In the 1980s, I sometimes hit the road with a kid named Billy Gardell, who now stars in the sitcom Mike & Molly. He was only eighteen then, but he already wrote brilliant stuff.
Outside the doors to Studio 8H, getting ready for rehearsal. The first time I did Clinton biting his bottom lip and giving the thumbs-up on air, the audience loved it. After that, anytime I got a Clinton script, it would include a note, “Does the thumb and lip thing.”
Credit: Mary Ellen Matthews / Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
Monica was a great kisser.
Mrs. Clinton sent this photo after I appeared as the president’s clone at the 1997 White House Correspondents Dinner. The inscription reads: “To Darrell Hammond with thanks for filling in the last few months—that’s our secret!”
White House photo
I wore the white wig to play the forty-second president more than eighty times while I was at SNL. Although I played more than 100 different characters over the years, Clinton would largely come to define my time on the show.
Credit: Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
As Phil Donahue on “Weekend Update” with Tina Fey during my first season. I had done Donahue in Spanish when I auditioned for SNL, and it became one of my first successful impressions on the show.
Credit: Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
On the back of my Ted Koppel impression on SNL, I was invited to an event honoring the celebrated newsman at the Museum of Broadcasting. When I took the stage dressed as him, he turned to ABC president Roone Arledge and said, “Roone Arledge, you cheap bastard, if you paid me a living wage I could afford a decent rug like this guy’s got on.” It got a huge laugh. Sam Donaldson is making the rabbit ears.
As Hardball’s Chris Matthews. I was once on Laura Ingraham’s radio show in character as Chris Matthews along with the real Chris Matthews. You can imagine how crazy that got, with two Chris Matthewses screaming emphatically at the same time.
Credit: Dana Edelson / Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
As presidential candidate Al Gore alongside Will Ferrell as George W. Bush, the Supreme Court in the background, when Gore finally conceded the 2000 election. When I studied Gore for the part, I realized that in each debate he spoke in a completely different way. I decided he’d probably had three different voice coaches. My impression combined the three. A reporter for U.S. News & World Report said I lost the election for Gore, which made me feel terrible.
Credit: Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
When I did the first Bush White House Correspondents Dinner in 2001, I gave the new president a baseball glove. Fortified by a bottle of wine, I proceeded to do a lot of Gore material. I turned to Mr. Bush and asked, “Can I do some more of him? I worked a year to learn the damn guy, and then you beat him.”
As Dick Cheney in October 2001, the day after it was announced that anthrax had been found at 30 Rock. In the sketch, Cheney reveals his secret location in Afghanistan and his one-man mission to hunt down Osama bin Laden with the help of his “bionic ticker that monitors my heartbeat, gives me night vision, and makes me completely invisible to radar.” The real veep told Rush Limbaugh he got a kick out of the bit.
Credit: Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
With Vice President and Mrs. Cheney. The Vice President invited me to his private box during the festivities at the second Bush inauguration. He introduced me to one of his pals: “This is Darrell. He’s the guy who does all the damage on SNL. Heh heh heh.”
As Senator John McCain, with Fred Armisen as then-Senator Barack Obama. McCain had visible war wounds, and part of imitating him would be to imitate his physical limitations, which were the result of torture, and I didn’t want to make fun of him. But my father, not knowing what this would entail, desperately wanted me to play McCain, whom he thought was a great man. In the months before my father died, he said, “That’s my final wish.” I was never able to pull it off well.
Credit: Mary Ellen Matthews / Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
Lorne Michaels with Sarah Palin watching Tina Fey in costume as Palin on the monitor. When Palin did a cameo on the show, she had more Secret Service protection than any other politician I’d ever encountered. I was mortified when she decided to use the bathroom outside my dressing room—what if I sprinkled when I tinkled?
Credit: Mary Ellen Matthews / Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
About a month before my father passed away in 2007, I thought it might give him a thrill at the end of his life to see his son hit some baseballs. I got in touch with my old high school friend Wayne Tyson and asked him if he’d pitch to me. He agreed, and offered up the field at Palm Bay High School, where he was coach. I hadn’t swung a bat in thirty years, but muscle memory kicked in. We didn’t talk about it, but I knew we were all thinking about that 297 sign at Wells Park and hitting one over the wall.
Photos courtesy of Wayne Tyson
My friend Eddie often accompanied me when I flew down to Florida to see my father in his last year. Eddie joined me and Wayne on the baseball diamond that day. That’s me in the outfield.
My father on the bench in the dugout, watching the proceedings as carefully as he ever had. His right ear, out of sight here, had recently been removed in a futile effort to combat his cancer. When I hit a high fly ball that nearly went over the fence, he struggled to his feet and paced it off, just like the old days. Later, he said, “It woulda gone out.”
In a sketch as Donald Trump, with Paris Hilton as Trump’s wife, Melania. When I kissed her cheek during the bit, I discovered that she has absolutely the best skin of any human ever.
Credit: Mary Ellen Matthews / Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
Back at SNL in May 2011 for a cameo as Donald Trump in a debate sketch that also featured host Tina Fey as Sarah Palin. That’s the fabulous Jodi Mancuso getting me ready for the Trump wig. Tina’s Palin wig is draping the counter in front of me. Note all the head forms on the shelf behind me; each cast member has his or her own.
