The Books: “Wired: The Short Life and Fast Times of John Belushi” (Bob Woodward)

Welcome House Next Door readers! This is my archive of entertainment biography (I’ve just started, as we can see from where we are in the alphabet). I plan on doing a post a day from each book on my shelf, which should keep me busy to, oh, about 2011. If you keep scrolling down this page, you’ll see the other excerpts – one from Carroll Baker’s autobiography, and three (one, two, three) from Lauren Bacall’s three autobiographies.

Wired: The Short Life and Fast Times of John Belushi, by Bob Woodward

Probably one of the best drug-ridden entertainment biographies ever written. At least it’s one of my favorites. Bob Woodward is out of his element here, but it suits him, I think. What I like about it is that he takes his investigative journalism chops and uses them on the entertainment world (and its hangers-on). It’s quite a compelling portrait. It’s thorough, it’s tough – and he was given carte blanche from Judy Belushi, John’s wife, to tell the whole story, as he found it. He encountered no roadblocks from her, or those Belushi loved. A couple people refused to talk to Woodward (DeNiro being one of them), but for the most part, the floodgates opened. Woodward was able to delve deep, and his investigative methods led him to some pretty unsavory places. At the end, Belushi had alienated many of his friends, and was hanging out with bottom-feeders, some truly frightening people. After reading Woodward’s description of Belushi’s chaotic last night, you just want to take a shower and detox YOURSELF. How did this topic come to Bob Woodward, a writer who focuses on Washington and politics? He opens the book with:

In the summer of 1982 I received a call at The Washington Post, where I work, from Pamela Jacklin, a sister-in-law of John Belushi, who had died of a drug overdose three months earlier. She said there were still many unanswered questions surrounding John’s death, and she suggested I look into it. John Belushi was not a natural subject for my reporting; I had concentrated on Washington stories and knew very little about his show business world – television, rock and roll, and Hollywood. But I was curious.

Curiousity (and his reputation, of course, as a writer) was all he needed. People were willing to talk to him because he was so, well, “legit”. Whatever he would write, it wouldn’t be a smear, and it also wouldn’t be a smarmy tell-all. It would be an examination of someone who, in a very short time, had become positively beloved by the American public – someone who was, at times, infuriating to his friends and loved ones, but always beloved. That’s one of the main things you get when you hear the stories, and when people still talk about him now. How much he was loved. He was also admired, he had a genius for improvisational comedy which still sets the bar for others. People still talk about his old skits at Second City, and how unbelievable it was to see him at that raw time in his life, when he was fearless, disgusting, and hilarious. Like many comics (and I speak from experience, having dated a few – in fact, a good 10 years of my life was taken up with dating ONLY improvisational comedians from Chicago, Second City and Improv Olympic boys. That was my romantic genre. Insane. But anyways) – like many comics, he also had the desire to be taken seriously. Belushi’s idol was Brando. He felt that if he were given the proper material he could do something like that, too. I think that’s one of the reasons why he was such a crazily effective mimic (uhm, Joe Cocker?) He LOVED those people. His imitations came from love on a fanatical level. He didn’t just want to imitate them, he wanted to BE them. There’s the great story about when Belushi sang WITH Joe Cocker AS Joe Cocker, and how freaked out Belushi was by it. He was scared. Would Joe Cocker be insulted? Didn’t he know how much he LOVED him? Belushi had no fear as a performer. He had plenty of resentments and opinions, however (he hated the “fucking bees”, for example) … thought they were stupid.

And his pairing with Dan Ackroyd unleashed something in him that had not been seen yet. Belushi, in sketch comedy – at Second City, and in groups in New York – had a way of strolling into a scene going on, saying one line, bringing down the house entirely, and walking away with the show. 10 people could have been onstage, but the audience went home babbling about Belushi. He was a star. Many of his fellow performers resented it – but at the same time, what’re you gonna do – say to someone, “Stop being so good, please”? But with Ackroyd, he found a soulmate, a “straight man”, a perfect foil. They became a duo, very quickly, understanding and anticipating each other, each as quick-minded as the other. In a way, his skits with Ackroyd REALLY set Belushi free.

