The Road to Mars: A Post-Modem Novel (1999) (5 page)

“Oh, knock it off,” said Lewis irritably.

“Any laughs, Alex?” asked Boo.

“One of ’em sneezed,” said Alex.

“A sneeze ain’t bad for a comedy audition. I’ll take a burp if it’s timely. Thanks for warming them up for me.”

“Break your legs,” said Carlton.

“That’s
a
leg,” said Boo.

“Don’t just stop at the legs,” said Lewis, leaving.

“Rim shot,” said Boo, unfazed.

“Will you kindly put that cigar away,” said the receptionist.

“It’s not lit,” said Boo.

“This is a tobacco-free planet.”

“It’s a prop. I use it in my act.”

“Then please insert it in an appropriate place when your act commences.”

“One to the receptionist,” said Charles Jay Brown, turning the pages of his racing form.

“Some people got their heads up their own asses,” muttered Boo.

I don’t think there is any subject which cannot be funny.

—
Peter Cook

“Ask me the secret of comedy.”

“What is the secret of…”

“Timing.”

Yeah we’ve all heard that joke. But the secret of comedy is sadness. Bleakness. It’s a young man’s game. Only the young have sufficient moral certainty to see how things are and how that differs from how things ought to be. The anger of comedy is for the young. Age sucks. With age comes ambivalence, the inability to be shocked anymore by the constant disappointments of life. I should know. I’m a forty-four-year-old professor of micropaleontology at USSAT hooked up with a thirty-something biology buff who’s driving me nuts. Don’t talk to me about anger. I’m stuck every day studying the crap of the late twentieth century, and she’s out there partying. I have to sit and read about all those poor sods on the cusp of the twenty-first century, a whole new millennium dawning, and they’re wearing their caps backwards. Two thousand years of civilization, and they’re walking around with the manufacturers’ names on the outside of their clothes. Don’t make me laugh. We’re all just thin layers of rock in the end. Sedimentary, my dear Watson.

Thank Christ for Carlton. My secret. My lifeline. The inventor of the antijoke. I kid you not. He postulated a category of things that don’t make you laugh which he called the antijoke. There were the things that were funny, and the things that were not funny. The things that were not funny he called anticomedy. The trouble is that these things kept shifting. Things could be both funny and not funny depending on the context. He could find nothing that was funny in and of itself, and nothing that couldn’t be funny occasionally. Baffling. He defined the anticomic too. He had observed that both Lewis and Alex hated certain comedians. Detested them. Couldn’t stand them. “They’re just not funny,” they said. This totally puzzled him since these comedians were often very successful and drew big laughs from an audience. How could they get laughs and still not be funny? He worked for days postulating something he called the antilaugh, before he realized that it was just plain old–fashioned jealousy. Alex and Lewis were envious.

Currently he’s working on the biology of comedy. Seriously. He’s studying the genetic makeup of comics. He suspects that there’s a comedy gene, something inherited, hidden somewhere in their autoimmune system. He points out human DNA is so long that if it were possible to stretch out the DNA of a baby into a single line, the distance would be staggering:
fifteen times
the round trip between Pluto and the sun. Somewhere in that billion-mile line of genetic material there could easily lurk a comedy gene. But how to find it? He dreams vaguely of identifying this gene and putting it into a lab rat. The world’s first stand-up mouse. He’s a hoot, isn’t he?

The coffee shop was busy. They left Carlton plugged into the recharger.

“I really don’t need a top-up, my batteries are fine,” he protested.

“Better safe than sorry,” said Lewis.

They nabbed a table by the window and ordered a couple of coffees. Alex drummed his leg nervously. He could hardly contain himself as the gangly Lewis wound his limbs into the booth.

“So how d’you think we did?” he asked the minute he’d settled.

“Well…” said Lewis, staring at the legs of the waitress.

“Not good, huh?”

“I didn’t say that.”

Alex beamed.

“I didn’t say we did good either.” He watched Alex’s face fall instantly, his mouth sinking into an upside-down U. He looked like a mask of tragedy.

“Alex, it wasn’t
that bad
,” he said.

“So you think we have a shot?” His face brightened again.

Boy, the guy is volatile, thought Lewis. “You can never tell with auditions, Alex. Sometimes you think they liked you and you find they absolutely hated you. Other times you play to twenty minutes of silence and they can’t wait to sign you.”

“So you think we’re still alive?”

