Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - 35. Bob Zmuda

Episode Date: January 25, 2015

Writer, comedian and producer Bob Zmuda has had a busy career, performing, writing and producing comedy specials, co-creating the charity Comic Relief and collaborating with the late (??) great comedian/performance artist Andy Kaufman. Gilbert and Frank rang up Bob at his house in Lake Tahoe to talk about (among other things) his early days as half of the comedy duo Albrecht & Zmuda, his role in bringing the Kaufman biopic "Man on the Moon" to the screen, his controversial new book about Andy's life, and his theory of how his old friend and collaborator pulled off the greatest hoax in comedy history. Also, Eddie Murphy takes a phone call, Tony Clifton (or was it Jim Carrey?) invades the Playboy mansion and Garth Brooks (almost) portrays Bob on the big screen. PLUS: The ventriloquist team of Dick & Stinky! Andy gets a woody! Larry the Lobster gets a reprieve! Gilbert gets the axe at SNL! And a surprise guest crashes the podcast! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by FX's The Bear on Disney+. In Season 3, Carmi and his crew are aiming for the ultimate restaurant accolade, a Michelin star. With Golden Globe and Emmy wins, the show starring Jeremy Allen White, Io Debrey, and Maddie Matheson is ready to heat up screens once again. All new episodes of FX's The Bear are streaming June 27, only on Disney+. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadre. You know, years ago, when I started out in stand-up, I used to play the improv in New York, and one of the people I would run into at the club was the late, well, supposedly late anyway, Andy Kaufman. Frank and I phoned up Andy's old partner in crime, Bob Zamuna, to get the lowdown on Andy's fascinating life and possible death.

Enjoy. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadrere And our guest today is a writer, actor, author and producer Who has created and produced comedy specials For NBC and HBO He's the co-founder and co-creator of Comic Relief A charity that's raised over $80 million to help combat homelessness. And he was the wingman, comedy partner, and co-conspirator of the legendary Andy Kaufman,

and probably the person who knew him best. His new book is called Andy Kaufman, The Truth Finally. Welcome to the show, Bob Zmuda. Thank you, Gilbert. Thank you very much. Welcome, Bob. Also, thank you. You did one of our comic reliefs for us many years ago with, I think, Richard Belzer. Yes, yeah, we were Dick and Stinky. Yeah, you were the ventriloquist dummy.

Yes. I don't remember Dick and Stinky. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Yes. It was, I remember it being, oh, go ahead, Bob. You said, I recall it was just like a ventriloquist act. Belzer came out. He was the ventriloquist.

And you sat on his lap. And they drew the lines coming down from the other side of your chin. And Gilbert looks so – I've got to tell you, he looks so much like a ventriloquist. They kind of had that red makeup on you. You had a little bow tie, you know. It was so great. People said, you know, Belzer and Gilbert should go on the road doing this.

This is fucking hysterical, you know. Yeah, because it started out by me and Richard just like we used to joke around. Right. As Dick and Stinky and it was a lot more obscene Right, because this was on ABC, right? Yeah, yeah

so it was a little harder because he would go Hey, uh, hey there Stinky, uh Go fuck yourself! Why don't you suck my dick? It's a little like Otto and George Yes! And this was the early years at Bud Freeman's Improv and Rick Newman's Catch a Rising Star, right?

Oh, yes. Yes. You started, what, you're 74? No, no. I started, when I first started doing comedy, I think it was like the end of the, I was 15. Holy shit. Yes. 15.

And I think it was like, may have been 69 or so wow so you were there because i got there with albrecht chris albrecht him and i had a comedy team at and i came in there around 74 at the improv so you that's right you were already doing it yeah tell us tell us a little bit about albrecht and zamuda bob comedy from comedy from A to Z, for people who don't know. Well, I did Chris, and you know Chris, and Chris did that show now. And Chris was just another actor. I went to Carnegie Mellon University. Chris went to Hofstra. We met in summer stock.

We did some summer stock. And after that summer, it was about 1973 or 72 we decided that we you know we wanted to become stars so we should either go to hollywood or new york city yeah so we went to new york city and we roomed together and just just starved had a great time because you know gilbert back then who cared it was a lot of fun you know yeah and nobody really thought that anybody's career would really hit everybody was doing it because i guess none of us could like think of any other jobs to have i would imagine you know that that was basically it it was like and when i started i walked in the improv with him and it was and talk about cheese you know walking in the right place at the right time. It was, well, it was Richard Belzer, it was you, it was Richard Lewis,

Elaine Boosler, Larry David, Jay Leno, Andy Kaufman, and what happened with Albrecht is that Chris, Bud Freeman, who owned the club, was going through a nasty divorce with his wife, Silver. And he was going to open a club on the West Coast. And he thought, because Silver, as you know, Gilbert, she liked to give notes to the comics. Oh, yes. And they didn't like that shit.

They didn't like that at all, you know. Nice lady, but they didn't like it. So Bud figured, oh, my God, if this keeps on, they're going to desert the improv, and he'll never be able to get them to come to the West Coast. So he took Chris Albrecht, because Chris was probably back then doing a lot of coke with these guys, and he made Chris the night manager of the improv. Now, what's extraordinary about that, so then all of a sudden when the comedy boom started taking off, and what happened is that the agents in LA said, hey, this comedy thing has taken off.

You know, Freddie Prinze, Jimmy Walker, Gabe Kaplan, everybody was getting their own TV show. Gabe Kaplan, everybody was getting their own TV show. So they said, hey, we've got to find out who these young comics are and sign them up. And everybody said, we don't know who they are. Who would know? Well, who would know better than Chris Albrecht, who's managing the improv? So they tapped Chris. ICM comes and taps Chris on the shoulder and says, how would you like to be an agent?

Chris is a nightclub owner, you know, at the improv. He says, sure. He comes to the West Coast, and within six months, Chris becomes one of the super agents in Hollywood because he signs up Whoopi, he signs up, I think, Chris Rock, Billy Crystal, because all these dudes knew him and then uh what maybe a year after that uh you you remember the names gilbert uh uh bridget potter and uh over at hbo and she decided that they needed to torand HBO. Before Albrecht got there, it was just the boxing with Don King. Remember that? Oh, yeah. That's what HBO was all about.

I remember when HBO was like 70% of it. It was a weird kind of great station to jerk off to. Oh, yeah. a weird kind of great station to jerk off to. Because they had it, it was called like, something like isometrics or flexibility or, they

had these clips. It was like almost 24 hours of girls in spandex doing, yes, yes. Aerobicize. It was like almost 24 hours of girls in spandex doing... Exercising. Yes, yes. Aroba size.

Sure, sure. Aroba size. And that was the big thing back then. And the camera would follow them, and it would, you know, narrow in on their asses and crotches and tits. And that was 90% of HBO. Yeah, yeah. And boxing. Yes. and tits, and that was 90% of HBO. Yeah, yeah.

And boxing. Yes. And then they brought Don King in, and then they brought Albrecht, and they branded it comedy. And then within six months of having that job, he called me up, you know, his ex-comedy team partner, and he said, him and I had a comedy team at the Improv, and he said, Zamuda, you have any ideas? He said, I'm now a programmer.

I'm not even sure what the fuck programming is. And so that was the official end of Albrecht and Zamuda. Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, it kind of ended at the Improv. You know, he started chasing the girls, and I started writing for Andy Kaufman. When Andy got the gig on SNL. Then I started writing for Andy. So I was covered. He was covered. You know, but the good thing is that Chris then, so when Chris got that job, Live Aid,

with Bob Geldof's Live Aid, where the music community got together and totally changed their image before Live Aid, musicians were guys that had too much pussy, smashed up hotel rooms, took too many drugs. And it totally changed the image of what the music industry could do when they raised all that money, you know, to help the starving in Africa. So Chris had just gotten the job. I'm watching Live Aid. And I said, shit.

I said, Chris, I call him up. I said, Chris, you and I know everybody in the comedy business. Because, Gilbert, as you know, it's just like everybody from the Improv and Catch at the time. That's it, you know. And everybody was going up, coming up the ladder. And I said, look, we know all these guys. We could do the live aid of comedy. And we called it Comic Relief.

Robin, the dear Robin Williams, was a good friend of mine so i got him aboard and then uh chris got billy crystal aboard through david steinberg and then whoopi was brand new she had just done the color purple she didn't even know she was a star yet. And I think Chris called, got to her, and she was excited that she could meet Billy Crystal and Robin Williams. And that's how Comic Leaf was born. We thought we were going to do it one time, and it went on 28 years, and we raised, like you said, over $80 million. It's an achievement, Bob. You deserve a lot of credit. Well, thanks to Robin Whoopi Billy and Chris Albrecht and all the other comedians like Gilbert, you know, and Richard Belzer.

