"Oh, jeez, that's awful." "That is awful." "Yeah, it's just..." "It's a tragedy, you know, but at least she lived 92 wonderful years." "No, I know not all of them, but, hey, nobody lives..." "The eulogy?" "Yeah, no, I would be glad to do that for you, and please let us know if there's anything at all we can do." "Yeah, we will be there." "I promise you that." "Okay." "Thank you for calling." "Dad, who died?" "I can tell by the..." "By the hysterical laughter someone in our family just died." "I don't know why this happens every time." "Yeah, I remember the last laughing fit you had." "Oh, god, I'm sorry." " Estelle." " Oh, Estelle died." "Who is she?" "What are you talking about?" " Morty's wife." " Who's Morty?" "Morty is my second cousin once removed." "Twice removed." "That's too far away from me, dad." "I don't think I've ever met Morty or Estelle, have I?" "They used to come over Thanksgiving, passover." "Anyway..." "Oh, that's too bad." "You seem so upset." "Well, we were close, we were very close." "Very close to hysteria there for a second." "Why do you laugh at somebody else's demise?" "I don't understand that." "I mean, I do..." "There's something about..." "One minute they're alive, and the next minute they're dead." "It's like slapstick." "I hope you're not upset." "I mean, you look it." "Well, I'm a little upset." "She was... when I was a kid, she was there for me a lot." "When both of my parents were working, she very often would pick me up at school and bring me home." "And Morty is somebody I'm very fond of." "You know, he was..." "Morty is a very worldly guy." "If that's what incontinent means anymore." "But there are services..." "There are services the day after tomorrow." "Y'know, the Jews are..." "Are obliged to bury their dead within a certain time frame." "Yeah, I know, dad, I'm Jewish." "Yeah." "Yeah, I know the rules." "Thanks for reminding me." "I know, but I remember you threw out the manual." "Okay, let me... all right, let me phrase it this way..." "Let's put it into the hypothetical, okay?" "Let's say Dr. Katz was gonna have a party, and at this party he was allowed to invite one of his patients." "Do you think that I would..." "There was any chance at all that I would be the one patient he would invite, or do you think I would be in the top-five patients he would invite, or do you think he would say something like, "No, he's not coming"?" "Is that..." ""He's not gonna be there."" "Which of those do you think would be..." "So I haven't been..." "I'm very frightened of doctors and dentists." "And my sister went to this acupuncturist, which was pretty cool, but he was a doctor, but he missed these signs that she had diabetes." "I mean, she had all these signs." "I mean, she was, for example, she was craving Insulin." "And then she would collapse after eating a Lifesaver, and still the doctor still didn't get it at that point." "Hmm..." "Tell me the whole thing again, Andy." "I went out with this woman for two months, and then we didn't have any sex." "And I asked her, "Why aren't we having any sex?"" "Which is always a good come-on line." "And she said, "I can't have any sex with you, Andy, because I'm impotent."" "I said, "Impotent?" "Don't you mean frigid?"" "And she said, "Sure, whatever it takes."" ""That too."" ""Yes," is what she said." ""All righty, then."" "I can't get enough of the women, though." "I can't get any of the women." "So I think you can see..." "My process of elimination..." "I can't get any of them." "When I was a kid, I hated musicals." "I couldn't stand..." "When I'd go to the theater and there'd be a musical, and I hate in musicals when they tell you what they're gonna do." "They always say, "We're gonna dance and sing and do everything."" "Well, then, go ahead and dance and sing and do everything!" "It's like those rock groups in the early '60s." "They would go, "We wanna rock 'n' roll."" "Well, go ahead and rock 'n' roll, then." "You've got the instruments and the amplifiers." "Who better than you?" "Maybe I'm a little too upset about this, but it's starting to stick in my craw..." "Wherever that would be located in my body." "That's right next to your druthers." "I used to have an agent and a manager, and then I had a lawyer, and I used to pay some guy 2%..." "I would call him up, and he would say," ""It's not you, Andy." "This business is screwed."" "For 2%." "And it was well worth it, is how I felt about it." "Well, you're in a business, Andy, where representation is critical." "You need to have people who have your interests at