January, 1994
Dear John,
Here is the material (verbatim) that CBS’s Standards and Practices Found ‘unsuitable’ for the viewing public in 1993, Year of Our Lord. THESE are the ‘Hot Spots’ I believe were most mentioned. I’m going to include audience response as well, for it does play a part in my thoughts on the incident which will follow the Jokes. Jokes, John, this is what America now fears – one man with a point of view, speaking out unafraid of our vaunted institutions, or the loathsome superstitions the CBS hierarchy feels the masses (the herd) use as their religion. Oops! I’m getting ahead of myself with my thoughts. Let’s go now to the afternoon of October 1st, 1993. The place: The Ed Sullivan Theatre, where The Late Show With David Letterman now reigns supreme amongst the many Late-night talk shows that have sprung up like poisonous mushrooms since Johnny’s retirement. The time – 6.40 p.m. ‘Time for the final guest of the night, a ‘very entertaining comedian – Bill Hicks. Bill, come on out here!’ The audience applauds as I stroll out in my new bright fall colors – an outfit bought just for the show, very unlike my usual all black ensemble and reflective of my bright and cheerful mood. I’m feeling good. The set I’ve prepared has been approved and reap-proved by Mary Connelly, the segment producer of the show. It is the same exact set that was approved for the previous Friday, the Night where I was ‘bumped’ due to lack of time. It is the Material that I’m excited about performing for it best reflects – out of all the other eleven appearances I’ve made on the show – myself. Let us begin . . .
Bill: Good evening! I’m very excited to be here tonight, and I’m very excited because I got some great news today. I finally got my own TV Show coming out as a replacement show this fall!
The audience applauds.
Bill: Don’t worry, it’s not a talk show.
The audience laughs.
Bill: Thank God!
Bill (cont.): It’s a half hour weekly show that I will host, entitled ‘Let’s Hunt and Kill Billy Ray Cyrus’.
Audience bursts into laughter and applause.
Bill: I think it’s fairly self-explanatory – each week we let the Hounds of Hell loose and chase that jar-head, no talent, cracker-idiot all over the globe till I finally catch that fruity little pony-tail of his, pull him to his Chippendales knees, put a shotgun in his mouth, ‘Pow!’
Audience is applauding and laughing through-out this run.
Bill (cont.): Then we’ll be back in ’94 with ‘Let’s Hunt and Kill Michael Bolton’.
Audience laughs and applauds.
Bill: Yeah, so you can see with guests like this, our run will be fairly limitless.
Audience laughs.
Bill: And we’re kicking the whole series off with our M.C. Hammer, Vanilla Ice, Marky Mark Christmas Special . . .
Audience laughs and applauds.
Bill: And I don’t want to give any surprises away, but the first one we hunt and kill on that show is Markie Mark, because his pants keep falling around his ankles and he can’t run away . . .
Bill Mimes a hobbling Markie Mark. The audience laughs.
Bill: Yeah, I get to cross-bow him right in the abs. It’s a beautiful thing. Bring the family. TAPE IT. It’s definitely a show for the nineties . . .
Audience applauds. At this point I did a line about men dancing. Since it was never mentioned as a reason for excising me from the show, let’s skip ahead to the next ‘Hot Point’ that was mentioned. (By the way, the Joke on men dancing got a huge laugh.) But let’s move forward to the following Joke.
Bill: You know, I consider myself a fairly open-minded person, but speaking of Homosexuality, something has come to my attention that has shocked even me. Have you heard about these new grade school books for children they’re trying to add to the curriculum, to help children understand the gay, lifestyle? One’s called ‘Heather’s Two Mommies’, the other one is called ‘Daddy’s . . . New Room-mate’.
Here I make a shocked, disgusted face.
Bill: Folks, I gotta draw the line here and say this is absolutely disgusting. It is grotesque, and it is pure evil.
Pause.
Bill: I’m talking, of course, about ‘Daddy’s New Room-mate’.
Audience laughs.
Bill: ‘Heather’s Two Mommies’ is quite Fetching . . . you know they’re hugging on page seven!
Audience laughs.
Bill (lasciviously): Oooh! Go, Mommies, Go! Oooh! They kiss in chapter four!
Audience laughs.
Bill: Me and my nephew wrestle over that book every night . . .
Bill mimes his little Nephew jumping up and down.
Bill (as Nephew):‘Uncle Bill, I’ve gotta do my homework!’
Audience laughs.
Bill: Shut up and go do your Math! I’m proofreading this for you . . .
Audience laughs. We move directly into the next ‘Hot Point’.
Bill: You know who’s really bugging me these days? These pro-lifers . . .
Smattering of applause.
Bill: You ever look at their faces . . . ‘I’m pro-life!’
Here Bill makes a pinched face of hate and fear, his lips are pursed as though he’s just sucked on a lemon.
Bill: ‘I’m pro-life!’ Boy, they look it, don’t they? They just exude Joie de vivre. You just want to hang with them and play Trivial Pursuit all night long.
Audience chuckles.
Bill: You know what bugs me about them – if you’re so pro-life, do me a favor – don’t lock arms and block medical clinics. If you’re so pro- life, lock arms and block cemeteries.
Audience laughs.