And as you know, every comedian out there, it's almost like you weren't in comedy unless you did a comic relief. Now, tell us how Chris Albrecht got fired from HBO. Oh, God. Gilbert. You're bad. He's incorrigible. Maybe you should ask Tony Clifton about that.

Bob, before we jump. I think Tony was dating the girl before Chris was. Okay. Now, we were talking, Frank and I, about in the book, and we heard that you once showed up at the Playboy Mansion in your Tony Clifton outfit. Yeah. And all the girls thought it was Andy Kaufman. No, they thought it was Jim Carrey. They thought it was Jim Carrey. They thought it was Andy Kaufman. No, they thought it was Jim Carrey. They thought it was Jim Carrey.

They thought it was Jim Carrey. Okay, so these... Yeah, go ahead. Here's what happened. Here's what happened. We were... You know, I produced... Me and Danny DeVito produced the film Man on the Moon,

which was the Andy Kaufman story that starred Jim Carrey as Andy Kaufman, Paul Giamatti plays yours truly. You know, Courtney Love played Lynn Margulies, Andy's girlfriend, a good friend of mine. But she's the co-author of the book you have right there, too, Lynn. So anyway, Jim was never into Playboy much, you know, and he gets a call. Hefner had been happily married for years. He had kids.

He wasn't messing around with the Playmates or anything. This was years ago. And his wife had it. She just didn't like living in the fishbowl anymore. And she asked for a divorce from Hef. Hef was crushed. asked for a divorce from Hef. Hef was crushed.

The Playboy company was happy because they wanted Hef to go back with the pipe and the silk pajamas and start putting on the lifestyle of an older person who could have all these hot chicks that sell the magazine

and everything. He came back. Once she left him, he put together this thing. It was one of these summer sleep parties at his night. I forgot what it was called. Oh, Midsummer Nights. Yes. Did you go to that? I only went to one party in the history of Playboy.

Yeah, well, Jim went, and Jim thought it was an old 60s, 70s thing. He could give a shit about Hefner. But he gets this call right when we're doing the movie. You know, I'm a Chicago boy, where, of course, Playboy started. So I went, well, this is cool. He says, no, this is lame. He doesn't want to go.

But believe me, guys, Jim doesn't need to be going to hang around. He's got so much pussy thrown at him. It's ridiculous. Seriously, it's ridiculous. When we were making the movie. Certainly then, yeah. I mean, mom is like with 15-year-old daughters made up like little tramps.

Oh, Jim, you know, maybe you could give her an audition. They didn't care if he dicked her. Of course, he stayed away from all that. daughters made up like little tramps. Oh, Jim, you know, maybe you could give her an audition, you know. They didn't care if he did. Of course, he stayed away from all that. But anyway, so he gets a call from Hefter himself. And Hefter wants Jim, because Jim is the biggest star in America at the time, $20 million a movie. And he says, Jim, I'd like to invite invite you you know to to come to my my my thing you know and jim thinks about it thinks about it and he really doesn't want to go and i said jim

you gotta go to this this is too cool man is okay and he said oh i got an idea he says i'll go as tony clifton because he you know in the movie man on moon he also plays the tony clifton, because in the movie Man on the Moon, he also plays the Tony Clifton role, which is Andy Kaufman's lounge lizard character. So he calls Hefter back. He said he's going to go, but he says, Mr. Hefter, he says, I'll come, but I'm going to come in character because I'm shooting a movie now. I'm coming as this Tony Clifton character, Andy Kaufman's alter ego, and I'll come. I'm going to come in full makeup, but you've got to promise me you cannot tell anyone it's me or it's not going to be any fun for me.

There's no sense in me doing it then. It'll be like I'm some guy in a stupid Halloween costume. And Hef, of course, promises him because he wants Jim there. Well, so we go to Jim's. So a week later, Jim's in the makeup chair at his house, and they're putting the prosthetic pieces on his face, jowls, nose, chin, you know, the whole deal, wig, to make him look like Clifton. And I checked my messages at home.

You know Bill Zamey Gilbert? Oh, yeah. Yeah, Bill the writer. And Bill, you know, had written a book about Hefner. He was good friends with Hefner. So there's a message on my machine at home. And this is 10 minutes before Jim's going to walk out of the house as Tony Clifton and go to this fucking party. And it's from Zany.

And he says, hey, I hear, he says, Hefner tells me that Jim's showing up as Clifton. He says, Hefner tells me that Jim's showing up as Clifton. Well, when I told Jim this, he got so fucking, fuck Hefner, that son of a bitch. He said, I'm not going now. And he starts ripping off the makeup. He's really pissed. You know, he said, oh, this is a downer. And he said, I told him not to tell you. I'm not going there.

You know, he said, how stupid is that? And then he went, wait a second. Okay'm gonna fuck hefter over he says hefter thinks i'm coming as tony clifton meaning uh jim carrey and i said yeah he said zmuda you do it i said no no no no he said come on in the years since i got in the in the prosthetics and i've got to do this. So they send me over there. I show up, okay, and Clifton is so fucking obnoxious. And they told him to make it look real. His name was not going to be on a list to get into the place. So Tony's limo shows up.

There's a long line of limos. Clifton gives his limo driver $100 to start laying on the horn. Every big star should get the fuck out of the way because Clifton's there. And he starts berating the security guy, you know, and telling him. And he finally gets in there. Hefter comes in and lets him in. And throughout the whole evening, Hefter is walking around with his arm around Tony Clifton thinking it's Jim. And, you know, and I'm in the Clifton outfit.

I'm sitting there. I could hear Hefner, you know, when my head's turned the other way, he's going, it's Jim Carrey. It's Jim Carrey. You know. And we had worked it out that at midnight, the real Jim Carrey was going to show up. And he was not going to make, and we were going to play it like he didn't know who I was. You know, he was not a part of this. You know, and so like around midnight's coming up, and now every one of these Playboy bimbos, I mean, they're just, you know, they've got all these old farts sitting around that place.

Wasn't Tony Curtis there? Yeah, Tony Curtis, yeah, he was there with his wife, you know. His wife wanted to fuck Tony, and I think Tony Curtis wanted to join in. Oh, no, it was sick. It was so fucking sick. And all these, and Clifton is just blatantly asking these girls if they'll go to the grotto and do anal with them, you know. And they all think it's Jim Carrey, so yeah, of course. Disturbing.

So now it's getting closer to fucking midnight i know jim's gonna be there so i had somebody there with a camera recording all this you know have allowed us to do because they thought it was jim carrey and uh i said get on the phone and tell jim not to get here i'm gonna get my ass i I'm going to fuck so much in this crowd. So, so on there is Clifton getting blowjobs left and right. This is absolutely true. And then I go back, I'm like so wasted. I came like three times, like in an hour and a half, you know, these are the hottest bitches in the world, you know, and Tony's like really just coming in her face, and it's awful, you know?

With the prosthetic still on. Of course, you know, they think it's Jim Carrey under this. And then Hefner, then Hefner's taking me around and introducing me to everyone. And who walks in but fucking Jim Carrey. Gilbert, you should have. It was the greatest double take you've ever seen in your life. Fucking Hefter's got his arm around me as Clifton. He looks at Jim.

He looks at me. He looks back at Jim. He looks back at me. And he says, screams, security! And the next thing I know, there's like five goons on me. And they pull me to the ground. Hefner bends over me, and there's people all around. They don't know what the fuck's going on.

And Hefnerfter i'm telling you guys you know and i was scared for hefter because hefter had a heart attack like a year and a half before right this guy had turned so red his neck that the vein in his neck is you know because i'm my my face is in the floor you know and then he says he says he says, he says, he says to me, he says, I don't know who the fuck you are. He said, but if all these people weren't here, we'd break every bone in your fucking body. And they take me and the girl who was out doing that on the camera and they take us out through the back. I thought they were going to kick the shit out of us. And then that security guy,

when Tony first came in there and Tony's calling him an asshole and everything, he's there. So I go, oh, this is curtains, you know? But they let us out. They didn't hurt us. They let us out. And then Jim and, uh, Lynn and I, you know, who was working on camera,

her and I went back to Jim's house and waited for him to return. And Jim then said to Hef, he said, I don't know who these people are. And then the next day, and listen, doing comic relief, and

Hefner has come to comic relief. So I knew it wasn't going to be long before Bill Zamey filled him in and said, look, this is Bob Zmuda, and I don't want, like, Hefner to be hating me. So the next morning, because this was a Saturday night, the next Sunday morning I went to Jim's house. I said, Jim, listen, we've got to come clean with Hefner. He's going to find out anyway, and he's going to think we're both assholes for pulling.

