- Yes. - You mean that liar guy?
[mumbles] It wasn't his only character.
To get rid of me, they would always say,
"Andrew Dice Clay, AKA Andrew Silverstein,"
and that's the one thing that got me angry,
'cause they might as well say, "Oh, the Jew."
You know, 'cause it was always the Jewish guy acting Italian.
God forbid you're from Brooklyn and you have a badass attitude.
Rodney Dangerfield was Rodney Dangerfield.
They didn't put his real last name.
People said his career was over.
I was just living off of those first ten years of fame,
and then Doug Ellin with Entourage,
he goes, "Listen,
I look at you as the biggest comic that ever lived."
He goes, "I'm giving you this season of Entourage."
All of a sudden, it's Dice mania again.
All of a sudden, there's a special on Showtime.
All of a sudden, here comes Woody Allen,
which I couldn't fucking believe.
And the last movie I did with Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga.
Does he know you sing at all?
Did he--did he hear anything from you?
Dad, I gotta go to work.
This could be the opportunity
- of a lifetime. - I don't have
the same disease that you have, Dad.
And I'm going, "This is nuts."
A different career,
but I never quit fighting for myself.
That's the key.
soft acoustic music
I got very lucky because a really special woman
took me under her wing
at a really special time in her life,
when she had all the power, and she used some of it on me.
[imitating Mitzi] Mike, you're just so great,
and I can really see your potential.
You're so fantastic.
Now, go down and get me some gumballs.
But there was one catch.
- [normal voice] What? - I had to babysit you.
- [Pauly] Yeah, exactly. - And let me
tell you something.
That was a long day.
I had to change your diapers, and you were 14.
Yeah, I remember that.
[Cummings] I can't imagine what it's like
to see someone go from being someone
you babysat to being a movie star.
I mean, I saw him first-- was on my television.
When he was a little boy, we used to all
party at their house.
[Pauly] And I used to be upstairs in my room,
and I'd go downstairs and open up
to a smoked-filled room.
And I'd be like, "Mom, can you please...
keep it down?
I gotta wake up for school."
And we'd be doing blow right in front of him
and smoking pot, and Richard Pryor
and Robin Williams and Chevy Chase
would be in the living room, and he'd listen
to the conversations about comedy.
And I didn't know who these guys were.
They were just my mom's friends.
He was right in the middle of the mix.
But let's be honest. That's not good parenting.
No, it's not good parenting at all.
My whole life, I grew up here. My whole life--
is this the coolest place? Think about it, man.
Look how I turned out, man.
[laughter]
[Apatow] I moved here, and day one,
I go to the Laugh Factory, and who's there?
Pauly was working all the clubs but The Comedy Store.
When I first started doing stand-up, you know,
I knew I would be labeled "Mitzi's kid."
And then when I became known,
she reluctantly made me a paid regular.
Like, she never really made me a paid regular.
I come from, like, a wealthy, divorced family.
Yeah, my mom's wealthy. My dad's divorced.
[Apatow] "And my mom runs it, so I need to please my mom."
Like, every possible Oedipal or terrifying
psychological reason to be too intimidated to do it,
he had to push through.
So you guys can probably tell
I didn't take the college route.
- [laughter] - Yeah.
[Walters] U2, the group from Ireland,
Bono and Edge came into the club here,
and Edge says to me,
"The young kid that went on after you,
the real strange little boy,
is something wrong with him?"
I said, "No. He's the owner's son."
He goes, "Oh, that explains it
'cause I didn't get anything he said."
And then when MTV was looking for people to be on air,
every once in a while, someone would get a shot.
Sandler got a little VJ'ing opportunity,
and he would be on, but they didn't embrace him
in a giant way.
And then Pauly was invited to do some stuff,
and it just exploded.
People went crazy for it,
and suddenly he had his own show.
[Pauly] Totally Pauly.
And then he just broke big and fast.
He was perfect for MTV.
[laughs] I'm back!
The MTV thing obviously really helped me out a lot.
Like, if you watch a guy like Dice and Sam,
they were like human cartoons.
