The Bassoon King

by Rainn Wilson

  For instance, today I told my wife I’d take care of something that needed taking care of and then I sent her this text:

  If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.

  My therapist once told me that intimacy, when broken down, was really “into me see.” Get it? Intimacy? Into-me-see? Now, I know that’s ludicrously simplistic, but it’s also ludicrously accurate.

  —

  Let’s get back to my family.

  My family was poor. Not food-stamps or Haiti poor. But poor.

  We rented an old two-bedroom cinder-block house with a dirt yard in Olympia, and my dad got a job working with kids at the high school. It was a program for juvenile delinquents and troubled teens just out of jail. He taught art and English and Spanish and made $5,600 a year. I truly have no idea how we lived off of that. Kristin was a housewife, as most women were in those days, and had never learned to drive for some reason, so she was truly a stay-at-home mom. I remember my dad’s shaggy juvies often dropping by the house in their bell-bottoms and leather-fringed vests. Kristin would stare as if the Manson Family had just stopped by for a chat.

  Here’s how I remember our poverty: We drove an old, used Edsel from the fifties and then a 1972 powder-blue Ford Pinto, replete with exploding gas tank. I drank powdered milk instead of regular and got all my clothes from the Salvation Army. I had about seven toys and eleven books and stared in awe and wonder at the Gnip Gnops and Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots and Lite-Brites and lawn darts and Twisters and vibrating electronic football sets that the other kids in the neighborhood played with. We never took vacations, and eating out was a complete luxury. When we did it was usually Bob’s Big Boy, Shakey’s Pizza, or this crappy restaurant that overlooked the local bowling alley, where I once found a rubber band in my cheeseburger. We never owned a washer and dryer and our weekend was always marked by a major trip to the Laundromat, where Kristin washed our clothes for the week and I wandered around trying to fish quarters out of the machines.

  —

  Never fear, dear reader. Life growing up in Olympia and then, eventually, suburban Seattle, was not all poor, sad nights and alienated TV dinners.

  There was also the faith community that surrounded us. Growing up a Baha’i was a strange and strangely wonderful thing.

  I remember the singing. There were lots of songs. Spirituals, call-and-response, folk ditties, chants, hymns, and upbeat kiddie tunes. As a Baha’i, I was raised to believe that all the races were one human race and that the color of our skin made us beautiful and distinct like the flowers of one human garden. We were taught as children that men and women were equal and that fighting for justice in the world was the “best beloved” of all things in God’s eyes. Young Baha’is are taught that the best of human virtues are the qualities of God Himself and that as we radiate kindness, humility, compassion, and honesty we are shining with the light of the Creator that is inside every single one of us. We learned, as fledgling Baha’is, the idea that “work in the spirit of service is the highest form of worship.”

  This is great stuff for a kid. None of that guilt crap to bog one down. We weren’t born sinful in this worldview, you see. We’re noble beings who are dual natured, both divine and animalistic in our essence. God loves us, no matter what we do. There’s no hell either, just in case you were wondering. (Can you imagine the despicable absurdity of a loving God creating us only to torture us FOREVER—which is a super-duper long time, by the way—in a fiery pit because we didn’t recognize the divinity of Jesus or Muhammad? What a cruel, horrible God that would be! I mean, how vindictive can you get?) In the Baha’i view, after we’re done in this physical world and have shed our meat suits, our souls (whatever they are) move on to another plane of existence and our good deeds and qualities are all that we take with us.

  People were far more open to ideas of and conversations about spirituality and religion in the early seventies. Spirituality had seeped into the cultural groundwater. Religion no longer necessarily meant “Catholic, Protestant, Jew,” but was a legitimate, alternative pathway that aided in ordering and experiencing the world in a more feeling, intuitive, connective way. Every Tom, Dick, and Dirty Harry was on a mystical journey of some sort or other. People of all stripes became “spiritual seekers” and were having some kind of transcendent, mystical experience everywhere you turned. Everyone was all like “Be here now” and “I’m okay, you’re okay.” Yoga, communes, meditation, and health food were culturally accepted spiritual paths. The Beatles went to India to meditate with the maharishi. Cat Stevens became a Muslim. Shirley MacLaine explored past lives. Steve Jobs did Buddhist retreats way before he did any corporate ones. Both “new age” spirituality and environmentalism came into being in that incense-soaked “age of Aquarius.”