So we jumped in Jim's car. We went over to his house, and on Sunday afternoons, he always shows these movies. He's a big movie buff. Oh, yeah. So he has these movies that are out. So when we show up, they let Jim in because it's Jim Carrey, and I walk in, and Hef has about 50 people there that just about sit down to watch one of these movies. And while we walk in, we hear Hefner is telling the story of how this Tony Clifton imposter

got it that for years that Hef deprived himself on having the greatest security ever. greatest security ever. There's, you know, and that people, whoever they were, they were brilliant. They were like the Mission Impossible squad. And then we walked in and we told them, and Jim said, you see Bob

is moody here. He was, you know, and Jim said, you know, I told you not to tell anybody. You did. So I pulled a prank on you, and everything was great. And we actually have this on video. Everything I just described was on video, me being thrown to the ground and everything else. Anyway, so that's the Tony Clifton story.

I'm curious, with the Playboy bunnies, did they feel like they had been raped because they were blowing the wrong guy? This is funny because when I went in the next day on Sunday, the one that Tony had shot his wad all over her face in the bathroom, when I walked in the next day, she was there. When Bob Smuda walked in the next day, she was there. When Bob Smuda walked in the next day, she was there. She came on Sunday for the screening. It looked like she had been scrubbing her face all fucking night to get my cum off it. Because she felt it was Jim Carrey's cum would have been fine.

Not Bob Smuda who deloused her. Yeah. Unknown cum. Non-stardom cum You don't want on your face Or in your ass Totally different Totally different Good for the skin

Were they screaming rape when they found out? No, no, they didn't know They didn't figure this out until the next day Oh my god they didn't know. They didn't figure this out until the next day. Oh, my God. They didn't know. A fucking unknown came in my face. Pretty much.

Bob, we'll talk a lot more about Man on the Moon, but let's go back to the improv for a second and talk about how you first met Andy, how he first came into your orbit. Well, it was around 1973, 74. Like I said, I was a struggling actor in New York, and I knew nothing about, you know, and as Gilbert knows, you know, now there's like, what, 20 comedy clubs in every fucking city. Oh, yeah. Back then, it was what? The improv and catch, and that was it. Was Comic Strip around back then it was what the improv and catch and that was it

was comic strip around back then nope nope okay they were the last and what's so strange is they're the only one standing now who of the three of the three big clubs yeah comic strip was like the last kid on the block, and improv's gone and catch is gone. Yes, yeah. And so it's amazing. But at the time, the improv, which was the granddaddy, even a little before catch, before Rick Newman's catch. So anyway, this was in Hell's Kitchen, as you know, the worst part of town there. And I walk into this place, and I i knew nothing never been in a comedy club it was the only comedy club and i walk in and and it was very interesting is you know the lineup was

going out i forgot i think larry david martin on the show jay leno everybody a fucking unknown nobody had two nickels to rub together and this guy kid guy walks in with this suitcase. Thank you very much. And he's talking to Bud Freeman, who was the owner. And at the old improv, you had to sit in the bar area, you know, and wait till the other room was emptied out, the showroom, and then you went in. So you waited for one crowd to leave, and then they'd clean up the tables. And so Andy was very clever. He's the master, and we'll get into this. He's the master of the put-on, of the hoax, of the humbug. And so he would come in in character, and he would talk to Bud Freeman,

and he'd say, I just come off the bus. I want to be stand-up comic. Can you please put me on? And he didn't do it in a very loud, presentational way. And what he was doing is he was kind of conditioning us, the audience, while we were waiting in this room. We thought the guy was real. And Bud would say to him, Bud would kind of hush his voice, but, you know, it was a small room, so you would hear all this. And he'd say, you know, he said, what's your name?

My name, Andy. He said, well, Andy, you're a very nice man, but I have auditions. It's the third week, Monday, of every month. And why don't you go, please, can I please, I just come? He said, no, I can't do that. You come back in a couple weeks. Well, I'll be happy to. We have audition night.

So the show goes on, and you forget about this guy. And then at the end, because nobody would follow Kaufman, you know, the rule was Kaufman would destroy the room. And what he did was so bizarre, you know, and fucked up the audience so much, nobody would follow Kaufman. So Bud would always put him on at the end. And he would say, ladies and gentlemen, Bud said, that's the end of our show. He said, ladies and gentlemen, I don't know if you were here a couple hours ago, but a young man walked in off the street. And I never do this, but I'm I don't know what he does, but he seems real nice. And please don't do this. We have auditions every

three weeks. But I'm going to put him on tonight. And it's not all I know. I don't know what he does. His name is Mr. Andy. And Kaufman goes up. This is the first time I see it. And Kaufman goes up in the original act. You know,

was that latke? He called it the foreign man character. Thank you very much. And he's an impressionist and he's terrible. He's doing like, I'd like to do the Ronald Reagan. Hello! And the voice doesn't

change at all. Archie Bunker. Yeah, Archie Bunker. You think that, you know, it's just terrible. So you're sitting there laughing. But he's so excited because you believe it's the first time this

guy's been on stage. And he's so excited because you believe it's the first time this guy's been on stage. And he's so excited that he's getting laughs. And then so you're laughing more because you go, oh, this bozo, he has no, this ain't going to go anywhere. It's just bad, but it's so bad you're laughing. And then he realizes that you're not laughing with him, you're laughing at him. And he has a total meltdown on stage, and he starts crying for real. And you feel so bad, which only gets you to laugh more. And now the girls who are on dates are shoving their boyfriends and saying,

if you don't quit laughing at him, I'm never going to go out with you again. And the place, and I'll never forget this, because Bud's in the back. Bud had that little control booth there. Not a booth. You know, you had that sound machine there for the mics and lights. And so I saw a guy get up and go back to Bud, because I'm sitting there in the inner room. He said, Mr. Freeman, he said, you never should have put this guy on stage. This poor guy is going to kill himself.

And then Bud's sitting there, and it was such a heavy psychodrama, but you can't laugh. And he's crying, and it's awful. Then all of a sudden he said, I'd like to do one last impression. The Elvis Presley. And you go, oh, my God. And then a strange thing happens. You remember this.

All of a sudden, there's a music cue from 2001, because that's what Elvis would use when he would come out on stage. Oh, yeah. And the lights started, the few lights that they had hanging with colored gels in it, they start changing in relationship to this music. You're going, wait a second. What's all this production value all of a sudden? Coffin turns around, and then Coffin turns around.

He combs his hair. He puts on an Elvis jacket. He strings a guitar around his neck, and he turns around, and he does, for the next three minutes, a drop-fucking-dead Elvis Presley impression. And, you know, Elvis at the end, he goes, thank you very much. And then after the thank you very much, he goes, thank you very much. And he becomes an idiotic character again. And everybody is scratching their fucking head, standing ovation, you know you've been had. But I now am out of my fucking mind. I'm going,

I am, is this guy this foreign freak who just does this great Elvis impression? Is the whole thing a put on? So I wait till the place empties out. Half hour later, I'm having a few drinks at the bar, and, you know, everybody is leaving, and then coughing, and I found out he had his dad's car out there, because then

he would run over to the fucking catch a rising star and do the same fucking show. So he had all these props. And back then he had congas. He had puppets. He had this 16 millimeter movie projector. I mean, the old type. This is like 180 pounds, you know, and he's fucking, you know, and he sees me standing

out there and he looks at me and he could see I want to talk to him. And he's got all these fucking props, and he says to me, can you help me? I have bad back. Oh, so he's still in character. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I don't know. I think the guy's, I don't know. What the fuck's going on? So no sooner for another 20 minutes, I'm loading all this shit into the trunk of his car.

My back begins to hurt me. Finally, everything is in there. He comes. He closes the trunk. Andy Kaufman looks at me. The first time he looks at me, he goes, he says, thank you very much, sucker. And he gets in the car and pulls away. That was the first time I met Andy Coffin.

And then about six months later, we became fast friends. And then I was his writer for 10 years. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast. But first, a word from our sponsor. Was he doing the Mighty Mouse bit then? Oh, yeah. Back then? Oh, yeah.

That was probably the first thing he did on SNL that got him the job. And I saw, slightly off the subject, but I saw an interview with Chris Albrecht, and he's talking about, and I never knew this, that Chris hosted a children's cabaret at the Improv on the weekends that Andy headlined. Oh, yeah. Yeah. He would do the same act for kids? Guys, here's the crazy part where this all came from.

Oh, no, it makes a lot of sense. Andy Kaufman went to a college in Boston called Graham Junior College. It was a shit college that doesn't even exist anymore. It was the only college that he could get into. He had very bad grades. But he wanted to be a child performer. He wanted to have a TV show kind of like Buffalo Bob and Howdy Doody. And so he did.

When he was a little kid, when he was about 10, 11 years old, he put up signs in Great Neck, Children's Performer for their birthday parties. And he would come in, and they'd pay him $10, $15 for a kid's birthday parties. And he would come in and they pay him 10, 15 bucks for a kid's birthday party. He would not let any adults in the room with the kids, just him and the kids. And he would sing Mighty Mouse songs and, you know, Pop Goes the Weasel and do with puppets and magic. And it was all this childlike stuff. Well, cut later on now. He's in Graham Junior College.