Bill (cont.): Let’s see how committed you are to this idea.
Here Bill mimed the pursed lipped pro-lifers locking arms.
Bill (as pro-lifer): ‘She can’t come in!’
Audience laughs
Bill (as confused member of funeral procession): ‘She was ninety-eight. She was hit by a bus!’
Audience laughs
Bill (as pro-lifer): ‘There’s options!’
Audience laughs.
Bill (again as confused funeral procession member): ‘What else can we do – have her stuffed?’
Audience laughs.
Bill: I want to see pro-lifers with crowbars at funerals opening caskets – ‘Get out!’ Then I’d really be impressed by their mission.
Audience laughs and applauds. At this point I did a routine on smoking that was never brought up as a ‘Hot Point’, so let’s move ahead to the end of my routine, and another series of jokes that was mentioned as ‘unsuitable’.
Bill: I’ve been traveling a lot lately, I was over in Australia during Easter. It was interesting to note they celebrate Easter the same way we do – commemorating the death and Resurrection of Jesus by telling our children a giant Bunny Rabbit . . . left chocolate eggs in the night . . .
Audience laughs.
Bill (cont.): Gee, I wonder why we’re so messed up as a race? You know, I’ve read the Bible – can’t find the words ‘bunny’ or ‘chocolate’ in the whole book.
Audience laughs.
Bill (cont.): WHERE do we get this stuff from? And why those two things? Why not ‘Goldfish left Lincoln Logs in our sock drawers?’ I mean, as long as we’re making stuff up, let’s go hog wild.
Audience laughs and applauds.
Bill: I think it’s interesting how people act on their beliefs. A lot of Christians, for instance, wear crosses around their necks. Nice sentiment, but do you think when Jesus comes back, he’s really going to want to look at a cross?’
Audience laughs. Bill makes a face of pain and horror.
Bill: Ow! Maybe that’s why he hasn’t shown up yet . . .
Audience laughs.
Bill (as Jesus looking down from Heaven): ‘I’m not going, Dad. No, they’re still wearing crosses – they totally missed the point. When they start wearing fishes, I might go back again . . . No, I’m not going . . . OK, I’ll tell you what – I’ll go back as a bunny . . .’
Audience bursts into applause and laughter, the band kicks into ‘Revolution’ by the Beatles.
Bill: Thank you very much! Good night!
Bill crosses over to the seat next to Letterman’s desk.
David Letterman: Good set, Bill! Always nice to have you drop by with an uplifting message!
Audience and Bill laugh, we cut to a commercial.
During the commercial break Dave asks me how things are going. I say fine, I’m working on a couple of albums these days. He asks me if I’ve lost some weight. I tell him yes, I’ve been drinking about a quart of grapefruit juice a day. Then Mary Connelly comes over to the seat followed by Robert Morton, the producer of the show. They’re both smiling and saying, ‘Good set!’. I ask them again how they thought it went. They say, ‘Great! Didn’t you hear the audience response?’ I’m relieved they feel this way. They leave the desk area. Dave then leans over and asks if I’ve quit drinking. I find this a rather odd question seeing as how I haven’t touched a drop of liquor in over five years and Dave and I have had this conversation before since then. I then tell Dave I’ve started smoking cigars, and I ask him what kind he smokes. He names a brand which I didn’t catch, then hands me one of his very own. I say ‘Thanks!’ And now we’re back from commercials. There’s about fifteen seconds left. Dave turns to me and says something to the effect of, ‘Bill, good to see you again. Good job.’ Then closes the show with . . .
Dave: I want to thank our guests tonight – Andie McDowell, Graham Parker, and Bill Hicks . . . Bill, enjoy answering your mail the next few weeks. Goodnight everybody.
The audience and Bill cracks up at Dave’s closing line, and we’re off the air. Again Mary Connelly comes up to me and says the show went great. When I enter the green room, everyone’s sitting there watching the taping of the show applauds and says, ‘Great set’. Graham Parker (who I’m a huge fan of) comes up to me with a big smile on his face and shakes my hand, saying, ‘Great! Loved it, mate!’ I finally start to relax a bit. It’s over, and as far as I can tell, everyone enjoyed it. Bill Sheft, a comic and one of the writers on the show comes up to me saying, ‘Hicks, that was great!’ I ask him if he thinks Letterman liked it. Bill Sheft, whose other duties include warming up the audience and getting them to applaud when the show goes in and out of commercials – a job that he performs just to the left of Letterman’s desk – says, ‘Are you kidding? Letterman was cracking up throughout the whole set.’ Now I feel even more relieved. Since I am a fan of Dave’s and the show, it means a lot to me that he would enjoy my work. Finally I begin to relax in general. While it feels good to do a set on the number one talk show in America, and again, a show that I’m a huge fan of – it is extremely nerve racking. The stakes are much higher obviously, playing to eight million people than the typical three-hundred-seat club crowd comics are used to playing every night. The fact that it was over and by all accounts went fine was a huge relief.
At this time, I’d like to tell you the circumstances that led up to me being called at the last minute to do the show . . .
