Lies That Chelsea Handler Told Me

This book is dedicated to Michael Broussard. He is responsible for every book I’ve written, and for every bridge I’ve burned in the book world. I love you dearly, you great big homosexual. Stay gay. It gets better.

My name is Chelsea Handler and I’m not proud of myself. I have made a career out of being a misanthrope with the maturity level of an eight-year-old who had to repeat the third grade several times. Am I pleased with myself? Sort of, but I am definitely not proud. I know that I should be more mature than I am, and I have sometimes tried to curb my behavior, but it never seems to take. I have to come to terms with what it is I have to offer the world, and obviously what it is isn’t mind-blowing.

So, in the vein of giving back to the community, I have figured out a way to give back to a handful of the people I harass on a regular basis. Everyone who contributed to this pile of nonsense is someone who is very dear to me, and someone who needed cash. I believe in spreading the wealth. Give, give, give, and laugh, laugh, laugh. Even when it’s at the expense of others, it’s important to laugh. Laugh loudly, laugh often, and most important, laugh at yourself.

For those of you who have read my other books, the names of some of the recurring characters in this book may confuse you. The reason being, when I first started writing books, I was instructed to change all names and likenesses to protect people and their privacy, and also to protect myself from being sued by people I had allowed to penetrate me.

However, it turns out that everyone in my life has somehow warmed up to the idea of being humiliated in print, and are now adamant about my using their real names going forward. Here’s a key:

Sidney = Simone

Sloane = Shana

Greg = Glen

Ray = Roy

There are more, but I’ve already lost interest in explaining this and would prefer for everyone to get to the part of the book that will, I hope, hold your interest the longest.

In closing, I would like to thank each and every one of you for making me a New York Times bestselling author. It is a sad testament to the state of this country, but I will take what I can get, when I can get it, and try to laugh at the fact that it happened at all.

xo,

Chelsea

JOHNNY KANSAS

Chelsea Handler is a menace. Working for her is very much like working for a highly functioning, oversexed, drunken chimpanzee. Just when you think you’re part of the family and it’s all fun and games, she turns on you and bites off your fingers, nose, and genitals.

As with any volatile primate, you can never tell when she’ll attack, but through years of experience and close observation I have concluded that she is most dangerous when she’s bored or has a little free time and is looking to entertain herself. Now I understand why they put toys in monkey cages. You want to keep them busy so they have no time for mischief. The thought has crossed my mind to buy Chelsea a tire swing for her dressing room.

For some unknown reason, I seem to be one of Chelsea’s favorite targets. Brad Wollack thinks she fucks with him more than anyone else, but he is sadly deceived. Brad Wollack is a whiner and an obsessive-compulsive, so not only does he talk about how Chelsea fucks with him more, he thinks about it over and over and over again while he counts the ceiling tiles and cleans his computer mouse with a Clorox wipe.

I also feel that Brad should be used to any abuse by now. I mean, just look at him. He’s ridiculous.

I apologize to his parents, whom I have met multiple times, and who are lovely and very attractive people. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind taking his mom for a spin around the dance floor, but I’m sorry, Brad looks like a newborn piglet with a red Jew fro. If you didn’t know better, you’d think Little Orphan Annie had had a sex change operation with less than optimal results. Add some big glasses and a twitch and you’ve got a guy who got his ass kicked religiously in high school. I’m sure people have been fucking with him for most of his life.

Getting back to Chelsea… Just so you know what I’m dealing with, let me explain. Chelsea introduces me as a “little girl” to everyone, whether it’s her family, new people at the show, people at dinner parties, or entertainment executives. I guess you could call that a lie because, for the record, I am not a little girl. I’m a grown man and a producer at Chelsea Lately. Even though little girls are cute and cuddly, they don’t exactly command a lot of respect in the rough-and-tumble, dog-eat-dog, who-took-my-sandwich world of Hollywood.