Del Close (an important mentor to John Belushi and, well, pretty much anyone who came through Chicago improv at that time) taught at Improv Olympic when I was living in Chicago – but he had started out at Second City. He was famous.

Just the track marks on his arms were famous. He’d show them to you and growl about the glory of shoving a needle in your arm. He was an old-school off-the-charts reprobate, and an improv genius. He took my flame at the time under his wing (see what I mean? They were all improv boys) – recognizing his genius, wanting to pass on the torch. To Close, improv was a religion, a way of life, a way of looking at the world. I remember sitting in the audience at Improv Olympic show – watching said flame perform with his group (they were called “The Family” and were famous to us Chicagoans … I still remember lines from those shows … It was 6 guys, most of whom are now famous on a pretty giant level … And these guys were so quick, so smart, so in tune with each other’s rhythms, that you would forget at times that this thing was improvised. You didn’t have that situation, with other improv groups, where maybe one person is the stand-out, one person is the funniest, and the others take on supporting roles, or try to be AS funny as the funniest and it falls flat. The Family did, to this day, some of the best improv shows I have ever seen in my life -shows that were not just hilarious (although they were that) – but thought-provoking, moving, mind-bogglingly brilliant … Here’s an interview with Miles Stroth, one of the members of “The Family” – about his years at Improv Olympic, and Del Close.

I’m mentioning Del Close so much because the excerpt below involves his relationship to Belushi.

Belushi was tough. He could be unmanageable. He had a giant ego, but it also seemed to cover up his flaws, his fragility and vulnerability. The early years of SNL are now the stuff of legend – with Belushi basically LIVING on the office floor at 30 Rock … doing drugs nd sleeping off benders on couches … and then going out to do the show. It was the wild west of television, very difficult to remember now – because it has become so “establishment”. Old-fashioned word, but come on, those folks were anti-establishment … the drug jokes, sex jokes, the crap they got away with … They were renegades. The first season is what is most interesting to me, because it was before people were REALLY paying attention. I remember that season, I was a kid, and it was past my bedtime, but I was allowed to stay up once and watch it. Steve Martin was hosting. It was insane. I remember it feeling dangerous. Just the fact that it was LIVE. There was an edge to what was going on there.

Belushi catapulted to stardom, and had his ups and downs … movies that missed the mark, and movies that hit a zeitgeist moment and still stand as anthems of the age. On July 28th of this year, Animal House turned 30 (which means I am a withered crone, basically) – Dennis over at Sergio Leone has a huge post about it (not to be missed) – actually, he had been doing a whole series of posts – that’s just the tip of the iceberg – if you’re an Animal House fan (and if you’re not, I have to say, what the hell is wrong with you) – go over to Dennis’ and start to click around. So fun!! Anyway – movies like Animal House and Blues Brothers are ones for the ages. Generations who never saw Belushi and Ackroyd do their bit live on Saturday Night love that movie. It works. It “hit”.

Belushi was frustrated with not being offered Brando-like roles, he was best friends with Robert DeNiro and truly thought he should be in projects like that. But it was not meant to be. He was the funny guy, the samurai, the blues brother, the fearless improviser. In a way, it’s probably a blessing that he wasn’t on the show NOW – because his “bits” might have been “franchised” out of existence. Stuff was given a chance to breathe then (at least that’s how it seems – I know the experience of WORKING there was absolute mayhem) … but if you think about the Lisa Lubner character (played by Gilda Radner) and her boyfriend Todd (played by Bill Murray) … those sketches were not at all ba-dum-ching experiences. There was no catchphrase (although Bill Murray screaming “NOOGIE” comes pretty close). It was character driven. Scenes were allowed to have many elements, sentiment, sadness, anger … and yet they were also hilarious. The Lisa Lubner/Todd skits are my favorite in the entire SNL canon.

As the excerpt below shows, Bob Woodward, despite the fact that Hollywood is not his scene, and the business of actors is not his gig, was able to ask the right questions in order to get the answers he needed to tell his story. What was it about Belushi that was so striking? What exactly? WHY was he so funny? WHY did he stand above his peers? Woodward, in interviewing Del Close, obviously had an ear for the good anecdotes, the revealing “secret” (the moment Belushi tells the truth to Del, and the look he gives Del in the aftermath) … that makes Belushi, as a person, come alive.