I was scheduled to appear on ‘The Late Show with David Letterman’ on Friday, September 24 – one week previous to the actual day when I went on – the show I just recounted. As I said earlier, the material I was to do was approved and reapproved by Mary Connelly, the segment producer of the Letterman show. I flew up to New York, went directly to the studio, and Mary and I went over the set again then she graciously showed me around the beautiful, revamped Ed Sullivan Theatre. We both agreed every base had been covered, and I went back to my hotel to run through the set again and again – my typical procedure. That afternoon I went to the show. The other guests that night were Glenn Close and James Taylor. The show began, I got made up, and sat waiting in my dressing room for my spot. About half-way through the show, Mary Connelly called my manager Colleen McGarr and me into a hall way and told me she had some bad news – the show was running late, and there wouldn’t be time to get me on. This is known as being ‘Bumped’ in talk show parlance, and isn’t as bad as it sounds.
You still get paid, free hotel room, and your flight back to wherever you’re going. The only downside really is that you’re all pumped up with adrenalin and ready to go on, then – nothing. It’s kind of like a cowboy might feel if he were sitting on the bull, wrapping his hands in the rope, psyching himself up, then the gate never opens. Of course I was a little bummed, because I wanted to get this over with and return to my more familiar world of three-hundred-seat comedy clubs and doing material the nature of which is unexpurgated, and only has to be approved by me.
Mary expressed her apologies, then went on to say I’d be rescheduled as soon as possible, perhaps in a couple of weeks. Colleen, my Manager, and I then went to The Palms restaurant and consoled ourselves with lobsters the size of canoes. We both felt fine about everything, and the next day I flew home.
The following week, I was back up in New York working Caroline’s Comedy Club. On Friday, October 1st, I called up a Florida paper to do an interview for my next engagement at the Comedy Corner in West Palm Beach, Florida. Toward the end of the interview, the reporter said, ‘Oh, by the way, congratulations,’ I said, ‘thanks, what for?’ He said, ‘Well, you’re doing Letterman tonight.’ Hmmm . . . I said, ‘That’s news to me, maybe I should get off the horn here and find out what’s going on.’ He said, ‘Yeah, you better, they’ve been looking for you all day.’ We hung up and I called my Manager’s office. Since Colleen, my Manager, was with me in New York, and was out shopping with her Mom, I assumed she’d heard nothing of this as well, I got a hold of Colleen’s assistant, who went berserk when she got on the line, ‘where have you been all day!? The Letterman people have been trying to reach you all day! They want you on the show tonight! Some other guest has fallen out.’
I was a little embarrassed by this inability to be found, for it was my fault entirely. You see, I had checked into the hotel room under the name Otis Blackwell, in honor of the true author of some of Elvis Presley’s biggest hits, including ‘All Shook up’ and ‘Don’t be Cruel’. Another reason I checked in under that name was kind of a private joke between myself and me regarding another comic who will remain nameless – hopefully forever, who had gained some popularity doing routines, mannerisms, and attitudes remarkably similar to my own. And another reason I checked in under an assumed name, and the most obvious in the world, I wanted to assure my privacy and avoid any over zealous creditors who might be lurking about trying to ruin my day and the beautiful weather we were experiencing that fall week in New York. Again, it was all my fault, though I make no apologies.
I hung up the phone and immediately called Mary Connelly at the Letterman show. She too berated me for being so mysterious about my whereabouts, then asked me if I could go on the show that night. I said ‘of course’. It was now 3.30 p.m. Mary told me a car would be by to pick me up at 4.15. I got dressed, the adrenalin started pumping, and I went through the approved set again and again until the car arrived. My Manager, Colleen, and her mom and I excitedly jumped in the car and we headed for the studio. Colleen’s Mom, a Canadian and another devout fan of the Letterman show, had already attended a taping that week. She was doubly excited for the opportunity to see the show twice in one week, and in this instance to experience the backstage goings on as opposed to watching the show as an audience member.
We got to the studio in plenty of time to hear about the guest who had been cancelled from the show – the former cook of the Gambino Crime Family, currently in the Witness Protection Program, had written a cookbook and wanted to go on television to promote his book. (These fellows aren’t known for their brightness.) The stipulation if he chose to go on, from the government, was a) he would lose his protection entirely, and b) he would forfeit his four-thousand-dollar-a-month stipend he receives from the US Government for turning stool pigeon against the Mob. The cook still wanted to go ahead with the show. He must have some unbelievably good recipes in that book. Anyway, apparently throughout the day, the Letterman show received several calls from Italian-accented men who wanted to know if the stool pigeon cook was really going on the show, then, when told he was, they asked, ‘What time does the show tape?’ Understandably, the Letterman people begin to feel nervous about booking the former Mob cook. The Letterman people then decided to cancel his appearance. Unfortunately, the cook, living in a hideout in New Jersey two hours away from New York (perhaps under the name Otis Blackwell), was already en route to the studio. There was no way to contact him until he reached the studio with pots and paws and cookbook in hand.
Now, who exactly was going to tell him he wouldn’t be going on the show after all? Twenty-four-year-old staff member Daniel Kellison drew the short stick and when the Mob cook showed up, Daniel broke the news to him as delicately and gracefully, I’m sure, as he could muster. By all accounts, the cook went berserk. He stormed off, pots and pans rattling, Daniel breathed a great sigh of relief and resumed his much safer duties on the show.
