Live...in New York City

It was a cold, dark February Saturday night in New York City. I was spending more time there than I wanted to, working on the company annual report. It was one of the big responsibilities of my new corporate job.  I had talked to Jane, as I did every day I was gone, and now wondered what I would do for dinner. Walking around Manhattan is the only way to go. It’s an amazing city. I was getting to know it only too well, making weekly trips for months on end.

One of my good friends had an older brother who was a producer for the NBC Nightly News and it just so happened that the typesetting company (there’s a step back in time) I was working with was just around the corner from Rockefeller Center. A new late night comedy program was making news by being live on Saturday nights. The show was starting to catch on in the first season and I was hooked. I decided to call my friend’s brother to see if he could get me a ticket. He had already given me a great entrée to the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and I had seen Johnny, Ed and Doc live several times while in New York.

He told me people were lining up and there was a long waiting list but he would make a call and try to have my name added.  The line was indeed long. It was all the way around the corner across from Radio City Music Hall and, at first, that discouraged me. I walked past the line and went to the reception desk.  I told the Page there that I was a guest of my friend’s brother. She said that they had my name but I would have to wait over to the side near the elevators.

Soon the line began to move. Elevator after elevator shuttled the masses up to the studio. I had just decided that I was being left in the dust when the Page came over and said, “Quick, catch that last elevator! The producer has your name and he’ll introduce you around backstage. There are no audience seats left.” Who am I to question why? I squeezed through the door just as it was closing.

The elevator opened to controlled chaos. People with headsets running everywhere. A short guy with long hair in a sportcoat came up to me and said, “Hi. I’m Lorne. So you know Joe.” “Yes,” I said, “he’s the brother of one of my best friends.” “Great guy,” he said, “Say hello to Chevy Chase. Let me see if I can find you a chair. Things are pretty hectic right now”

Chevy said that rehearsal a couple of hours earlier had not gone well but some changes had been made and things should be back on track.  Lorne (Michaels, of course, now producer emeritus after all these years) appeared with a metal folding chair and said, “Sit anywhere you want that’s out of the way.  You can meet everyone after the show.”

What can I say. I was witness to the birth of an American comedic institution. They were all there. Chevy doing the news…”And Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead.” Aykroyd selling automotive oil that was a health drink. Belushi as an Indian guru… and Gilda giving her opinion of the Supreme Court ruling on the DEAF penalty ("deaf people already have enough problems!") “Never Mind”. Jane Curtain and Laraine Newman playing reporters and Garrett Morris asking people to send him money for the White Guilt Relief Fund. Academy-Award-Nominee Jill Clayburgh was the host and a newly-discovered Leon Redbone was the musical guest.Even Andy Kaufman had become a semi-regular guest doing odd pantomimes to old records.  I was mesmerized.

The 90-minutes went by in a flash…but then, after the now-traditional group hug on stage at the end of the show, which actually took place backstage then, Lorne came up and told me to join in and meet the gang. I don’t think they knew that they were creating a staple of American life, generating catchphrases for generations and producing many of the greatest comedic talents that our country has ever seen. Belushi was cracking everyone up and Gilda, still in her Emily Litella garb from the news, was making sure that each cast member received her admiration and approval.

I’m glad that I didn’t go out to dinner that night. At about 2 am, I picked up my favorite pastrami and chopped liver sandwich and a Dr. Brown’s crème soda from the Carnegie Deli, went back to my hotel room and just thought about the experience. It was new. It was exciting. It was funny. They were even so far ahead of the curve that they depicted a lesbian wedding between two movie actresses to end the show. Sometimes now I think it would have been great to have had a phone with a camera…but when I think more about it, I feel like it would not have been the same indelible experience with today's technology. It was truly an "acoustic" evening. For sure, I have to count it as one of my all-time favorite “brushes with greatness”.