Gasping for Airtime - Jay Mohr [26]
One of the few true collaborations I experienced was when Travolta hosted. The sketch was “Welcome Back, Kotter Directed by Quentin Tarantino.” The Sweathogs were Travolta as Barbarino; Tim Meadows as Washington; Mike Myers as Kotter; David Spade as Horshack; Sandler as Epstein; Janeane Garofalo as Julie; and I played Mr. Woodman, the principal. Dave Mandel, Al Franken, and I were hammering out the beats late one night in Franken’s office and things were clicking. We weren’t tipping the sketch or making it too jokey, and it felt great.
Mandel knew Reservoir Dogs the best, Franken knew the show, and I know both well enough to round out the beats. All the lines I suggested were good, and they were met with positive reinforcement. Franken would throw his head back, slap his knee, and bellow with laughter. There was a slight hesitancy on my part, thinking that he might just be fucking with me. I didn’t know how to react to someone actually liking my ideas. We hammered that sketch out in six hours. That was an evening of quality.
The sketch opened with Myers (as Kotter) asking, “Did I ever tell you about my uncle Sid?” Then it launched into a rendition of “Little Brown Bags,” the Reservoir Dogs theme song. This was followed by the Sweathogs walking in slow motion to “Little Brown Bags.” I enter the room as Mr. Woodman and complain about the noise, at which point they all tie me to a chair and pour gasoline over my head. Travolta then dances toward me with a razor. Just before Travolta cuts off my ear, the door flies open and special guest Steve Buscemi bursts into the room brandishing a gun. The Sweathogs all pull their guns. It’s a Mexican standoff. Finally, all the guns go off at once and everyone drops dead.
Mondays quickly became my favorite night of the week because each one brought with it hope and opportunity. I would meet the host, who was usually one of the hottest stars in the country at the time, and afterward the host and a few people from the show would all go out to dinner. After dinner, we would all pile into cabs to go play basketball together. The dinners with the other cast members were when I felt the best. I was one of them. More important, I was one of them in public. It was amazing to sit in a restaurant next to David Spade and across from Chris Farley. Other patrons in the restaurant would point and ask for autographs. Even though no one ever asked for mine, I didn’t care. I was with them when they signed their autographs, and I would be with them when they shot their first basket. I would also be with them on Saturday night with the world watching.
Every once in a while, that week’s host would come along and play basketball with us. George Clooney was a great player. David Duchovny could hit a jump shot from anywhere on the floor. I basked in these evenings well into the next day, when someone would inevitably ask me, “What did you do last night?” Basketball wasn’t really my thing, but it felt great just to be running up and down the court.
When Jason Patric hosted, he arrived in the early afternoon. He had heard that we played basketball and wanted to know if he could play, and if so, where the gym was located. I didn’t know which gym we would be playing at yet, so I gave him my phone number and told him to call me at my apartment, where I was going to change clothes after the pitch meeting. When I walked in, the message light