Lost in the Funhouse: The Life and Mind of Andy Kaufman by Bill Zehme

Author:Bill Zehme [Zehme, Bill]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Autobiography
ISBN: 0385333722
Amazon: B0030P1W6S
Publisher: Delta
Published: 1999-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

George Shapiro and Howard West had sold him to the American Broadcasting Company with some ingenuity, and with a caveat, in that he would be the delightful Foreign Man on the network as and when needed, first in a sitcom pilot already developed to suit him and then as a guest performer on six variety specials hosted by other people (guaranteeing him $30,000 inside of one year at $5,000 per appearance whether or not he was utilized)—but, more importantly, he would be supplied a budget of $110,000 to create and produce a late-night special for himself, plus an additional $25,000 to write his own sitcom pilot. And the economics of it all meant nothing to him and he told George to call Stanley and give him the financial details, then and ever after, because he just wanted to focus on the work. On March 29 he fulfilled his first obligation and taped the pilot for a “futuristic” sitcom called Stick Around, in which Foreign Man was an android household servant (named Andy) employed by a most annoying family-of-tomorrow and it was an odorous endeavor beyond redemption, which the network instantly realized, opting not to turn it into a series, although the executives had liked his work as the robot. Robot … oh … he would be a robot again … later … in three years … it would be a very bad thing … very very extremely bad thing … and the makeup he would wear … taking hours and hours to apply … he would look like lacquered fruit and, oh, the smell … and they said it would almost be like an art film … George even thought so … but … oh…. Foreign Man then did de Redd Foxx variety special and was very funny interrupting de nightclub sketch and somehow ABC had no other variety specials for him to infiltrate for the remainder of the contract year and so there was thirty grand for a day’s work, not that he understood, though George and Howard and Stanley did. And, in June, Foreign Man went with George to the production offices of the game show The Hollywood Squares hoping to secure a celebrity square for him to occupy and the producers were amused at the outset of the visit but grew less so as the mask did not drop and minutes passed and the pidgin-dither continued and producer Jay Redack said finally, “Well, lookit—shit—we’re getting no place. Time is valuable here and so if you’re gonna fuck around …” And Foreign Man was truly stunned by the outburst and George yanked him out of the meeting then sent Andy back in and Andy was perfectly congenial but said nothing of what had just transpired and got his square and George whispered to Redack afterward, “That’s the first time I ever saw him break character like that!” And Foreign Man taped a week of shows for them, although he was never asked to return.

Uncle Andy’s Fun House was

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