Okay, he's 19 years old, 20 years old, and he's in the student union, and Andy was always a skirt chaser. And there's a hot chick who was supposed to book the show the next night for the student union, and she didn't have any acts. So she's actually running around the cafeteria asking everybody if there's anything they know how to do that she could put them on stage tomorrow night at the coffee house at the school. And she comes up to Andy, and Andy realizes he's hot, so he wants to talk to her. And she says, no, no, and she says, oh, really?

He says, well, I did a kid's act when I was 11 years old. Remember, he's 20 now. She says, do that. He says, well, no, it's like kid songs. She says, please, I'm in trouble. I'm in trouble. I got it, but could you please do it as well? And he went to layers and says, okay.

And he goes the next night, and he does the same freaking act he did for these eight, nine-year-olds when he was like 11. Amazing. And everybody, the juxtaposition of that childlike material for adults, that became the act we know as Andy Kaufman. Isn't that wild? that became the act we know as Andy Kaufman. Isn't that wild? Yeah. If that girl had never come up to him, Gobert,

you never would have heard of Andy Kaufman, ever. Wow. And then when he, that's why, so when he auditioned, when he, I have his first audition tape from SNL, the audition tape, because I have a lot of his stuff. What did he audition with? Because I remember him doing Mighty Mouse the first time. He did Mighty Mouse and he did Pop Goes the Weasel. It was the idea, once again,

of taking this childlike material in front of sophisticated adults and that's what did it. That was the lightning in the bottle. Then we realized that for a while when he first started, for a long time, him, his manager george shapiro

and myself we contemplated for a while should he ever use his real voice okay you know what i'm talking about you know should he ever use his real voice or should it always be they give that foreign man voice and he and matter of fact the few first times he did Johnny Carson he stayed in character and Johnny loved it because Johnny because that was like you know Johnny loved if he had like a weirdo like

Timmy Tim or Chero you know he was always good with those people the act worked itself because Johnny they would say something and Johnny just would would do those takes to the audience. Or Carol Wayne. Yeah, exactly. Anybody who stayed in character like that. So that was great.

But then Andy decided, because he had a whole box of other characters he wanted to do. He wanted to do the bad guy wrestler. He wanted to do Tony Clifton. And basically, he said to himself, he said to me one day, if I keep this character going, I'll never get laid. He says, don't think I'm a goof like Tiny Tim, I'll never get fucking any pussy. That's funny. And that was it.

So he then did it. Now, what's interesting, when he then went back on Carson and dropped the character and did his own voice, Johnny didn't like it. Johnny was very uncomfortable. The dynamic that he thought he had going with Kaufman didn't work anymore. And from that day on, Andy was never on. They put him on the tonight show when somebody else would be hosting steve allen or steve martin but never again with johnny didn't know that yeah now uh i heard that he started that whole wrestling thing just as uh basically to get some physical contact with women didn't he like didn't he like tall muscular women bob yes this is you are gilbert you've done your homework this

is absolutely true it started like this his birthday was coming up okay he was already on snl you know he was you know and he was making good money, he was touring the country. And I figured, okay, now I'm his writer, I gotta get him something nice. But Andy wasn't really into money and shit, so I figured, I gotta come up with a clever birthday present. And one day, I go over to his house, and all of the shades are down low, I see his car in front of the house. So I know he's in there. And I'm knocking on the door.

You know, and he's not answering. I don't know what the fuck's going on here. And, Andy, I know it's Bob. Bob, let me in. What's going on? And so he opens the door. He opens the door to the crack. And he's in this fucking sweat.

I said, what's going on I said you with somebody he says okay okay okay come on in he shows me he's got that darkest hell in the place he's got this is before they're like porn videos and stuff you know before the videos

he has this stupid little 8mm little thing that's like it's like attached to a flashlight. It's with a battery, and you turn it on, and there's a little, like, porno thing going on it. You put your eye in this thing. This is very early, you know. I think Gilbert had one. Gilbert, you have that, don't you? He has a look of familiarity on his face here.

Look at the recognition. So I'm going, what? He says, well, I don't ever show this to anybody. But he says, oh, you've got to see this. So I look at this. I know it's some kind of porno. I'm going, what the fuck is this? Is it farm animals?

What the fuck, you know? And I look in there, and it's two girls wrestling but like they got like bikinis on but he's such a he's such a a guilty Jewish boy he's got like chairs piled up get that somebody's gonna come in and catch him doing this it was so ridiculous you know I'm'm going yeah he's isn't that unbelievable i said yeah he's oh man and there was one girl named marilyn rubin that we knew she was a beauty she was an actress unknown and there was this other girl he said oh could you imagine those two in bikinis wrestling you know and i realized pop in my brain go ah this is going to be my

birthday present to him. So like a few months later, it's his birthday. His parents are there, his brother and sister at his house. There's about 40 people. And I come out in a referee outfit. And I have this wrestling mat down. He's looking. I said, Andy, I think, what could I get you for your birthday?

And I convinced these two girls who knew Andy. They wanted to get him something for his birthday. I said, look, will you girls wrestle in bikinis for him? And that was it. That was the first time we did it. And he got so excited. And the girl, well, Marilyn, sorry, Marilyn, because people are going to hear this. But that night, he fucked Marilyn Rubin.

You know? Because Andy was very shy, but that night he fucked Marilyn Rubin. Because Andy was very shy, but he figured once you could wrestle a girl, you've broken down the physical distance. I never considered this. Remember when you were a teenager, you'd go to the movie theater, and you put your arm around the girl for the whole fucking movie,

your arm's aching, and you hope, you know, you put your arm around the girl like for the whole fucking movie, your arm's aching, you know. And you hope, you know. But so he figured, no, if he could wrestle a girl, he could break that down and he could then get the third base. Because he's already groped her the entire time. Exactly. He's already half naked and and he's stroking her. Anyway, this thing takes off, and we decided to start putting this in our road show, because we played colleges. We're on the college circuit, so we figured, well, I produced all his shows.

I figured, okay, Andy, let's separate the men from the women at the college shows. Let's separate the men from the women at the college shows. So when you bought a ticket for an Andy Kaufman show and you went into the auditorium to see him perform, we had the girls on one side and the boys on the other. And then he would start this whole thing about how he could beat any woman in wrestling. And then I would always come out in the shows. We had about $500. If a girl could pin him, she'd get $500.

And it became a big part of the fucking show. The schools would advertise that the girls would show up in leotards. And then we'd select. We'd have the audience. The girls would come up on stage. And I'd put my hand over their head as to who they would select. So everybody knew this wasn't rigged by the applause in the audience, you know. And they would always pick, we'd always get down to two girls. First of all, of course, the sexiest one because all the guys would want to see her, you know, get wrestled, you know.

and then, of course, the biggest, fucking ugliest pig girl on campus that looked like she was bigger than a guy. It looked like she could kill him. Kill him and throw him out of the audience. Well, soon, it wasn't long before Andy started working on on Dick Ebers, on Lorne Michaels. Dick Ebers, Dick at the time was then producing SNL because it was that little while when Lorne left and then he came back. So Ebersol's director... Oh yeah, Gilbert knows something about that period.

So anyway, so he comes out, so Ebersol gets on the show and Andy finally convinces him to do the wrestling, you know, to do the wrestling. And so now we're on national TV, and SNL had girls, you know, and so the first time he did it on SNL, there was a hot girl that came out of the audience, you know. And now remember, guys, I'm always the referee for these things. So here we are live on SNL, going out to millions of people, and he's wrestling the hell out of this girl. She's hot as all hell. But I'm the only one who's down on the mat, and this is what I hear him saying to the girl. Oh, baby, you are so

hot. We are on national TV right now. He said, you come back to the dressing room afterwards. We've got to get to it. She said, you're a pig. Shut up. Shut up. And I'm listening to all this shit. But nine times.

And we did this. And the same thing would happen across the college. And we did this. We had probably about 300 wrestling matches. And I am not lying. Andy Kaufman bedded about 80% of those girls. Incredible. Yeah.

They said, oh, just come back. And, you know, and Zmuda talked to Zmuda. He'll get you backstage. You know, and they just, first of all, they had the time of their lives. They were being cheered on stage. He had broken down the physical armor between both of them, and it was really incredible. So that's how it started.

Now, he would get so aroused. I was scared on SNL if it was fair that he would put on a jockstrap in the dressing room. This is true for SNL. And then I would take a whole roll of fucking gaffer's tape. And I would wrap it around his dick and balls and tie him down. I swear to you. And that's why then he would put on swimming trunks, these boxer swimming trunks. And remember, then he put on these long johns when he wrestled.

