Authors: Jerry Stiller
I could feel sweat breaking out over my entire body. What had I done? I’d trusted this guy.
“What did you do?”
“Why, don’t you like it?”
I knew it was too late. Second best, I said to myself. Fucking second best. Now I knew why.
“How long will it stay this way?”
“About nine months,” he said.
My heart sank. That’s as long as it takes to make a baby. How could anybody do something like this? I got up out of the chair, paid him some inordinate amount, and walked down Third Avenue, feeling sheared.
Jack O’Brian, a columnist on the
Journal-American
, was walking toward me. He stopped, stared, and said, “What happened to your hair?”
I smiled weakly. “It’s a new image,” I muttered.
“Good luck at the Latin Quarter,” Jack said.
When I got home, Anne made no mention of my hair, so I knew there was something wrong.
We opened at the Latin Quarter, played one week, and were canceled. Was it the hair, the act, or a new tax ruling on business deductions? It didn’t matter.
I didn’t see the world’s second-best barber again until years later when I was flying down to my cousin Florence’s funeral in Fort Lauderdale. Somewhere over South Carolina, a man on the plane approached me and said, “Remember me?”
I knew immediately it was him. He had a smile on his face as if he had just given me the greatest haircut.
“I’ve got a shop in Florida now,” he said. “It’s a great place. Visit me if you get a chance.”
He gave me his card. I put it in my wallet with a lot of other cards. You never know when you’re going to need a second-best haircut.
It was around this same time, while Amy was still a tot, that she was cast in
Lovers and Other Strangers
. Anne was playing Wilma opposite Harry Guardino. David Susskind, the producer, thought it would be rather nice to have both Amy and myself playing family members in the wedding scene. In the ceremony, I would put Amy up on a piano and she would sing “I Love You Truly.”
On the day of the shoot at the Tarrytown Inn in Westchester, I was late in leaving the city. Although I had only about three words to say, I was very nervous. I don’t know whether it had to do with the fact that I was not cast as Anne’s husband and I was playing a walk-on or what. The upshot was that I was late getting to the set. I rented a car and sped up the Henry Hudson Parkway. Amy was about to do her first acting job. She had no interest in show business. We’d never pushed her into it.
We’re late,
I kept thinking as I exceeded sixty-five miles per hour. Amy could not help but feel my strange vibes.
“What am I supposed to do, Daddy?”
“You sing a song,” I told her. “I put you up on a piano and you sing, ‘I Love You Truly.’”
“Where’s Mommy?”
“She’s on the set. Now sing, ‘I love you truly, truly dear.’” I started to sing.
“Daddy, you’re going too fast.”
“I can’t help it, we’re late,” I said.
“Daddy, please. I’m scared.”
We hit a bump. A little rise in the highway that when taken at sixty-five or seventy sent the little car flying in the air as if it were a toy. Amy screamed. My God, what the hell was I doing? Filling my kid with anxiety just before she was about to do a scene in a movie. I slowed down, wishing I could erase the tape and shoot the last few minutes of my life over again. When we arrived at the Inn, they were still in the midst of shooting Anne Jackson, Gig Young, Diane Keaton, Bob Dishy, Marian
Hailey, and Richie Castellano. We were early, as it turned out. The usual movie routine—hurry up and wait. Diane Keaton played games with Amy while we killed time.
Anne was doing a scene with Harry. They were both in the buff under the sheets in the bedroom, attempting to make love. Anne tells Harry, an ex-Marine who’s having trouble getting into the moment, “You owe me one.”
Anne and Harry were students at the Dramatic Workshop. Some years earlier, Anne had mentioned that Harry had written her once. He had had a crush on her. In the scene, they worked wonderfully together. I told myself I wasn’t jealous; I only wished that I had been cast in the role.
My scene with Amy was next. They shot it quickly. Amy was adorable, not the stereotypical precocious brat that I figured they’d want her to be.
Lovers and Other Strangers
was a big success for Renee Taylor and Joe Bologna.
Anne had just been cast as Bunny Flingus opposite Harold Gould and Katherine Helmond in John Guare’s
The House of Blue Leaves
, playing at the Truck and Warehouse Theater, when we registered Ben at the Calhoun School, then located about six blocks from our home. After being taken to and from school by Anne or me for the first week, Ben suggested that he walk home by himself.