All of this was occuring during, and up to the time they were looking for me, to when I got to the show and heard the story. We all had a good chuckle, acknowledged the strangeness of life, then I went up to be made- up. What I didn’t learn until after the show was that half-way through the taping, young Daniel received a call from the fuming Mob cook, who proceeded to call Daniel every name in the book, then threatened to kill him if it was the last thing he ever did. I was oblivious to this turn of events as I headed down to do my spot in the show. I wasn’t even aware of the extra tension in the green room, the additional security, nor the ashen-faced Daniel standing sadly in the corner, focused as I was on the set I was about to do.
I stood in the wings, taking a final drag from my cigarette, then David Letterman introduced me, and I walked out to center stage and performed the set I recounted in the beginning of this evergrowing saga.
After the show, I returned to my hotel and took a long hot bath. It felt really good. All the tension of the day steamed away. I’d done the show. It had gone well. The pressure was off. I could finally relax. As I was getting out of the tub, the phone rang. It was now 7.30 p.m. Robert Morton, the producer of the Letterman show, was on the line. He said ‘Bill; I’ve got some bad news . . .’ My first thought was that Daniel had perhaps been chopped up and sautéed by the Mob cook. Robert Morton went on . . . ‘Bill, we have to edit your set from tonight’s show.’ I sat down on the bed, stunned, wearing nothing but a towel. ‘I don’t understand, Robert. What’s the problem? I thought the show went great.’ Morton replied, ‘It did, Bill. You killed out there. It’s just that the CBS Standards and Practices felt some of the material was unsuitable for broadcast.’ I rubbed my head, confused, ‘Ah, which material exactly did they find . . . unsuitable?’ ‘Well,’ Morty replied, ‘almost all of it, if I had to edit everything they object to, there’ll be nothing left of the set. So we just think it’s best to cut you entirely from the show. Bill, we fought tooth and nail to keep the set as is, but Standards and Practices won’t back down. David is furious. We’re all upset here, Bill, this has nothing to do with how we feel about you. We loved the set and we take full responsibility for this. We love you and know how hard you worked on this set. What can I say? It’s outa my hands now. We’ve never experienced this before with Standards and Practices . . . and they’re just not gonna back down, I’m really sorry.’ I was trying my best to digest all this. The tension creeping back into my body and my mind. ‘But, Bob . . . they’re so obviously jokes . . .’ ‘Bill, I know, I know, Standards and Practices just doesn’t find them suitable.’ ‘But which ones? I mean, I saw this set by my sixty-three-year-old Mom on her porch in Little Rock, Arkansas. You’re not going to find anyone more mainstream, nor any place more Middle America than my Mom in Little Rock, Arkansas, and she had no problem with the material.’ ‘Bill, what can I say? It’s out of our hands . . . Bill, we’ll just try and schedule a different set in a couple of weeks and have you back on.’
I wanted at that time to say ‘I don’t think I can learn to juggle in that short of a time’, but I just was too stunned. Then Morton said, ‘Bill, we take full responsibility for this. It’s our fault. We should have spent more time before hand working on the set, so Mary or I could have edited out those “hot points” and we wouldn’t be having to do this now.’ Finally, I came to my senses. I said, ‘Bob, they’re just jokes. I don’t want them to be edited by you or anyone else. Why are people so afraid of jokes?’ To which Morty replied, ‘Bill, you have to understand our audiences.’ This is a line I’d heard before and it always pisses me off. ‘Your audiences!’ I retorted. ‘What do you grow them on farms? Your audience is comprised of “people”, right? Well, I understand “people”, being a person myself. People are who I play to every night, Bob, and we get along just fine . . .’ ‘Bill, look, it has to do with the subject matter you touched on, and our new time slot, we’re on an hour earlier you know.’ ‘So, what? We taped the show at 5.30 in the afternoon, and your audience had no problem with the material then. What . . . does the audience become overly sensitive between the hours of 11.30 p.m. and 12.30 a.m.? And by the way, Bob, when I’m not performing on your show, I’m a member of the audience for your show. Are you saying my material is not suitable for me? This doesn’t make sense, why do you underestimate the intelligence of the audience? I think that shows a great deal of contempt on your part . . .’
Morty bursts in with, ‘Bill, it’s not our decision. We have to answer to the networks, and this is the way they want to handle it. Again, I’m sorry. You’re not at fault here. Now let me get to work editing you from the show and we’ll set another date as soon as possible with some different material, OK?’ ‘What kind of material? How bad airline food is? Boy, 7–11s sure are expensive? Golly, Ross Perot has big ears? Bob, you keep saying you want me on the show, then you don’t let me be me. Now, you’re cutting me out completely. I feel like a beaten wife who keeps coming back for more. I try and write the best material I can for you guys. You’re the only show I do because I’m a big fan, and I think you’re the best talk show on. And this is how you treat me?’ ‘Bill, that’s just the way it is sometimes, I’m sorry, OK?’ ‘Well, I’m sorry too, Bob. Now I’ve gotta call my folks back and tell them not to wait up . . . I gotta call my friends . . .’ ‘Bill, I know. This is tough on all of us . . .’ ‘Well, you gotta do what you gotta do . . . OK’. Then we hung up.