It was so ludicrous. And this was all down because I thought he was going to pitch a tent on national TV. I prep for every one of these podcasts the same way, Bob, with Gilbert. Keep duct tape handy. Gilbert's wrapped right now, huh? He is. And I've just decided to add wrestling to my head. I'm wondering what took so long.

Hey, guys, what were you hinting about? Something about SNL or Dick Ebersole? What was that all about? I was on SNL right after Lorne Michaels. He was on the Gene Dumanian era. Yes. Oh, boy. Between Lorne and Ebersole.

You saw the politics beneath it all. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It wasn'tole. You saw the politics beneath it all. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It wasn't nice. It wasn't nice. No. And Dick Ebersole, I remember Dick Ebersole came in. This is so funny.

I remember sitting in an office with Eddie Murphy, and it was just some empty office. It wasn't yeah and and uh somebody goes pick up a line to uh Eddie someone wants to talk to you and he goes uh okay and he picks up the phone he goes yeah yeah oh no no no no I won't tell anyone no no it's a secret I won't and before he even hangs up the phone, he turns to me and goes, Gene Domanian's just been fired. Oh. The EP.

And he's not going to tell anyone. Yes. And then she has a meeting to tell everyone to announce she's been fired. And by then, everybody knows. And everyone's kind of like looking at the ceiling and at their shoes. And then it's someone's birthday, and they bring out a birthday cake. And they're singing happy birthday

the timing right yeah and and then uh dick ebersole comes in a few days later announces i'm the new producer i'll make some minor changes and uh and we came back the next day. Each of us are waiting one by one outside his office. I pick up a fan letter from the desk that's addressed to me from some girl in Indiana, and she goes, Dear Gilbert, I'm so sorry about what happened to you. The girl in Indiana knew. Yeah, yeah.

She knew before I knew. I was fired. Yeah. Incredible. Well, see what happened when the Ebersole was... Oh, boy, don't get me started on the Ebersole.

The one thing was this. This, you know, because Andy was kicked off of SNL. But he was voted off. This was awful. And what happened was this. Kauffman called me one day, and he said he had gotten –

what had happened is that the good thing about Lorne Michaels, Lorne was smart enough to realize Andy was a real artist. Just leave him alone. Just a performance artist. Yeah, I'm not going to – what kind of notes am I going to give this guy other than, Andy, it's too long, or it's too short, or it's never going to be too short. It's too long, you need to cut some time out of it.

That's all, that's all, you know, Lorne would do it. And remember, Lorne was actually a writer. He was a comedy writer for Smothers Brothers, you know. Lily Tomlin. Lorne's a very smart, sophisticated guy. Ebersole gets in there, and all of a sudden now he's going to start giving notes to Andy. This would be like telling Picasso what colors you should use. It didn't go over well, so they got in a big fucking screaming match, you know, because I wasn't there that day,

but I heard from a few people who were there, and they said, oh, no, it was off. It was a big screaming match, Andy and Ebersole, top of their voices, yelling, blah, blah, blah. And then a couple weeks later, I get a call from Andy. He said, hey, listen. He said, here's a bit they want to do on SNL. What do you think about it? I said, well, what is it? He said, well, you know, did you see this Louis the Lobster routine where they had a boiling pot of water and people would call in to vote if Louis the Lobster would live or die? And of course, the vote, and these were real votes.

This was the first time they started doing this, that people could call into a number or two separate numbers to live or die. And of course, Louis, they weren't going to kill the lobster, so Louis lived. Well, a couple weeks later, Ebersole has the idea, let's do this with Andy. Let's make Andy Louis the lobster. Not a boiling water, but so Ebersole comes out and says, ladies and gentlemen, there are some of you who think Andy Kaufman is a genius. There are others of us who believe that he's not funny anymore. But we're going to leave it to you to decide if he is kicked off the air or if he's able to come back. So Andy runs his spine back. I said, well, Andy, they're going to kick you off.

He said, you think so? I said, of course so. They saved Louie the Lobster. The next guy is going down. Just comedically, that's how it's going to work. And he said, oh, okay. He said, but I said, so if I was you, I wouldn't do this. Okay. He said, okay, well, let me think about it more.

He calls me up a couple days later, said he talked to Ebersole, and he said, Bob, I'm going to do it. He said, here's why. Because Dick, I said this to Dick, I told him about our conversation, and he said, look, Andy, so they vote you off. That's okay. He says a couple weeks later, we'll have, while the sketch is going on, you could be in the background like sweeping up the floor or something.

I said, well, that's funny. That's a great way to bring it back in, you know? So I said, yeah, well, in that case, if that's what he's going to do, fine. So Andy does the show that he's voted. I mean, they take the vote. And actually, it was Eddie Murphy who was the one. I remember. Yeah, who did this.

And the votes come in at the end. And, of course, he's kicked off the show. And the audience at home is like thinking this is a comedy routine anyway. You know, Jesus Christ, two weeks before with Louis the Lobster. You know, how Christ, two weeks before with Louis the Lobster. You know, how serious is this? Ebersole will not return Kaufman's calls. He is actually kicked off the show. Now, guys, SNL was so powerful.

That show at the time was so powerful. All of our dates, our booking dates across the country dried up because of it. Wow. Andy was going to fuck it. Oh, Andy wanted to sue Dick Ebersole, NBC. Oh, it got ugly. It got really fucking ugly. And a matter of fact, and if you believe that Andy Kaufman died

his dad Stanley Kaufman, Andy's dad went to the grave saying that it was the stress of what Andy went through because of Dick Eversol that gave him cancer and killed him Wow, and so he never

actually returned to SNL, did he? No. Well, fortunately Letterman booked Andy at the time. Well, yeah, because Letterman loved him. Letterman just loved him. And matter of fact, Andy would go on Letterman and then explain to him what happened. Because Andy would take what really went down in his personal life, what all of us would hide, and he used that stuff as material.

So he'd go on Letterman, you know, and he said, nobody will hire me anymore, and this and that. And we'd put a little Vaseline underneath his nose and make it look like he was crying. Now, before we forget, let's get to Man on the Moon, the Jim Carrey movie. Yes, yes. I heard originally, well well everyone was up for that part everybody yeah what what it was we were surprised it was crazy when when it was announced actually danny devito announced uh in the trades that they were moving about uh andy kaufman all of a sudden these big stars it's amazing, Gilbert, how many people wanted

to play big stars. Let me give you the names that called and said, I would like to play the role. It was Tom Hanks, Sean Penn, Nicolas Cage, Gary Oldman, Kevin Spacey, the names went on. Jim Carrey, of course. Ed Norton. Didn't Milos Forman want Ed Norton for the part? Yes, he wanted Ed Norton. Milos, who directed the film, two-time Academy Award winner for Amadeus and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

Yes, Milos wanted Norton. He had just done The People vs. Larry Flint with Norton. Right. Milos directed it. And Scott and Larry, who wrote the screenplay for that, also wrote the screenplay for, as a matter of fact, for Man on the Moon. Actually, they've got a movie out now called Big Eyes.

Yeah, we just interviewed them. We just talked to Scott and Larry a couple of weeks ago. Great guys. And they also wrote Problem Child 1 and 2, so just interviewed them. We just talked to Scott and Larry a couple of weeks ago. Great guys. Great guys. And they also wrote Problem Child 1 and 2, so I know them. That's right. And they did, oh, they did Ed Wood, too. That's right. Yes.

Right. These guys, you know, great guys. Great fucking guys. And so, you know, they were kind of, you know, and then, of course, DeVito wanted Jim Carrey because, you know, Jim was the big box office name, so they figured the film would open big with Jim. And I heard Nicolas Cage was really high up in the room. I wanted Nicolas Cage.

There was something about Nicolas. I'm the one. There was something about Nicolas Cage that reminded me of Andy. There was something about Nicolas Cage that reminded me of Andy. And not only that, at the time, you know, Cage really had the acting chops. Because, you know, Man on the Moon is a serious movie. Jesus, he dies at the end. So I figured, well, Jim's funny, but man, this is some heavy lifting here, at least as far as the drama's concerned.

Could Jim Carrey pull this off? I was not assured of that at all. So I did not want Jim. And so Milos now, who's a gun-for-hire director, he didn't want to make the decision because if he did, that all these other names like Tom Hanks and Sean Penn, you know, and they would, you know, whoever Milos would be, he'd go, they'd go, well, Milos, you didn't want me when I wanted to play Andy Kaufman, so fuck you. Down the road. You know, so Milos got all upset.

He says, and you know, Milos has this Czechoslovakian accent. He says, this is what we do. He says, look, let's put in the trades. Whoever wants to play Andy Kaufman must make audition tape. Because this way, a lot of these big guys, they ain't going to make audition tape. Yeah. You know, the pressure would be off them. Well, I'm going, that's a good idea, you know, because I know that, you know. And then I get the call I dreaded most.