My first fears were that he might be kidnapped. This was quickly followed by the fear that a child molester would be lurking in every doorway on West End Avenue, ready to pounce on him. Anne sensed my apprehension and said, “You’ve got to give him a chance to grow up. He wants to walk home. Let him walk home.”
Reluctantly, I gave in. With great fanfare I announced to Ben one morning that he could walk home by himself that afternoon.
“Can I, Dad?” He asked. “You really mean it?”
“Yeah,” I said, a slight lump in my throat. “Just make sure you don’t stop for anybody.”
I could hear myself filling Ben with my foreboding, which he sensibly ignored. I didn’t quite say, “Don’t take candy from strangers,” but it was implicit in my tone.
I drove him to school that morning, kissed him good-bye, and went back home. At about 2:45
P.M.
, fifteen minutes before school was dismissed,
I got into my car and drove up to the school. I double-parked outside the school and waited until I spotted Ben leaving, his book bag on his shoulder.
He strode along the street, turning his head to see if he really was alone. I slunk behind the wheel. As he walked toward West End, I started the car and trailed after him. I stayed a good half-block behind. He kept a steady pace, occasionally looking behind him. He seemed to be reassuring himself that no parent was following him. As I trailed along, other cars either passed me or formed a small procession in my rear. I was going five miles an hour and I’d get the horn, the finger, or a questioning look as other drivers passed me.
About halfway home I noticed a police car practically on my rear bumper. It too was crawling along, obviously checking me out. I continued to follow Ben, ignoring the squad car until it pulled alongside and a cop motioned to me to stop. One of the cops got out. Fortunately the cop recognized me and was friendly. He said, “We noticed you driving along the street, Mr. Stiller. Is there any reason you’re going so slow?”
“Yeah, I’m following a kid home from school,” I said, making a joke.
“Really?”
“It’s my own kid,” I said laughingly. “He’s going home by himself for the first time, and I’m very nervous.”
The cop laughed. “Give Anne our regards,” he said, as he and his partner drove off.
That day Ben made it home safe and sound, and gained a little confidence along the way. So did I.
Ironically, fifteen years later Ben made his Lincoln Center and Broadway debut playing Ronnie in
The House of Blue Leaves
. This was a prelude to
Permanent Midnight and Something About Mary
.
As we were becoming more popular, our four-room apartment was slowly becoming our unofficial office. Each morning we tumbled out of bed and went straight to the typewriter. The apartment was our own little kibbutz on Riverside Drive. We even built bunk beds in the living room, which now became our work room. Who said you need to separate family from work? We were not shutting the kids out of our life just because we were in show business.
One day Anne and I were rehearsing our “Hate” sketch, which is about a husband and wife who can no longer restrain themselves.
Anne: “I hate you.”
Jerry: “You hate me? I hate you.”
Anne: “You don’t know what hate is, the kind of hate I have for you….”
At this point Amy, about two years old, tears in her eyes, came into the room and said, “Daddy, Mommy fight?”
I took Amy into my arms and said, “No, no, Amy. Mommy, Daddy rehearse.”
A couple of days later Anne and I got into an argument about whether a joke was funny. The argument got heated. Amy must have heard it in the other room. She ran in and smilingly said, “Mommy, Daddy rehearse?” I had to be honest. I said, “No, honey, Mommy, Daddy fight.”
This setup lasted about a year. There was no way two married people with children in New York City could live in bunk beds with no locks on the doors. But at least we had tried.
Show business was in our kids’ blood before they were born. Amy was on stage with us twice a night for five months when we were doing
Medium Rare
in Chicago. She was privy to our every punch line in every sketch twice a night. All the kicking she did in Anne’s stomach was either her laughing or telling us something could be funnier. Ben was on
Sullivan
no fewer than three times before he was born.
Both have chosen the same profession as Anne and myself. God help them.
One day Mike Douglas, whose show we were guest-hosting, asked us if we would like Amy and Ben to come on. They had just started taking violin lessons. Anne tried desperately to stop me from opening my mouth.
“Yeah, they play the violin,” I said proudly.
Ernie DiMassa, Mike’s talent coordinator, said, “That’s great. Why not have them play a piece together?”
