Live From New York

One November years ago I wanted to celebrate my birthday in style. So thanks to friends-of-friends (and a well-placed charity donation) my then husband and I flew to NYC to spend a week at SNL.  This was the era of the famous “Superfans-Da Bearz” skits and before I headed east, my son Nick and I bought Chicago Bulls hats for all the male members of the cast.  It was the Michael Jordan three-peat era and we thought they’d might like them.  All except Mike Meyers.  I bought him a Blackhawks hockey hat.  He’s Canadian, eh?

Joe Pesci was supposed to be the guest host that week and I was stoked.  Loved him in Raging Bull and Good Fellas.  But when we arrived on set for the first day of rehearsal, we were told that he had cancelled and a sub was coming in.  Tom Hanks.

Different kind of eh.  As in I was disappointed.  I mean I liked Tom Hanks in Big- but Bosom Buddies? All his great work was still ahead of him.  He wasn’t a legend then.  Just a nice guy and hard-working actor who clearly considered himself lucky to have gotten the gig.  But I got quickly over my disappointment when I saw how he killed himself in every take in every rehearsal.

(Did you know there is a theater tradition to “walk through” rehearsal?  It’s a time-honored/superstition thing and it’s considered bad form if you really emote during this practice period. It’s kind of like showing off.  Read Moss Hart’s  Act One – the bible of Broadway – if you don’t believe me.  But clearly Tom Hanks had never read Act One, because from the very first word of the very first skit, he acted as if the Emmy Award Nominating Committee was waiting in the wings with the envelope.)

And after countless script changes this required super-human effort. After five days of rehearsals I was worn out from just listening to the same slightly-tweaked bits over and over again.  But Tom was the consummate pro and gave 1000 per cent (hey, Kevin, can that be right?) each and every time.

Showday Saturday arrived and we skipped the last dress rehearsal. Our friends-of-friends clout had brought us seats right on the stage floor (as opposed to the peanut gallery up above) and we wanted to look refreshed and camera-ready in case we actually appeared on tv. We arrived at 30 Rock at the appointed hour and were whisked upstairs to Studio 8H to wait in the V.I.P. Friends and Family Line. All I can tell you is that waiting in the line with all the cast members’ relatives was more fun than anything I had ever done in my life up to that point.

Then a stage manager ushered us to our seats right in front of “home base.”

“There’s a gift from the cast for you, Ellen.  It’s under your chair,” he whispered.

I couldn’t have been more surprised- until I opened the bag.  In it was a SNL t-shirt signed by all the cast members and special guest stars.  Jay Leno had a bit on “Weekend Update” that night and he had even drawn a big-chinned self-caricature as part of his signature. Adam Sandler had written “I love you.”  Everyone had signed – except Chris Rock.  As angry as Nat X in real life for his perceived short shrift of airtime, he wasn’t signing no @##$!@#$# shirt for no @!!@$##@ white woman.

But Kevin Nealon, Molly Shannon, Maya Rudolph, Dana Carvey, Chris Farley, David Spade, Phil Hartman, Mike Meyers, Siobhan Fallon, Victoria Jackson, Melody Hutsell (remember her great “Moon Dance” skit?) all signed it.

And wait- there’s more.  Tom Hanks and the night’s musical guest had also included fabulous, candid, autographed pictures in the bag for me.  They were taken by SNL’s official on-set photographer, Edie Baskin, and they were awesome.  Oh, did I happen to mention that the special musical guest was Bruce Springsteen in his first live televised appearance?  I felt pretty lucky to be born in the USA that night, I can tell you.

Truth be told I was in shock.  The gift bag had blown me away and the rest of the show went by in a blur.  I’m sure it was great but I had to go back to Winnetka and watch the tape Nick had made for me because I don’t remember anything much of the live performance.

When it was over, our social sherpa, Edie, rounded us up and the four of us (her beau had joined up post-show) headed over to the cast after-party. This blowout was held at Sam’s Café- Mariel Hemingway’s husband’s restaurant on the Upper Eastside.  When we walked in Edie strode over to the maitre d’ and announced, “We’re now going to be six.  Have Bruce and Demi arrived yet?”

That did me in.  I had a mini-seizure right in front of his podium. I didn’t think the evening could get any better than the gift bag and now we were going to be with Mr. Moonlighting/Die Hard himself. (In a small world coincidence, when I had called home earlier that night, Nick had told me he was watching The Last Boy Scout.  Now I was having fashionably-late supper with him.)

Let me just state for the record that in person- him?  Small, skinny and ripped.  And quiet.  But her?  In real life, the MOST beautiful creature I had ever laid eyes on.  Black hair and gray eyes.  And that voice.  Smoke-filled and incredibly alluring.  Even at her box office height, no film has ever done her looks justice. Trust me on this.

But I managed to get over my stupification when the cast poured in. I had the hats and  heartfelt compliments ready to go and when I gave each guy his hat and my thanks for his t-shirt signature, I got a stunned thank you from them.  Super-stardom was in most of these guys’ futures, and they were all, to a man, surprised and grateful. Chris Farley bent me over backwards and French-kissed me.  Which delighted Adam Sandler so much that he insisted on dancing with me.
And we all “played” and re-enacted some of our collective favorite SNL bits.

Phil Hartman and I did “Dysfunctional Family Feud.” (What a tragic, awful end for that  talented man.)  Kevin Nealon, Dana Carvey and I did some very Hans und Franz “pumping up.”  And once I got a very, very shy Mike Meyers to meet my eye, the moments we shared doing “Coffee Tawk” were like buttah- sheer Land O’ Lakes buttah.

When I climbed down off of cloud nine and came back home, I had the precious SNL momentos framed.  They’re valuable keepsakes, of course. But the moments I shared with the cast guys in our youth- priceless.

Post Script: A few weeks later, as we were home watching the latest SNL “Superfans” skit, Nick suddenly piped up.

“Look, Dude.  They’re wearing your hats!  I recognize the Bulls logo. They’re the new ones we bought them.”

I peered at the screen and he was right.  Chris Farley, Robert Smigel and Mike Meyers were all wearing my hats.  And that was the absolute best part of the whole great shebang.  The moment was simply glorious.

Or should I just say it was like “buttah?”