The Genius of Michael O’Donoghue
So I’ve finally gotten around to reading Mr. Mike by Dennis Perrin. I’ve read so many books on SNL and its respective cast members that now I have to resort to reading about the show’s writers. But, you can’t go wrong with Michael O’Donoghue. He’s got everything - death, gore, violence, and of course, excellent comedy. Even if you aren’t a fan of his brand of black as pitch humor, at his best he wrote some very funny, approachable and spot on sketches (i.e. The infamous Star Trek sketch, Lucy’s New Job, the Castration Walk). Certainly someone who was underrated, and left us way too early.
Enjoy an article of his from Spin Magazine…
Who’s left? Liza. Freaky, mawkish Liza with those waif-found-stuffed-in-a-drainpipe looks and that paperback version of Judy’s voice. Liza, not so much a human being as a walking collection of show business tics. Liza, whose career is based on the belief that you can’t overuse the words “special” and “magic.” Liza with an “F.”
Obviously, on a sane planet, she would be kept in a cage and people would pay a small amount—no more than a quarter—to poke her with a stick. Yet here on Earth, she’s a big star. Why, you ask, and rightly so? I’ll tell you why. Because her mother, who always looked like she was two seconds from jumping off a high ledge, knew an incredible secret—a secret so dark and twisted that it has never been spoken aloud—a secret any Rosicrucian would give his left nut to possess—forbidden knowledge older than the pyramids unveiled here for the first time—a secret guarded by the rich and powerful for centuries yet I reveal it to you for the price of a rock’n’roll magazine—a dreadful secret that Judy, lying on her death bed, with seconds to live, leaned over and whispered into her daughter’s ear:
“The person in the most pain wins.”
This simple truth is the basis of all daytime chat shows—
“Notice me, Phil. I’m a woman and my husband beats me.”
“Notice me, Sally. I’m a woman and I’m black and my husband beats me and my father sexually abused me.”
“Notice me, Ricki. I’m blind—so blind that I don’t even know if I’m black or a woman—and somebody—it’s so dark it’s hard to tell—beats and rapes me and I weigh 850 pounds.”
“Notice me, Montel. I’m a woman, I’m handicapped, I’m fat, everybody from the mailman to the parish priest beats and rapes me, my son has Gay Bowel Disease, my daughter was born with pot holders for hands and I’m on fire right now.”
“Notice me, world. I’m Liza.”
