Laughter as Medicine

The weekend now seems very long ago. But it is worth mentioning.

Last Friday, at the eleventh hour, I was recruited to help out with the Mark Twain Awards at the Kennedy Center (which this year honored Steve Martin). I agreed to do it because the person who asked has done me more favors than I can count, and lately I have been thinking that I need to do what I can to improve my karma. Not that I believe in that stuff, but...

So, Saturday I went to the Concert Hall at the Kennedy Center, was sent to sit in the audience, where I napped for a while, waiting to be told what to do. My cohort for the weekend was to be Kathleen, a cute, blonde, intern from the Kennedy Center. When they finally needed us, it was basically to hit a couple of marks while they looked at some lighting levels. We were used very sparingly for about two hours, and then sent home. The celeb count was very low that day - limited to Randy Newman performing "I Love to See You Smile" over and over again. (Which, I was to learn after later due diligence, was written for Parenthood, and won the Oscar that year for Best Original Song.)

It's a good song, maybe a bit less good when you hear it performed at least ten times over the course of 48 hours.

The next day they wanted us there at 9:30 am, which would not have been a problem had I not planned to go out with my cousin the night before. It was a late night, unusual for me in that we party-hopped, interacted with normal people (not theater folk) and I had to talk to people I didn't know.

All, I am sure, a good thing (shake things up a bit Citymouse - meet people you DON'T know intimately) but nonetheless, exhausting.

So I made it to the KC - shockingly - on time, and managed to grab an Americano on the way, then nestled into a seat in the concert hall, anticipating a quiet "sit around and wait" day like the night before.

Not so.

Sunday, they were actually teching the entire show (that would begin at 8pm that night) and Kathleen and I (and another random woman who was alternately surly and saccharine sweet) were the stand-ins for over a dozen different famous people.

Let the games begin.

I was sent out of the starting gate first with a speech courtesy of Tom Hanks, and quickly jumped into the world of reading a teleprompter. And I kind of sucked. I hadn't looked the speech over before, and there was this light shining in my eye (it wasn't just me complaining about that - Lily Tomlin also took issue with the light) and I didn't realize that the teleprompter follows me, not the other way around, so I get up there, start talking really fast, realize I can hardly see, and the thing is scrolling even faster because I am prompting them to, and then "Hold...Let's skip to the end".

Thank god.

After that first one, I figured out how things work. I relaxed, breathed, talked at a reasonable pace, and miraculously - the teleprompter also slowed down (duh). I also realized that if I avoided looking into the light until absolutely necessary, I wouldn't get the annoying halo effect I had been seeing. I also studied the next speech ahead of time.

It was much better.

So we are trudging through the event's speeches, when suddenly a flurry of activity erupts backstage. A tall, blonde, very well put together woman (three things that I - especially that morning - am not) heads back stage with a small dog and not as small an entourage in tow.

It's Claire Danes.

I guess I hadn't really realized that the celebrities would be practicing their stuff ahead of time, assuming that they would just go at it cold that evening. Had I known, I would at least have put on lip gloss...

So she breezes in, does her speech, she's practiced, it's good, she's tall, she's lovely, we wait, she goes, the dog follows, the entourage departs, and then we resume tech where we left off.

This goes on for a while (celeb, standins, celeb, standins) with a progression that includes Lorne Michaels, Eric Idle (of Monty Python fame), Karl Reiner, Lily Tomlin, and Queen Latifah.

Around midday, as I am getting my mic switched for the umpteenth time by one of the sound guys, I see out of the corner of my eye the person who has entered backstage, up next for the rehearsal. He is tall, he is wearing khaki colored cords and a fleece jacket, he is sort of slouching back a bit, and is wearing a yellow hat with tufts of white hair peeking out from underneath.

Larry David.

I feel my face turn warm. Larry David is six feet away from me, five feet away from me, four feet away from me, standing right next to me.

He does not speak to me.

He watches from the wings a bit, looks back, and cannot help but notice that I am staring at him. I am staring at him. I can't stop staring at... stop staring at him Citymouse! Stop staring at him!!

He gives me a moment of "Should I know you?" look, decides he should not, and then goes to his mark for his speech.

It is hilarious - mostly in the delivery, not so much in the writing - and he somehow manages to work the phrase "You dirty Jew" into it, and I realize, I am blushing, I am flushed.

I have a gigantic crush on Larry David.

The other stand-in Kathleen notices this, and says, "SAS - you are all red!".

I try to explain. I try to explain that I am speechless because I am so enamored with this middle-aged bald man, because he makes me laugh like few can, and has gotten me through some rough times lately (rather, his show has) completely unbeknownst to him, who I KNOW is not his TV persona, who I REALIZE I don't know at all.. and yet I can't help feeling like I do.

One of the other helpers, this guy with bad facial hair, won't stop talking to me, and I try to tell him that I just want to watch Larry David as he is now rewriting his speech back stage at the baby grand piano. He is gesticulating, and going back and forth over the fine points of it with the writers, and I think somehow that watching him do this will teach me something about, I don't know - being funny?

I am not by nature a very funny people. But I adore funny people. If you can make me laugh, I am smitten.

It is very often my downfall.

So I finally break away from bad facial hair, and I watch him finish the rewrites. The hat goes on and off, the jacket I swear is the one he bought with Mary Steenburgen and then tried to return during the first or second season, and about twenty minutes later, he is done.

I tried desperately to come up with some way to force a conversation with the man, but was unsuccessful. I suppose better to say nothing at all to Larry David, than to say something stupid.

The creepy girl in the pink sweater who wouldn't stop staring at him. If this character shows up a few seasons from now - you will all know...

The afternoon continued, Martin Short passed through (becoming the only person to truly ackowledge us standins), then Paul Simon, Mike Nichols, and then we were finally graced with Steve Martin's presence (who really must be one of the most talented human beings on this planet - between his writing, his timing, and his BANJO PLAYING!!) we managed to shake his hand (while walking through the curtain call - he didn't have an option) and finally all was said and done, and I was exhausted.

From accounts I heard the show went very well. I wouldn't know. I was getting a drink and food with my friend Jeremy.

And thinking about the power of laughter. It is amazing really. Unmatchable.