ZEVON, WARREN

Musician, Werewolf of London, Excitable Boy

In 1999, singer/songwriter Warren Zevon was a guest star on Suddenly Susan for an episode, playing himself, alongside fellow guest star Rick Springfield, and it was weird and wonderful and inspiring. (By the way, my beloved millennial assistant, John, admitted he didn’t know who Warren Zevon was, so if you need a sec to Google him, go ahead, I’ll wait.) This was three years before he was diagnosed with the cancer that very quickly took his life, and his diagnosis led to a special hour-long David Letterman show on which he was the only guest, which made for a shattering public good-bye to everyone.

What I remember from his time on Susan was that he was one of the rare musical icons who was naturally funny. He brought his guitar to the set every day. I remember during a break in rehearsal, watching him sitting on one of the sofas singing, “Lawyers, Guns and Money.” His sense of humor was incredibly wry, and I thought, I want to hang in this guy’s orbit as long as I possibly can. I think he just took the gig for fun, because he didn’t seem to know Brooke Shields (or Rick Springfield, for that matter), and it wasn’t as if he was some professed fan of workplace sitcoms starring Calvin Klein models. He might have thought it was a new experience worth checking out. I also wondered if this was one of those situations where four other more well-known musicians turned down the gig, and then we luckily ended up with somebody truly great, instead of somebody just famous. It did lend a strangeness to his scenes, because his humor was delightfully dry, and though he delivered his lines with professionalism and superb timing, I also detected in his respectfulness a belief that he was in a comedic environment not entirely in his wheelhouse. During the tapings, he joked around with the audience between takes, which I’m sure for the 10 percent of them that knew who he was and loved him, it was an experience they’ll remember for the rest of their lives.

A lot of musicians don’t bring the guitar, don’t want to sing the song, don’t want to be bothered, but he was really the perfect guest—did the work, made friends, wasn’t demanding, made us laugh—and it taught me a lesson. On Suddenly Susan, I was incredibly happy to have that job, and yet I knew that on Saturday night, I could go to a theater somewhere and really say what I wanted to say completely uncensored. I felt as if Warren Zevon was in that frame of mind. Instead of acting like he had better things to do or complaining that nobody got him, his vibe was, “Life’s short. Let’s do something really off the grid and be silly and have fun.” Considering the incredible grace and dignity and artistry he brought to living the last year of his life, it’s a memory I’ll always cherish. Keep him in your heart for a while.