Growing Up Laughing_ My Story and the Story of Funny - Marlo Thomas [53]
Q7 So what happened?
According to the minute-by-minute tracking, at 9:30, we had something like 25 million viewers. At 9:32, we had 12 million viewers. We had lost, like, 13 million viewers in 30 seconds. And we never got them back. Our sponsors were six different Pepsi subsidiaries, and four of them pulled out. So after that we were sponsored by Diet Mug Root Beer or something like that. We were done.
Dana came into my office afterwards—Steve Carell and I were office mates—and said to us, “I’m sorry. I’ve ruined your careers.” We said, “No, we’re having fun!” He said, “No, guys, you don’t realize—it’s over.”
Q8 You’re the youngest of eleven children. Most people develop their sense of humor around the dinner table. How did you ever get a word in edgewise?
In my family, it was a humorocracy. The funny person in the room was king. So I learned to retell my brothers’ and sisters’ stories, emulate their styles. Like, my brother Jimmy has a rapier wit. He could cut you right down. And my brother Billy actually taught me jokes—like guy-walks-into-a-bar jokes. And Eddie was known as a storyteller. Other members of the family were more physical. Everyone had their specialty, and there was never a moment in which we didn’t try to make each other laugh. We were constantly at it. One of my clearest memories was watching them and thinking, I wish I had made that person laugh. Or, I wish I had made that joke right there. Or, I wish I could be like them.
Q9 That’s like growing up in a school for comedy. Were your mom and dad funny?
Yeah, they were. I don’t remember much about my father—he died when I was young. But I’ve been told he was known for his sense of humor. Very funny, very dry. And my mother has a good sense of humor. She just loves to laugh. She’s a big hugger, too. And for no reason. That was a rule—you never had to ask for a hug.
Q10 It’s been said that your ancestry is both French and Irish. Which one is it?
We always thought we were French because we grew up hearing that Jean Baptist Colbert had been finance minister for Louise XIV, and was the Marquis de Seignelay. My father’s family was too dirt-poor and uneducated to have made that stuff up. They wouldn’t have known about that—they were, like, horse thieves from Illinois.
Q11&12 Didn’t you have your DNA sequenced on your show?
Yes, and they told me that my DNA almost perfectly matches four people in the world—and all of them live in Ireland. They also said, “Your family evidently are very specific racists: They will only marry other Irish people.”
Did you?
I have a mixed marriage. I married a Scots-Irish.
Q13 Tell me about your wife. Is she funny?
Yes, my wife’s funny. But I had to teach her silly. I brought the silly to the marriage. She’ll say to me, “Why did you just do that?” And I’ll say, “Because it’s ridiculous.” So now there’s a complete balance of humor in the family, but it took a little while.
Q14 What about when you were single? Did you date funny girls?
The thing about comedians is, they don’t get groupies. That always bugged me when I was young and single. How come rock stars get groupies and comedians don’t? When I was with Second City, we’d do two hours of sketch comedy, and afterwards, it would be like, “I just killed, man!”—but never, ever did anybody want to talk to us. I kissed a girl maybe once during the entire time. And, I mean, it was like a peck-on-the-check, let’s-go-to-the-ice-cream-social kind of kiss, not like Sodom and Gomorrah.
Q15 You took on President Bush pretty fiercely when you hosted the 2006 Correspondents’ Dinner. It was like a Friars Roast. Were you there to make him laugh, or were you there to skewer him? I mean, what were you thinking?
It was a little bit of both, I think. I actually thought