Lost in the Funhouse_ The Life and Mind of Andy Kaufman - Bill Zehme [163]
Lawler was finally brought back into the studio—“Now the whole audience boos, right? All of a sudden they’ve turned into a wrestling crowd! So I sit down and everyone is trying to get their composure. Dave is not even looking at me. Andy is over by the studio door, where everybody comes in and Dave says to him, ‘Andy, do you want to come back here and sit down or not?’ And he said, ‘No! If I come out there, I’ll say words that I can’t say on television!’”
And so the cameras relit and Letterman welcomed viewers back and said, “Andy, are you coming in here again or—” Whereupon, he burst back into the studio and began leaping up and down behind Letterman’s desk as he addressed Lawler with a diatribe that would resonate in broadcast history, largely for the number of expletives that were obscured by coo-coo noises—“I am sick of this bull shit!” he began. “You are full of bullshit, my friend! I will sue you for everything you have! I will sue your ass! You’re a motherfuckin’ asshole!!!!!!!!! As far as I’m concerned!!!!! You hear me?!!!!! A fuckin’ asshole!!!!!!!!! Fuck you!!!!!! I will get you for this!!! [He stormed away, then instantly returned.] I am sorry, I am sorry to use those words on television. I apologize to all my fans. I’m sorry, I’m sorry. But you—you’re a fuckin’ asshole!!!!!!!!!!!!! You’re a fuckin’ asshole!!!!!!!!! [He slammed his palms on Letterman’s desk.] You hear me!!!!!! A fuckin’ asshole!!!!!!”
Which was when he took Letterman’s coffee cup and sailed its hot black contents in Lawler’s direction—“You know,” Lawler would say, “if you watch that closely, you can see him make the move to the cup to let me know what he was fixing to do. He threw it so I could get out of the way. It barely went on my left shoulder.” So Lawler leapt and Andy scampered out and Letterman said, “Uhh, I think you can use some of those words on TV…. But what you can’t do is throw coffee. I’ve said it over and over again….” And the segment ended.
Lawler was accompanied to an elevator by the same security guard who saw that he was safely out of the building before asking him to autograph a wrestling magazine. Andy, meanwhile, went upstairs to the Late Night production offices to hide from view and to think about what he had done. After the show, Letterman found him up there and Andy eagerly asked, “What did you think?” And Letterman wearily glanced at the neck brace and sighed, “Next time wear a tie.”
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… And the people could easily see, now, how noble and beautiful those episodes were, and remembered with grief that at the time they occurred they had seemed rank rascalities, well deserving of the cowhide. The congregation became more and more moved, as the pathetic tale went on, till at last the whole company broke down and joined the weeping mourners in a chorus of anguished sobs….
—Mark Twain,
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
The brace had browned from sweat and folly. He wore it and wore it and kept on wearing it and it became a wreath of perpetual martyrdom—and martyrs, everyone knew, were supposed to die. Of course, he had been giving it serious thought. Most certainly, it was on his mind. The idea excited him very much. He had discussed it with eminent hoaxer Alan Abel, who had managed to do it but then called a press conference immediately after his obituary was published. Abel had not properly lingered in death. Elvis, he liked to believe, was doing it well. He had a theory about Elvis, which he shared with a magazine writer named Judd Klinger just one year after Elvis had been gone: He believed that there may have been four Elvises, beginning with the original,