Photo courtesy of Elizabeth Stein
When Donald Trump hosted the show, he dove in with tremendous enthusiasm. He asked more questions and spent more time with the cameraman, the lighting people, and the costume people than just about any other host I’d ever encountered. But he’s a lot taller than I am, so in our matching dark suits and purple ties, I ended up looking like a Mini-Me version of the dude instead of his double.
Credit: Mary Ellen Matthews / Courtesy of Broadway Video Enterprises and NBC Studios, Inc.
After three months of in-patient rehab, I’m back on stage in spring 2011 at Caroline’s, where Marci Klein had discovered me for SNL sixteen years earlier.
Credit: Ayala Gazit
As Truman Capote in the one-man play Tru at the Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor, New York, June 2011.
Credit: Jerry Lamonica
Acknowledgments
Many people have helped me in ways both small and large with my career, my life, and this book. I am grateful to each and every one of them. No doubt the list that follows is incomplete.
At Saturday Night Live, thank you to Lorne Michaels for rerouting my destiny; Marci Klein for discovering me; Tina Fey for making me look better at sketch comedy than I really am; Mary Ellen Matthews for the awesome cover photo; Dana Edelson for photo research; Kenny Aymong; Steve Higgins; Mike Shoemaker; Katreese Barnes; Louis Zakarian; Jodi Mancuso; Lindsay Shookus; Bettie Rogers; Will Ferrell; Tracy Morgan; Gena Rositano; and both Jimmy Fallon and Maya Rudolph for holding my baby so much.
I am also grateful to my manager, Tim Sarkes at Brillstein Entertainment Partners, and to my agents at William Morris Endeavor, Stacy Mark and Mel Berger, with an assist by Graham Jaenicke.
At HarperCollins, gratitude to Jonathan Burnham, David Hi
rshey, Barry Harbaugh, Jaime Wolfe, Rachel Elinsky, Archie Ferguson, and Miranda Ottewell.
I would also like to thank:
Elizabeth Stein for putting up with me for a year during the writing of this book. Maris Kreizman and Joan Kasarda for their terrific transcription work;
Estee Adoram at the Comedy Cellar; and Caroline Hirsch and Linda Smith at Caroline’s; Alan Spector for making my radio career possible; and the Westies for encouraging me to do stand-up in the first place;
Karen Giordano for making my Clinton more than an impression; my assistant, Lisa Robicheaux; my trainer, Matthew Grace; Wayne Tyson; Kathryn Tyson; Janet Collester; Ken Shirek; Craig Eden; Larry Laskowski; Frank Facciobene; Ginny Ballard; and Amber Paul, the yoga teacher who coached me out of my final darkness;
The doctors who have saved me on more than one occasion: Anne Griffin, Sally Burton, Andrew Ramsey, Fredda Gordon, and Nabil Kotbi. Along the same lines, I am grateful to the staff of the Emergency Room at New York Hospital and the nurses of the NBC infirmary;
Tony Robbins, Martin Seligman, David Burns, and Ned Brown, all of whose books helped guide me during the tough times;
My inspirations: Martin Luther King, Jr., Harriet Tubman, Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera for showing me how the game should be played, and Willie Mays for the catch;
The NYPD and the New York District Attorney’s office for saving my family;
Eddie Galanek for convincing my dad that God loved him;
Donald Trump; Chris Matthews; Laura Ingraham; Maria Bartiromo; Senator John McCain; and Brucy Bochy. President George W. Bush for the invite to play catch. President Bill Clinton; Vice President Al Gore; and Vice President Dick Cheney for reaching out to me and showing me so much respect. Lynne Cheney for her hospitality. Whoopi Goldberg for understanding me. Howard Stern for telling people I was funny and giving me a chance. Tom Shales of the Washington Post. Whoever put me on the sand pile at the Ravenite Social Club. The woman who helped me get on the plane back to New York. The mayor at the Sanctuary, for hope and inspiration. Stanley the Bahamian guard. Hitchcock the Crow;
Truman Capote and Murphy Davis; and Joy Behar for the cell-phone line as well as her overall support;
And my daughter for introducing me to the miracle of unconditional love.
P.S. This book was written at the Gracie Mews Restaurant. Try the tilapia.
Author’s Note
What follows in these pages is my life as best I remember it. Some things happened a long time ago, some of them happened when I was under the influence of alcohol, drugs, and/or any number of hard-core psychopharmaceuticals prescribed for me by about two dozen shrinks, so I’m not always perfect with the details. I did the best I could. Some names and details have been changed to protect people’s privacy; while I was proud to know them, I can’t be sure the feeling was mutual.
About the Author
DARRELL HAMMOND is an award-winning actor and comedian who was a cast member on Saturday Night Live for a record-setting fourteen years. He has also appeared on Broadway and in the dramatic television series Damages and Law & Order: Criminal Intent. He most recently starred in the one-man play Tru at the Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor, New York. He lives in New York City.
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Credits
Jacket photograph by Mary Ellen Matthews
Jacket design by Jarrod Taylor
Copyright
All photos courtesy of the author, unless otherwise indicated.
GOD, IF YOU’RE NOT UP THERE, I’M F*CKED. Copyright © 2011 by Darrell Hammond. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition NOVEMBER 2011 ISBN: 9780062064578
Print Edition ISBN: 9780062064554
FIRST EDITION
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Author's Note
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
The Last Chapter
The Real Last Chapter
Acknowledgments
Photographic Insert
About the Author
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
God, if You're Not Up There, I'm F*cked: Tales of Stand-Up, Saturday Night Live, and Other Mind-Altering Mayhem Page 22