I didn’t really mind it at first, but then I realized that even though people probably didn’t think I was actually a little girl, I could tell they were assessing my physique and thinking, “Well, he does kind of have an adolescent female body.” “I don’t know what it is about him, but for some reason I can’t stop thinking about that robot girl from Small Wonder.” This doesn’t give me the biggest boost of confidence about myself, everybody thinking that I have the body of a teen girl and that my name is Jill, not Johnny. That’s also what Chelsea introduces me as, Jill.

If she doesn’t introduce me as Jill, she introduces me as Baby Bird. I believe Baby Bird came from the size of my body and the fact that I’m not really a big eater. You wouldn’t be either if you were looking over your shoulder during every meal, keeping your eye out for a lonely marauding basic cable host. I guess I don’t put much effort into eating, and I will admit that when everyone at the table is finished I’m usually about three bites in. But what the fuck does that have to do with being a baby bird? It’s not like I’m having someone chew up my food for me and then regurgitate it into my mouth. That happened only once, in Cabo, with a banana, but that was for a movie, one I remain extremely proud of to this day, titled Drunken Jackasses: The Quest. Netflix it.

The only conclusion that any normal person can come to is that Chelsea is infatuated with my body. She won’t admit it, but come on, that’s all she talks about. I’m sure right now she’s probably somewhere thinking about my slim, petite body. Maybe she’s attracted to little girl bodies and that’s why she’s always talking about mine. I believe she probably wishes she had my body.

Another thing you should know is that Chelsea gives me three to four wedgies a week. Not your cute, giggly, “oh, you silly goose” wedgies. We’re talking tear-inducing, ball-crushing, bloodstain-producing underwear wedgies. I’m sure by now I have the words Fruit of the Loom permanently embossed on my asshole.

This insane behavior is perfectly acceptable in the Chelsea Lately offices. How is this possible? Is that any way to run a television show? Do you think at The View the morning starts with Joy Behar emerging from what I’m sure is three to four hours of makeup, taking hold of an intern’s boxers, and screaming, “It must be Christmas because I just gave you a Nut Cracker”?

But in this asinine workplace you have to learn to grin and bear it and laugh because, well, it’s part of the job. “Ha, ha, ha, Chelsea just severed my left testicle. Hilarious.” I know some of the writers can feel my pain and humiliation when she’s doing it, but still they laugh along. I once saw it in Sarah Colonna’s eyes, I saw the sadness and compassion for me through her giggles, but I don’t blame her, she has a career to look out for. To this day I’ve never held it against Sarah.

Sarah Colonna

To mix it up, Chelsea doesn’t always go for the wedgie. At least once a week she strips off other articles of my clothing: shoes, socks, belts. Ripping my shirt over my head is a standard. She will pretend to be having a simple, sweet conversation with someone, and then, out of the corner of my eye, I’ll start to sense her slowly sidling up to me. I’ll flinch. Then she’ll start in. “What? Why are you flinching? I’m not doing anything. You’re such a little girl.” Of course I flinch, you liar. Why wouldn’t I? You think Tina Turner didn’t jump every time Ike reached for the salt?

Chelsea is a very strong woman, in almost a mannish way. She has the shoulders of an outside linebacker. Chelsea and I once actually met Brian Urlacher, linebacker for the Chicago Bears, when we were in the Bahamas, and I’m positive I caught him looking at her build with surprise and envy.

There are times when I’m in the middle of a skirmish with Chelsea, with my arms pinned above my head and my shirt pulled over my face, when I think she may have missed her calling and that she should have taken advantage of her surprising retard strength and gone into professional wrestling. “Now entering the ring, from the great state of New Jersey, Coslopus Face.”