  Our personal heroes were Seals and Crofts, the folky, long-haired, mandolin-rockin’ duo that sang “Summer Breeze” and “Hummingbird” and were quite vocal about their Baha’i Faith.

  Later on, as I would found the website and media company SoulPancake, which was inspired by many Baha’i ideas, I realized looking back that our home frequently had long, intense discussions of “Life’s Big Questions,” which SoulPancake was built around. Investigating other folks’ belief systems, faith, and philosophy was a big part of being alive in the seventies. Our bookshelves at home were filled with books on Sikhism, Sufism, Buddhism, Egyptian mythology, and Native American spirituality. We had art books filled with paintings and sculptures from every corner of the world. An informal talk about the Faith was called a “fireside,” and there were always long-haired artists and intellectuals and curious housewives in macrame vests and clogs sitting around our living room, digging into these topics with great abandon.

  My dad once told me that people were so open to having these kinds of discussions in those days that you could just go up to somebody on the street and say, “Hey, we’re going to have a spiritual gathering with some music at our house tonight, wanna come by?” And the random person would say nine times out of ten, “Sure, man, sounds totally groovy,” or “I’m in, brother,” or “Whoa! Heavy!” or something like that, and before you knew it there’d be a full house of people that resembled background actors from That ’70s Show. Can you imagine doing that today? Going up to a group of twentysomethings in a Starbucks and saying, “Hey, you guys want to come to a spiritual gathering at my house tonight?” You’d clear out the Starbucks faster than you can say “anthrax chai latte.”

  I would sometimes put down my Thor and Superman comic books and sit in on these hangouts as a kid. Diverse, patchouli-scented characters would be talking about Jesus and the Buddha and God and free will and the soul and life after death and “If there is a God, why does he let innocent children suffer?” and “Is the Bible the literal truth or the metaphorical truth?” and “Isn’t it just okay to be a good person and not be a part of any religious faith?” and “Did the CIA, in league with the Mafia, actually kill JFK?” You know, the questions that have haunted humankind from time immemorial.

  When Watchtowers (Jehovah’s Witnesses) or Mormons would come to our house, my parents wouldn’t pretend they weren’t home or slam the door, they would welcome them in, serve them tea, and exchange ideas about the Bible. We would politely hear their thoughts and they would politely, confusedly listen to ours.

  I remember once a nice born-again lady came inside and showed us a pamphlet that had a picture of Jesus on a cloud looking positively radiant and a lion and a lamb taking a nap together on a lovely green field. She said, “You see, when Jesus returns, the lion will lie down with the lamb. Just like in the picture!” I said to her (precociously nerdy at age twelve), “Don’t you think that the saying from the Bible might be metaphorical, meaning traditional enemies will lay down their weapons and make peace in the world? Not that actual lions will stop eating actual lambs? I mean, what will lions eat when Jesus returns, hummus?” (I made up that last part. Hummus hadn’t been in
vented yet.) She paused quizzically and then pointed to the pamphlet again and said, “No, see? The lion is lying down with the lamb!”

  I don’t mean to poke fun at biblical literalists (actually I do, a little bit) but to point out the constant flow of ideas about religious and philosophical concepts that came and went through our sad and interesting little house.

  There were so many things that were different in that befuddled, well-meaning decade. Parenting for instance.

  Guide to Parenting in the Seventies

  After-School Choices

  Offer a powdered drink (e.g., Kool-Aid, Ovaltine, Nestlé Quik, or Tang) and rush children out the door, telling them to be back for dinner (i.e., when it gets dark).

  TV.

  Homework (optional).

  Dinner Choices

  American: burgers, fried chicken, meatloaf, steaks, hot dogs

  Or other ethnic and cultural options:

  Italian: pizza, spaghetti, lasagna

  Mexican: tacos (hard taco shell, ground beef, lettuce, tomato, red sauce, grated cheddar, sour cream)

  Chinese: La Choy frozen stir-fry

  Dessert Choices

  Ice cream: chocolate, vanilla, strawberry. Or Neapolitan (all three)

  Television-Viewing Parameters and Boundaries

  N/A

  Hygiene

  Brush the hell out of your teeth.