He emerges as more than his addictions, more than just the cliched too-much too-fast story – he emerges as a true talent. Someone who was conscious of what he was doing, although it might have LOOKED off-the-cuff, had perfect pitch when it came to audiences and what would make them laugh, and also had that underlying sadness and loneliness which is so much a part of 99.9999999 of every comedian I have ever met. It’s a hypnotic mix. (And one I, personally, find almost impossible to resist.)

The book could have been completely overshadowed by the ending, because we all know how John Belushi died. But Woodward also manages to capture the wild freedom and joy of those early days, in Chicago and New York, and just what it was Belushi was really like, in those tiny theatres of 40 or so seats, with thunderclaps of laughter greeting his every move.

One of my favorite anecdotes in the entire book, one that has stayed with me, is the story of Betty Buckley, then a young singer performing in the Broadway show Pippin, coming to see an improv sketch show called Lemmings, which John Belushi was in. She was absolutely stunned by his brilliance on stage. She had never seen anything like it. She didn’t know John, she didn’t go up and speak to him afterwards, nothing … she just walked off, amazed by what she had experienced watching him. A week later, she got a group of friends together, and brought them all to see Lemmings. She hadn’t been able to stop talking about “this guy John Belushi” and what a revelation he was. And that night that her friends were there, Belushi was coked out of his mind, phoning in his performance, basically blowing it off. He was already, then, a self-destructive person who didn’t have that “No” valve in him. People around him were doing drugs, he did drugs, whatever, it wasn’t a huge deal. But to Buckley it was. Especially if it affected your work. Her friends were saying to her, “How can you think this was funny?” or “That guy? You brought us here to see that guy?” Disbelieving. Here is what happened next, according to Woodward:

Buckley got up and went backstage. She had never met Belushi.

As John walked by, Buckley grabbed him by the shirt with both her hands and threw him against the wall. She introduced herself and said she was in the musical Pippin, which had been a sensation on Broadway for more than a year.

“I’m in a long run, too, and I know it’s difficult to give night after night. People come to see you and you blew the show off … There are those of us who appreciate it. Do it for us.”

John’s face lit up. He said he understood. They talked for a bit. Buckley was amazed that he didn’t tell her to get lost, that he was big enough to take the criticism.

“I’ll be back and bring my friends again,” she said.

Several months later Buckley met John at a party. He threw his hands in the air as if he were afraid she might grab him again.

“You remember?” she said.

“How could I forget?”

Yes, Belushi was a drug addict, irresponsible, self-destructive. But to me, that lovely anecdote, and not just his willingness to take the criticism – but his eagerness for it, because it sounded like truth to him – and then his joking reference to her grabbing him later … to me, that is all I need to really know about John Belushi’s character.

The excerpt below is from Belushi’s early years as an improviser in Chicago.

EXCERPT FROM Wired: The Short Life and Fast Times of John Belushi, by Bob Woodward

Del Close, a thirty-six-year-old former Second City actor who had directed some of the revues in recent years, came back in 1972 to put together the forty-third revue, the 43rd Parallel. Close didn’t care too much for Sahlins’s highbrow instincts, and he was attracted to John immediately. John was in italics and the other cast members were in regular print. They were comedians, John was the one human being; they were playing parts and characters, Belushi played real people. Belushi’s presence revived Close’s feeling of the old days – the Beat Generation, drugs and the vital Lenny Bruce era – nastiness, fuck-you, sick-comic daring.

“How is it that you look so totally relaxed on stage and so in command?” Close asked him.

“Because that’s the only place I know what I’m doing,” John replied. The communication was so truthful. John worked his eyebrows and gave Close a lecherous look, not sinister, but boyish and honest, as if he’d confessed. Close, a thin, fierce, former stand-up comic, had a small mattress-on-the-floor apartment across the street from Second City. He had been a heroin addict and had had dependencies on speed and Valium at various times. His current problem was alcohol, but he relished his narcotic past, and he wore his track marks from the needles like a badge of honor. The marks confirmed his status as an outsider, the precise quality that he wanted to impress on the show. Actors comprised an alien subculture; they were supposed to spokesmen for outrage. Second City was supposed to be picking at society’s scabs.