One of her favorite times to assault me is right before we tape the show. She’ll be all dolled up, with hair, makeup, and six-inch heels ready for the camera. If I try to fight back at such a moment, she pulls out the “Don’t mess up my hair. Watch out, Baby Bird, this journalist has a show to do.” Standing alongside her, wearing bright red lipstick, will be her rather questionable lesbian stylist, Amy, yelling at me not to mess up Chelsea’s clothes. Really? Maybe someone should tell Chelsea not to start a wrestling match in the hallway before she steps in front of an audience.

On occasion she has actually called to others for help in holding me down. Now throw in the largest lesbian on record, Fortune Feimster, who thunders out of her office to grab me. It’s criminal. While she picks me up by the scruff of my neck with one massive hand, Chelsea rips my shirt off and displays it like some sort of washable all-cotton trophy.

I can only assume this is her pre-show prep to get fired up for the taping. A simple prayer circle would work for a more reasonable person, but where is the invigorating humiliation in that? Chelsea needs more, just like the ancient warriors who sacrificed a virginal goat before battle. That is, if they ripped the goat’s shirt off first.

All this leaves me standing in the office without a shirt on. Wandering around at work topless just screams professionalism. That’s one of the first things you learn in business school. It’s hard to take a man seriously when you can see his nipples. I don’t want to give you the impression that I’m not proud of my nipples. My right nipple, if I leave it to its own devices, will grow a single long silky brown hair. When I was in college I named him Harold.

Anyway, being topless on the job leaves me no other choice but to go to the wardrobe room to find something to wear. Unfortunately, for the fashion-forward hipster that I am, Wardrobe is filled only with crap for Chelsea. So now I’m stuck wearing one of Chelsea’s tops the rest of the day. And her blouses are normally baggy on me. I don’t know who this is more embarrassing for, me or Chelsea. The only saving grace is that we both have blue eyes, so a lot of her tops are somewhat flattering on me and have been known to make my eyes pop. This can turn your day around after being physically violated by a woman.

This is me on some stupid yacht in the Bahamas. The crew offered to put Chelsea in a mermaid costume and film her swimming underwater. But because of my feminine physique, she insisted it be me. Thank you, Chelsea.

All of this may help you understand why I am rarely at my desk during the day. First, I’m obviously out and about shooting different segments for the show, but it’s mostly because it’s good to keep on the move when Chelsea is roaming around looking for a target. If I’m in my office, I’m a sitting duck. It’s better never to be in the same place for long. But this brings up a whole other set of difficulties. If she can’t fuck directly with my person, she will fuck with the next best thing: my desk.

If it’s not a jar of salsa emptied onto my chair, it’s steamed clams (without butter or oil; that’s how she pretends to like them) in my top drawer. Numerous times I’ve come into my office to find my trash can and everyone else’s trash cans upended onto my desk. I know it’s not just my trash because I’d never subject myself to eating beef stroganoff before 5:00 PM. One day I picked up my phone and realized that Chelsea had cleverly taped a dead moth to the mouthpiece. I don’t know which took longer, her delicately taping its little dead body to the portion of the phone closest to my mouth or tracking down the innocent moth and killing it.

Why would I expect her to respect my desk when she doesn’t even respect me or, more important, my Cadillac? It’s a fucking Cadillac. A vehicle that combines power, performance, and luxury should command respect. When I’m on the road, people pay heed because I am behind the wheel of an American driving machine. You might ask me, when I turn it on, does it return the favor? The answer is yes.

The first day I got it, I proudly took Chelsea for a ride around the block so she could “experience Cadillac.” First, she refused to sit in the front seat like a regular person and insisted on sitting in the back like Driving Miss Daisy, saying the only time she rides around in town cars is when she’s being chauffeured. And you know what that big-titted, loud-mouthed New Jersey broad did? She hid two turkey meatballs in each of the backseat pockets in my brand-new Cadillac. Chelsea basically survives on turkey meatballs, arugula, and pints of hummus, not unlike an actual chimpanzee. Her brother Roy prepares these by the dozen each week, so Chelsea can try to avoid her natural instincts, which would be to gorge herself on raw meat and nacho cheese.