Romantic Comedy, page 3
I’d had the arrangement I had with Gene with a series of guys, ending the previous one when I discovered an unsettling three months in that he was a married dad (I’d always imagined that being someone’s mistress would feel compromising yet glamorous, but in this case it had mostly been marked by my unwittingly catching the guy’s preschool-aged kids’ colds). Though I sometimes joked with Viv and Henrietta about being a man-eating career woman, I felt confident that I wouldn’t have found a deeper connection with Gene or his predecessors if only I’d given them more of a chance. If I’d gone out for a meal with them, or walked around Governors Island with them, if we’d been required to hang out clothed and sober, I’d have ended things immediately.
I was typing Busy this week, what about meeting up next Tues or Wed? but before I could send it, presumably when he could see the three dots of my impending reply, another text from Gene arrived, and it was a dick pic. He appeared to be at his Queens apartment, which I’d visited just once. Taken from his navel down, the picture showed him lying on gray sheets, wearing no shirt and navy-blue mesh athletic shorts that he’d pulled toward the inside of his right thigh so that his wrinkled balls tumbled out and his veiny erection sloped left and upward. Given the nature of our relationship, such a photo wasn’t out of bounds, and far from the first he’d sent, but I’d never found a way to express that they had the opposite of what I assumed was their desired effect. In fact, the personal details peripherally revealed—the mesh shorts and gray sheets, the nightstand in the background on which I could discern a plastic container of watermelon-flavored antacids and a book about the leadership principles of billionaires—were oddly poignant but alienating. They reminded me of a truth I was usually unbothered by, which was that I knew what Gene’s dick looked like, but I hardly knew him at all.
I deleted Busy this week, what about meeting up next Tues or Wed? and typed Wow!!
Right now, he replied. Thinking of you
Flattering! I replied.
Send me one? he wrote.
At dinner w/ friends, I typed back. Then I added, Busy next few weeks unfortunately but hope you’re well
At some point soon after that, I fell asleep with my phone in my hand, the better to look at it first thing upon waking the next morning.
Tuesday, 12:10 p.m.
TNO’s offices and studio, along with many other offices and studios for our network, were located in an iconic building referred to as 66—it was sixty-six floors, and when the building had been completed in 1933, such a number had been more noteworthy. As I walked there just after noon, I knew I wouldn’t set foot outside again for the next twenty-four hours.
The writers’ hall on the seventeenth floor was, as I’d anticipated, ghostly in its emptiness, and I sat at my desk and inserted my earbuds. I always listened to classical music, usually Haydn or Schubert, while writing sketches about things like dog farts, tampons, and Title IX. I worked for two and a half hours without standing or removing my earbuds and in this way generated a rough draft of the Danny Horst Rule sketch (nine pages) and then a rough draft of the Blabbermouth one (ten pages). This early on, I was more focused on getting the structures into place than coming up with jokes.
One of the legends of TNO was that most of the show was written between the hours of 5 p.m. Tuesday and, because sketches were due by noon, 11:59 a.m. Wednesday. Another of the legends was that much of the creativity of TNO’s early years had been fueled by cocaine. While both of these rumors were in fact true, I personally had never done coke in my life and didn’t do most of my own writing overnight. I stayed at the office overnight because it was when I worked with cast members on their ideas and because it was considered bad form not to, and I often did find myself feverishly revising at 11:55 a.m. on Wednesday. But I wrote first drafts much better and faster during the day, and I sometimes wondered if, the cult of the overnighter aside, most of my colleagues would have, too.
At some point in my first year, I’d realized that the all-night writing sessions were, in a different way from the sketches, largely performative. Occasionally, it really did take six hours to write a sketch, but far more often, people fucked around for five hours then wrote a sketch in forty minutes. At any point on the writers’ hall, as Tuesday turned into Wednesday, you were as likely to see someone goofing off as typing. The TNO writing staff was still three-quarters male, and they’d be wrestling or making bets or peeing in trash cans. Some writers or cast members left before midnight to do a set at a comedy club; returned to wrestle, make bets, or pee in a trash can; then started writing. But these days, I knew of only one cast member who used hard drugs at work. Far more of my co-workers wore Fitbits, drank kale juice, and meditated in their off hours, or at least claimed to.
It was Nigel himself who was clearly a natural-born night owl, and though the schedule he’d set in the beginning seemed objectively crazy, it was after all this time justified by an if-it-ain’t-broke logic. Many sketches that had found their way into the country’s collective consciousness and spawned beloved characters and catchphrases had indeed been written at one or three or four-thirty in the morning. And really, if you were lucky, Tuesday was just the beginning. If one or more of your sketches made it past the table read, you might stay up late on any or all of the remaining nights until Saturday, rewriting, rehearsing, or directing a shoot for a pre-tape. Then you’d probably stay up all night Saturday, too, commiserating or celebrating at the after-parties, because your sketch had been cut at the last minute and you felt despondent or because your sketch had made it to air but bombed and you felt despondent or because your sketch had aired and killed and you felt exhilarated.
