One of my first jobs out of school was playing a rotating
succession of floozies—some dumb, some angry, all crazy—on MTV’s first-ever
nonmusical program, Remote Control. The
parts were tiny, but Remote Control,
the cultish late ’80s game show in which three college kids confined to
EZ-Chairs answered trivia questions about television and pop culture, was a big
deal. Often presented in mini-sketch format, the questions were posed by
comics, who’d pop out in different characters when their “channel” was selected.
Adam Sandler, a
friend from NYU and already a semi-regular, had suggested hiring me as a
replacement for the sole female spot on the show, a Carol Merrill/Vanna White
type whose chief function was to look foxy in Body Glove swimwear whilst mutely
waving toward prizes. I knew I wasn’t right for the job. I had way too big of a
mouth to ever just stand around as set dressing, and though I looked OK in
skimpwear, I wasn’t exactly Sports
Illustrated material. But
Adam had come up with what the producers thought was a wonderfully novel idea: What
if the Body Gloved Babe was funny? What if she could create and play
characters, like the guys, thus making her more like, you know, a real person?
“Great idea!” the producers cried gleefully, before telling Adam to have me show up for the audition in a bathing suit.
In the past, this
might have set off alarm bells, but at this point, I was so excited I didn’t
care, and all the way over to the MTV offices, images of being the new Goldie
Hawn go-go danced through my head. The audition itself was fun: I improvised
shtick with Ken Ober and read commercial copy with his co-host, Colin Quinn,
then did a few of my impersonations: Debra Winger, Nancy from Sid and Nancy and a lovesick Dino
Flintstone. The fresh-faced producers, who were all very casually sitting on
the floor sharing Chinese food, looked up when I was finished and with mouths
full of dim sum said, “You’re hired.”
I jumped up and down
when they told me, then ran around the room like an idiot (“YAY!!! WHEEEEEEEE!
I LOVE YOU- UUUUUU!!”), throwing my arms around everyone.
“Hired on the spot,”
I whispered incredulously to my reflection in the darkened subway window all
the way home. “What a great story!”
And it really would
have been a great story, except that the next day, the producers had a change
of heart, decided I wasn’t “hot enough,” and hired a model instead. I didn’t
have an agent at the time, so Adam was dispatched to relay this news.
“They thought you were real cute,” Adam told me, sympathetically. “They
just wanted someone a little bustier, is all...”
To soften the blow, I suppose, they said they might, at some point, be
interested in having me do some characters, though there were no guarantees,
and it wouldn’t be something regular.
And that was it. Everyone had moved on, and some other girl was, at
that very moment, being fit for all that glorious spandex. But I took that bone
they threw me and wouldn’t let go. Maybe it wasn’t Shakespeare in the Park, but
the fact that they didn’t want me because of my rack, or lack thereof, sent me
into spasms of fury.
One day, about six months after the audition, I called up and told one
of the writer’s assistants that I was Glenn Close. When the writer
(immediately!) picked up, I pretended to be Glenn as her Alex Forrest character
in Fatal Attraction, demanding
attention from Michael Douglas:
“You don’t expect me to be
ignored—do you, Dan?”
Well, it worked. He laughed, then invited me to the office to try out
some character ideas I had (provided I left all cutting tools at home), and
within a week I was on the show, playing “Nancy,” Ken Ober’s “Psycho Ex-Girlfriend from Hell.” Costumed in a
trench coat with rabbit ears sticking out of the pockets and clutching a large
cleaver with which I gesticulated wildly, I made my entrance to the tune of
“Love Is a Many Splendored Thing” whenever a contestant chose “The Ex Channel.”
After quizzing the contestant about their knowledge of celebrity divorces, I
would beg Ken, “Tell me you love me and I’ll go,” repeating this several times
rapidly like a deranged mantra before being given the hook.
It’s never great to be the Not Hot Girl on a comedy show for a mostly male
audience. For one thing, I was booed every time I made an entrance as the
“Psycho Ex-Girlfriend From Hell” and when I wasn’t being booed, I was being
pelted with Cool Ranch Doritos by the mostly frat boy audience, who repeatedly
demanded to know why I wasn’t more of “a
babe.” At the end of tapings, I would limp into my dressing room and cry. And
every day, without fail, Ken would knock on the door, come in and give me a
hug.
“Don’t let those douche bags throw you off your game,” he’d say, as I’d
sob into his shoulder.
“You’re funny and a babe—I promise…”
Ken was a wonderfully talented guy, witty and warm, who, in the short
time I worked with him, taught me a great deal about comedy, but even more
about grace, generosity and compassion. Of all the guys whose psycho
ex-girlfriend I have ever been, Ken Ober will always be my favorite.
Nancy Balbirer wrote and performed on MTV’s Remote Control and also appeared on Seinfeld. Her new book, Take
Your Shirt Off and Cry: A Memoir of Near-Fame Experiences, was published by
