So MAYBE SIMON WAS RIGHT. Downers had lost most of its legendary cache over the years. Stand-up comedy had gone mainstream, corporate; even had its own cable channel. The mythology of Roscoe Downs remained cultlike, and probably for good reason. In the final analysis, his modest establishment in Nashville would be considered little more than quaint, an interesting exhibit whenever they got around to building an official comedy hall of fame.
All of which made Oliver’s ultimate career goal seem rather ordinary. Or at least that’s what he thought before he showed up for the gig, before his lifelong ambition started to feel more like a surreal dream.
His first problem was finding a place to park. It seemed half the lot was filled with panel vans emblazoned with big logos, each sporting giant retractable antennae pointing toward the heavens. Oliver parked two blocks away, slung his hanging bag over his shoulder, and was already starting to sweat when he tried to let himself in through the kitchen door in the back alley. But for the first time in twenty years, it was locked. When he made his way to the front door, he was greeted by an athletic blonde with a clipboard. After an embarrassing exchange that included Oliver showing his license to prove that he really was the lone nonfamous comic on her list, she gave him a lanyard with a laminated ID and ushered him inside.
There were camera crews everywhere. And lots of people dressed in black. Oliver found the promoter on stage, squinting into the lights and arguing with someone on his cell phone. He waited for the man to hang up before introducing himself.
“Oliver Miles, glad to finally meet you in person. I see you’ve got yourself checked in. Here’s a copy of the lineup tonight. Looks like you’re sandwiched between the Steves.”
Oliver nodded, as if he actually knew who “The Steves” were. He assumed it was an improv troupe or a ventriloquist act. Then he scanned the list of comics on the itinerary and realized that he would be performing between Steve Martin and Steven Wright. He concentrated on not throwing up. The lack of publicity for Roscoe’s benefit gig was making more and more sense now. With this kind of star power crammed into this size room, there was no need to advertise.
“You okay, Oliver? You look like you need a nap.”
“No, sir, I’m good.”
“You sure? I could try and scrounge up a cot.”
Oliver did some quick math—he’d been awake for at least thirty-two hours, maybe more. “No, I’m good, thanks.”
“I take it you know where the dressing room is?”
Oliver trudged away, wondering how so many bodies with so much talent were going to fit in the eight-by-eight dressing room. Then he opened the door and saw that someone had propped open the other dressing room door, the one that led to the parking lot. He stepped through that doorway, down a few concrete steps, and found himself in what appeared to be a circus tent with dozens of partitions along either side that formed a maze of makeshift dressing rooms. When Oliver found the large sign that said “Miles,” he ducked inside his assigned cubicle and sat down. The tiny room was supplied with a folding table, a telephone, a mirror, and enough snacks and drinks to feed a preschool for a month.
Running away was not an option, because Oliver wasn’t sure he could actually stand up. Tunneling out might work if the tent hadn’t been pitched on a blacktop. The number and intensity of voices increased outside his tiny cubicle, which made Oliver wonder just who might be milling around out there, swapping war stories and catching up on old times. But his breathing had just returned to some semblance of normalcy. And he didn’t think it wise to endanger his respiratory system for a little stargazing.
So he tried to distract himself by picking up the schedule and reading from the top. Despite the obvious generation gap—Oliver was the only comic under thirty on the docket—the list still read like a veritable who’s who of comedy greatness. Along with the two Steves, it appeared Oliver would be sharing the bill with Robert Klein, Cheech Marin, Richard Belzer, Dennis Miller, Larry Miller, Carol Leifer, Jeff Foxworthy, George Wallace, and David Brenner. By modern standards, these were neither the hippest nor the coolest comics working today, but an intimidating list nonetheless.
It didn’t dawn on Oliver that he was only one of a small handful of other local comics on the list until a young guy with a headset simultaneously knocked and stuck his head into the cubicle.
“Hour and twenty minutes to showtime. Need anything?”
