1) I’m writing the first hunk of this entry on a plane to do the Craig Ferguson show on CBS. I’m nervous, and the best way to convey the sharp flavor of the anxiety is to start now—when I don’t know whether I’ll bomb or not—and finish up by telling you how it went.
I have two things working against me: I woke up at 5 AM NewYork time, to give my wife another few hours of sleep while I cared for of our baby twins. (Turn to uxorious in your dictionary; you’ll see my baggy-eyed likeness, weeping (depending on the edition)). And now I’m flying a six-hour economy class to LA, on which the screams of two red-headed babies (a touch of home) keeps me from sleep. They’re sitting right behind me. So I’ll be too tired for the show—not quick enough for Craig’s celebrity-grade banter. The other handicap: my book isn’t really meant to be funny. I wish those babies behind me would shut the hell up. I mean, I tried to sprinkle moments of dark comedy into my novel. But More Than It Hurts You is about a child in terrible jeopardy, about corporate greed, the modern mania for attention, loss of privacy, the maddening even-handedness of media coverage, about a family’s dangers from within and without — all the threads and fears of contemporary life. Including, too, race and gender. I don’t regret making the book about serious things (just look at the current political landscape to see how important those last two subjects still are). But it might make for awkward late-night comedy material. Where are those red-head kids’ already?
2) Backstage, three hours later; the Late, Late Show’s green room is like a tiki joint; salad-and-sandwich platter, a bamboo-ish bar with a smiling bartender,and a woman dressed in Hawaiian clothes. In this case, the woman in Hawaiian clothes is Virginia Madsen. We’re both slated to be guests that night, but it’s her green room. Madsen’s the planet around which a lot of moons—assistants,children, publicists, who-knows-whats—keep orbiting. Her assistant has impractically blue eyes and her skin is camel-hair tan. Madsen seems flawlessly nice and stands among her entourage withthat air celebs have of pretending not to notice you’re in the room near them. We never speak, except later, when she’d finished her segment.
I say “great job”; she lifts her unflappable chin and fires off a comfortable smile.
So, now it’s my turn on TV.
After having gotten slathered in pancake make-up (“You lookpale and tired—we’ll fix that”), I stand in the wings, toeing a piece of yellow tape that read “Guest’s mark”; next to me whispered a really nice producer named Lisa Ammerman, who tells me not to be nervous, or something (I’m too nervous to follow what she’s saying). And then Lisa walks off; I’ve been left alone. I try a moment to let the details marinate a bit. Didn’t I, and most kids, dream about being on a talk-show?
I gawk around, at the union workers who get paid only to put water in Craig Ferguson’s mug, up at the curtains, the wires, the bits and pieces of this network show, this sort of company, this business that employs a hundred people to put out a product every night. “Two million viewers,” I think. Virginia Madsen had been funny—in part because Craig is so charming and easy that he teased out the humor in her stories.
Craig himself bounces over to me in the between-guest break, all kinetic energy, larger than life, and he says in friendly voice: “I hear you’re nervous—you’re going to be great.” I say something brightly about my gratitude and he is gone.
On the monitor, a more manageably-sized Craig holds up my book, shoves it right in the camera’s face,and pretends to read it. “Looks pretty good,” he says. Then I hear my name being called in a loud thriving Scottish voice. This is followed by the mid-volume applause you get when a crowd has no idea who the person coming onstage is.
I walk out. He gives me a hug, and, nervously—or because I am filled with gratitude—I return the hug vigorously: too vigorously. It’s as if I’m greeting a brother I thought I’d lost on the Hidenburg.
The lights are blinding when you look into the crowd. Under the cameras, a red digital clock ticks away. A very funny man asks you questions, and the crowd you hear rustling behind the impenetrable Klieg-light brightness waits for you to be funny in return. I do get some laughs: I tell him that most press I’ve done as a literary author are more like the Schwedtty Balls skit on SNL than a late night TV show. He says something very funny about Munchausen-by-Proxy—which is hard to do—and then tells me I looked like the comedian Richard Lewis. (I’ve heard this before. I am not psyched.) I do a bad impersonation of said comedian by grabbing my head in mock-angst with both hands. (I don’t think I “went for it” enough, so I’m not sure the audience or the host, or even my friends watching at home, knew what in God’s name I was doing.) Craig then intimates that our time is up. Impossible! I’m only getting started. But it’s true—I’ve flown 6 hours here, and will fly five back the next day, for three minutes of chat.
And yes, it was a total thrill. I didn’t embarrass myself; at the end, Craig graciously leaned over to me (I always wondered what end-of-segment host-guest pow-wows were about), and said, “You were great.” He couldn’t have been nicer, or funnier. And like that it was over.
My abiding memory—since the interview itself is a haze—is of his kindness. He really went out of his way to promote my book, to make me feel welcome, and he even wrote me a personalized card. I leave LA on a high (and fly home in economy, sitting next to a man with b.o. who’s from, of all places, Scotland. Today, I forgive him his B.O.)
3) Next stop, NY—for the official book launch. It’s Thursday,June 19th, at the Barnes and Noble on 97 Warren St (at Greenwich St.), in New York, NY. I don’t know yet what I’m going to read; I’ve been too busy being nervous. So please come by and offer advice, and suggestions, and support. If you do something freaky, I’ll mention you here.
Oh, one more thing: if you saw me on the show, and have any tips on how I could improve, or what you thought of me in general, please let me know.(Also, the show will re-air on July 3).
That’s it. Strauss out.