“We’re pushing them,” Anne said. “People will think we’re just pushy parents.”
“It’ll be great.” I thought,
the kids will love it
.
“People love you and Jerry. It’ll be great,” Ernie reassured me.
Despite Anne’s protests, I made the decision for Amy and Ben to appear on the show. Anne fumed. That night I informed Ben and Amy that they were going on
The Mike Douglas Show
. I expected them to be elated.
Instead, they informed me that all their friends would be watching, and they could only play one song, badly.
Whatever sensitivities my children had about being on television escaped me. I saw it as their rite of passage into the world of show business, perhaps the beginning of a theatrical dynasty. We’d be like the Barrymores, the Cohans, the Foys. I said to myself, who has a better right to show off their kids than someone in the business? It’s taken years, I thought, for me to get my foot in the door. The echoes of rejection are still with me.
Anne, on the other hand, said, “Let them learn on their own. Don’t force it. It’s the only way they’ll get a sense of themselves.”
The next day Amy and Ben arrived in Philadelphia with their tiny Yamahas. They played “Chopsticks” for a national audience. They started on time and ended on time. The studio audience applauded enthusiastically. When it was all over and I went to congratulate them, they said, “Dad, our friends are going to hate us for this.”
We did get a letter from some women who said, “How could you have done that to two such nice kids?”
What words of wisdom can I give my children? See past the hype and the glitz and ask yourself why you want to perform. It may take years to arrive at the answers, but understanding the reasons will help you to keep the dream alive and reach your goals.
A
nne and I had never done a commercial together before Blue Nun came into our lives. Anne’s hand had been shown testing a harsh dishwashing detergent that purportedly reddened her skin. I had once played a short silhouette telling a tall silhouette at a dance that he—the tall silhouette—had bad breath, and Colgate toothpaste could change everything for him. I earned about $300.
One night Jerry Della Femina, then a copywriter for the Ted Bates Agency, walked into the Phase II, saw us perform, and said he would someday own his own agency and use us. Years later, true to his word, he telephoned and asked us to drop down to see him. “I want you to improvise something,” he said.
We met in a room with Jerry—baldish, wide-eyed, hardly a Madison Avenue type—and two of his young copywriters, Mark Justein and Sara Bragin.
“I guess you remember me telling you that someday I’d come to you,” Jerry said. “Well, now I’m on my own and I have an account for a wine. I’ve wanted to use comedians, and I think you two would be perfect.”
I asked the name of the product.
“It’s called Blue Nun Wine,” Jerry said.
“Why is it called Blue Nun?” Anne asked.
“Blue Nun is a name we created.”
It was a German table wine, Jerry said, a Liebfraumilch that would sell for around $3 a bottle.
Anne then and there improvised a story into a tape recorder about
nuns who worked in the vineyards of Bavaria picking grapes. These nuns would jump up and down, stomping the grapes until the grapes were crushed and put into vats and fermented.
The barefoot nuns were not permitted ever to taste the fruits of their labor. As a result, the nuns became very depressed. The mother superior, seeing all the sad nuns, their heads hanging low, declared a holiday to cheer up the convent.
“Ring the bells! Let’s cheer up our blue nuns!”
The bells rang, and some monk ran in with a cask of wine that had fermented. He filled a lot of flasks and made a toast: “Here’s to our blue nuns!”
They drank the wine … and got sick.
At this point, Jerry Della Femina was on the floor, laughing. He asked if I knew how to order wine.
“No,” I said.
“That’s it. Men are afraid to order wine when they go out. Do you order red or white?”
“If it’s meat you order red, if it’s fish you order white.”
“Not necessarily,” Della Femina said. “White wine goes with anything, so does red, but we’re talking Blue Nun—the delicious white wine that goes as well with meat as it does with fish.”
Anne said, “Is this supposed to get a girl to go to bed with a guy? Because he orders Blue Nun wine? Boy, if the nuns ever hear about this.”
“We’ll give it a try,” Della Femina said. “You two meet in a restaurant. It’s your first date. Jerry, you’re trying to impress Anne. Just be yourselves and see what happens. Anne, you’re Lola; Jerry, you’re Phil, and this is a real fancy restaurant.”