“We’re hanging in, I guess. I’d say we woulda had a definite shot if that idiot Boo hadn’t shoved his face in all the time. If they think we’re with him, we’re dead.”

Alex wandered off in search of a sugar bowl. Coffee was his thing since he quit alcohol, but he liked it well stocked with sugar. He squeezed past a warm female body in a fleecy kangora sweater.

“Oh, pardonnez-moi,” he said in his mock camp French accent. He reached across for the sugar and brushed against her. “I a-dore kangora, dahling,” he said in his deep Tallulah shopping voice. “It’s to die for. Half kangaroo, half angora, it’s the jumper that keeps on jumping.”

She turned and he saw her for the first time. Dark hair, nice face, brown eyes, full lips, high cheekbones, almost Slavic, on the tall side for him, but oh how she breathed. She was shaped too, long legs, straight limbs; her body seemed to glow from within, and the woolly kangora sweater clung flatteringly to her outlines.

“Wait a minute, wait a minute,” said Alex, sniffing the air, “the scent is familiar but the shape escapes me. You wouldn’t be a woman, would you?”

“I might be,” she said. “Hang on a minute, I’ll just check.” She reached inside her sweater and felt around.

“Oh-oh, breasts, yes. One of the telltale giveaway signs. Woman definitely.”

“Mind if I just get a second opinion,” said Alex, reaching forward for the hand slap he knew would stop him. It didn’t come. He was left with his hand frozen lamely halfway towards her breasts, not quite having the nerve to go through with it.

“Chicken, huh?”

“That’s right. Half man, half chicken.”

“Not half funny though, Alex. Hi, I’m Katy Wallace.”

“You know me?”

“I was just looking at a tape upstairs. Hopping hospital. Very funny stuff.”

“You think so?”

“You made me laugh.”

“Oh, thank you, God” said Alex, looking upwards.

“Do you always speak to Him in public?”

“Only in coffee shops,” said Alex. “He’s a caffeine freak, you see. A speed-of-light junkie. Ever since the Big Bang, he needs more and more energy.”

Her laugh was open and genuine.

“So you’re with the Keppler cruise?”

“That’s right.”

Alex couldn’t believe his luck. He had the biggest grin on his face.

“In casting?”

“Not exactly.” She glanced over his shoulder and frowned for a second. Then she relaxed and smiled, put a hand on his arm, and said nicely enough, “Will you excuse me, I gotta make a call.”

“Can I come with you?”

“It’s a call of nature.”

“I love nature.”

“Then we’d better let it take its course.”

She squeezed past him so close he could breathe her in, and headed for the rest room. Halfway across the café she glanced back. He was still watching her. She threw him a little wave.

“Who was that?” asked Lewis.

“Oh, just someone,” said Alex.

“Cute.”

“Cute ain’t it.”

The reason that there are so few women comics is that so few women can bear being laughed at.

—
Anna Russell

Why does laughter empower the male but threaten the female? Is it something to do with not laughing at the penis or the erection will crumble? What is it with women and humor anyway? Why do they find it so appealing? Why don’t men ever boast, “I got this dame with a great sense of humor?” Not my questions by the way. These are things Carlton was asking himself as he observed Katy Wallace leaving the coffee shop. He’d been listening in, of course. Can’t blame him—that’s his job and he took some great shots of her, which I have just finished downloading. I must say she is one hell of a great-looking lady. I can see why Alex was smitten. Much better than my Molly. But then I’m not a famous comedian, am I? Don’t get me wrong, Molly’s not bad-looking. I suppose you could call her a bit trampy. There is something a little obvious about her, some hint of the trailer park, but then, that’s where she’s from. I suppose you’d say she was a dirty blonde, that kind of streaky look. I saw her first in an oyster bar. It was lust at first sight. I thought, Ooh, hello, who’s that then? She was laughing at the bar, in a push-up bra, her blouse too open and her skirt no bigger than a large belt. Wearing fuck-me boots. All shiny and plastic in black. That clinched it for me. Good legs, and she gave you a pretty decent look at them up at the receiving end where they just dipped under the red vinyl. A lot of makeup, I grant you, especially round the eyes. I used to think she looked like a ring-tailed lemur. But I liked the challenging way she looked at you through those bruised eyes with the deep dark circles that suggested lack of sleep and hinted of depravity. You’d have to be deaf and blind not to notice her that night.

I found her irresistible.

