So here I am, a down and out stand-up comedian. I have been traveling back and forth from Los Angeles to New York and every place in between. I don't make much money, just enough to get from town to town. I sleep in my car and take bird baths at gas stations and have eaten bologna sandwiches daily for the last six years. Most days I feel like killing myself, but the one thing that keeps me alive is to know that I’m funny by telling these stories…
One day back in Los Angeles I parked my car in Hollywood and took the red line metro downtown to the skid row section. They have run down hotel rooms for $12 dollars a night. I like to go there sometimes when I'm L.A. so I can take a shower and sleep all day. while walking to the hotel, this big black Rolls Royce stops in front of the hotel and a big black guy gets out of the car and started chasing this girl around the corner leaving his driver side door wide open. I swear there was nothing around but crack-heads and heroin- junkies, no one even looked twice at this car. I walked by the Rolls Royce and saw a nice black leather bag on the passenger's seat. I don't know what made me do it but I grabbed that bag out of that car and started running down the street to the metro station. I caught the red line back up to Hollywood and kept thinking that the big black guy was going to be there waiting for me. I ran to my parked car and I finally looked in the bag to see what I got. It was 5 bricks of cocaine. At least I think it was cocaine and as soon as I saw them I thought to myself I'm a dead man if I stay in L.A, so I sat in my car and started to cry. What have I got myself into now, I wondered to myself.
After crying for about an hour I decided that the only person that could help me was Anthony. Anthony was this comedy club owner in New York City. Anthony was connected to a certain New York family, if you know what I mean. I only had $142 dollars on me, not enough to make it to New York, so my plan was to go up to San Francisco to see if I could get some gigs to help me on my journey to New York City. I swear as soon as I crossed the Bay Bridge I got a call from Tony Sparks. Tony is the don of comedy in San Fran and he asked me when I would next be back in the city. I told him I had just crossed the Bay Bridge. Tony said, "Good, be at the club at 10:00pm."
I got to the club and had a great set, even sold 10 DVDs of my stand up at $10 dollars a pop. At the end of the show Tony gave me $190, 40 dollars more than normal. I told Tony that I needed to work my way back to New York, so Tony made a few phone calls and set me up. I did about 25 shows from San Francisco to New York. No show paid more than $150 dollars a gig. It took me 3 weeks to get there, but at about 4 in the morning I made my way down to Time Square and found a parking garage to park my car. It was only down the street from Anthony's club and I knew he wouldn't be there until 4 or 5pm. So I just slept in the car and didn't wake up until 6pm.
After I got up I made my way down to the club. As soon as I walked in, I heard a loud, "Heyyy!" It was Mike, Anthony's partner in the comedy business. Mike was Jewish, but he acted more Italian than the Italians. He had the slicked back hair with his shirt unbuttoned down to his stomach and of course the pinky ring. Mike walks up, gives me a hug and says, "What are you doing here, Hollywood?" He is the only one who calls me Hollywood, because I prefer L.A. over New York in the winter time. Mike said I should have called, I said “I know, but I really need to talk to Anthony, it's important.” Mike walks over to Anthony’s office, opens the door and yells; "Guess who's here to see you? It's Hollywood."
Anthony sees me and let's out a loud “ohhhh,” comes over and gives me a hug. He says, "Why didn't you call if you were coming to town?" Anthony looked bigger. He was about 6' 4" or 6' 5" and 350lbs easy with a salt and pepper beard. He always wore sweat pants and a tee shirt with some kind of pasta stain on it, but he always wore very nice pair of dress shoes. I asked Anthony if I could talk to him in private and we walked into his office. As soon as we walked in, Anthony offers me some of his mother's pasta. I said no thanks, but then he insisted. So I ate the pasta and it was pretty good. Anthony sits in his chair and said, “If you want stage time you got it. I'll have Francisco put you up, and you can go up tonight." I told Anthony that is not why I'm here.
I handed Anthony the black bag, “What's this?” He says while opening the bag. He looks inside and pulls out one of the cocaine bricks and says, "Is this what I think it is?" I said “I'm pretty sure it is.”as I shrugged. Anthony got mad as if offended and started yelling, "Why the fuck would you bring this into my club? Get this out of my club now!" "Anthony please, I really need your help," I said in desperation. I tell him the whole story on how I got the bag; how I tried to teach that guy a lesson about leaving his door wide open. I thought it would make a great joke. I did not expect that to be in there. Then I told him that this could change my whole comedy career. That I could buy my way into Hollywood just like those rich white boys. Anthony hands me the bag and says, "Go outside, and wait across the street." "So you're going to help me right?" Anthony looks at me for a minute and says, "Just wait across the street."
I took the bag and went across the street from the club. I waited for about an hour and a half when Anthony finally came out of the club with this other Italian guy. They walked up to me and Anthony said, "This is Vic, go with him and if you got what you think you got then you'll be taken care of." Anthony then grabs me by the back of my neck and says, "Don't ever bring nothing like that in my club again, you go it?" I said yeah, okay and don't worry as Anthony walked back across the street and into the club.
