Gasping for Airtime - Jay Mohr [59]
Though I assured her that wasn’t the case, I don’t think she believed me. Even after my summer writing binge, I was light-years from having enough sketch ideas that I could work Eric Clapton into any of them.
I truly believed that my second year on the show would be different. During our summer hiatus, I had filmed a movie entitled Stranger Things for Castle Rock Entertainment, Rob Reiner’s production company. The movie was directed by Jason Alexander of Seinfeld, and he starred in it along with Joe Mantegna, Lolita Davidovich, and James Woods. By auditioning, I had landed the part of Joe Mantegna’s bumbling nephew. All my scenes had funny stuff in them, and I was thrilled to finally be in my first motion picture.
It was evident early on during production that Joe, James, and I had a great chemistry for comedy, or at least I thought we did. I had the time of my life as I acted across from an Academy Award nominee and a seasoned pro. Almost every day we shot, I thought about how when the film became a blockbuster hit, people all over the country would watch Saturday Night Live with renewed interest because “that guy Jay Mohr is on it.”
But it wasn’t long before my big hit movie evaporated. The movie was edited by early fall, and I was invited to a screening at the Galaxy Theater in Hollywood. My agent warned me that the studio’s holding a pre-release screening and not a premiere wasn’t a good sign. The entire night was steeped in foreshadowing—beginning with my running out of gas on the way to the theater in the pouring rain.
But when Jason Alexander took the stage to introduce the film, I knew the fix was in. He was wearing a red sweater the exact color of the curtain behind him. With all the spotlights shining on him, all you could see was his head and his jeans. I leaned over to Nicole and said, “Who told him to wear the red sweater? Maybe there should have been a change of clothes in the car in case there’s a red curtain in the theater. What are the odds? Maybe fifty-fifty.”
Then the lights went down and the film started. Three minutes into the movie I knew it was going to be a disaster. The tone was all wrong. The music was all literally in Seinfeld instrumental tones. Jason and Lolita had this long courting scene in which they skirted the issue of their relationship. It lasted so long it became torturous to watch.
I had returned from summer to 30 Rock with a real swagger about the movie. Just wait until this baby hits the theaters, I thought to myself. I spent three months telling my coworkers and anyone else who would listen to keep their eyes peeled for Stranger Things. But even if they had their eyes peeled, it would have been difficult for them to find the film. The title was changed from Stranger Things to For Better or Worse, and the film went straight to video.
When I went back to the seventeenth floor for the first time, I felt something there I never had before: familiarity. All the tables were in the same place and all the walls were where I left them. I knew the people around me. I knew what they sounded like. I knew their personalities. I had seen them laugh, and I had seen them scream.
At the first table read, I had two sketches. One of them didn’t get any laughs. It was funny in my head the night before when I had written it down and handed it in, but at the table it was dying. Lorne narrated as he always did and everyone read their parts well, but the sketch just wasn’t funny. When my sketch ended, the room was quiet and everyone reached for the next sketch to read. From the table Adam Sandler shouted in a Joe Dicso impression, “Cast for Good-nights! Cast for Good-nights!” Everyone laughed, and for the first time I felt a part of everything.
By Adam’s teasing me, I felt a little more accepted. To the new people, it probably looked like we were all old friends. To the old people, it was Sandler mocking one of the guys. I wasn’t imagining it. Everyone was treating