heart." "But do you think it's a bad sign if you're talking to your lawyer and right in the middle of talking to him your lawyer says," ""Hey, look, I'm no legal expert"?" "Is that good?" "Is that a bad sign?" "Not necessarily." "Dad, it's just that it's gonna be a little awkward for me, 'cause I haven't been to a funeral since I was 12." "So I'm a little out of practice." "I'll cover for you, because I've been to three funerals this year, and I'm not a "mourning" person." "Well, just go to bed early tonight, and you'll be able to get up..." "It was a joke, it was a joke." "Oh, you mean it was a bad pun." "Mourning for... right." "Puns aren't really good or bad." "They're just puns." "Well, don't defend 'em, dad." "Maybe you're just not a "punny" person." "That's a bad pun!" "You slap in the face now..." "Pun, you're going to your room right now." "Pun-ish me!" "Well, don't pun-tificate." "Just punt, punt." "Hey, Laura?" "Yeah?" "I'm gonna be in a little late tomorrow morning." "Oh, me too." "Well, I have to go to a funeral." "Oh, I'm sorry, Dr. Katz." "Well, thank you." "And it's gonna be a tough one, because this is my third funeral this year, and I'm not a mourning person." "Is that a joke?" "Uh, yeah." "I don't think that's appropriate at a time like this." "Do you think it's a bad joke or just an inappropriate time for a joke?" "Both." "You can only choose one." "I'd have to go with bad joke." "That hurts." "Well, let's try and pick up where we left off last time, Margaret, because I thought we were making some progress." "Tell me about your family, about your siblings." "Everyone in the family was fat." "I used to have to hide in the bathroom to eat." "They'd all be at the door trying to get in to get my food." ""We just wanna wash our faces."" "It was like The Night of the Living Dead." "I'm telling you, it was a very scary childhood." "My mother has home movies you gotta be 18 to get into." "There's one of a barbecue, if you look real close, you can see Hitchcock sitting at a picnic table." "Odd." "Weren't you talking last time about your uncle Joe?" "Oh, uncle Joey?" " Yes." " Jeez." "Ate nothing but food additives." "He was always real shiny, like a sausage casing." "You'd just wanna stick him with a fork." "You knew a fennel seed would come flying out." "Disgusting human being." "Couldn't get a sentence out without belching." ""So, Mar..." "How you doing?" "Jeez, you're..." "looking good."" ""Yeah, you too, uncle Joey."" "Yeah, shiny guy." "But it's good that you're getting out." "You're seeing people, you're taking chances." "I went out to dinner with a marine last weekend." "He looked across the table at me and he goes," ""You know, I could kill you in seven seconds."" "I go, "Oh, I'll just have the toast, then."" "I like him, though, 'cause he fights." "Everywhere we go he picks a big fistfight." " I love fights." " Really?" "I don't like the actual fight." "I like the loose change on the ground afterwards." "But you find yourself drawn to the macho types?" "Big, strong guys?" "Of course, I don't like hairy guys, though." "I went with a hairy guy..." "He'd get in the bathtub, it would look the sewer backed up." "All that fur floating on that water." "Made me wanna snap a cigarette butt in there." "Where do you meet these guys?" "I mean, do you go to bars?" "Bars..." "I hate bars." "'Cause I don't drink or smoke, you know?" "Guys coming up to me..." ""Hey, cupcake, can I buy you a drink?"" "I'd always say, "No, but I'll take the 3 bucks."" "Then they wanna know my name." "I say, "Margaret."" "And they always go, "Ah, what do you like to be called?"" "Like Margaret's a crummy name." "I go, "Oh, just call me Bubbles." "I'll give you a name, you little weasel."" "You know something?" "I used to actually be very uncomfortable with the idea of being buried." "I thought I wanted to be cremated, but then there's something very..." "There's a certain kind of symmetry about regenerating life with the decaying of your body." "That's disgusting, dad." "I'm not saying we should do it today." "Does he accept gifts at all?" "Would it be inappropriate to find out when Dr. Katz's birthday is?" "And do you think sending a present would be an appropriate gesture?" "That's the kind of decision you will have to make about your father someday." "About what..." "How you should be buried?" "Whether I should be buried or cremated or who knows by the time I die..." "I think you should make the choice, dad, about the way you wanna be buried." "Well, I'm telling you now." "I'd like to be buried nicely." "I