So there you have it – not since Elvis was censored from the waist down has a performer, a comic, performing on the very same stage, been so censored – now from the neck up, in 1993. In America. For telling Jokes.
I began getting dressed for my shows that night at Caroline’s. It began to dawn on me there were greater implications than just me being censored. When I went up to my manager, Colleen’s room, Colleen and her mom were getting ready to go with me to Caroline’s. I told them the news. They didn’t believe me at first, but my emotional state and the fact that I kept repeating ‘they’re just Jokes. They’re just Jokes, they’re just Jokes . . .’ finally convinced them it was true. Colleen immediately went into the bedroom to call the Letterman people. I sat with her Mom and ranted for awhile. There were tears in her eyes. I think there were tears in mine as well. ‘What are they so afraid of?’ I yelled, and ‘goddammit I’m a fan of the show. I’m an audience member. I do my best shit for them . . . they’re just Jokes . . .’
My feelings for the show and my relationship with them were undergoing a metamorphosis, as were Colleen’s Mom, I believe. It was like finding out there is no Santa Claus, only the implications of this realization were much more sinister. Here’s this show I loved, that touted itself as this hip late night talk show, trying to silence one man’s voice . . . a comic no less. A show that pretends to be so irreverent, yet buckles at the first hint of anything resembling, in their frightened eyes, edginess. Colleen came back into the room after talking to Mary Connelly of the Letterman show. Mary told Colleen exactly what Robert Morton told me. Colleen asked her if we could get a copy of the tape of my performance. Mary told her, ‘No problem. We’ll get it off to you on Monday.’ Shellshocked, Colleen, Colleen’s mom, and I headed off to Caroline’s Comedy Club where I was to do two shows that night.
On Monday Colleen and I flew to W. Palm Beach, Florida, where I was to perform a five-day run at the W. Palm Beach Comedy Corner. Colleen called the Letterman show and was again told getting a copy of my performance on Friday’s show would be no problem. Colleen then gave her address and Fed Ex number, and she was told the tape would arrive the following day.
Meanwhile, we had walked into Maelstrom. The phones were ringing off the hook, and for the next three days I was continuously busy. You see, over the course of my sixteen years performing comedy all over America, I had made many friends and fans in the media-print, radio, and television. All of them were notified by ‘my people’ of my Letterman appearance that Friday. When my appearance on the night they were watching never occured – ironically replaced by a canned comedy performance by Bill Sheft – they were curious as to what the story was. As I told them, I heard word processors clicking in the background. Apparently, many of my Media Friends, fans, and supporters are also Letterman fans. They felt this was a story that was Newsworthy and expressed to me their own sympathy and outrage over what had occurred. The ball was rolling without any help on my part. While it’s been tiring these last few days of continuous interviews, it’s really easy on my part, for all I have to do is tell the TRUTH . . . over and over and over again. At least it’s easy to remember.
Tuesday came and went without the arrival of the tape from the Letterman show. Throughout Monday and Tuesday, the interview requests kept pouring in. My managers Colleen McGarr and Duncan Strauss were pondering how to handle this situation. We all agreed that it wouldn’t be fair to voice our thoughts until we received the tape of the show and saw for ourselves the set, my performance, and the reaction of the audience. We also thought it only fair to tell the Letterman people about all the calls we were receiving, and find out what their response might be. Thinking the tape still might be on its way – even though it was now two days since they assured us they had overnighted it – Duncan Strauss called up Letterman’s producer Robert Morton, to tell him of all the articles and interviews that were pending.
Essentially, Robert Morton didn’t like the idea of any press about what happened. He took a particularly ‘dim view’ of the upcoming New Yorker profile, if it were to include any mention of this incident of me being censored. Mr Morton then reiterated how much they loved me at the show, and how well I’d done Friday. Duncan told him he looked forward to seeing the set on the tape and then they hung up. Now we all had heard 1st hand that a) The Letterman people loved my set. b) CBS Standards and Practices were responsible for the censoring. c) The tape was on its way. And d) They wanted to rebook me for another spot in the upcoming weeks.