Close saw an instrument in Belushi – a trainable, ticking, bad-boy time bomb.

Close had known Lenny Bruce, who had died of a heroin overdose in 1966. Close had once gone with Second City’s founding director, Paul Sills, to see Bruce perform, and afterward Sills had told him, “If you can ever find out what Lenny is taking, by all means do it.” Drugs were central to the outlandish performances Close wanted. Belushi didn’t need to be convinced.

“Lenny Bruce,” Close told John one night, “took his work seriously. You have no idea how seriously he took it, pinned his entire life on it. And he had courage, not just through the drugs, but in his art.” How long do you think Lenny could go without a laugh? Once he went nearly twenty minutes and then pulled nine trains of thought together. The audience laughed at the same moment like a snap of a sheet, not only a laugh for the jokes but for the brilliance and for the release of tension.

Close found John a most unusual student; he didn’t need to be taught to relax or to be spontaneous. His timing was exact. John approached his skills as if they were simply a personality quirk, so Close undertook to teach John structure. That meant more complex material.

Close believed that the most complex subject for a comedian to handle on stage was death. First he guided John in parts calling for him to deal with the death of someone else. In one skit. John plays a taxidermist who brings his fiancee home to meet his parents. The parents are stuffed. John is meant to appear quite natural, to wear an expression of “What did you expect?” The fiancee is, of course, horrified. When she realizes she is next, she calls the police. John leaves the stage and returns with a stuffed policeman.

Close instructed him that the object was to end the sketch with a scream rather than a laugh. And he wanted the scream to be so loud it was a laugh. John carried it off.

For the 43rd Parallel, subtitled “Macabre and Mrs. Miller,” John developed an angry, hip comic character of the early sixties modeled on Close. On stage, he predicts his death. (“And by then the needle will be in my arm and I’ll be six feet underground, and there’ll be nothing you can do to stop it.”) Often he died on stage. Close taught John that the dying had to come unexpectedly; it had to be a surprise.

Marlon Brando, whom John had mimicked when he was still a schoolboy, became increasingly a role model. He’d seen On the Waterfront (1954) a dozen times, and he loved everything Brando played. Flaherty could see that John was thinking of himself heading in that direction, the next Marlon Brando. Judith Flaherty felt that John was right to see in Brando a style that fit him – encompassing both courage and range, the young, unjaded Terry Malloy to the burnt-out, wise Don Corleone of The Godfather.

John explained to a reporter for Tempo at Chicago State college how one imitation led to another: “Well, what I did, I happened to see Brando in a picture called Reflections in a Golden Eye in which he played a homosexual. Not long afterwards, I saw Capote being interviewed on TV and I suddenly realized, ‘Hey, Brando was doing Capote!’ Now if Brando can do Capote and I can do Brando – well then, I can do Capote.”

* *

In the spring of 1972, after John had been at Second City for fourteen months, Chicago Daily News writer Marshall Rosenthal interviewed him. “Obsessed with Marlon Brando, John Belushi polishes off a slice of pizza, stuffs the greasy napkin into his cheeks and becomes The Godfather,” Rosenthal wrote.

“The Brando character, in fact, runs through much of Belushi’s hilarious impersonations at Second City, but it never overtakes him because beneath the macho-Mafioso pose always beats the vulnerable heart of a hippy-dippy chump … Belush has only to step on stage to get laughs.”

Rosenthal quoted John: “But a funny thing happens at Second City. A year after you’re there, you start to get this fear that you’ll die there, and you start wondering when you’ll leave.”

Rosenthal concluded:

“The pizza had turned into specks of sausage and cheese scattered in the deep-dish baking pan. We step across Wells Street at 3 a.m. to have the last beer at the Earl of Old Town. Folksinger Ed Holstein is on stage, and he calls to John, ‘Hey, Valachi, c’mon up and do your Brando!’ Not too reluctantly, Belushi ambles on stage, takes a long swig of draft beer, and says, ‘I could’a been a contendah ….’ ”