The First Joke

I was going to frame it; it just made sense. After all, lots of people frame stuff that’s important to them  – Degrees. GEDs,  Certificates of Completion from Transmission Schools.  And this is important to me even though it’s only a check stub for $50.  The amount is not significant, but the note on the left hand side is. It says, “ Writers Services – Comedy Material Jay Leno”.  Safely tucked under a little pane of glass, this little piece of paper is the first piece of hard evidence that actually proves to everyone (including the IRS, who keep asking about that office deduction) that I’m really a  comedy writer.

I guess this writing thing was a natural outgrowth of doing stand up. For about 18 months after my first open mike night I had been honing my writing and delivery skills at the Comedy Club.  I slurped  up information about comedy the way an anteater sucks up ants.  I even purchased a couple of books on comedy writing.  These quickly became invaluable because they taught me joke structure and the routining of bits.  I even began to write topical one liners and fed it to a couple of local DJs who needed the help.  Payment was in T-shirts and cassette tapes (that tells you how long ago it was).  Nothing like schlepping a couple of jokes for the new Journey album.   About this time I noticed an interesting cover of Rolling Stone Magazine.  It had a joint photo of Letterman and Leno – don’t think you’ll see that happening now without some serious Photoshopping.  What I remember about the article inside was what they wrote about Leno….” A decent, blue collar kind of guy”.  In fact, even he responds to every bit of his fan mail.  An idea germinated.    Hey, what if I sent Leno some of my topical jokes and asked him to critique them?  That would be so cool  – to have some of my own jokes graded by the man who was Johnny’s permanent guest host.

So I got out a legal pad and wrote to Leno, one comedian to another.  Forget that he was guest hosting the Tonight Show and i was about one step beyond knock knock jokes.  I made every effort to suck to up him  (which I admitted in the letter), and then asked the favor.  I enclosed about 4 pages of my comedic gems along with a self addressed stamped envelope.  I asked the future King of Late Night to write some suggestions in the margin and send them back to me.  Considering he got thousands of letters each week, my guess was that I wasn’t going to hear from him for a while.   So, I dropped it in the mail and forgot about it.

Two weeks later, I was working in my office when the phone rang. It was trouble. My wife.

“Uh, I want to ask you something.  Have you sent some kind of letter to Jay Leno?”

My heart jumped, but I stayed cool.  “Why are you asking me that?”

“Because I think I might have just made a fool out of myself.”

Wisely, I let that hanging curveball go right by me.  My years of experience as a husband finally paid off.

“What could you possibly mean?”

“I just got a weird phone call.  Somebody saying they were Jay Leno.  He wanted you to sign a writing contract.  It was really a pretty lame impersonation, so I thought it was one of your idiot comedy friends playing a joke on you”.

Panic flooded me.  “NO NO NO!  Did you hang up?  Did you get a name? Did you get a number?”  I was screaming like George Costanza.  “ Vandalay Industries! Vandalay Industries!”

“Well, they left a name and number, but I’ll bet it’s one of those sex lines.”

“I’ll be the judge of that!  Just give me the number!”

Turns out it was Jay.  He really does read his letters.  More importantly, he read mine and liked the stuff I submitted.  So, I was given the number to his manager.  When I called her, I got a very to the point primer of how to submit material to Jay, and how I would be paid (which was and still is, a check hand signed by Jay).  I work as an independent contractor for Jay.  He only pays me on the jokes he decides to use.  So, it’s the ultimate free enterprise set up.  And no heath care.  Once Jay buys a joke, its his to use.  This whole set up is a lot like a home builder who buys a hammer.  It belongs to him, and he can use it over and over.

Now,  there was this matter of writing jokes.  I began to watch every Monday, looking for style, tendencies, and topics.  I started writing about 5-7 jokes a week (now that number is up to about 50).  Finally, after about a three weeks, I THOUGHT I heard something that sounded like a joke I submitted.  Eagerly, I started watching the mailbox like a Sumo wrestler watches a meat loaf — and got nothing for two weeks.  I even called and asked if a check was coming.  Then I got that envelope, with the Beverly Hills return address.  Inside a light blue check, “autographed by Leno in dark  blue Sharpie.  It may have been a sympathy payment, but I didn’t care.  I was elated.  I was a  professional comedy writer.

The joke?  Oh yeah – here it is:

“Scientists are now saying that drinking cows milk can be hazardous to your health.

I’ll tell you what’s hazardous to your health.  Having your Mom catch you in standing in front of the refrigerator drinking milk from the carton.”

I know, I know.  Anyone of you could have written it.  That’s probably true, but I’m the one who put it on paper.  And because of a fan letter and an open minded late night host, I got a check for it.