Name: It's Pat
Uploaded: 2021-12-17T14:37:02.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'It's Pat' from I'm not Norm on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-12-17. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'It's Pat' from I'm not Norm on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-12-17. Transcript available.

What we want to know is, are you a brother or a sister?
Well, I'm an only child.
There's a word for what you are.
Charismatic?
So what the hell are you?
A man or a woman?
Farley, that night was the first night I ever met Farley.
It was your first night on the show.
We all sat around and watched you when we were cheering you on, buddy.
And Farley, he took me -- he'd never met me before in his life, you know?
He took me back.
He said, "I got to tell you a secret about SNL."
-Oh, yeah. -All the way to the back in Mohawk.
-Like the woods. This is the woods.
-No, within the -- -Okay, the hotel, right?
-In the hotel, and he secreted me into this room,
and he locked it, and he made sure it wasn't bugged and everything.
He said, "I got a secret to it.
I was very, you know, honored to have this."
And then his secret was, he said,
"This doesn't go past these walls.
Pat is a woman!"
- - - - - -
Tell me your history with Norma. Did you guys date?
-No, no, not date. He -- -Oh, good for you, by the way.
-He was mean to me in a terrible way. -Oh, I'm sorry.
- -When his first show on SNL, there was a sketch,
and they wanted to change something, and I didn't want to change it to that
line.
And he came up to me in the makeup chair and said,
"Your problem is you're not funny. You're just not funny."
He said that to me. I'd been on the show for four years.
He just started it. I think it was his first week.
Okay, there's a better part of the story.
So then, of course, I didn't like him.
-Norming can be rough. - -I really didn't like him.
And then I was about to leave the show anyway.
It was like, just one more reason to get the hell out of here.
And -- but I was very good friends with Laurie Jo Hoekstra,
who he was always, you know, very much -- -Oh, right, right.
They're friends for years. I don't even know if that is the woman in his life,
or is she --
-I don't actually even know. -She's his handler.
- -Yeah. - -Low Jo, as he refers to her.
-Low Jo. - -She's been with him for like --
-For a million years. - -since back then at SNL in like '93.
-Yeah, and I always loved Laurie Jo, and it was a very tumultuous friendship
then.
And I just really didn't like him, and then I left the show,
and I just really didn't watch anything for years.
But some people would talk about how funny he was, and I would see him
occasionally,
and I wouldn't -- I had a bias, you know, obviously, because I had this
traumatic thing.
Then at the 40th reunion, Norman came up to me, and he said,
"I just have to apologize to you. That was a terrible thing to do.
I can't believe I did that terrible thing."
And I said, "Oh," and then that meant a lot to me.
And then after that, I could watch Norm's stuff, and I realized he's hysterical.
Okay, so I -- it was like I was able to emotionally let it in how great and
funny he is.
-That's an interesting comment on there is some gateway to your sense of humor
that goes through personal feelings. -I know, that's embarrassing,
because it's very narcissistic. -No, no, but that's everybody though.
-I mean like -- -Christ, I can't tell you how people just hate my humor now.
And I think, "Oh, that's a pretty good joke."
And I'm trying -- I try to figure it out like sometimes where somebody will
over like a joke,
and somebody will under like a joke, and I'll see the finer gradation that that
was a decent joke.
It probably should have hit right in here.
And I could see -- I said, "Oh, I see. It really isn't an involuntary gesture.
There is some price of admission to get through to really convulse somebody."
-Yeah, that's true. -And it's about their biases towards it.
-Yes, it's true. -Well, I'm glad Norm came around,
because that seemed like a particularly -- he was probably scared shitless, too.
Everybody's a little scared over there. -Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
No, I mean, I'm sure I've had bad moments there as well.
I don't know if you know this, but I used to tour with Norm MacDonald for seven
years.
Yeah, and so like when I -- like he was like my best friend, so like whenever I
have like auditions and stuff,
he used to say, "Oh, just don't bother acting, because there's a good chance
you won't get it anyway."
And those are the ones that I usually got. You know what I mean?
-Um, hold on. I have to hide my self-view, because I -- if I'm on camera, I
look at myself, which is weird.
-Oh, by the way, I don't promote the video.
-No, okay. No, that's okay. Do whatever you want with it, but I'm just saying,
for me, I've become distracted by myself.
-Yeah. -Um, well, well, Norm --
-I saw your tweet, and I wanted you to know that he loved you very much,
because when I was going to --
-I know, that meant a lot to me. That's what made me do it.
-Yeah. -I'm not doing interviews, really. But, um, yeah, we -- well, you know,
it was -- happened right away when he got
on the show, and I was -- we only overlapped by a few months.
-Yeah. -And, um, so he was young and new, and I was jaded and had one foot out
the door.