  Bathe when stinky.

  Medical Care

  Visit doctor or dentist when something is broken, bursting, bleeding, or causing so much pain you can’t move.

  Morning Routine

  Wake up children twelve minutes before school starts.

  Breakfast Menu

  Bowl of cereal: Frosted Flakes, Count Chocula, Boo Berry, or Lucky Charms

  Healthy option: Cheerios

  Lunch

  PBJ

  Weekends

  Feed children pancakes. Rush them outside. Saturday-night sleepover at friend’s house. Make sure they’re alive on Sunday night.

  —

  It’s a little different today. Today’s parents are, as you know, referred to as “helicopter parents.” There is a constant, anxious hovering over suburban children. A hypervigilant concern as to their well-being and schooling and friends and free time and accomplishments and hobbies and future and college and marriage and earning capacity and AAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

  (And, at the same time, contrarily, iProducts are shoved into kids’ hands by harried parents from the time they can sit upright to act as instant iBabysitters. Human interaction is greatly reduced and most modern kids spend more time looking at screens than at human faces.)

  Now, don’t get me wrong, I didn’t have a miserable childhood by any means. I wasn’t beaten. There were snacks around. We had various dogs and cats and furniture. You know, the things that families have around when undertaking the routine of a normal life. We had an RCA color TV that played various sitcoms of the seventies most evenings as we escaped our ennui by watching the flickering lights and laugh tracks of classic television. In fact, this appliance played a hugely important role in our lives as an easy respite and social nexus after a long, taxing day of subtle alienation.

  I imagine there are hundreds of thousands of families to whom the families on the telly seemed more real, more tangible, more “familial” than their own. That’s what all great television is, I believe: unlikely families. People coming together and finding a home.

  The TV was my escape. Especially the comedies. I certainly loved my cartoons, my Pink Panther, my Super Friends, and my Looney Tunes, but it was the sitcoms that caught my imagination as early as age six.

  I adored F Troop and The Addams Family. I absorbed Mary Tyler Moore and Dick Van Dyke in reruns. I have seen every episode of The Bob Newhart Show at least three times. Two hundred fifty-one episodes of M*A*S*H? No problem. In fact, I would sometimes watch two or three episodes a day, having memorized where and when all the syndicated reruns were playing. All in the Family was more real to me than my own family. We never missed a Laverne & Shirley or a Happy Days. (Even after they had “jumped the shark.” Literally.) Three’s Company was a bit “risqué” for my parents, but I was able to catch episodes at friends’ houses. Mork was my spirit animal. Barney Miller was the father I never had. And I longed to someday be a Sweathog. I feasted on WKRP in Cincinnati. And when, thirty-five years later, I got to work with Howard Hesseman on The Rocker, I picked his brain for hours on that sublime comic creation.

  Moving forward toward the eighties, my family and I discovered Taxi. I had no idea a sitcom could have such heart. Besides the usual comedic shenanigans, episodes were filled with longing and unlikely romance, with hopes unfulfilled and dreams dashed. New York City became the place I wanted to study acting purely based on the haunting Bob James Fender Rhodes theme song and the cinematic opening credits of the show. It was a wistful, magical place, where you could dare to be yourself and be accepted, where artists mixed with blue-collar workers and even someone who looked like Judd Hirsch could find love.

  Unlike the others at my school, I didn’t revere Pete Rose, Terry Bradshaw, and Dr. J; my heroes were Reverend Jim Ignatowski, Louie De Palma, and Latka.

  Because, for me, it was all about the sidekicks, the disjointed men of mayhem who provided the comic relief. The “A” story plots involving some emotional quandary of the main characters never interested me in the slightest. I wanted the zany neighbor clowns to come over without knocking and to have gotten fired from their jobs, or to need to borrow a lawn mower or have a zebra trapped in their kitchen. All those delicious “B” plot devices featuring the sidekicks made the show worth watching for me.

  The idea that I would someday get to play that kind of character on an actual TV show was beyond the furthest reaches of my wildest suburban imagination.

