Comic Times

BEING FUNNY - JIM MENDRINOS

Jim Mendrinos' talent runs the gamut. An accomplished writer and stand up comic, Jim has an imagination to be proud of. He has written jokes tor some of the best, and his performance skills equal his writing. He's just as funny on stage as he is on paper. Always preparing for his goals, Jim writes and performs constantly. As he puts it "Anybody that says they didn't ultimately want everything-to control the vast majority of the work, like Woody Alien and Larry David..." After years supporting himself honing his collective talents, Jim’s determination and tunnel vision stood out at The Montreal Just For Laughs Festival last year. Along with agent Larry Weissmann Jim found himself not only on stage but in meetings, pitching his series, "Max".

WHEN AND HOW DID YOU BEGIN YOUR CAREER AS A WRITER? AS A STAND UP?

Way back in the Paleolithic era, in '83! I was doing a lot of writing and that job was ending, so they asked me to write for a British comedian and I had never seen live comedy before. So I went to Catch a Rising Star in August of '83 and I saw a show and the show was excellent, people like Larry Emeros, Larry Stolen Gilbert Godfried and Margaret Smith.... it was a wonderful array of comics that were around in the '80's. When I saw the show and I saw the reaction I wanted to give it a shot myself. I went up the very next week and I wrote 5 minutes of material and they left me up there for thirteen minutes in a five minute slot. So I had five minutes of fun then I just ate it. I have the kind of ego that won't let me really fail at something, I have to succeed by my standards. By the time I did, I was already getting paid and making a living at it. So at that point I kind of fell into it.

DID YOU WRITE FOR THAT BRITISH COMEDIAN?

I actually didn't write that much for him. I wrote some, but in the beginning I concentrated on writing for myself. Then around '84 to '86 a lot of the old timers and especially the mountain comics would approach me and ask me to write material. It was a really great way, when I had some material that didn't fit me to get that material out there and make some money off of it. Then after you write for one person he refers you to somebody else and then you're writing for two then three and before you know it you are writing for everyone. Then I made the next leap and started doing fax submissions to "The Tonight Show" when Jay Leno was the guest host. Then I started doing fax submissions to Letterman and started getting a reputation for good quality material. It's at the point now that I can fax into just about any program and they use most of the jokes I fax in.

THAT'S GREAT. DO YOU STILL WRITE FOR STAND-UPS?

I wound up pricing myself out of the market. Part of being good is that you can be more selective with who you are working with. I mean, I still work with national acts and I get paid a lot of money. I start at around $75.00 an hour to write for somebody and it goes up from there. There are times it goes up to $150.00 depending on when and what you need. A lot of people don't find that economically advantageous. But by the same token , when people do use me, they know they are going to get good quality material. It's one thing that I'm starting to phase out because I'm starting to work more on film and television and I get a lot of my plays produced around the city. So I'm trying to move in that area more. The more I want to do that ,the less I want to do the other one. My price keeps going up exponentially and it gets easier as time goes on to just not write for other people.

HOW DID YOU START FAXING TO ALL OF THE TELEVISION SHOWS?

I believe it was Ron Richards, he is a name from the past who is a writer for the Tonight show for many years, who told me a lot of the shows take outside submissions. He is the first one who told me you can call them up, you ask if you can send stuff, they'll read your daily jokes for a day, see if they like it, if they do they'll give you permission to send it in. When he told me that I made a few calls and started sending jokes in and they were pretty responsive. Naively when I started I thought I would fax my jokes in, the people will see my jokes, they'll realize my brilliance and they'll invite me to do a guest spot on the show. It doesn't quite work that way. Though it was pretty lucrative and it's a great kick when you see somebody like a Jay Leno or a David Letterman or a Colin Quinn say your jokes on National TV.

I' M SURE. I WANT TO TALK ABOUT THE MONTREAL FESTIVAL LAST YEAR.

WHAT BROUGHT YOU THERE?

I'm not very much into festivals and mingling. That's pretty much been my weakness. So when the festival was coming up my managers at the time and my agent who I still have, Larry Weissmann, really pushed for me to go up to the festival. I didn't do any of the main shows I wound up doing the smaller ones. The biggest show I did was at The Comedy Works on Saturday night. I thought I was going to go and it was going to be a giant waste of time and that I was going to be underexposed but before we got up there Larry had set up a series of meetings, most importantly with Castle Rock. So we actually sat down and were doing pitch meetings up in Montreal. The experience and the connections were invaluable. It taught me a world of the business side.

