"John Morressy - Last Jerry Fagin Show" - читать интересную книгу автора (Morressy John)

I watched the show by myself that night, and , I certainly didn't gloat.
I had been alone most r of the past month, ever since Jerry dropped me from
his staff, loudly and publicly. In this business there is nobody as
untouchable as a ', loser, and an out-of-work comedy writer is a loser of the
Hindenburg class.
So I settled in, hoping to see Jerry screw up y and blow his big moment
and knowing all the .i time that no matter how big a son of a bitch Jerry
Fagin might be, he was a pro and this would be the show of his career. But I
could
hope. -e
At the same time I didn't want to see Jerry completely wrecked, just
badly damaged and
G
requiring some repairs. Humiliation and disgrace were fine, but I didn't want
him ruined. He was still my best potential source of income, and I was
starting to feel the pinch. Trouble tonight, and Jerry would be calling me
back, asking me to polish up some of the failureproof routines that had helped
put him where he was. And I'd be there. I was not about to turn down the
best-paying job in the business just because Jerry had made me look like a
fool in public and closed every studio door to me. I mean, I have my pride,
but I have my bills, too.

I started watching early, so I could savor the full hype. Spot
announcements every fifteen minutes. On the Seven O'Clock News, a special
five-minute report on the universe. At eight, ninety minutes of interviews
with astronauts, starlets, clergymen, science-fiction writers, senators, a
rock group, and the president of the Descendants of Prehistoric Alien
Visitors. During the nine-thirty commercial interludetoothpaste, deodorants,
and detergents hawked in skits starring, respectively, teen-agers and aliens,
secretaries and aliens, and housewives and aliens-I started drinking. I could
tell it was going to be better than a one-bottle night, and I wanted to start
early and avoid having to rush things later on.
After the barrage of commercials came a special one-hour feature on
alien visitors as depicted by Hollywood. Sixty minutes of blobs, globs, bugs,
slugs, crawling eyes, brain-eaters, body-snatchers, mind-stealers, worms,
germs,

robots, and androids, and every ten minutes a screaming reminder of tonight's
once-in-alifetime Jerry Fagin Show.
What kind of impression all this was supposed to make on Twelve, I could
not imagine. Maybe they made sure he was nowhere near a television set.
At ten-thirty, a longer, louder announcement. Then, after the
mature-viewer commercials-wine, tampons, and laxatives peddled, respectively,
by diplomats and aliens, female skydivers and aliens, and grandmothers and
aliens-a half-hour special to remind the viewer who might have forgotten that
there are nine planets in the solar system, that we are but a grain of sand on
the shore of the great ocean of infinity, and so on. Very profound stuff,
delivered like Sermonette or an insurance commercial. I kept on drinking.
Eleven o'clock brought the traditional mix of news, commercials, and
station ID, and then, at eleven-thirty, came The Jerry Fagin Show. It was