Vic said follow me and we went to a really nice hotel just a few blocks down the street from the Comedy Club. Once inside the hotel room Vic grabs the bag out of my hand, pulls out one of the bricks of cocaine and tests it with some kind of kit. He takes a little bit of the coke, puts it in a device and the water turns blue. Vic begins to smile and says that I got some really good shit. "Wait here, I'll be back in a couple of hours." "What do you mean a couple of hours? Wherever that bag goes I go." I said. Vic shrugged and said, "Hey kid do you want my help or what?" The funny part about it was I am pretty sure that I was older than him. I stared at him and then Vic goes, "Then shut the fuck up! Order yourself some room service if you want," then Vic took the bag and left.
So I did the only thing I could do. I called for room service, ordered a bacon cheeseburger and asked for a 5th of Jim Beam Black. Then I ordered porn on the T.V. and jacked-off twice! I drank damn near the whole bottle of Jim Beam Black and passed out on the bed. Vic finally came back and woke me up by kicking the bed. I sat up and looked at Vic, still trying to fully wake up. Vic yelled get up and walked over to the table and put the wad of money on top. "I got you 17.5 a brick, but if Anthony asks, you tell him I got you 20 a brick, okay?" I did not understand shit from what he just said. I just looked at all that money and said, “Is this all mine? I have never seen so much money before in my life and I swear my dick started getting hard from the site alone of all that money. Vic said, “Yeah that is your money! Eighty-seven thousand and five hundred dollars. But you tell Anthony I gave you a hundred thousand dollars, okay? You got that?” I looked at him and that is when Vic said you ever seen that kind of money before? I just smiled and said I had seen more. Vic said "Get your money and get the fuck out of here. I've got one of my bitches coming over, so hurry up." I said nothing, I grabbed the money, put it in the bag and left.
I went back to my car and started counting the money. After counting the money the first thing I thought was, I'm going to buy me some pussy, but first I had to do the right thing and see Anthony at the club. So I hid the money in the trunk of my car, put 5 grand in my pocket and went back to the club.
As soon as I walked in and saw Anthony yell over to Mike: "You owe me 5 bucks." He then turns around toward me and finishes under his breath, "…you cheap Jew bastard." I just smiled and asked what that was all about. Anthony shakes his head and says, “So you want to get on stage tonight or what?” I tell him I'm here to pay my
respect and to give thanks. Anthony says, “Yeah you can go and get your ass on stage.” I tell Anthony that I didn't feel like going up, that I just wanted to hit the road back to Hollywood. Anthony looked me right in my eyes and says, "Don't let that little bit of money go to your head. You're a comedian. Now get your black ass on stage." I walked to the back of the club and got me a shot of Jim Beam Black to calm down and got on the stage. I had a great set. I think I could have sold all my comedy DVDs, but I forgot to bring them with me. After the club closed, I stayed and had a couple of drinks with Anthony, Mike and Francisco, but I got to be honest; that money was burning a hole in my pocket and I could not wait to spend some of those bills.
After drinking with Anthony and them I left the club, went and got a hotel room that cost me $800 dollars a night. I paid for two nights, because I knew I would not wake up for check-out and I didn't want to be bothered either. I went up to my room and called
over two hookers that cost me another $1,200 each. I figured I had plenty and since you only live once, I thought fuck it and had one of the best nights of my life.
They were only supposed to be there for two hours, but they stayed until 11:00am and after they left I slept for 12 hours. I woke up, took a shower and checked out of the hotel at 12:45am. I decided to hit the road, I walked down to my car and thought to myself I've never been to Miami, so I hopped in my car and hit I-95 south down to Miami and stayed for three days and had the time of my life. Just drinking and sleeping with as many women as I could. I spent $12,000, or maybe $14,000 dollars. I'm not sure, but I then hopped in my car and went to New Orleans. I only stayed there for one day, but still managed to spend $2,000 on nothing. I swear I don't know how I spent that much money. Then I went down to Texas and got so drunk that I crashed my car on one of those dark freeways. I passed out while at the wheel and ran into a ditch so hard and fast that the airbag deployed.
Luckily there was not as much as a scratch on me which was in itself amazing, because my car was fucked up. I grabbed my money out of the bag and stuffed it all in my pockets and left the bag in the car. I started to walk and thought up an explanation I could tell. I walked approximately ten miles to a motel. Once there, I called the cops and said that I was robbed at gun point. Ten minutes later the cops show up at the motel and ask me what had happened. I told the cops that I was driving down the road when this guy flagged me down as if his car had broken down. After I pulled over and got out of the car a second guy came out of nowhere, put a gun in my face, hopped in my car and drove away. The other guy jumped back in his car that I had thought was broken down and took off. The cops asked me if I could describe them. I said that the whole thing happened so fast that it was impossible to get an accurate description. “All I know is they were white,” was the best I could come up with on the spot. The cops asked me a couple more questions and told me not to get my hopes up about them finding the car. I sat there shaking my head. The manager of the motel felt so bad for me that he gave me a free room for the night and as I got up to go to my room, the cop gets a call on his walkie-talkie and announces that they might have found my car.