And Pauly, I thought, kind of definitely
tore a page out of that playbook.
- [cheers and applause] - Whoa!
[Allen] It was great watching Pauly.
It was like, "What? That little kid
standing in the hallway?"
And, you know, became a movie star.
What was that like?
It was the best time of my life.
- Oh! [laughs] - Hey!
- [grunts] - Oh, you a funny boy, huh?
[both laughing]
- [grunts] - [tires squealing]
Ah! Oh.
[glass squeaking]
Some of my favorite movies are Pauly Shore movies.
Like, I loved Bio-Dome. I loved In the Army Now.
The Weasel. What are you talking about?
I don't care what anybody says.
If you don't think he's funny, you're crazy.
When the ride kind of ended about being a movie star,
that must have been hard as hell, huh?
No, it was very easy. No, I'm just kidding.
[both laugh]
No, it was only because I-- it was interesting because...
[breathes deeply]
soulful music
You know, most people that have a run like I had...
...after they knew it was over or it was, like, time to chill,
they would pat themself on the back and say,
"Fuck. What an awesome run I had.
That was fucking amazing.
I'm gonna chill, and I'm gonna go to Bali and surf.
I'm gonna go to Europe and, like"--
but I was the opposite for me.
I took it very personal. You know what I mean?
And that was because I just missed
making people happy.
I missed working. I missed--
I mean, that's why when I go out on the streets,
I'm always like this to people because that's who I am.
So they took that away from me.
Hollywood took that away from me.
I think most people that grew up in that scenario
would have just bottomed out.
You know what he said once? [chuckles]
"In the '70s, it was Pryor.
In the '80s, it was Kinison.
In the '90s, it was me."
I look at the stuff you're doing now, and I'm thinking,
"You made it because you were so brave."
[Pauly] Mm.
You were brave right from the get-go.
- And that's what I think... - I love it. I love it.
...the new stuff you're doing feels like--
- [Pauly] Yeah. - Someone who has
cleared the deck to do anything they want to do.
- And your new movie... - Yeah.
- [Pauly] Oh, this backyard. - Shut up and take our money.
What's the catch?
Are you guys here for the party?
rap music
- [all cheering] - [laughs]
Ah! Oopsies!
[Pauly] I want to be happy.
I want to bring happiness to people.
I want to do my projects, and I want to look back
on the good times that I had with both my parents
and smile, you know what I mean?
And be like, "That was fucking awesome."
mellow music
So what do you think of my apartment?
I know that you could be living--
'cause you have a couple of other properties.
But it's cool
that you live in this apartment here in Silver Lake.
It's amazing.
And I'm proud of you, man. You're growing up.
- Thank you, thank you. - Yeah, yeah.
- And, Ku--Ku, question. - [Ku] Yeah?
What do you think of my fanny pack, dude?
It's creepier than you, dude.
[Pauly] Not cool.
[laughter]
smooth music
[Cummings] Do you think, as you look at the great comedians,
do you see a connection between comedians' behavior
and risk taking and outlandish behavior and their talent?
I would argue that this next generation,
we're working our asses off on being mentally healthy
and hopefully are not compromising,
but I do have this little voice in the back of my head
that's like, "Don't get too healthy.
You're gonna stop being funny."
When I was a young guy, I always told myself
that all the great ones, you know,
you have to be out there on a limb.
- Yeah. - But it's a lie.
All it does is cut your work short.
Once I tell myself I shouldn't do it,
there's another thing that goes, "Yeah, you should.
Come on, come on, do it, do it.
It'll be fun. Watch their faces."
He went from doing real material
kind of toward the end
to more about the grandness
of the stardom and stuff.
And he got a little caught up in that.
[screaming] Someone broke your heart!
What was her name?
- Wild Thing - I'll never forgive you!
We were like a rock band.
We traveled like one.
We dressed like one.
We were doing 17,000, 50,000, stadiums.
We were living on a tour bus, traveling around,
and the guy who's in charge is completely out of control.
He couldn't just drink.
He had to drink till he passed out.
Nobody could leave. He was a party goalie.
If you did get to get a chance to escape,
he would call you on the phone and go,
"You're out. You're out.