  COMPENDIUM OF COMIC SIDEKICKS

  —

  My list of the ten greatest comic TV sidekicks of the seventies

  (With evaluations by renowned comic sidekick Dwight K. Schrute, who was paid $125 per paragraph.)

  SQUIGGY, LAVERNE & SHIRLEY

  The funnier half of Lenny and Squiggy, Squiggy, was played by David Lander. He brought an exquisite insanity to a guy who thought of himself as cool but in reality was one step away from being a mental patient. This nasal-voiced “greaser” with a spit-curl hairdo always had a get-rich-quick scam. The beautiful thing about his characterization was it was impossible to put your finger on what “type” of character he was. He wasn’t “the dumb guy” or “the nerd” or “the weirdo”; he was his own very specific, off-the-wall creation. Also, his timing was never the on-the-nose, asking-for-a-laugh sitcom rhythm. Every time he burst into the door, you just knew something incredible was about to happen.

  —

  Dwight: He “wasn’t ‘the dumb guy’”? What a moronic statement. Squiggy was a near-subhuman cretin. However, it must be noted that in 1979, he and his life partner, Lenny, recorded an LP under the name “Lenny and the Squigtones.” It is a masterpiece that my family and I listen to, in its entirety, each Christmas morn. If the children make any noise while it plays, their gifts are rescinded.

  HOWARD BORDEN, THE BOB NEWHART SHOW

  The clueless neighbor of Bob and Suzanne Pleshette (TV’s hottest sitcom wife, FYI) was played by one of the sweetest and funniest human beings on the planet, Bill Daily, who also played the neurotic astronaut buddy on I Dream of Jeannie. He was able to play “dumb” in the most unobvious, effortless way. When he would pop into Bob’s apartment for some inane reason, America would sit up on their sofas. Like all great comedic actors, Bill Daily never underlined a joke or a punch line, but allowed the comedy to come from his dim-witted, lovable character’s perspective.

  —

  Dwight: I failed to see the humor in a television program centered around treatment of the men
tally ill and thus never watched The Bob Newhart Show. The cast of that show should have been housed in the facility from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and been given care by someone effective like Nurse Ratched.

  RADAR O’REILLY, M*A*S*H

  Another sweet, dumb guy who captures your heart. His innocence was aching, as was his need for approval. I was mesmerized by this character as a child. I always wanted to know what Radar wanted. Did he want love? Respect? Meaning? How did he have that strange, almost psychic ability to read his commander’s thoughts and know what he wanted before he did? I was captivated by his love of grape Nehi soda and his odd, specific history in Ottumwa, Iowa. He felt like a real American boy caught up in the horrors of war. Radar was someone I wanted to be friends with. So did America.

  —

  Dwight: I liked the episode where Radar killed the enemy soldier by ripping his throat out with his bare hands. Oh, wait, there was no such episode—because Radar was perhaps the biggest wuss ever to serve in the armed forces.

  MICHAEL STIVIC (AKA MEATHEAD), ALL IN THE FAMILY

  The hippie boyfriend of Gloria Bunker was effortlessly and delightfully played by Rob Reiner (director of The Princess Bride and This Is Spinal Tap, among many other great films). This well-meaning but thick counterculture loudmouth was a perfectly balanced and nuanced foil to Archie, the bigoted patriarch of the family. You wanted to both wring his neck and hug him at the same time. To this day I admire his willingness to be so unlikable and yet lovable.

  —

  Dwight: As a child, I was terrified of Meathead because I quite logically assumed his head was perhaps a large pork shank adorned with a long wig and false mustache, or a pile of sculpted venison. I have yet to find evidence that this was not the case.

  REVEREND JIM IGNATOWSKI, TAXI

  This drug-addled taxi driver was perfectly, specifically etched by Christopher Lloyd (the professor from Back to the Future). I loved that his character was, by turns, HUGE and terrifically real and heartfelt. This balance is incredibly hard to do in comedy. In a giant, brilliant ensemble, he really popped. In the hands of a lesser actor, he would have been a caricature, but Mr. Lloyd brought such heart and pathos to him that I longed to see him in my living room every week. The writers created a brilliant backstory for him where he was a rich, successful Harvard student who, upon sampling a pot brownie, instantly went down the rabbit hole of drug addiction and loony insanity.