Oliver croaked out some kind of response and the guy moved on.
He decided to test his legs. And to his great surprise and delight, they seemed to work fine. Then the effects of gravity manifested in his bladder. Oliver had to pee—really bad and really soon. But he wasn’t quite ready to go mingle with a bunch of famous comedians either. He glanced around his cubicle, as if a urinal was going to suddenly appear on the carpeted wall. Then he noticed his hanging bag and grinned.
Two minutes later Oliver emerged in his security guard uniform and strode unnoticed to the men’s room. He passed at least three television crews on site—the local NBC affiliate, the Biography Channel, Bravo. And there was plenty of gossip to be overheard along the way as well. Supposedly, there were correspondents from Rolling Stone, MTV, and even Comedy Central. He even overheard a credible-sounding rumor floating around that Seinfeld and Cosby had gotten together and videotaped a tribute to Roscoe Downs.
When Oliver finally bellied up to the urinal, he overheard a couple of familiar voices that he couldn’t quite place, discussing how nervous they were. Somehow knowing that veteran comics still had to deal with nerves made Oliver feel a little better. But that all ended when he stepped back into his cubicle and found the guy with the headset on.
“There you are. There’s been a change of schedule.”
Oliver said a silent prayer, prematurely thanking God for answering his former request to get bumped out of the lineup. He even tried to look disappointed.
“Good news, bad news,” the guy said. “There’s been a couple of last-minute cancellations. So we’re adding five minutes to everyone’s set.”
The guy smiled and clapped Oliver on the shoulder, leaving him to wonder which was the good news and which was the bad.
Alone again, he sat and tried not to panic. He pulled his notes from the bottom of his hanging bag and read through them. His material really was pretty funny. But he wasn’t sure he was man enough to pull it off. He folded his arms on the folding table, rested his head on his arms, and tried to pray for his set. But that felt selfish and pointless, so he prayed for Mattie and his mother and Roscoe until he eventually nodded off.
• • •
The dream ended with applause—loud and bountiful and lingering applause. He’d been doing his act on the stage at Downers and the crowd had adored him. But of course in the elastic reality of dreams, the crowd numbered into the thousands, maybe even tens of thousands. As far as he could recall, the audience consisted of only his mother, Roscoe, and Mattie. Yet, there were hundreds of variations of each of them, all different ages and sizes and all dressed in different outfits.
It was the knocking that finally woke him all the way up, sweeping away the last few delightfully dreamy tendrils.
The guy with the headset held up a handful of fingers and simply said, “You’re on in five minutes.” He paused on his way out the door and said, “Unless it’s part of your act, better wipe that drool off your chin.”
Moments later he heard a distantly familiar voice introducing him to a raucous crowd. The master of ceremonies was Tim Something, or maybe Tom? Either way, Oliver recognized his voice from the commercials for Dancing with the Stars.
When Oliver took the stage he didn’t see a single version of his mother. No Mattie either. Although he didn’t see Barry, he assumed he was there somewhere. Joey was leaning against a pinball machine, introducing himself to everyone that passed. Roscoe sat in his customary seat near the back. Oliver’s old friend beamed at him, offered him a thumbs-up, then clapped his encouragement along with everyone else in the room.
If Mattie was right, if the truth really was funnier than fabricated premises and contrived punch lines, then he hoped the crowd on hand tonight had the refined comedic sensibilities to find the funny in abject terror.
Oliver stared at the microphone. This is what he’d always wanted. And if he allowed a little stage fright to derail it, he’d never forgive himself. So he feigned enough confidence to walk across the stage, snatch the microphone off the stand, and say, “Let us pray.”
He thought he heard Simon laugh the loudest. Or maybe it was Barry.
“Dear God, you know I usually ask you to help me be funny. Well, tonight I’m kind of begging.” Oliver heard a smattering of chuckles metastasize into full-blown laughs. “Actually, I’d settle for you not letting me die up here. But if my heart does finally give out up here, please make that funny.”