Prior to joining the show, I’d kept typical sleeping and waking hours, but TNO truly had rewired my biology, as if I were a third-shift factory worker except vastly better paid, or an ER doctor except not saving anyone’s life. It now seemed normal to me that most people arrived at the office around 5 p.m. on Tuesday, and we placed our orders for dinner around 9 p.m. I spent the hours before and after dinner working with cast members, most often Viv and Henrietta, on sketches they were developing. Around one or two, I lay on the couch in my office, set a T-shirt over my eyes and earplugs in my ears, and, except when I was awakened by chaos in the hall, I nodded off for about five hours, which was downright decadent by TNO standards. I’d set my phone alarm to go off at six or seven then brush my teeth in the women’s room. There was a shower in the private bathroom off Nigel’s office that some of my co-workers used after he went home, but I wouldn’t have had the nerve or the ambition and merely kept a toiletries bag in a desk drawer. After brushing my teeth, I’d have coffee and an energy bar and sit down again at my desk for revisions. At this point, plenty of people were still awake, never having slept at all, and usually emanating a half-dead exhaustion, though sometimes giving off a loopy camaraderie reminiscent of the kids who’d stayed up all night at an elementary school slumber party. I’d revise for a few hours, turn my sketches in at the last minute like everyone else, and go home for a few hours to poop in peace and shower before returning to work for the read-through at three.
On this particular afternoon, I still had a draft of the Cheesemonger to hammer out but decided to get coffee—real coffee that I’d buy from a place in the lobby of 66, not from the office kitchen—and while I was waiting in line, I texted Viv, How was doctor apptmt?
So, she replied immediately.
Interesting story
I didn’t see my usual doc
I saw someone else
And he was
She added three fire emojis.
Then came a screenshot, clearly taken off the eye clinic’s website, of a man who looked to be in his early forties, was smiling earnestly, was either light-skinned or biracial, and was wearing a white dress shirt, yellow tie, and white lab coat. Next to the photo were the words
Theodore P. Elman
Certification: American Board of Ophthalmology
Education: M.D., Perelman School of Medicine, University
of Pennsylvania
Specialty: Comprehensive Ophthalmology
Another text from Viv: OK he looks kinda middle aged dorky here but trust me
We had crazy chemistry
And he wrote his email on business card if I have Qs
But he can’t ask me out right?
Because it would be illegal
I typed: Wait how’s your eye?
Then: I don’t think illegal but maybe unprofessional?
Want me to ask my college roommate who’s a pediatrician?
From Viv: I have a subconjunctival hemorrhage
Which grossness aside isn’t that serious
Should heal on its own 1-2 wks
From me: Oh good
Obviously you don’t look gross if there was crazy chemistry
Was he wearing a wedding ring
From Viv: No
From me: Did he know who you were
From Viv: Unclear
If I think there was chemistry, was there chemistry?
From me: Yes
From Viv: What if there was chemistry but only for me
From me: Pretty sure that’s not how chemistry works
When are you getting to office
From Viv: 4:30?
Can you write some sketches that make me look hot and hilarious in case the love doctor watches this week
From me: Hmm should I assign not hot woman in Danny Rule sketch to you or Henri
From Viv: Me me me me me
From Viv: All airtime is good airtime
Tuesday, 10:08 p.m.
Viv, Henrietta, and I had brought our food from the dinner order—on this night, Greek—into the office they now shared. I sat at Henrietta’s computer, Viv sat on her own desk, and Henrietta sat on the floor. We were working on the idea about dogs’ Internet searches, and first we debated whether the sketch should feature real dogs or Henrietta and Viv in dog costumes (because cast members were always, unfailingly, trying to get more air time, we quickly went with the latter). Then we discussed where it should take place (the computer cluster in a public library, but, even though all this mattered for was the establishing shot, we got stalled on whether that library should be New York’s famous Main Branch building on Fifth Avenue, with the lion statues in front, a generic suburban library in Kansas City, or a generic suburban library in Jacksonville, Florida, which was where Viv was from). Then we really got stalled on the breeds of dogs. Out of loyalty to my stepfather and Sugar, I wanted at least one to be a beagle. Viv said that it would work best if one was really big and one was really little, and Henrietta said she was fine with any big dog except a German Shepherd because she’d been bitten by her neighbor’s German Shepherd in third grade. After forty minutes we’d decided on a St. Bernard and a Chihuahua—I eventually conceded that Chihuahuas were funnier than beagles. We decided to go with the Florida location for the establishing shot because the lions in front of the New York Main Branch could preempt or diminish the appearance of the St. Bernard. Then we’d arrived at the fun part, which was the search terms.
With her mouth full of beef kebab, Viv said, “Am I adopted?”
With my mouth full of spanakopita, I said, “Am I a good girl?”
With her mouth full of falafel, Henrietta said, “Am I five or thirty-five?”
“Why is thunder scary?” I said.
“Discreet crotch-sniffing techniques,” Henrietta said.