I had twelve oysters last night and only four worked
. That was our joke the next day when I woke up with her. Gotta tell you, no boasting, those sheets were pretty darn crumpled. I’d had a couple of cocktails and was feeling pretty horny, and now I come to think about it she picked
me
up and took me back for a workout. She liked sex, and that’s always very pleasant in a woman. Matter of fact, I soon found she liked it a little bit too much. I’d find her stretched out on the floor with the vibrator when I got home. “Honey, I started without you,” she’d say in that husky voice of hers. “Come here and finish the job.” The job. That’s sometimes what it felt like as I obediently labored away on top of her.

So she’s a game girl, Molly, but a long way off that Katy Wallace. Now
she
is one hell of a classy lady.

When Alex and Lewis returned to the office an hour later, Boo was just emerging. He seemed tremendously pleased with himself.

“You got the gig?” asked Alex.

“No, man, I got flung out. They hated me.”

“Imagine,” said Lewis.

“Why’d you get flung out?” asked Alex.

“No idea,” said Boo.

“Perhaps you shouldn’t have set fire to her desk,” said Charlie. “I believe that was extending the boundaries of comedy a little too far.”

“She said, ‘Surprise me.’ At least I didn’t take my dick out. Maybe I shoulda. Doesn’t look like she gets to see a lot.”

“Wouldn’t see a lot with you anyway,” said Lewis.

“Ta-da,” said Boo, flicking ash off an imaginary cigar.

“If you gentlemen will excuse me,” said Charles Jay Brown, firmly placing a large fedora on his head, “I have a date with some ponies.”

“He’s not a gambler,” said Boo. “He just likes to fuck animals.”

Nobody laughed. It seemed to reassure Boo.

Charles Brown tipped his fedora at the door. “My heartiest congratulations to you gentlemen on your forthcoming employment. My client and I join you in our sincerest wishes for your continued success.”

“Say what?” said Alex.

“Didn’t you know? You guys got lucky,” said Boo. “You’re on the list. Congratulations.” He didn’t look that happy.

“We got the gig?” asked Lewis in disbelief.

“Sure did.”

“Oh yay!” said Alex, breaking into a rumba. He danced round the room, wiggling his butt and waggling his body, waving imaginary maracas in the air. Even Lewis smiled.

“So who was the dame?” said Boo when Alex finally calmed down.

“What dame?”

“The one with the legs. Katy something?”

“She was here?” said Alex, his face lighting up. “Don’t give me that shit,” said Boo. “I heard her put you on the list. They tried to argue; she said, ‘Just do it.’ Old Frozen Face practically had a fit. What did you do to her?”

“Just gave her sugar.”

“Well, she must be diabetic, ’cause she sure went to bat for you.”

“How about that,” said Alex. “It must be my animal magnetism.”

“Perhaps I oughta slip her some candy,” said Boo reflexively. “Maybe I’d get me a job.”

Lewis was reading the posted list. “Brenda Woolley. Act One,” he said. “Muscroft and Ashby, Comedy with a Difference, seven minutes.”

“Too bad you got the death slot in the first act,” said Boo. “I guess she didn’t love you that much.”

“As long as we got an audience,” said Alex. “Audiences,” sniffed Boo contemptuously, “that’s what spoils comedy.”

Most people think, oh Jerry Lewis is the funny man—what does Dean Martin do?

The answer is, he makes Jerry Lewis funny.

—
Peter Cook

The orange tender was jammed with little old ladies. The ritual bunting and gathering of local souvenirs was over for the day, and the shoppers were discussing the kill: kangaroos, koala bears, tiny stuffed emus, plaster models of the New Sydney Harbor Bridge and little plastic statuettes of Brenda Woolley.

“Look, a tiny Brenda,” said Alex. “Small is beautiful, but not small enough in her case.”

They were riding the shuttle out to the cruise ship. Ahead of them an elderly gentleman in a large fedora was scanning the X-shaped profile of the
Princess Di
as their tender slid underneath and in towards the vast main hold.

“Oh, heart, forget not to beat,” he said in dramatic terms as the enormous size of the vessel became apparent.

Alex nudged Lewis. “Isn’t that Boo’s manager?” he asked.

The gentleman in question threw back his arms, removed his hat, and declaimed loudly, “‘Jupiter hath not anything to show more fair,’ as the poet Wadsworth remarked in the twenty-first century.”