When Thursday came and went and still no tape arrived, I took it upon myself to call Robert Morton personally. I asked him why the tape hadn’t arrived yet. He said, ‘Um . . . I don’t know if we’re legally allowed to send out a tape of an unaired segment of a show . . .’ Hmm . . . I thought that was pretty off the top of his head. I said, ‘Robert, I just want it for my archives, and my parents would love to see it.’ Morty said, ‘OK . . . I’ll try. I’ll see what I can do. I’ll get you the tape. Are we OK, Bill?’ ‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘I’m fine. I’m just looking forward to seeing my act.’ To which Morty replied, ‘I understand, I’ll get you the tape. And let’s work on another set for a few weeks from now.’ I said, ‘Great!’ And we hung up. To this day, no tape has ever arrived. What I’ve recounted here is the exact material I used, and the exact responses I received from the people responsible for producing the show, and the responses of the audience to the best of my memory. Since no tape of the set seems to be forthcoming, this puts me in the awkward position of having to recall these events and commit them to paper – basically to stand up for myself and tell the truth with all the possible information that’s at hand at this moment. Since there was so much interest from the media, and no support from the Letterman people, we decided to go ahead and do these interviews, telling the exact truth as we knew it to be with as much information that was at our disposal. Reporter after reporter followed radio talk show after radio talk show for five solid days. Almost to a man, each and every one were fans of mine and of Letterman’s show. And almost across the board the same outrage was expressed when I told them the material CBS Standard and Practices deemed ‘unsuitable’ for the viewing public. One such radio talk show – The Alex Bennet Show in San Francisco – had a live studio audience the morning I called in to be interviewed. The studio audience laughed at the Jokes as I told them, and applauded the points I made about television after hearing the Jokes. Someone who heard that broadcast took it upon himself to write a stinging letter to CBS, chastising them for their cowardice for not airing my set. They quickly received a letter in reply which was then faxed to my office. Its contents were most interesting and added a humorous twist to this already black comedy that was unfolding. I have CBS reply before me, and I quote ‘. . . It is true that Bill Hicks was taped that evening and that his performance did not air, what is inaccurate is that the deletion of his routine was required by CBS (!) In fact, although a CBS Program Practices editor works on that show, the decision was solely that of the producers of the program with that of another comedian. Therefore, your criticism that CBS censored the program is totally without foundation. Creative Judgements must be made in the course of producing any program, and while we regret that you disagreed with this one, the producers felt it necessary and that is not a decision we would override. (!) (By the way, the underlining of pertinent sentences was done by me.) Whoa! Here was a unique twist. This response from CBS was at total variance with everything I’d been told repeatedly by Robert Morton, the producer of the Letterman show, and Mary Connelly, the segment producer of the show and my set in particular. This response doesn’t gibe at all with Morton’s claim that ‘Bill, the set was great! You killed! It’s CBS Standards and Practices who want this particular material edited . . . we fought tooth and nail to keep the set as is . . .’ etc., etc., etc. Then the darker implications of all this came into even clearer focus. I realized this is the only time weaselly capitalists ever pass the buck – when they’re held accountable for their actions. Next, the scoundrels will be wrapping themselves in the flag, and the farce will be complete – just another minor footnote in the history of the ongoing saga of Freedom of Expression in the Land of the Free, and the Home of the Brave.
It’s been exactly one week now since this odd story began. And believe me, none of this was planned, expected, nor sought after. I did what I’ve always done – performed material in a comedic way which I thought was funny. The artist always plays to himself, and I believe the audience seeing that one person can be free to express his thoughts, however strange they may seem, inspires the audience to feel that perhaps they too can freely express their innermost thoughts with impunity, joy, and release, and perhaps discover our common bond – unique yet so similar – with each other. This philosophy may appear at first to some as selfish – ‘I play to me and do material that interests and cracks me up.’ But you see, I don’t feel I’m different than anyone else. The audience is me. I believe we all have the Voice of Reason inside us, and that voice is the same in everyone. And if I may open up even more, I believe that voice (you may call it conscience) is the voice of the Holy Spirit that God has instilled in us all to gently lead us out of our own self-created hells – those feelings and thoughts of hopelessness, fear, sin, and guilt which have never and could never exist in Reality, for what God did not create, does not exist. And I pose a question you can Meditate on and find a great deal of peace from: ‘What could oppose God’s will?’
This is what I think either CBS, or the producers of the Letterman show and Networks and governments fear the most – that one man free, expressing his own thoughts and point of view, might somehow inspire others to think for themselves and listen to that Voice of Reason inside them, and then perhaps one by one we will awaken from this dream of lies and illusions that the world, the Governments, and their propaganda arm – the mainstream media – feeds us continuously over fifty-two channels, twenty-four hours a day. What I realized was – they don’t want the people to be awake. The elite ruling class wants us asleep so we’ll remain a docile, apathetic herd of passive consumers, and non-participants in the true agendas of our governments, which is to keep us separate and present an image of a world filled with unresolvable problems that they, and only they, might one day, somewhere in the never-arriving future, may be able to solve. Just stay asleep America, keep watching TV, keep paying attention to the infinite witnesses of illusion we provide you over Lucifer’s Dream Box – television. I find it laughable and pathetic.
When I was a young boy, watching comics on television, I used to think, ‘Boy if they like this guy, they’re going to love me.’ And I began working quite young, writing, growing, maturing, always striving to top myself – to make people laugh hard at things they know and believe deep in their hearts to be true. It has been a long road, let me tell you; but after sixteen years of constant performing up until this little incident on October 1st, 1993, the cold realization finally struck me. A sobering answer to the wish of that young boy I once was back in Houston, Texas, all excited with the idea that ‘if they like these guys, then they’re going to love me.’ The realization was – they don’t want me, nor my kind.