Don't ever come back. You're out."
There was a lot of onus on who ruled the parking lot.
- Yeah. - Who was the funniest guy?
Who had the best line?
[Carrey] One time I was standing
in the parking lot with my soon-to-be wife, Melissa.
Kinison came up to me, and he said,
"Come on, man, let's hang.
I want to hang with you, man," like that.
And I looked at her, and she looked at me,
and she gave me kind of a look,
like, you know, "We were gonna be together."
And I...
I said, "I think I'm probably gonna go back home
and hang out with Melissa."
And he went, "Oh."
"Well, good luck with your compromise."
- [laughs] - And just walks away.
And, oh, my God, it was devastating.
Melissa and I drove home that night--
literally silence in the car.
That is the cruelest shit ever to lay on somebody.
- Yeah. - But funny, man.
He's like, "I hear you're the new head door guy.
You're the guy."
And I'm like, "Yeah, I'm the guy."
He's like, "Well, let's talk. Let's do it."
So he comes up to Cresthill with, like, an eight ball,
you know, and we're just sitting there doing coke.
And he's, like, looking at me-- he's like,
"Look me in the eye, Maron.
Yeah, can't trust a man that doesn't look me in the eye."
Just doing the whole fucking preacher mind-fuck on me.
The scariest was the one day he came home and he said,
"I'm gonna study the devil.
I've studied God my whole life.
But I want to find out what the devil's about."
Then he started studying witchcraft.
And that, as a friend,
is the scariest fucking thing I ever heard in my life.
He explored everything.
He was exploring a bunch of different stuff.
I don't know how deeply he got into it
or that he just wanted to know what those things said.
Sam used to hold séances back here in this little room.
Alice in Chains' "Man in the Box"
Some agent didn't book him for some thing,
so he put a curse on the agent.
And the agent got in a car wreck
the following week or something like that.
And he was all like, "See, it works."
It's like, "Well, shit, I don't want it to work.
Why can't you pray?" [laughs] You know?
There was a house above The Comedy Store
where I'd lived at for a while called Cresthill
that came with the purchase of The Comedy Store
when Mitzi bought the Store.
My gig was, on Monday nights,
all the freaks would come out of the woodwork.
Sam would show up about 11:30.
He'd give me a few hundred bucks
to go set the house up for a party.
And we'd go till Wednesday or Thursday up there.
Certainly, if this was the college,
then that was the fraternity house.
And, you know, Maron's up there.
One night, for some reason, Sam brings all his guitars
and amps up to Cresthill, and we're gonna jam.
And then they all leave, and Sam leaves his equipment there,
and I put it in my room,
and Dave the Satanist comes.
And Sam doesn't like him.
Like, and there was this argument.
Sam throws a drink in the guy's face
and fucking clocks him, and, like, there's chaos.
And I'm like, "What the fuck?"
And, like, the guy wouldn't leave.
And I locked him in my room, and then I left.
- You locked Sam in your room? - No, the Satanist, yeah.
And then I got to go
because my buddy's coming in from out of town, right?
Got to go pick him up at the airport.
So I leave, and I'm like,
"I can't go back there tonight."
And I told him about Sam and everything.
So we go back over to the house the next day.
And I walk in, there's, like, five people at the table--
Sam and a couple of random people.
And I go look at my room, and the door's been kicked out.
Like, it's broken off the hinges.
I'm like, "What's going on?"
And Sam goes, "I pissed on your bed, Maron.
You wanna know why?"
And I'm like, "Yeah, I do."
He goes, "'Cause you let that freak sleep with my guitars."
I turned to my friend at that moment, and I said,
"I told you I knew him."
[Carrey] When he tried to be healthy,
people were coming up and screaming in his face
and saying, "You're the fucking beast, man."
Once Sam Kinison came in
and I saw that gun on the table--
like, you know, "I'm out of here, man.
What, is this gonna go off accidentally?"
His self-esteem was so low,
he wanted everything he shouldn't have had.
I asked myself, "How the fuck did I not become a drug addict,
an alcoholic, and all that shit?"
