Gasping for Airtime - Jay Mohr [44]
To this day, I don’t know what happened to those pills.
In my second season, Farley struck again in a “Motivational Speaker” sketch. I was only in the sketch because Spade had been trying to score at a party full of models. He thought his chances were good, so he had called Downey and asked to be removed from the sketch. He then wouldn’t have to return for rehearsals that night. After Downey told me about Spade, it became a running joke between us. Whenever David would call and say he wasn’t making rehearsal, Downey would hang up and give me Spade’s part in the sketch. The more famous Spade became, the better his odds to score a model became, and the more sketches I got in.
In this “Motivational Speaker” sketch, Michael McKean was playing a wealthy Spanish father of two. He explained to his kids, who were played by Morwenna Banks and me, that he had called the United States to enroll the help of a motivational speaker (that is to say, Farley as Matt Foley). Chris’s part was written entirely in Spanish. America had probably seen Matt Foley ten times—but never speaking Spanish.
Farley entered the stage, shouting at the top of his lungs: “Hola, mis niños! Me llama señor Matt Foley!” Keeping a straight face was impossible. The audience erupted when Chris delivered the money line for the first time in Spanish: “Van cerca del río!”
McKean’s character explained to Señor Foley that both he and his children spoke excellent English, so speaking in Spanish was not necessary. Chris as Matt Foley responded, “Padre, donde por favor and ferme ton grande YAPPER!” That’s when I was supposed to say my line. It was simple. All I had to do was open my mouth and say, “Señor Foley, where did you learn your Spanish? Taco Bell?”
The problem was that Chris had screamed his line so loud into McKean’s ear that he covered him in spittle, causing him to move back a step. I struggled to keep from becoming a member of the audience myself. Although I was in the sketch, I was being treated to an incredible performance. I bit my tongue and tried to think of things that weren’t funny. I thought of dead babies and naked grandmothers, but resistance was futile. Chris was standing on the stage, but he was also taking up all of the space between my ears. Finally I decided that if I was a teenager and Matt Foley was in my living room in Spain, screaming into my father’s ear in terrible Spanish, I would think it was funny and most likely giggle. I said the line and laughed at the same time, making it barely audible.
Then Chris sauntered across the set toward me and put his hand on top of my head and began to tussle my hair. To the audience it looked endearing—but we all knew better. As he shouted, “Muy cómico es el Paul Rodriguez?” he continued to rub his hand back and forth until my black wig was now draped over one of my ears.
For the rest of the sketch I was delusional. I didn’t know whether to fix my wig or just to continue with the wig hanging on the side of my face. The audience watched the entire process unfold, and an entirely different dimension of laughter filled the studio. Chris had all of us by the jugular. I should have been at least a little prepared. In dress rehearsal, Chris had tugged gently on the hair on my wig, making it come loose but not off. I giggled through that exchange as well. In the meeting in Lorne’s office between the dress rehearsal and the live show, Lorne looked at me and said, “Jay, do you think you could do us all a favor and not laugh through the entire sketch?” I said