His prayer was as earnest as ever, and twice as sincere. He just hoped it would help. He closed his eyes again and added, “Oh, and it would be really cool if you’d heal Roscoe … and my mom too.”
Someone in the back shouted Amen, which by itself wasn’t that funny. But since it was Roscoe, everyone laughed.
When Oliver finally opened his eyes, he tried to ignore the cameras and focus on the friendlier faces in the crowd. He took a sip of water, careful to leave it closer to half-full than the alternative. Then, he did his set.
It took a minute or two to calm down enough to get the shakes out of his voice. Of course, the laughter helped. He navigated his way through his now familiar material, most of it self-deprecating, all of it true. He’d worked up a few friendly barbs about Roscoe’s smelly old car and his burger platters that went over much better than he expected. In fact, there was a gaggle of famous comedians in the back who actually elbowed each other and pointed at the stage. Oliver wasn’t killing, but he was performing respectable stand-up comedy at Downers and garnering genuine laughter from the most intimidating crowd he might ever face.
The problem came when he hit the fifteen-minute mark. That’s when he ran out of material. He’d already worked up to his climactic series of jokes about the adorable kleptomaniac at the hotel. As his set began to fizzle, he realized he was searching the crowd—rather frantically—for any sign of Mattie.
When his final joke ended, what Oliver should have done was launch into an enthusiastic, Thank you … You guys have been great … And let’s give it up one more time for this awesome lineup of talent tonight … and one more round for our esteemed host, Roscoe Downs … What he did instead was glance toward the dressing room and wish in vain for the emcee—either Tim or Tom—to magically appear and take over.
It grew quiet. And the longer he stood there staring, the harder it was to breathe.
Finally, he turned to the crowd and said, “Thanks, you guys are a great crowd. And I hope you’ll indulge me for a minute or two. I have some unfinished business I need to tend to. There was a smattering of tentative laughter. First, an admission. I only prepared fifteen minutes of material. I thought when they told me to do twenty, I could fake my way through it … just talk slower or something. But that obviously didn’t work.”
This time he was sure it was Simon he heard laughing. He followed the sound and said, “Thanks, Simon.” Then he used his hand to shield his eyes and said, “By the way, I’m looking for my manager. Anybody here seen Barry?”
There was some rustling near the back until Barry stood up and offered sheepish waves at everyone and no one at the same time.
“Barry, you’ve done a really nice job for me, better than I expected. So, thank you for that.” The silence from the crowd thickened. But you could never tell with comedians. Maybe this was part of the act? Oliver then cleared his throat and said, “But you’re fired.”
It didn’t break the room up, but it was funny enough to embolden Oliver. He began scanning the crowd again. “What about Mattie? Are you here?”
There was no response, no rustling, no nothing.
“Well, maybe you’ll see this on TV or YouTube or something. What I wanted to say is, ‘I’m sorry.’ I know I say that a lot, and it’s always been true. But I don’t think I’ve been sorry for the right stuff. I should have been a better friend. And I promise I will be from now on. No matter what …”
The crowd had gone restless again. Oliver was being sincere, but not funny. And they were there to see a show, not a confessional.
“Anyway, I just wanted to say …” Oliver kept moving his mouth but no sound was coming out. For a moment he thought Roscoe had killed his microphone, which would preserve his perfect record of never completing a set at Downers. But then he realized the technical difficulties were with his own windpipe. “Sorry, I promised myself I wasn’t going to do this …”
His last few words were garbled by the familiar, but inconvenient, lump in his throat. And the tears sprang quickly and started trailing down his cheeks.
At least they were laughing again. Not hard, but it was enough.
“I should have told you this a long time ago. But I’m pretty sure I love you. And I really wish you wouldn’t move away.”
There was a smattering of applause, followed by more contagious laughter. Then a familiar voice yelled, “I love you too!” That’s when the room really did break up.
It was Roscoe again, giving Oliver a one-man standing ovation.