“Cheap mani-pedis in my area,” Viv said. “Oh, and cheapest self-driving car.”
“Best hamburgers near me,” I said.
“What is halitosis,” Henrietta said.
“Halitosis what to do,” I said.
“Where do humans pee,” Viv said.
“Taco Bell Chihuahua male or female,” I said.
“Target bull terrier married,” Viv said.
“Lassie plastic surgery,” Henrietta said.
“Funny cat videos,” I said.
“Corgis embarrassing themselves YouTube,” Viv said.
“YouTube little dog scares away big dog,” I said.
“Doghub two poodles and one corgi,” Henrietta said.
“Waxing my tail,” I said.
“Is my tail a normal size,” Viv said.
“Refinancing my mortgage,” Henrietta said, and, though all of us had been laughing intermittently, this was the one that made me laugh so hard I had to stop typing. I had been both in- and outside of this moment many times at TNO—laughing uproariously with my co-workers on a Tuesday night, and hearing writers and cast members in other offices laughing uproariously, without me, on a Tuesday night. After I’d recovered, I said, “How to tie a tie.”
“What is bitcoin,” Viv said.
We’d all started laughing again when a foam football sailed through the open door, and someone—I quickly realized it was the writer Rohit—yelled, “Stop gloating, you succubi!”
Tuesday, 11:29 p.m.
Rather shamelessly, I’d been planning to ask Danny to give me some dialogue for his part in my Danny Horst Rule sketch. When I entered our office, he was slouched on the couch, holding his phone in front of him, a female voice I recognized as Annabel’s coming out of it.
Danny glanced up at me and said, “Hey, Chuckles,” and, though I couldn’t see the screen, Annabel said, “Hey, Sally.”
“Hi, Annabel,” I replied.
Apparently continuing where they’d just left off, Annabel said to Danny, “But if you want to compliment someone, you say they look hot. If you say how impressed you are by their body positivity, it means, ‘That’s great you’re so confident even though you’re fat.’ ”
“Baby, you’re the hottest girl ever,” Danny said. “You’re reading too much into it.” Judging from his cooing tone, I assumed the preceding day’s concerns over their astrological mismatch had been resolved.
“The worst part,” Annabel said, “is that being criticized makes me want a donut.”
“You could eat a hundred donuts and be just as sexy as you are now.”
As I sat at my desk, in exactly equivalent amounts, I did and didn’t have the impulse to put in my earbuds. In the last seven weeks, Annabel had with her entourage in tow attended all the live shows except for the one when she’d been in Tokyo for the opening of the flagship store of a luxury clothing brand for which she was a spokesperson. During the shows, Annabel hung out not in our office but either in Danny’s dressing room or, befitting her status, with Nigel. Nigel was both Buddha-like in demeanor and an intergenerational celebrity mega-schmoozer, as likely to walk through the studio, on any given day, accompanied by a septuagenarian rocker from one of the world’s most famous bands as a rising teen starlet.
“I don’t know why she has to be such a bitch,” Annabel was saying. “I thought our feud was over after we presented together at the Globes.”
Danny lowered his voice, which still meant, because he was sitting about four feet from me, that I could clearly hear every word he said. “You know how perfect you are?” he murmured. “You’re so perfect that I’m getting hard just looking at you. I don’t think I could stand up if I tried.”
Did he realize I wasn’t yet wearing earbuds or did he not care? I suspected the latter; every day, things were said at TNO, often on camera, that would have constituted sexual harassment in any other workplace except the current White House.
“Instead of eating a donut, I’m getting on the treadmill right now,” Annabel said. “I’m going to turn the gradient up to 15 percent. Body-shame that, you bitch.”
“What if instead I come over and fuck you really hard and tell you how beautiful you are?”
After a pause, in a much softer voice, Annabel said, “Yeah?”
“So beautiful,” Danny said. “So, so, so beautiful.”
“Should I send Mickey to get you?” This was her driver or bodyguard, or maybe both.
“It’s faster if I take an Uber.”
“I’ll get in the shower now.”
“Don’t take a shower. Don’t do anything. I’m hanging up now and I’m on my way. I’ll call from the Uber. I love you so fucking much, baby.”
“Hurry, baby.”
He’d already stood and was halfway out the door when I said, “Please if you ever jerk off in here don’t get it on the couch. That’s all I ask of you.”
Danny paused and glanced over one shoulder with his back to me, which offered the advantage to both of us of my not having to know if he actually had an erection. “I’d never jerk off in here.” He smirked. “That’s what my dressing room is for.”
Wednesday, 1:14 a.m.
I heard someone saying my name, but at first I was so deeply asleep that I incorporated the voice into my dream. I thought it was Bernard, the janitor, coming to empty my trash can, and, senselessly, I mumbled, “You can leave the mollusks.” I felt a hand lightly pat my shoulder, and the person said, “Sally, I’m really sorry to bother you”—not a commonly uttered phrase at TNO—and I pulled the T-shirt off my eyes and the earplugs from my ears, sat straight up, and said, “What do you want?”