WHAT IS IT LIKE AT A PITCH MEETING?

They run the gamut. Some of them are sheer business, "What's the product? What's the demographic? Why should we buy it from you? What's your track record?" It's very much like a business interview, and those aren't much fun. But every once and a while you get one, for instance with the one at Castle Rock; we met with two executives, we met in a great restaurant, we talked over lunch and we spoke for 1 ½ hours. It was very relaxed and they wanted to talk all about the series. You tell them the world and the characters and where you envision them down the line and what it's similar to and what it's dissimilar to... At that meeting there was no conversation about business. The most business we had discussed was about a particular comic they very much liked whom I have a relationship with for fifteen years and I was able to bring the scripts to him and him to them and we came within inches of actually getting this optioned.

GREAT. YOU DIDN'T FIND PITCH MEETINGS INTIMIDATING?

If the people are nice it's very nice. I've had pitch meetings where they are sitting on one side of a huge desk and you're on the other. They spit out their title and what they have done and "Why should we even listen to you?" Those meetings are very intimidating. And anybody that says they're not is either insane or their just lying. When they are down to earth and nice and when they are interested in your art it's a pleasure to do a pitch.

YOU SAID YOU'RE FIRST MEETING WITH CASTLE ROCK WAS 1½ HOURS.

HOW DID YOU KEEP THEM INTERESTED FOR SO LONG?

You really have to know the world backwards and forwards. The project that I pitched to them was one called "Max". It's the one that everyone is interested in. It's the bait we use to get people to look at other projects. The world is incredibly developed, I know the characters, the seasonal breakdown, I know the background, I believe in the characters and I believe in the show. So it's very easy in that case. When they say, "Where do you envision him five years down the line?" and you have an answer, it keeps them interested. If they would have said, "Where do you see him down the line?" And I would have said, 'I have no idea', I'm sure the meeting would have lasted around 25 minutes, "Thank you good night."

WHEN YOU FIRST STARTED DID YOUR WRITING PARLAY INTO STANDUP JOBS?

Every once and a while I would have somebody take me with them as an opening act, when they wanted to work on certain things or sharpen a thing here and there. In some cases it was getting recommended; I did a gig in Atlantic City opening for a major act because somebody recommended me and it was somebody that I was writing for. It does happen, unfortunately it doesn't happen enough. You think it's going to happen all of the time, especially when it happens once or twice in a month but writing isn't the greatest way to get opportunities for performing. In some ways it even limits you because people think, "Oh he' s a great writer" but the flip side of the coin is "How much of a performer is he?" You don't want to be saddled with that reputation.

AS FAR AS PERFORMING STANDUP HOW DID YOU GO ABOUT GETTING

YOUR GIGS, YOUR MANAGER AND EVENTUALLY YOUR AGENT?

You have to find somebody that absolutely positively believes in you. I mean I've been approached by other managers and I've been managed by other people from time to time and it doesn't work unless they absolutely believe in you. If you are soliciting a manager it probably is not going to be a good mix. If the manager is soliciting you then it'll be great, because then they want you to work, then there's an incentive.

WE FOUND OUT IN LARRY WEISSMANN'S INTERVIEW HOW YOU AND HE MET. HOW

DID YOU COME ABOUT LEAVING YOUR MANAGEMENT AND GOING WITH LARRY?

At the time the management team I had was very strong in personal appearances and not as strong at literary. I was working all the time as a stand up but my writing wasn't getting seen by the people that I felt it should be seen by. Larry had asked me if he could make a few calls and I really had nothing to lose so I let him and the first four calls he made out of the box were meetings and he set it up. His instincts are very good and he has a very good eye. He doesn't yet have the connections that a long term literary agent has but he's got the tenacity and he also believes in my material more than anybody will. I'm also not the greatest client to have. I've been on both sides of the industry, having also represented people in the past, so I know what can be done, what can't be done, when somebody's slacking off, when to push, when not to push. Most of the people that have tried to represent me find that to be very annoying and Larry will put up with a lot of that. So it's a very good mix. The one thing that I very much like about Larry that I've never before encountered with people in the industry and it's something that I wish would change in this industry is that when he doesn't know how to do something, he's not afraid to ask. He always wants to learn, not only how to do something but how to do it right. It's pure gold when you can find that.

WHEN YOU WERE SUBMITTING STUFF BEFORE YOU HAD

AN AGENT, DID YOU HAVE TO WRITE A QUERY LETTER?