Oliver paused to savor the moment. Then he wiped his eyes, waved at his crowd, and left.
• • •
Backstage, Oliver humbly received a handful of pats on the back from guys he idolized as a kid. Robert Klein said, “Nice work up there.” Then, in his thick Bostonian monotone, Steven Wright offered a “Good set, kid.”
Oliver stepped into his cubicle and was prepared to collapse in his chair and just sit there for a very long time.
But Barry was there, grinning like an idiot.
“Did I tell you? Or did I tell you? That was one tough crowd. And although you didn’t kill ‘em, you did make them laugh.”
“Cheer up, man. It was a shaky start, but the next ten minutes were solid. And that’s all that matters. Although I must say, that end part fizzled out a little. And that bit about firing me wasn’t really funny at all.”
“It wasn’t supposed to be.”
“What? You telling me you were serious?”
“You and Chuck robbed innocent people at the hotel. And you let Sherman think it was Mattie.”
“You’re right, Oliver. You’re right. And I do feel bad about it. Tell you what, I promise I’ll apologize to Mattie, come clean with General Sherman. I’ll even get Chuck to call the cops tomorrow and drop the charges, tell them it was a big misunderstanding. I mean, it’s not like she actually stole anything. In the meantime, we need to get busy launching your career into comedy space.”
“I don’t think so, Barry. I need to figure out what’s going on with my mom. And with Mattie.”
“Why can’t you do that and be funny at the same time?”
“I plan to.”
“Without my help?”
“At least until we get our respective acts together.”
“So, what?” Barry said. “You think you’re my conscience now?”
“I’m trying to be your friend.”
“Well, I don’t think you’re doing it right.”
“You’re probably right,” Oliver said. “But it’s kind of a learn-on-the-job thing.”
“You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Afraid so,” Oliver said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go find Mattie.”
Barry looked at Oliver for a long time, then finally said, “She’s already gone.”
“What?” Oliver said. “You mean Mattie was here?”
“She sat in the back, in a pair of sunglasses and a bright green baseball cap.”
• • •
Oliver didn’t bother to change out of his stupid uniform. Instead he bolted for the back of the tent, feeling like the dopiest star of the world’s most predictable romantic comedy. But the gig’s promoter intercepted him before he made it out of the giant tent.
“Hey, Oliver, just wanted to thank you for doing the gig. It really meant a lot to Roscoe, I can tell.”
The fact that he didn’t mention Oliver’s performance was not lost on him. “I appreciate the opportunity. And I’m sorry I sort of fell apart at the end there.”
The promoter shrugged, and Oliver wished again he could remember the man’s name. “Just thought it was part of the act. I didn’t really get it, but it got some laughs. And everything up to that point was good stuff.”
“Really?” Oliver said, a little too quickly. “You liked it?”
“Don’t sound so surprised. Anyway, Roscoe sent me to get you. He’s reserved a spot at the table and wants you to watch the rest of the show with him. As his guest of honor.”
Oliver was flattered. He was also tempted, confused, and conflicted. Finally he said, “Tell him I’m really sorry. But I have something I just have to take care of. Like now.”
“Are you sure? I mean, no offense kid, but Roscoe really had to lobby hard to get you in the lineup tonight. Seems like the least you could do is go out and sit with him.”
“Roscoe got me this gig? I thought this whole thing was some big surprise.”
“You’re kidding, right?” he said. “No, I guess you’re not. Let me put it this way. At the very first preproduction meeting, Roscoe told us to add your name to the bill. We reminded him that the point was to honor him with really famous comedians that he’d helped along the way, that it was going to be filmed by at least two networks. He pretty much said if Oliver Miles wasn’t in the lineup, there was not going to be a show. And he meant it.”
“Did he say why?”
“Yeah, he was pretty adamant. He seems to think that you’re the funniest comic on the list.”
Then the promoter shook his head, ambled out the door, and lit a cigarette.