Just look at ninety per cent of television programming. Banal, puerile, trite scat. And this is what they want, for they hold the masses – the herd – in such contempt. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve been in a ‘creative’ meeting in Los Angeles, and after pitching an idea for a show, I heard the following statement: ‘That’s very Funny, but do you think it will play in the Mid-West?’ As though the Mid-West were this vast wasteland filled with bib-overall wearing bumpkins whose intellectual level and comprehension could only be satisfied with ‘American Gladiators’, or ‘Love Connection’, or ‘full house’, or . . . etc, etc, etc. The list fills the one inch TV guide each week – the Bible of the herd. Like a menu for bad drugs that deaden the mind and drive a wedge between our conscious and unconscious minds, and between ourselves and each other, and between us and them, and between us and the experience of Life itself. Well, I’ve got some surprising news for you – I’ve played the Mid-West – all over the Mid-West, in fact, and you know what I’ve found? The people there are quite intelligent, well read, thoughtful and reasonable folks, just like most people I meet every day, everywhere, all over the world. But no wonder there’s an evergrowing sense of disenfranchisement, apathy, and cynicism in our country. When we’re all tuned in to the real drug of this country – television – brought to us by an elite class of ‘unique’ and ‘special’ people who find the dirty herd beneath contempt, and only there really to buy the useless products created to fill the imaginary ‘wants’ television really hawks between hours of puerile programming. Every few years, they cart out the old argument regarding television’s role in our society. As usual, they pose to keep us divided and keep the problem unresolved, then it’s back to ‘business as usual’. The herd has been pacified by our charade of concern as we pose the two most idiotic questions imaginable – ‘Is TV becoming too violent?’ and ‘Is TV becoming too promiscuous?’ The answer, my friends, is this – TV is too stupid. It treats us like Morons. Case Closed. Truly, the only stupid people I’ve ever met, the most absolutely clueless are the very people that produce television. Unfortunately, self-awareness is not one of their long suits, regardless of how many hair weaves, breasts augmentations, Valiums, shrinks, or phony religions of the ‘inner child’ they’ve partaken of. Don’t you find it ironic at all, that television pushes beer (alcohol, the number two killer drug in the world) down our throats twenty-four hours a day, with beautiful half-naked women and the promise of ‘freedom and infinite sex appeal’, while also maintaining a division of their corporate empire called ‘Standards and Practices’? Exactly what Standards are you practising. I’ve even seen these commercials during ‘in depth’ reports on the war against drugs. At least drug dealers have enough shame to lurk on street corners and in alleyways, and not come over the tube into our homes with all the slick, glossy production values the beer hawkers muster as though they were offering manna from Heaven in a six pack.
But as I said before, their lack of self-awareness is only matched by their blatant hypocrisy. I remember one time I did the Letterman show, and the night before Robert Morton and I made the rounds of the comedy clubs in New York to hone the set. During the course of the night, Mr. Morton had decided I should drop a few of the bits from my set because they weren’t ‘right for our audience’. The next morning I did a radio show, and the interviewer asked me if it was difficult to translate my club act to television. I responded by telling her of the previous night’s activities. That afternoon, when I showed up at the Letterman studio, Robert Morton ran up to me and said, ‘Hey Hicks, why were you dissing us on the air today?’ I asked what he meant. He said, ‘you were saying we edit your stuff for TV, we’ve never done that!’ Uh . . . Hmmm. How do you respond to the insane? I was speechless. Yes, lack of self-awareness and hypocrisy reign supreme in the world of television. Shoot, TV would still be hawking cigarettes if the government hadn’t stepped in. Why the government stepped in in the first place is anybody’s guess. Perhaps it’s because we’ve opened so many new overseas markets to push the number one killer drug in the world, that the future of tobacco products is still safe from encroachment. By the way, that’s another issue never raised by our OBJECTIVE News media – the fact that we are pushing the number one killer drug in the world to unsuspecting Third World Nations with the same glossy, enticing advertising that was used in the US in the fifties. We should all kick back, pop open a beer, and breath a sigh of relief that the few are still making a profit, while the many are tightening their belts in this ‘ever changing’ global economy – the New World Order. As Don Corleone said in The Godfather, ‘Follow the money’.
This leads me, hopefully, to my summation on my own personal involvement with Letterman and CBS, and television’s involvement with society in general. Why was I censored from the Letterman show? Because some of my Jokes hit ‘Hot Points’ and were deemed unsuitable for the American viewing public. The fact of the matter is, this vast empire of network television called CBS are a bunch of shameless cowards who kowtow to very organized, although minority, special interest groups in America. They fear losing their corporate sponsorship, and that is the threat these special interest groups promise. What the networks don’t realize, due to their total lack of contact with anything resembling Reality, is that the majority of people in America are in general, thoughtful, reasonable people. But it is the minority of fundamentalist morons pushing their fear mongering agendas that get all the attention. The squeaky wheel gets the oil.
You see, Reasonable people don’t usually write letters of complaint or praise to networks because a) Reasonable people have lives. b) Reasonable people know they’re just jokes. c) If the Reasonable people don’t find the jokes funny, they know it’s just TV. d) Reasonable people know if something’s on now which they don’t like, there may just as well be something they do like coming up soon. e) Reasonable people know they can turn the TV channel, and f) Reasonable people know they can just turn the TV off and go about their day.