So we both kind of had -- we're in a weird place, you know, to be maybe not at
our best, but, um, he had come up and yelled at me about a sketch that he wrote,
and they had -- it was in, but then it got traded out for a sketch of mine or
something, which happens all the time, you know?
-Right. -And he would certainly learn that, you know. But at that moment, he
didn't. And I was in the makeup chair, and he came and started yelling at me
about it, which wasn't even my responsibility to -- I was not in charge of that.
-Right. -And then he -- but then -- and I think I was saying that, and I was
kind of shocked because he -- you know, I felt like I was a senior statesman.
You know, like, I'd been there four years, and he just had arrived on the scene,
and he was yelling at me about something I had nothing to do with. And --
-And then he started saying how unfunny I was, I was not funny, blah, blah,
blah. And that was really rude. And it was in the makeup trailer with a bunch
of people. Anyway, which I don't really care. But it didn't get us off on the
best foot.
-Yeah.
-But then, as I said, so -- and then, you know, when I left SNL, I didn't watch
the show at all. Like, I just --
I was so sick of anything sketch-related. I really didn't watch it for years.
So I missed him, his genius. You know, like, I didn't know -- I would hear
about him. I mean, I wasn't in an igloo, but --
-Right.
-But I didn't -- because we'd have that weird thing and -- but Lori Jo, I was
in contact with, you know --
-Oh, Lojo. I love Lojo.
-Yeah. And --
-And I suspect it was her that made him, you know, come around maybe or rethink
it. Or maybe he didn't -- maybe he rethought it one week later. I have no idea.
I don't know. But I just know that --
-It wasn't for years later that I see the sketches of him and realize what a
real comic genius he was. I mean, really. I mean, just so good. And, like,
going to the reunions, I realized that he was so good. Like, I'm so out of it.
I'm like --
-Yeah. -Somebody's old aunt who's like, what's up with the kids now? And --
-So then I -- I was like, oh, he really is good. And I actually didn't hold it
against him. I feel even bad saying it. But then, the only reason I put that
tweet out there is because I thought it was so big of him to come to me and say,
I think I said something to you that was mean, you know, when we first met, and
I'm so sorry, and I think you're great.
And it was just -- not that many people do that. You know, like, that's a
really -- that showed such wonderful character. And it just made me love him,
you know? And so -- but then some people got mad at me for tweeting that. I
really meant it positively.
-I took it positively. -Like, everyone has a bad moment, you know? And what I
was trying to show is that he reflected
on it and made an apology that was genuine and sincere and accepted on both
sides. So it's like, that's -- that's not a common thing to happen. And that --
and he did that. So I -- I was trying to be positive about it. But some people
were like, not the time and place and stuff like that. And anyway.
I remember -- I remember when I told him I was going to interview you like
three years ago. And he's like, he's like, oh, my God, that's going to be
awesome. I can't wait to listen to it.
And I was like -- and I was like, yeah. And he's like, you know, I only did one
movie and she played my mom.
-Oh, what? -Yeah. He said that you played his mom on "Dirty Work" or something.
-Oh. You know, I've done so many of those parts. -And I watched it and I didn't
see it. So I -- I don't know if he was screwing with me, but --
-I'm pretty sure I'm not in that. Although, I've been cast as the mom so often.
It's like -- but, yeah, he's probably mixing me up with someone. But it doesn't
matter.
-Yeah. But -- but I just thought it was funny because he said nothing but good
things about you. So I just want to --
-Okay. That's good. Maybe he actually totally forgot -- thought of me as
someone else. But, yeah. But, oh, you must miss him so much.
-Yeah. It was -- I -- -Did you know, like, did he get -- was he getting sicker
and sicker around you or --
-Well, I found out he had cancer in December. And, you know, there was only a
handful of people who knew. And, you know, he kind of made me say, like, I can't
tell anyone or whatever.
But, uh, he also told me that it was a different type of cancer from what the
--
-Wow. -What came out that he had. So, I don't know. Like, I feel kind of, like,
privileged that I knew, but also kind of hurt because it wasn't what he told me.
You know what I mean?
-But maybe he told you the truth. -No. Yeah. He told me a colon cancer. And
when --
-When he died, it said -- -Maybe he just didn't want --
-Yeah. -What did -- I don't even know. I just knew he had cancer. What did they
say it was?
-It was a leukemia cancer. So, I don't know -- -You know, if you have, like,
something like colon cancer, I think it can get into the lymph system and
become a lymphoma. Like, I don't --
You know, like, a lot of times in late-stage cancers, there's overlapping
cancers. But usually, you name your cancer after the first one you have. So, it
would be colon. But he probably just thought people would make jokes about it.
-Yeah. I just -- I just know nothing about cancer. And it sucks because, you
know, I was born in July.
It's a birthday joke.
-Okay. That was a good one. It took me a moment. -Oh, thank you so much. It's
so good to hear you laugh.