can't afford that." "Remember when uncle Phil died?" "Yeah." "Yeah, that was great." "Okay, when you're saying to me, "Get away from me,"" "now, are you talking to me as a patient, like this area is not for the patients?" "Or are you saying..." "Are you saying, "Andy Kindler, you, you get away from me"?" "Dr. Katz's office." "Hey, Laura." " Hi, Ben." " It's Ben." " How you doing?" " Fine." " How are you?" " Hanging in there?" "Good." " What?" " Good." ""Hanging in there," I said." "Oh, I thought you meant you were hanging in there." "Oh, no, no, no, it's an expression." "Like I would say, "Hanging in there?"" "And you would say, "Yeah."" "You have to put more of a question mark at the end." "Try it again." "Hanging in there?" "Yeah." "Me too, me too." "My mother came out to California." ""California's very nice, Andy." "San Francisco was lovely." "The hills I could have lived without, but the people were courteous and well kempt."" "She gets off the plane, she's reading from the tour book." ""Andy, did you know San Francisco is the fifth-largest textile manufacturer in the early 20th century?" "Andy, I would like to visit Sausalito." "Can we go to Sausalito, a small fishing village north of the Golden Gate Bridge, nestled in lovely Marin county?" "Can we go to Sausalito?"" "Actually, it's kind of a tough time for the Katz family." "I don't know if you've heard, but my aunt Estelle died." "Oh, right." "Were you very close to her?" "I didn't know her." "I mean, my dad told me I met her a couple of times, but I don't actually remember." "I think my dad was kind of close." "Is he overly upset today?" "Uh... not really." "Well, he should be." "He was trying to make a bad joke." "Well, the thing about this is I have to go to the funeral tomorrow, and I'm not exactly a mourning person... you know?" "Right, that was the one." "The one what?" "The bad joke that he tried to make." "Oh, oh, he told you that." "Yeah." "Well, I mean, I wrote it, he just tells 'em." "The thing is is that the comedy boom is over." "It's very depressing." "I mean, this is the field that I've picked for my life and it used to be that everybody wanted a comic." "In the mid-'80s, if you could say," ""How you people doing?"" "You could make like $100,000 a year." "Well, but now you're doing other things." "You're branching out, you're writing comedy." "My whole trouble is I can't focus." "I'm supposed to try and write a script or something like that." "So I wanna write a script, but then I figure maybe I'll take a nap for a couple hours, get things stirred up that way." "Then I start to write and then I notice that Newhart is on Nick @ nite." "So how can you not watch Newhart?" "And then I start to write again and I realize that dragnet is very watchable when you're trying to avoid your obligations." "Here's my impression of a network TV executive during World War II." ""Look, I don't like Hitler either, but he's very, very popular." "He does very well, he has a lot of energy." "He scores very well with the 18-to-49 men-who-hate-Jews category." "We're skewing it that way." "They buy a lot of products." "What do you want me to do?" "They buy the brown shirts, they enjoy the riding crops."" "Hey, when was the last time you bought a suit, Stanley?" "Uh, a couple of years ago." "You know what size you are?" " Yeah." " What size?" "41 reg." "41 reg." "See, the last time I bought a suit," "I was a 38 short." "And I went and I tried on a 38 short, and I could get one sleeve in, essentially." "Oh." "Y'know, I'm a little..." "I have a little more fullness." "Gotten a little heavier." "Well, I've filled out." "I've bulked up a little bit." "You know what's a good thing to do for that?" "It sounds outrageous, but go for, like, a higher number." "Like, instead of 38, go to a 40 or a 42 or..." "Well, this is what I was gonna tell you, is this woman who was selling me this suit..." "She kept saying to me, and she was belting it out in front of everybody..." "She says, "Well, the problem is, Mr. Katz", you're a portly gentleman." "If you wanna wear a 38, you have to wear a 38 portly."" "Is there really a portly size?" "Apparently, but I am not..." "Would you ever describe me as portly?" " No, never." " No." " Never." " No." "No, I'm not a portly guy." " No." " No." "So I said, "Stop it."" "You said that to her?" " I said, "Stop it."" " Good, good." "I don't need that." "She was probably projecting..." "Was she portly?" "No, she was svelte." "She was made out of felt?" "Did I say "felt"?" "Sometimes when women get really aggressive it's