I get a call from Jim Carrey. Now, Jim had done comic relief, so I knew Jim. But I didn't know him well. And now he's the $ this one and now he's the 20 million dollar guy and he calls me and remember i went cage i've been talking to nicholas cage on the phone for like months saying don't nick you got the fucking role you're the guy as far as i'm concerned you know i'm not the studio but as far as i'm concerned you're the guy so jim calls me and he says he says bob how are you doing? And I said, he said, you know, I really want to play this role.

And I made the audition tape. And Jim is so smart, guys. He says, before I embarrass myself with Milos Forman, can you come over to the house and see it, Bob? You know? And I said, sure. You know, and I really didn't want to see it. And I said, when? He says, could you come now? And I said, sure. You know, I really didn't want to see it. And I said, when? He says, could you come now?

And I'm like, yeah, sure, Jim. So I'm driving to his house in Bel Air, you know, and I'm going. And I'm saying to myself, now, Bob, whatever he shows you, don't say anything he could take to the bank. Don't say, that's great. Say, you know, say, hey, that's interesting. You know, don't insult him, you know? So I go over to his house, and, of course, the gates open up. He's in Bel Air, you know, that's interesting. You know, don't insult him, you know. So I go over to his house, and of course the gates open up. He's in Bel Air, you know, incredible fucking home.

And, you know, the property is so magnificent that he actually has a movie theater on the property in its own fucking building. Okay. I walk in there, and he's got, in this theater, he's got, mounted on the walls,

behind plexiglass, all the costumes from all his movies. The Riddler, Cable Guy, you know? They're all there, lined up. And he has brought in

a projectionist, just for me, you know? And he's going to show me this audition tape he made. Did he make it with Judd Apatow? Yes. Yeah. So anyway, what he – and Judd wasn't that well-known at the time, but that was his good friend.

And he brought in a candy counter guy. He's got a full candy counter back there and everything and he comes and he takes me back in there and he says and and and he says bob he says give me about 10 he says i got about 10 minutes of phone calls to make and then i'll bring on the audition tape but help yourself to anything you want any popcorn ice cream so i'm sitting in there i'm jamming this shit in my pockets because i figure i'll never see jim car again. I want Nicolas Cage, you know. So I'll be taking the popcorn and everything. And meanwhile, while I'm sitting there, before he comes back with the audition tape, on the big screen in the theater, he's got clips, old clips from Taxi, from Saturday Night Live, you know.

And it's great. And I'm sitting there and, you know and I'm watching the real Andy Kaufman and then about 10 minutes later just like you said he shows up and the candy counter person is gone and he shows up and he's got this little brown bag and I'm alone with him

in this dark little theater and he says okay Bob he says well here's my audition tape. And he reaches in the bag, and he starts laughing like a fucking maniac. And there's nothing in the bag, and he tears the bag up. And he's, I have no fucking clue what's going on.

I'm thinking maybe he's a fucking nut, you know? Who's to say a big celebrity can't be a serial killer, you know? He's like a fucking nut. And then he says, so what do you think of my audition tape? And he points guys to the big screen. And what he had done, you're right, he had gotten a hold of his buddy, Judd Apatow. They contacted Lorne Michaels.

They got the drop curtain from SNL to be put on a truck and shipped to L.A. They set this up in a studio, and Judd shot it, and they flawlessly cut in andy doing the mighty mouse routine and playing the congas with jim carrey back and forth it was flawless it was beyond fucking belief and i of course and i got quite emotional remember i want fucking want fucking Nicolas Cage. I am so taken back. He had nailed it. He goes, this just shows you how these motherfuckers work it. A guy, why he's the $20 million guy. Here he is auditioning for the role.

I would find out later, he took a month, he took four days every week for one month to learn how to play the congas just so he could make this fucking audition tape now i i heard later on they asked nicholas cage if he ever sent in a tape let me tell you because there's a punt coming up yeah so now i stop answering my phone from nicholas cage he would have been great he would have been great in the park bob So now I stop answering my phone from Nicolas Cage. He would have been great in the park, Bob. I got this girl, but she goes, God, it's Nick Cage calling you.

Don't tell him I'm not here. Tell him I'm not here. Because I now want Carrie. I'm totally sold on Carrie because I'm going, look, he's got the impression down. Let's start the movie with that at least you know so he was so fucking good so anyway at the we go to the premiere and everything and after the premiere uh we had at that man's chinese they had the party afterwards i forgot we had the party anyway so we had a big party afterwards so i'm at the bar drinking slugging a few down. There's a tap on my shoulder. I turn around

and it's Nicolas Cage. I go, I'm stumbling. He said, no, no. He was really cool. He said, no, no, no. Remember, he had just seen the film, too. He said, I've got to tell you. He says, good choice on your guy's part. He says, I

couldn't have done what Jim did. And it's not like Cage was hurting for work anyway. He says, I couldn't have done what Jim did. And it's not like Cage was hurting for work anyway. You know what I mean? And he said, he said no. So we started tossing bags. You know,

he's a big elk. You know, Cage. So we started drinking. And then, here's the punch. And then I tell him, I finally turned,

you know, 10 minutes later and everything's fine and we're good boys again. I say to him, I said turn to him, and we're like 10 minutes later, and everything's fine. We're good boys again. I say to him, I said, Nick, I've got to ask you, why is it that you didn't make the audition tape? Like, I blamed him like he didn't make the audition tape, you know? And he breaks into the biggest laugh.

And I did not know that he was like really good friends with Jim Carrey, right? He said, oh, yeah, the audition tape. I'll tell you why I didn't make that audition tape because jim carrey called me and said guys in our position shouldn't make audition tape so nicholas cage was okay about the whole thing oh yeah he was fine about it yeah yeah yeah no he was serious he said i couldn't have done that impression. That was spot on. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast after this. And I got to tell you something. Yeah.

I did a job in Reno recently, and I went up to the Bunny Ranch, the big brothel. I know this because Dennis Hoff's a friend of mine. Oh, yeah. And I'm the only person in the history of the Bunny Ranch not to get pussy while I was out there. I know that. I was shocked. I asked Dennis. You're doing research?

I said, what do you mean? He didn't get laid? He said, nope, nope. He was, you know. Well, if he would have given me a coupon maybe and said, here's for a free blowjob, then maybe. You don't like the prices. So did you actually go to the facility and everything? Yeah, yeah.

It was something like tie-in press thing between the club and the Bunny Ranch. Oh, I see. Okay. They told me that you and Andy practically had your own bungalow there. Pretty much so. Yeah. Yeah, pretty much so. No, Andy would do a thing. This was so crazy. The first time, you know, when he played Harrah's in Reno,

and he had heard about these brothels. So we went into the Bunny Ranch. Then it was called, it wasn't called the Bunny Ranch at the time. Dennis added the bunny to it. But anyway, so we walked into this brothel for the first time. They had about 26 girls line up, you know, and it was like, wow. And Andy's eyes were just about bugging out of his head.

And he said he didn't want to insult any of the girls by not taking them. So he was going to take them all. Now, we were playing here is like a San Reno for the whole week. So he had made a deal that he was going to fuck everyone before he left town these 26 girls in one in about five days and right when he'd get off state there'd be a limo waiting for him god bless him jump it he'd go over to the fucking bunny ranch there and start nailing these girls so So he'd go in there like three, four girls a night. So it wasn't exactly the sad, tragic life of Andy Kaufman that most people...

No, no, no, no, no, no. That wasn't in the movie. No, no, no. And, you know, he was probably the first celebrity that publicly came out in support of legalized prostitution. Because he was kind of a wallflower and everything. He was kind of shy. And actually, his mom, Janice, who I was very good friends with, she was so happy that he

was going to the brothel because she thought he was kind of a weird kid. And she would say, oh, you know, call and say, well, where's Andy? Oh, he's off at camp. She'd call at camp. He was kind of a weird kid, you know, and she would say, oh, you know, call and say, well, where's Andy? Oh, he's off at camp. She'd call at camp. He was relieved. Oh, he had hookers, who I talk about in the book. He had hookers left and right being flown in and everything else. Now, oh, here's something I want to know.

Yeah. Danny DeVito was in the movie, Man on the Moon. Playing George Shapiro in his manager. But then they go to the set of Taxi, and it's got the whole cast, and you're sitting there the whole time going, wasn't Danny DeVito on Taxi? Gilbert wants to know why Danny didn't do Double Duty, Bob. Oh, you picked that up, did you? Yes, yes.

We were wondering ourselves on the set. It was kind of like if you visited the set of The Odd Couple, and there's no Jack Klugman there. Well, Danza wasn't there either. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, listen, they thought about it, and they just decided, no, that would be, if they put him in there, and then he's playing George with a mustache, that might fuck things up more. It might bend a few people's minds.

Yeah, but a lot of people didn't mind it. You know, not very few people bring it up. You're one of them, because obviously you're a stickler for detail. Who's that? Now, you were played in the movie by Paul Giamatti, Bob. Paul Giamatti played me. I cast Paul Giamatti to play me. Universal wanted to keep me happy, so they had different actors audition to play.