Now this is where the acting began. I screamed out, “Thank God!” I then asked if I could get my car back tonight. They told me it had been wrecked in a ditch. I just held my head up and acted like I was trying to hold back the tears. The cop asks me to ride with him to find out if it was really my car. I get in the car with him and drive to where my car was located. Once we came up to the ditch, I told them that it was my car and then yelled out a loud FUCK! for effect. That is when the cop said, "It could have been a lot worse and who ever wrecked your car is going to need medical attention so we'll check the hospitals. Don't worry, we'll find those guys." He let me get my stuff out of the car and drove me back to the motel as they towed my car away. Back at the motel I thanked the cop for all his help and went to my room and couldn't believe they fell for that hook, line and sinker. I guess people love a good story, even cops.
The next day I went to a used car dealership and got a new car for $9,800 dollars because I knew if I had spent over $10,000 dollars in cash that it would have tipped off the IRS, so I just got a Toyota to stay under the radar. I switched my insurance over to that car and the best part was my insurance company said they would mail me a check for the damage done to my other car to my P.O. Box in L.A.
Now I had to decide what to do next. I stopped at a gas station to fill up my new car and while at that gas station I saw Sean Green, another comedian from L.A. We got to talking and Sean said that he was in Texas headlining a couple of shows and asked me if I wanted to open for him. It turned out his opener went back to L.A. because his girlfriend threatened to leave him, so he caught the next greyhound back. Sean said he was going to have one of the locals open for him but would rather have me open. I said fuck it and followed him to some hillbilly town with loads of rednecks. We checked into a motel where they had a free room for Sean. He said I could stay in his room and that he would have them put a cot down for me. I said no thanks and asked for the nicest room they had. Sean just looked at me with this weird I-can't-believe-you-are-spending-your-own-money type look. We went to our rooms and got ready for the show. A couple of hours later, Sean came and got me so we could go and do the show. It was at a small bar right across the street from the motel. The place only sat about 45 people and I thought this could be my chance to live out one of my fantasies and get into a bar room fight with a lot of rednecks just like in the movies. I always wanted to do that, so I went on stage and started saying honky this and honky that, thinking that would get them going and make them want to fight. Turned out they loved it and it seemed like every redneck in the joint wanted to buy me a drink after I got off stage. I didn't even try to sell any of my DVDs because I was mad that no one wanted to fight, so while Sean was on stage I left.
I didn't even get paid. I just went back to the motel and started drinking by myself. I was feeling depressed and the funny thing about it was I'm not even a fighter. I just wanted the story, a funny story to tell, but at the same time I'm glad it didn’t go down, because like I said I'm not a fighter. Later that night Sean came to my room and gave me $150 dollars and asked why I left. I told him that I wasn't happy with my set. Sean said I did great and he could not believe that I got away with talking all that shit. He said they loved it and kept asking him where I was. I stayed in Texas for another week opening for Sean spending more money than I made.
At the end of that week Sean said that he was going back to L.A. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do; go either back to L.A. or shoot up to Chi-town. That's when Sean said he had never seen me act so crazy with money before. Then Sean got real serious and looked me right in the eyes and said, “Are you dying?” I said, “What?” And Sean asked me again, “Are you dying?” I told him no and was almost tempted to tell him the story, then thought it best not to. I just sat there laughing and that's when Sean said, "Hey man I don't know what's going on with you, but you're not acting like yourself. I mean I remember you use to hold on to every dollar like some tight ass Jew and now you're spending money like its water. Come back to L.A. with me and whatever you're going through I'll help you the best I can. I can help you get more spots at the bigger clubs."
I thought about it for a minute, thanked Sean and told him I would take him up on his offer. I mean I kind of did go crazy. I spent $40,000 dollars in two weeks and I made a promise to myself and Anthony to do the right thing with the money and all I had been doing is getting drunk and sleeping with hookers. It was time to go back to L.A. and do the right thing with the money. I told Sean I would meet him in L.A. So I left Texas and started back for Hollywood and when I got there, I had $48,000 dollars left. I went and hired the top publicity company in Hollywood which cost me $20,000 dollars, but that is when I started to see pictures of myself in magazines and I started doing T.V. spots. Soon those spots finally led to movie roles. I paid 20,000 dollars to get into Hollywood, but talent kept me working. Now I’m a national headliner, a movie star and I'm making a shit load of money, but when I'm in New York I like to play Anthony's club for free. I just drink all the Jim Beam Black I can for free while I'm there and that is just fine with Anthony. Oh yeah, thanks Sean Green for being a friend; if not for you I think I would have spent all that money. And if you don't know who I am by now, you never will!
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