I'd drop whatever I was doing to show up to do the graveyard shift of 'America's Shopping Place.'
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
My mom would be leaving the house and she'd say, 'Don't you pull out all of the old dresses in the attic and put on a show again!' And the door would close, and that's exactly what I'd do. The show was calling me!
I'd get home at 3:30 A.M. from the bar after my shift ended at 1. I'd write jokes, film it, and then sleep. So I did that for two years.
I would roll up pennies to take the subway to work in Times Square. I was broke, but I was happy.
I'd get kicked out of buildings all day long, people would rip up my business card in my face. It's a humbling business to be in. But I knew I could sell and I knew I wanted to sell something I had created. I cut the feet out of those pantyhose and I knew I was on to something. This was it.
I'd stand on a coffee table, and my cousin Edith would give me dimes, and you put the dimes on your head... And when your forehead was full, show was over.
I would fly to Los Angeles just for a cheeseburger with pickles and extra tomatoes from In-N-Out.
If I was a criminal, stationery stores and bakeries would be the two kinds of places I would concentrate on.
My grandmother and I would go see movies, and we'd come back to the apartment - we had a one-room apartment in Hollywood - and I would kind of lock myself in this little dressing room area with a cracked mirror on the door and act out what I had just seen.
I'd watch my father get up at 5 o'clock and go down to the Eastern Market in Detroit to do the shopping for his restaurant, and get that business going and then go out on his vending machine business.
I would go to the all-night grocery store and pretend that I was at Studio 54 because it was the only place open all night. Truman Capote in the frozen foods. Andy Warhol over in vegetables.