What was his name committed suicide? Seymour Hoffman. Oh, Philip Seymour Hoffman, yeah. Yeah, he made an audition tape. He played me, you know. And wasn't Garth Brooks considered for the part of Bob Smudda? Well, I get this bizarre call at 3 a.m. on a Saturday night from Milos Forman, who I think was stoned or something.

And he calls me in the middle of the night and says, Smudda, I know who can play you. I go, Milos, it's 3 a.m. What are you talking about? For the movie, who we could cast to play you. I said, who can play you? I go, Milos, it's three hours. What are you talking about? For the movie, who we could cast to play you? I said, who? Garth Brooks. I go, Garth Brooks?

I said, Milos, Garth Brooks is a country. He's not even an actor. What are you talking about? And he says, no, no. He was on SNL. He hosted SNL tonight. He killed. he's good. Well, of course, I got the tape.

And really, I mean, Garth was great. He held his own with the cast. You know, he was funny and everything else. And I'm thinking to myself, well, you know, maybe this might work. Shit, you know. And so he, now this is where it gets funny. So I said, yeah so so we actually i called up uh william morris because i thought you know because then the studio is going now i don't know

about garth brooks and i figured well i'll get you know william morris behind this maybe so i called his agents up and i told him about the conversation i would be loach the next thing I know is that Garth cancels a Friday night performance, sold-out performance, to fly to L.A. to meet Milos at the Polo Lounge, and he walks in as Tony Clifton, Garth Brooks. I've never heard that. Because if you're going to play Bob Smuda in Man on the Moon, you play Bob Smuda and you play Tony Clifton because Andy handed the role to me. So he had to get that down.

So he wanted to impress Milos. He got an outfit. He got a wig. He did the sunglasses, the mustache. He shows up at the Polo Lounge as Tony Clifton and has dinner with Milos. Now, here's what's funny. For some reason, William Morris, and I'm glad that Paul Giamatti took the role. Giamatti's wonderful. Yeah, better than Garth Brooks, I think, would have been.

But Garth Brooks, William Morris didn't want Garth Brooks to do it, so he didn't do it. But here's what's funny. About a year later, this is how great these major celebrities are and the way their business minds think. And I'm reading an article in Rolling Stone that Garth Brooks has a new album out. And you'll remember this, Gilbert.

You'll remember this. He did an alter ego. Oh, yes. Oh, Chris Gaines. And he had a little goatee. It was called Chris something. He had a little, it was not good. It got bad reviews.

He had like a little goatee. Yeah. He had his hair different. But here's what's so funny is that the article, the writer who wrote this review of this album didn't like it started it by saying it looks like garth brooks has pulled taken a page out of the andy kaufman alter ego tony clifton book and isn't that funny and the guy never knew how what about the story so here you know go you know here know, Garth figured, hey, this alter ego shit, you know, I put time into it.

Let's do it. Small world, huh? Now, I remember when Andy Kaufman died. I was one of those that thought, oh, is this another hoax? He was 85% of the country. Yeah. Now, you believe he may have faked his own death. I know he faked his death.

Yeah. That's what my book, I know he faked his death because I helped him do it. It took about three years. And he had gotten this idea that this would be the greatest put-on of all times, and he toyed with it. And he kept toying with this and how to do it. He would call me up. We talked about this for two and a half, three years, of how to fake his death. He'd call me up.

He'd say, Zmuda, he'd call me up in the middle of the night. He said, how do I get my hands on a cadaver? And I said, oh, geez. I said, Andy, well, you're in medical schools. You could get your hands on a cadaver, but there's going to be paperwork. He said, oh, I see. I said, so he said, oh, that's not good. I said, why did you want a cadaver?

He said he thought he'd fake a car accident, fiery crash, have a body in there. And I said, and it would be Andy Kaufman. And I said, Andy, they're going to, you know, I said, they're going to check, you know, dental records. He's, well, can I, he actually said, can I knock out a couple of my teeth? And so I said, no, I said, there's going to be records of your top, you have the whole jaw, you know? And so he, he toyed with this for a while, and he finally came up with the idea that he would find somebody he really realized to pull this off. Because at the time, as you know, everybody was waiting for him to fake something. Nobody was going to believe it.

He was the boy who had cried wolf too many times. He had totally bamboozled the American public that he was critically that he had almost broken his neck when he wrestled the man jerry lawler oh yeah that was all bullshit he he had convinced people gilbert i did tony clifton for eight years i would go on Letterman I would go on Merv I would do all the shows the Miss Piggy special I would go on and they thought it was Andy Kaufman

under the prosthetics I kept it quiet I kept it quiet until we did the movie Man on the Moon and then Scott and Larry put in the script I didn't want them to I would have gone to my grave I did Letterman three times with Tony Clifton.

The last time, David turned to me during the commercial break and said, Andy, if I didn't know it was you, I'd swear it was somebody else. And this is Letterman, who likes to think he's the coolest, brightest guy in the room. Totally bamboozled. Andy would be at home laughing his ass off. So truly amazing stuff. I was talking about something, I think I forgot what it was. You were talking about how he finally came up with the right way to pull it off. Which, according to the book, the fake x-rays and a body double.

No, what he did, no, he figured the way to do it was to find somebody who was dying of cancer that was a fan of his. That was a diehard fan of his and said, look, I want to pull off, and with your help, pull off the ultimate hoax. He got a real guy who was dying of cancer, his same height, same color eyes, but everything else, because of prosthetics that were used on this individual, everything else could be changed, just like me. I did, like I said, for years I played Tony Clifford. Everybody thought it was Andy Kaufman. So he went in, he got a makeup expert to do the same thing, and then this is the guy that went to Cedars-Sinai Hospital,

and everybody believed it was Andy Kaufman. Wow. And I talk in detail about that in the book, as you know, of how that was pulled off. Now, so anyway, this is why I came out with this book now, is because Andy, when we had asked Andy, well, how long would he go in hiding for to pull this off? Lynn Margulies, Courtney Love played in the movie, Lynn said to Andy, and he said, she said, how long would you be gone for if you pulled the scam off? A year or two? And he laughed.

He said, a year or two? He said, if I was a little boy about it, it'd be a year or two. If I was a man about it, it would be 30 years. Guys, supposedly he died in 1984. Here we are, just 2014. We're at the 30-year mark. And that's the reason I wrote the book. And only because he set game at that time limit is the reason I came out

and am now for the first time announcing, yes, he did fake his death. I want him back. Now, he may be dead. Let me get this straight, Gilbert, okay? I have not talked to Andy Kaufman in 30 years. And for all I know, he got hit by a bus last week. I don't know. But I will tell you this, guys. 30 years ago, he faked his death. So he's due. It's been 30 years. He's due. And how old would he be now if he's 64?

64. And didn't he threaten Bob to come back as a children's clown named Zany Clowney? Well, I asked him what he said. Yeah, I asked him, Andy, aren't you going to miss performing and stuff? And he said, oh, I'm going to keep performing.

I said, well, how are you going to do that? He wanted to come back. He said, oh, he wanted to go back to his original. He never really wanted to be a big celebrity Hollywood guy. The plan really was that he thought, and he hated that. He had to go through all the stuff. You know, Gilbert, you know the backstabbing and everything. You know how nasty this business can become.

And what he went through at Eversol and SNL, and then they canceled Taxi. He was kicked out of the TM movement. Oh, yeah, by the women. Because he was wrestling women. Oh, and could I just ask you quickly? Sure. You had an old star seance to get in touch with Andy. Who was there?

We had a star seance over at that top room in the comedy store. What's that called? Oh, the belly room? Up in the belly room, because Andy loved the comedy store, on one of the anniversaries, May 16th, of his death. And who was there was a...

Who was it? I think it was Bobcat Goldthwait. I think it was... Was Saget there? Bob Saget, yes, was there. I think Andy Dick was there, a few other people. You know, but, and we had, I brought in a top,

a real legit top seance person, and said, could not make, they made contact with some other spirit that was hanging around some waitress. I like the term a legit seance woman.

Yeah. There's some people who believe in this stuff. It's like a totally honest con man I found. So Andy did not come through, Bob. He did not come through, which is further proof that he's still alive.

I love it. I love it. I love it. This is strange. Gilbert's phone is, his phone is ringing. Yeah, oh. Yeah, hello. Well, shut the phone off.

We're supposed to be doing this. Sorry about that. Yeah, this is, yeah, this guy called, this is the third time this guy's called. He says you're full of shit, and he wants to know if he can tell you on the air. I don't know if you want me to just hang up on him.

Go on. Put him on. I don't give a shit. You want to put him on? I guess if it's okay with you, because he sounds like an asshole. Okay. We'll put him on. Okay. Hang on a like an asshole. Okay, we'll put him on. Okay, hang on a second, Bob. Darren, I'll set this up.