It’s that insane minority the networks cower to, and play to in their imagined perception of the ‘Mid-West’, i.e. any state between Los Angeles and New York. That horribly unsophisticated herd that makes up the majority of Americans. Instead, one letter from some fundamentalist anything, written in crayon saying, ‘I saw a guy talk about Jesus on your show. I’m offended, signed X’, sends the network cowards scurrying to make amends and rid the show of the ‘unsuitable’ material. Well, I’ve got news for the Bureaucratic Capitalist Whore Cowards that run television. I’m offended too! I’m offended by the constant barrage of banal, trite, puerile scat you offer without any sense of shame or human dignity. And I’ve got something else to say to those people who say, ‘I’m offended’, like some five-year-old child throwing a tantrum. Ready? There are a lot of things in life that are offensive, life itself can be offensive, I myself have a large list of things that offend me . . . So what!? Grow the fuck up! We now live in the ‘Age of being offended.’ Get over it. Perhaps a little open-mindedness, tolerance, and acceptance may be the antidote to what ails you. Try it and see if your load isn’t lifted just a bit. See if your pinched face of fear doesn’t relax a tad. Why don’t you exercise a little of the faith you say you believe in so much, and trust in God and his infinite, unconditional love. Why don’t you fucking Christians start acting like Christians?
And now, the final irony. One of the ‘Hot Points’ that was brought up as being ‘unsuitable for our audience’ was my joke about pro-lifers. My brilliant friend Andy posited the theory that this was really what bothered and scared the network the most, seeing as how the ‘pro-life’ movement has become essentially a terrorist group acting with impunity and God on their side, in a country where the reasonable majority overwhelmingly supports freedom of choice regarding abortion. I felt there was something to this theory, but still I was surprised to be watching the Letterman show (I’m still a fan) the Monday night following my censored Friday night performance, and lo and behold, they cut to a . . . are you ready for this? . . . A pro-life commercial! This farce is now completed. ‘Follow the money’.
In summation, I’d like to point out that I am not some curmudgeon with a chip on his shoulder regarding television. There are several shows on TV I absolutely love and never miss. ‘Northern Exposure’, ‘The Simpsons’, ‘Seinfeld’, ‘The Larry Sanders Show’ I find absolutely brilliant, hilarious, and inspiring. It’s these exceptions to the rule that are truly entertaining, and treat the audience with love and respect as they deserve. And, I’d like to take my hat off to Roseanne Arnold for having balls the size of Montana, and overcoming much more serious odds than I’ve ever faced, to realize her artistic vision, keeping it pure, and silencing the white male elite ruling class by putting on, again, one of my favorite shows on television.
Folks, there are no bitter grapes on my part. I love what I do, and I will do it forever – creating and sharing and trying to shed some light and hope to my lovely lost Brothers who need to laugh and be free just like me. Whether I’ll ever be asked to return as a guest on the Letterman show is of no consequence to me. I still think Dave does the best talk show on TV. (Along with Bob Costas and Charlie Rose.) I do not fear CBS, Letterman, or anyone or anything anymore. I’m at peace with myself and the world and my God. I only pray everyone will find that same peace within themselves, as I know in my heart they will. The Voice of Reason told me that, and if you think about it, it really is the only thing that makes sense. The answer to the philosophical question I posed earlier, ‘What could oppose God’s will?’ is ‘Nothing’. And God’s will for his beloved children is perfect happiness and remembrance of Him and his eternal love for us. We are undergoing evolution, and will continue to do so until all of us awaken to this Truth. Our awakening can be as gentle or harsh as we want to make it. Personally, I prefer the gentle awakening I’ve experienced in my own life. But, as always, you are free to choose your own route to Heaven. In the end, it really doesn’t matter. We’ll all make it there in the end. I’m reminded of a quote by the brilliant Noam Chomsky, a personal inspiration to me: ‘The responsibility of the intellectual is to tell the TRUTH, and expose lies.’ While I do not consider myself an intellectual by any stretch of the imagination, his quote, coincidentally is the same way my parents taught me how to live. So in honor of them, I’ll continue doing what I’ve been doing, the best way I can. Then, I’ll see you all in Heaven, where we can really share a great laugh together . . . forever and ever . . . and ever.
With love,
Bill Hicks
Final thoughts . . . You know. This postulating on the power the pro-life movement wields against the cowards (co-conspirators?) of network television and mainstream media in general has finally led me to a conclusion I’ve been trying to draw on my own thoughts and Feeling about abortion. Here it is: the answer to that confounding question of when, exactly, does the foetus become a human being? Well, after my dealings with television producers and the bureaucratic twits that run the networks has led me to a rather novel answer to that question: I know now of some adults who have yet to develop into real human beings. This realization helps me rest easy with my own pro-choice stance regarding abortion. The pro-lifers themselves remind me less of human beings than a frothing pack of mad dogs impervious to logic, reason, or facts that seem to be the defining characteristics of human beings, and the difference between the lower’ order of animals.
I’m reminded yet of another quote, one by Thomas Jefferson that I believe sums up my whole problem with mainstream television. He said, ‘I know of no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of society other than the people themselves; and if we deem them too unenlightened to exercise their power with a wholesome discretion, the answer is not to take it from them, but to inform (them).’
If television considers itself in any way the moral arbiter of our society, I think it goes a long way towards explaining the awful situation our culture is in. For television has not ‘informed’ the people but instead deformed them by deforming reality and presenting it 24 hours a day on 52 channels . . . no wonder we feel so confused, afraid, and out of control when this is the reflection presented to us as life’. There can be only one answer – turn it off, open your window and listen to the breeze and the crickets and the silence that has nothing to sell to us, but gives freely – this is Reality.
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