Magnificent Desolation_ The Long Journey Home From the Moon - Buzz Aldrin [127]
David wanted to know what the tourists would do all that time.
“They’ll float around, and enjoy zero gravity just like John [Glenn] is doing now,” I told him.
“Will there be games and activities?”
“Yeah, yeah!” I said. “We’re going to play checkers.”
For all of his joking, David understood the vision for space tourism, and I appreciated having the opportunity to share my ideas about it with his audience. On other occasions when I’ve been on David’s program, I have done some rather quirky things myself. For instance, once in response to a letter from a viewer, David had me “live” in a New York City cab “about thirty-three inches above the big blue marble we call Earth,” doing important “space experiments” such as dropping my astronaut’s pen, which dropped like a rock, of course. “This is America’s finest hour,” I said. On another show, I was on top of the studio roof of the Ed Sullivan Theater building, dressed in full spacesuit regalia, in the pouring rain. As another of David’s ridiculous experiments, I was to hit a golf ball off the roof, to supposedly determine the gravitational pull of the roof. The golf ball was teed up on a mat, and I could barely swing the golf club in the bulky spacesuit, but I hit it with a good stroke and the ball sailed off the roof. “It’s so serene, so tranquil, looking down on the Earth from the roof,” I said. Of course, as usual, my tag line was “This truly is America’s finest hour!”
On another of David’s shows, I participated by reading his “Top Ten List.” The topic was “The Top Ten Other Things to Say When Stepping on the Moon.” Dressed in a bright orange “NASA” jumpsuit, I deadpanned lines such as, “Set your phasers for fun; the Buzzmeister has landed!”
David said on one show that if he was running NASA, wed have a shopping mall on Neptune by now. I wouldn’t doubt it a bit.
Over the years, I have appeared on numerous news interview shows, but I’ve especially enjoyed the lighter moments playing off the space themes, such as on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Working with Jay was great fun, as well. We both wore brown trench coats, Casablanca style, and Jay drew comparisons between life on the moon and life in Hollywood, where the real space exists.
While promoting Encounter with Tiber, I appeared on Rosie O’Donnell’s talk show during the week of Elton John’s birthday, so, as a special tribute, Rosie was having all of her guests sing one of their favorite songs by the prolific pop artist. Mine, of course, was “Rocket Man.” In my estimation, there was no better Elton John song, and who better to sing it but me? I didn’t even pretend to try to sing it seriously. I stood on stage with a deadpan expression and droned, “I’m just a rocket man, and I think its going to be a long, long time …” The audience laughed uproariously.
I also did an “interview” with Ali G, alter ego of Sacha Baron Cohen, star of the movie Borat. For our interview, Cohen played his Ali G hip-hop journalist character to the hilt, with a British gangster street accent, dressed in a yellow jumpsuit, and adorned in heavy gold jewelry and a black skull cap. His shtick was to go around to distinguished people under the pretense that they were giving serious interviews. In fact, when he came to my home, we were expecting British Channel Four to show up. Instead, Ali G walked in, and commenced his litany of nonsensical questions. He asked me, “What was it like not being the first man on the moon? Was you ever jealous of Louis Armstrong?” The funny thing about Cohen’s zaniness was that many people he interviewed would get upset and storm out, but when he did the bit with me, I caught on rather quickly and had a great time with him, playing it straight.
I love humor, so maybe that’s why when an invitation came to “appear” as myself in an episode of The Simpsons, I couldn’t resist. The episode was called “Deep Space Homer,” in which Homer