Okay, put the phone by the mic. Go ahead. Are you guys setting me up? You're talking to him. Oh. Hello? Hi. Wait, hello?

Who's that? Tony Clifton. Who do you think it is, asshole? Gilbert. We're sorry. We're sorry about this, Bob. I'll tell you what. No, I'll talk to him.

No, I'll talk to him. You want to talk to him? Yeah, I'll talk to him. Damn right, I'll talk to you, fucking load up. I read your book. I've never read such bullshit in my life. Tony. Tony, but treat our our guests

with a little bit more respect than that yeah hey listen Tony Tony I'm still I'm listening

listen you are a dumb fucking Paul I point out that much okay first of all I agree

I agree with Elaine Boosler who has come out publicly and saying that you are nothing more than a low-life fucking maggot feeding off the fucking dead body of your friend. Now, what kind of friend are you that you would write this book about him?

Wow. Hey, listen. Listen, Tony. Is he on? He's still there. I am on. Just fucking talk, asshole. Well, if you just calm down, I'll talk a little, okay?

If you give me a chance. I will give you a chance! Go on, speak your piece! Because I think you're the biggest piece of shit to do this! You're just doing my thing. I think you went all the way to the bank, making money, coming up with these fucking, phony fucking stories. And I think this goof Jew boy Gilbert here on top of it

will put you on the air, helping you sell books and line your pocket over here dead bunny. Wow. Hey, Gilbert? Yeah. Um, I'm kind of surprised you would do this to me. No, he's got nothing to do with it.

He's a dumb fucking Jew himself. Look. That's how it is. So anyways, I think you're full of shit. I don't think anybody should buy this fucking book. And I'm just telling you. I take off and that guy is as dead as the doornail. I don't think he was a cocksucker.

And I opened for him a few times and he never tried to pinch my ass or anything backstage. And as you know, a few years ago when he was still alive, I was quite a handsome dude. Wow. Wow. Tony, I don't know what to say. Hey, Gilbert. Yeah, well. This is awkward.

Okay. Well, you know. I don't know. I mean, I didn't know if he wanted to. And I'll tell you another thing about this one. He's a dumb fucking Polack. That reminds me. You hear about the Polack whose wife had triplets?

No. You went out looking for the two other guys. Hey. Wow. Polish parachute opens on impact. Bob, we have to apologize. We figured you guys were. We figured you guys were... I got another Polish dunk.

Don't let that dunk go up. Every half hour, Polish firing squad, they stand in a circle. Stupid Polak. He won a gold medal in the fucking Olympics. He had it bronzed. Okay, Tony, listen. Okay, Tony. Hey, maybe we had enough, okay, Tony, hey, maybe we had

enough of them, Gil. It's up to you. Don't get me off the fucking line. Hey, hear about the Polish lesbian? Yeah, she liked men. Jesus, Tony. Okay, well, that's all I want to say. Okay, well, Tony, thanks for calling in.

Don't buy that fucking scoundrel's book. He's a scoundrel. Elaine Boozler's right. He's a maggot living off the dead bones of his bad ass friend. Tony, that makes no sense, because I believe Andy Kaufman's still alive. Yeah, well, I think you're an asshole. So, you, Tony, you think that Bob is some kind of a ghoul or something?

He's a fucking dumb pollock trying to make a few bucks for himself. That's what it's all about. Hey, what did the Polish girl do after she sucked cock? What? She spit out the feathers. All right, Tony. Well, thanks for calling in. We appreciate hearing from you.

Wait, wait, wait. I got to go. Hello? Yeah. Is he gone? We cut him off. Oh, yeah. We cut him off.

He was a little over the top. Boy, Gilbert, thanks a lot. What? I gave you the option. You didn't say, was Tony Clifton going to be on? Yeah. Well, he's so cold. Yeah, yeah, he's so cold.

I forgive you guys, but wow. You guys had a background. You'd work together. What a maniac. That's the real Tony Clifton. He tried to show up to the set of Man on the Moon and, of course, Universal

banned him from a lot and the whole thing. He's a nut. Which brings me to a question to start to wrap this up, Bob. I understand there's a script floating around, the Tony Clifton story. What happened to that project? Well, Universal owns it, actually. Andy and I started writing that back in 81. Now, here's what's interesting.

Here's a little piece of fact that if people want to figure out that Andy Kaufman, to prove that Andy Kaufman did fake his death and had thought about it three years before. We're working. We had a bungalow on the back lot at Universal. Kaufman shows up one day. He had been up all night. He's got some papers, and he says, oh, we got to change the

Tony Clifton script. I said, what, why, why, why? He said, look, read this. And he gave me this page and in it, he wanted in the movie, the movie is the Tony Clifton story about Tony Clifton. And in the movie, he wants Tony to die at Cedars-Sinai Hospital of Cancer. Guys, Andy Kaufman would die of cancer, supposedly, at Cedars-Sinai Hospital four years later. That is a fact that's in the script. It's in the vault at Universal Studios. We had a guy from UCLA in the statistics department do odds. The chance of you naming what you would die of and what hospital is something like 840,000 to 1.

An impossibility. An impossibility. Now, briefly, before we wrap up, what were the memories of the taxi crew about Andy? Were they still kind of like pissed off? Well, this is a good question to wrap up on because this is one of the most bizarre things. And I talk about it extensively in the book. Danny DeVito, as you know, was a member of the most bizarre things, and I talk about it extensively in the book, is Danny DeVito, as you know, was a member of the cast. And Danny was the one who got this movie made

at Universal. And he's the guy, he had the clout because he had done, you know, Danny's a big movie producer. American public doesn't even know this. You know, he did Pulp Fiction. That was Danny DeVito. Jersey films.

Yeah. You know, he did Pulp Fiction. That was Danny DeVito. Jersey films. Yeah. You know, and big movies. And so he got this movie made. And, you know, they do what they call an electronic press kit for a film, where you sit people down and, you know, they're making the movie for publicity. And Lynn was the one, because Lynn was a filmmaker herself, so they threw Lynn a few coins to do the EPK, as they call it, for Man on the Moon. She came in one day to my office on the set and said,

you ain't going to believe it, I just interviewed Danny DeVito. I said, yeah. And Danny was talking about Andy's funeral in Great Neck. And how he was there. And I went, wait a second. I said, Danny DeVito wasn't there. Neither was any of the cast members of Taxi. She says, I know.

But Danny's lying on this EPK that he was there. And then it hit me. This is the reason Danny DeVito made this movie to rewrite history. If you see the movie Man on the Moon, you will see that in the funeral scene in Great Neck, not only is Danny there, but the entire cast of Taxi. And in real life, it never happened. Not only this, the day we shot that scene, and we shot most of this movie, you know, out on the Universal lot, you know, about 95% of it.

But for some reason, on that day to shoot this, we went out, I think, to Pasadena to some cemetery that had a chapel. The whole cast went, the the whole crew about 300 extras and i'm going why the fuck are they spending this kind of money we could do this on the back lot danny devito wanted to recreate and rewrite history and shoot the whole scene at this cemetery, in this chapel, and rewrite history because I think he was so fucking guilty that he and the cast did not show up to Andy Kaufman's funeral. Guys, it gets weirder. They spent $35,000. My mom is a co-executive producer on this movie, so I see all the invoices. They spent $35,000 with a guy making a wax reconstruction of Andy Kaufman in the casket to look like Jim Carrey.

They could have had Jim lay in there and get the shot. They didn't want it. After shooting had stopped, it was the most bizarre fucking moment of my life. I'm there with the cast members, original cast members of Taxi, in this chapel. Danny said a few words and he went up to the casket where this $35,000 wax figure of Andy Kaufman was in it. And he said a few words. This was not on camera. And he closed it, and they wept.

And I'm telling you, this was the psychological imperative of why Danny DeVito made that movie. Fascinating. Oh, yeah. Wow. Yeah, true. So anyway, true. So, anyway, to wrap up,

I'm Gilbert Godfrey. This has been Gilbert Godfrey's Amazing Colossal Podcast with my co-host Frank Santopadre, and we have been talking to Bob Zamuda. We want to wrap before Tony calls

back. Yes. Whose new book is Andy Kaufman, The Truth Finally. And Andy, if you're out there, send us a sign. Or at least buy a copy of the book. Thank you.

Bob, this was informative, fascinating. Thanks for doing it. Thanks so much, guys. Thank you. We appreciate it. Gilbert, if you're up in Reno anytime, you know, contact. I live up in South Lake Tahoe. Oh, yeah?

We'll go to the ranch together. You got a coupon for him? Huh? You got a coupon for him? I got a coupon for him. Okay, I'll be there. All right, my friend. Thank you so much for having me on.

Thank you, Bob. Bye-bye.