DISASTER. I’VE LOST MY VOICE. I’VE GOT LARYNGITIS. I CAN’T SPEAK AT ALL: I CAN ONLY CROAK. I WOKE UP WITH A VOICE SOMEWHERE BETWEEN DEMI MOORE AND HENRY KISSINGER, WHICH AT FIRST AROUSED, THEN TERRIFIED, MY WIFE. NOW I have twelve hours to recover. I’m on antibiotics and homeopathics and echinacea and ginger and vitamins and I have so much zinc in me I’m suffering from metal fatigue. I’m even swallowing phosphorus now, so I’ll probably glow in the dark. Everyone, it seems, has their own recipe for this common showbiz ailment. Jim Piddock advised gingerroot with apple cider and honey. My friend Joe asked me if it was hysterical laryngitis, and I said it wasn’t that funny. I’m aware of the psychosomatic effects of stress on the body, of course, but what do you do? Tell yourself “Don’t be stressed, just get well”? “Fuck off,” says your body, “I’ll do what I damn well please.” It’s sod’s law of course. First night in New York, all the Spamalot company are coming with the producer, Bill Haber, and the director, Mike Nichols, and several friends attending, and now this. Oh shit, shit, shit. It’s just not fair, dammit. My wife comes all the way from L.A. to be stuck with a sick husband. I’m going to lie around all day not talking and hope to hell my voice comes back.
I had the same problem one time when I was hosting Saturday Night Live. All week I had wanted to work on my monologue but Lorne kept saying “No, no, we’ll write it later,” and I knew we never would, and of course we never did. Just before dress rehearsal, with very little voice and feeling like shit, I grabbed Al Franken and Tom Davis, and they carried me in on a stretcher, and we improvised stretcher impersonations: me upside down, me at an angle, and so on. It worked out quite well, but I can’t fake two hours without a voice.
It’s a rainy day in New York. Patient pigeons are parked along the branches of the trees. Tourists scurry by with umbrellas. I keep falling asleep. Every time I do someone calls or comes to the door. It’s like a French farce. Head down, eyes closed, ding dong. Finally I manage a sweaty nap and wake up feeling a bit better. Now I sound like Lee Marvin. Eight hours to go. It’s going to be touch and go.
Recently I met the lady who discovered the G-spot. She said she’d show me how to find it. She curled my fingers into an O, inserted two fingers into the fist, and from inside pushed real hard on the fleshy part of my palm.
“That, ” she said, “is the G-spot.”
And I was surprised, because I’d always thought it was in the vagina.
So be very careful, ladies, next time you shake hands with me.