Because I watched all you guys do it.
I watched Sam do it. You know, we can go down the line.
You guys were a fucking mess.
So look at you guys-- what not to do.
And, fortunately, I don't have a gene in me
where I can go out and have a glass of wine.
I don't need ten glasses. I don't need to turn it up.
And I guess--I don't know. Can I say you're an alcoholic?
- Yeah. - So you couldn't do
- just one thing, right? - No.
I didn't have that thing in me.
So I have a saying that I came up with
from watching you guys, especially Sam--
"Dance with the Devil. Don't become the Devil."
We were on our way to do Laughlin, Nevada,
and I remember we had a van and his sports car.
And he was driving with Malika, his wife,
and it was a two-lane highway on the road to Laughlin.
And the others followed in the van.
And the kid tried to go around the 18-wheeler
and thought he could make it.
And then our van stomped the brakes,
and then I heard-- like two trains hit.
That's what it sounded like.
And in slow motion, I fell onto the floorboard
of a skidding van that had stomped its brakes.
And when I got out of the right side of this van
and went toward the car,
I saw that the hood of his sports car was crushed up
and there was smoke coming up in the air.
And then there was a pickup truck
with three indentations in the window
where the three boys that were in that truck
had smashed their heads against the glass and left marks.
And when I got to the car,
Sam's body was laying across the middle.
That's when I noticed that just the steering column was there.
He had taken out the steering wheel with his chest,
and he had hit into the windshield.
So he had a little blood on his forehead,
a little blood out of his nose,
and he was just taking deep breaths.
And I said, "Don't move, buddy. Don't move."
And then he forced himself out of the car and landed on me,
and I fell to protect him.
And I was on my butt and he was laid across my arms
and he was looking up and he started talking
to whoever was there that he saw.
And he was going, "I don't wanna die.
I don't wanna die now."
And I said, "You're not gonna die, man; I got you."
And then it dawned on me that he wasn't there,
that he was seeing somebody.
And he goes, "I don't wanna die now.
But why now?"
Guns N' Roses' "Patience"
"Oh."
"Okay.
Okay."
All we need is just a little patience
And he just took off.
And his eyes shut, and I felt him go right through my face.
And it wasn't until someone came up and shook me
and said, "How's he doing?"
And then I realized that he's gone.
He's gone.
And after that, then time turned back into time.
It was normal.
The car noises, everything...quit.
- [sirens wailing] - And I laid him down.
And just as I did, the ambulance pulled up.
And then I went around the car to get his wife,
and she woke up at that point, screaming,
"He's gone, isn't he? He's gone."
She wasn't even awake for any of that stuff.
I think in that moment,
even though I haven't admitted it in many years,
I think I forgave him of all the things he did to me.
You know, I found out he fathered my daughter
after he was dead.
So he was having an affair behind my back with my wife.
And I knew he was doing it with other people,
but I didn't think he was gonna fuck me over, and he did.
Not only did he fuck me over, he fucked my ex-wife over,
'cause I'm sure he had promises with her,
and he didn't keep them.
And he has a little girl out there in the world
that he never got to know.
He lost all that because of drugs and booze
and whatever else was in his head.
I'm lucky I got here.
I got to learn how to forgive myself, of all things.
I got to make things right.
[Binder] Yeah, it's an amazing story.
- That's 40 bucks. - It's an amazing--40 bucks.
[laughter]
[Kerrigan] One of my first nights,
Mitzi was in the Main Room
with a couple other comics, just sitting, late night.
We couldn't leave until she went home.
So she kept ordering stuff, and the club was closed.
It was, like, 3:30 in the morning.
And they were laughing and then crying and laugh--
and I didn't know what the hell was happening.
I'm like, "What are they doing in there?"
And they're like,
"Hey, it's the year anniversary of Sam Kinison."
I'm like, "Oh, okay."
Said, "Woman, take it slow"
And things will be just fine
You and I'll just use
A little patience
Said, "Sugar, take the time"
'Cause the lights are shining bright
You and I've got what it takes
To make it
After Sam, the darkness overtook it.
