Gasping for Airtime - Jay Mohr [91]
Two weeks later, I came up with an original character and a sketch titled “Rock and Roll Real Estate.” In it, I played a real estate agent who used to be the lead singer of an eighties metal band. I screamed all of my lines at the top of my lungs as if I were onstage in a giant arena. I submitted it in week eighteen when Courteney Cox hosted. I had both “Good Morning, Brooklyn” and “Rock and Roll Real Estate” on the board that week, so I was looking really good. I was hoping that two original characters on one show might take the taste of Rick Shapiro’s lawyers out of Lorne’s mouth.
But “Rock and Roll Real Estate” was cut after dress rehearsal on Saturday afternoon. In the meeting, I was told by Lorne to make sure I resubmitted it the following week, which I did. Again, it was chosen for air. Bob Saget, an incredibly funny guy, was the host. He also had the most disgusting sense of humor of any human being I’ve ever met. He would be talking about raping his mother and having sex with his daughter—no, he’d say, I was having sex with someone’s else daughter and then I brought her home to have sex with my daughter, but first I took a shit on them.
The only host who came close to Saget’s toilet talk was Emilio Estevez, who was easily one of the coolest people I met during my SNL years. Every joke Emilio told was about his rosebud (which he taught me meant asshole), but he told them in the funniest way with a real quick wit. I’d ask him what he was doing later and he’d launch into a riff like “I don’t know, licking your rosebud. You sleep on your stomach, don’t you? Okay, then, I’ll be over at ten.”
I thought the sketch worked better with Bob than it had with Courteney Cox because Saget was funny playing the straight man to my screaming metal head, but “Rock and Roll Real Estate” was cut again on Saturday after dress rehearsal. Again, Lorne told me to make sure I resubmitted it the following week. I complied and for the third consecutive week, “Rock and Roll Real Estate” was chosen to be on Saturday Night Live.
It was the last show of the year and David Duchovny was hosting. Everybody was very loose all week, and the pickup basketball game was particularly competitive that week. Another season was ending. Critically, it had gone much better than my first one. This meant that instead of headlines like “Saturday Night Dead,” the New York Post now wrote nothing. We all knew the show was funnier than it had been the previous year, and it also seemed that everyone definitely had more fun.
In the “Rock and Roll Real Estate” sketch, I wore a big blond teased-out wig, leather pants, and a Realtor’s jacket. My hair looked just like Rod Stewart’s hair; Rod Stewart was the musical guest on the twentieth and final show. After I rehearsed “Rock and Roll Real Estate” on Saturday, Rod was scheduled to do his rehearsal immediately after me. He was standing off to the side during my rehearsal. I wanted to stop and tell him that despite how I looked, I wasn’t doing an impression of him.
When Rod Stewart finished his rehearsal, he had to walk past me to get back to his dressing room. He was surrounded by about ten people who walked with him and formed a circle as he passed. One of the people in the circle pointed at me and said, “What’s up, Rod!” I started to worry that Rod Stewart would have my sketch cut again because I was dancing around like a jackass and screaming while wearing a Rod Stewart wig.
It turned out that Rod Stewart wasn’t too concerned with my possible impersonation, and the sketch made it through dress rehearsal and the meeting in Lorne