really that they're kind of, like, coming on to you." "Sometimes some women do that." "They get, like, really aggressive, and then they're testing you to see if..." "How far they can push you?" "And see if you like that, basically." "If you like being bossed around." "Does it always mean that?" "'Cause women come on to me like that a lot." "No, it doesn't always mean..." "No, it doesn't always mean that." "What about when they ticket your car?" "Is that, is that..." "That's a come-on." "Man, I fall for that every time." "Y'know, those salespeople..." "They hate their jobs." "I remember the last job I ever tried to get in the normal work force." "A guy told me I had to wear high heels." "I said, "Well, I'll wear the high heels, but I'm gonna need a handicapped parking space."" "I like that one store, that Ann Taylor." "They're a little pushy there, though." "They get in there, they follow you around." "Rush me in and out of that dressing room." "I get in that dressing room, I like to stay a while." "It's nicer than my apartment." "So I'm in there, like, 10, 15 minutes." "She comes knocking at the door." "I go, "What?"" ""You've been in there a while." "Are you okay?"" "I opened the door a crack." "I said, "No, could you get me some toilet paper?"" "What does she think I'm doing in there?" "Oops..." "Margaret, I'm sorry." "You know what the music means." "We're gonna have to stop now." "I know our time's up, but..." "Nope, gotta go." "I think I got designs on you." "Bye." "What did you just say?" "I think I'm in love with you." "Bye!" "Wait, wait, wait, this is some..." "I mean, I wish you had said this earlier." "Well, then we would have had to talk about it." "But we do need to talk about it." "Well, okay." "But we can't do it now because our time is up, but we have to talk about this issue next session." "I think you should chip in half, though." "Why is that?" "If we're talking about our relationship, isn't that a couples session?" "Well, technically, but it's really more about what we call transference in this business." "Don't worry..." "I'm not gonna stalk you or anything." "Well, that's good." "I mean, it never really crossed my address... my mind." "Never..." "I never addressed that issue in my mind." "But I really..." "I have to get going now, because I never go directly home." "You know what I mean?" "I don't know why I'm telling you this." "So now what exactly are you gonna say?" "I was gonna ask you." "Y'know, I usually try to open with a joke." "But I don't think I'm gonna today." "No." "I think what I'm gonna do is I'm just gonna talk about Estelle, y'know?" "Yeah, that would be a good person to talk about." "It is her funeral." "That's true." "I gotta acknowledge her somehow." "Yeah, I would say touch on her." "Hey, Ben, isn't that cousin Sheila's husband Larry?" "You remember him?" "That's the guy that used to put on the magic shows at the family gatherings." "Right." "He'd make me be his lovely assistant, y'know?" "Yeah." "I hope he doesn't try to saw the casket in half." "Dad, don't make us laugh." "It's not right, not here." "Oh, man." "This is a depressing event here." "I don't care what anyone says." "And I haven't even done my eulogy yet." "I think they're sorta..." "They're... asking me up to the..." "Yeah, you're gonna have to go up now." "I'll stay here." "Unless you want me to be your lovely assistant." "Nah, that's all right." "All right, you go up." " Knock 'em dead." " Okay." "Okay!" "When I first heard that Estelle had..." "When I first heard that Estelle had passed away..." "Can't hear in back." "Ben, if you can't hear me, come a little closer." "I'm sorry, folks." "When I first..." "No, I thought of..." "When I first heard that she had passed away," "I thought of her life, and Estelle had..." "92 great years." "And by my count that's... 92 great years." "I'm sorry..." "I lost my place here." "I remember her love and her laughter." "And her love of laughter." "Mayday, mayday." "Estelle was a remarkable woman." "She... in her lifetime she accomplished so much and did so much for so many people in her 92 years, which, if you break it down, it's really..." "It's not that much, considering how long she lived, but still..." "Wrap it up." "She did a lot..." "Oh." "I know what the music means." "Oh, dad." "How'd I do?" "I thought for sure you were gonna turn it around, but you didn't." "I mean, I've never heard a eulogy before, but I think it's safe to say that that was the worst eulogy ever given." "At the afterparty we're splitting up." "That's all there is to it."