I saw drug busts here.
It was just a scary place,
and that cocaine just adds to paranoia.
One of the door guys OD'd in the back on heroin.
And I heard
- that there was a period... - Yeah.
When, like, big-name guys would come in.
- And they would just go-- - Run the show.
It was just chaos.
It was the inmates running the asylum.
Paul Mooney,
Carlos Mencia,
Eddie Griffin, Dice Clay--
they ran the room.
[Binder] What does that mean-- they ran the club?
I mean, you're about to go up, and then Dice pulls up.
They would do an hour, two hours.
Two hours? I wish it was two hours.
It was three to four hours.
I'm not gonna say I didn't do it,
but there was really no audiences back then.
One time Eddie got here before nine o'clock
and started and then just closed the place at two.
Didn't get off,
just bumped the whole lineup.
And they would try to get here earlier and earlier
to beat each other 'cause they didn't want to wait
the hour and a half for the other one.
They would go up there and just be famous
and just stand there leaning on the mic stand--
"So what else is going on?"
And then all these younger comics learned,
and they were just, "Oh, someday I'm gonna get a show,
then I'm gonna bump everybody."
A lot of people mention,
"Eddie would go on for, like, three hours."
Sometimes five.
But why?
If you love, eat, shit, and bleed comedy,
like I said, I'm gonna get on that mic, and I'ma go
and I'ma go and I'ma go.
Would the other comics give you a hard time
for doing long sets?
Not really.
He used to be on a sitcom on, like, the CW,
and then he got to fucking ruin all our lives?
After I'd do, like, Philadelphia Spectrum,
all of a sudden, I'm in a comedy club the same night,
and I'd go on, and it would blow Eddie's mind.
He goes, "You just did an hour and a half
of new material."
And I go, "Yeah, 'cause I don't need to do
what I did at the Spectrum.
I'll just work on stuff."
As his career took off now
with the movies and his TV show,
he would start going up and doing hours at a clip.
I don't want to see a comic kill for two hours
in front of a full crowd.
That would just be gross, indulgent.
That'd be like eating too much chocolate.
Are you just-- are you riffing?
Mike, I don't know why you find it hard to believe.
'Cause I've never seen anyone--
My entire career, I have been riffing.
I'd never seen anyone do four hours.
I haven't written a joke yet.
And it was like that for years, dude.
Comics with names didn't even want to come here.
They thought it was a dark energy here.
The '80s boom had ended,
and there was this unbelievably, like, toxic,
like, negative vibe.
The night that I was here, I did not feel welcome,
and I was surprised by that.
I mean, I saw one time-- I was working the door here,
and Steve Harvey walked in.
He goes, "Fuck this club," and he spit on the wall.
A lot of comics hated this place
because they couldn't get time, and Mitzi just didn't see it.
And was there talk that The Comedy Store
- was gonna go under? - Always.
The owner of the club was sick.
And my opinion is, if the owner of the club is sick,
the club's gonna be sick.
Her health started declining right around '98, '99-ish--
beginning stages of dementia.
And when I would help her with her finances--
which I'm like, "Don't ask me.
I'm negative in my account. Why would you--
get a real person that knows how to fix businesses."
She's like, "No, they don't know
what they're doing either."
So I would just go through her paperwork,
and I'd be like, "Oh, my God, this is awful.
This is brutal."
Business was bad,
and it's, like, the comics were running the club.
Like, nobody even knew
who was really running The Comedy Store.
We were going out of business.
She took a second mortgage out on this place.
[Binder] Were you thinking, "Something's gotta come along
- to save this place"? - Yeah, money.
I mean, it seemed like it was gonna maybe
go out of business there for a minute.
What's going on? This is such a weird period.
Is comedy ending?
The Store had died,
and it was just kind of still barely flinching.
The muscles were still there,
but there was just no life in it.
Enjoy it while it lasts. This is the death rattle.
The one thing I used to know about this place
is that if you got a bunch
of hateful fucking monsters up onstage,
then the darkness in the building celebrates.
Still Rebel's "No Way Out"
Oh, been looking for a way out
But I don't give a fuck