When I was submitting film scripts, yes. Without an agent it was impossible to get someone to look at a television pilot. Managers did it very occasionally but even then ... For some reason the minute that you have an agent you have credibility and people actually believe in you before they meet you. I've always been very lucky in that, and this would be the one piece of advice I'd give writers, don't submit something worlds before it's ready. DOES THAT INCLUDE FORMAT? Oh yes. Especially the details, format spelling, grammar. I'm the world's worst speller and I can tell you right now I've had scripts sent back to me unread because there were spelling mistakes. People think that stuff doesn't count, it does. You have to make sure it's absolutely ready, because even if they pass on this project, for instance Castle Rock did eventually pass on "Max", but they are open to seeing other projects. Whereas if you submit something, and you hear these horror stories all of the time, that isn't ready, that the production company feels they have wasted their time, they'll never look at you again.

WOW. SO NOW THAT YOU'VE HAD PITCH MEETINGS, DO YOU FIND IT'S EASIER TO GET MORE PITCH MEETINGS?

Yes. It really is. Once you're in the loop, you're in solidly. If I have an idea for a project I'll give it to Larry and he's able to get the meetings for me. It's a building reputation. The people over at Comedy Central know who I am because we've had meetings with them. From production companies in LA to networks in NY, they will actually take a meeting if the project is something that fits into what they need and what they want. You also have to realize that just having an agent or just having a concept doesn't guarantee that everything's done. When I give something to Larry and ask him to set up a pitch meeting for me, I already know what demographic it fits, what network appeals to that demographic and I give him a very targeted search area. It makes his job easier and when we go into the meeting it doesn't look like, 'it's a good concept but it's not what we do.'

SO YOU DO A LOT OF RESEARCH BEFOREHAND?

You absolutely have to. Nobody is going to work as hard for the writer as the writer themselves and it's no longer enough just to write the script and hand it to the agent. An agent has other comics and if you're not the client that is making the most money you are not the agents priority so you have to be able to cut down on the amount of work that the agent has to do.

HOW OFTEN DO YOU WRITE- JOKES? SCRIPTS?

I try and write as my full time job, I try and write 8 hours a day. I don't always hit it, but I always hit at least an hour or two a day. I think that's the minimum I need to keep my tools sharp, but that can be spread out over a lot of projects. It could be spread out over a film script I'm working on or a re-write of something that I wrote two years ago. It's not like I'm regimenting my time, saying 'okay today it's 2 hours on standup and four hours on the film script.' It really is a lot more flexible for me because of the situation I'm in. Remember if you are lucky enough to sell something or your lucky enough to get on staff somewhere you are going to be writing for eight hours a day, minimum. That's a full time job. Better to build up that discipline now than go in there and have a brain freeze. If you don't write every day it's very difficult to get inspiration or to milk something out. When you do write every day you are training your mind to think in a funny way and to produce in a funny way or a dramatic way and your able to move forward even when you're not quite up to it.

HOW DO YOU COME UP WITH IDEAS?

I dig up my ideas mostly from real life and flights of fancy that I have . For me it's more imagination than it is dramatization. Other writers are exactly the opposite; other writers base everything on real life, jt's going to be an individual thing for an individual writer. For me, I always keep a log of things that strike me at the moment. When I'm finished with one project I go back and read over those lists before I start my next one. DO YOU GO THROUGH NEWSPAPERS? I do that because I write a lot of dailies when I'm faxing into shows. For me, a typical day is reading 3 or 4 newspapers or searching the internet to try and find even more obscure stuff.

HOW OFTEN DO YOU PERFORM?

I'm actually very lucky in that I can perform as much as I want to in the city, basically . I've had some clubs that have been extremely good to me throughout my career, Gotham, Comic Strip, Standup NY, NY Comedy Club, they've all taken care of me very well. I can get up as many as 6 or 7 nights a week and that helps because I can not tour as much that way. DO YOU STILL TOUR? I'm trying not to so much. That's not where I have the most fun. You have to go where you have the most fun. It was fun in my twenties but when you're in your 30's it isn't as much fun.

ARE YOU CONSTANTLY WRITING JOKES FOR YOUR ACT AS WELL?

I do write new jokes. It's more difficult because the jokes come faster than you can weave them into your act, plus when you've been around as long as I've been around, you walk into a club and the owner or the manager or the booker is there, "Hey, are you going to do this bit?" I wind up constantly doing a lot of the old stuff as well as the new stuff I want to try out. Every once and a while I'll just retire a set of minutes and bring in a new set of minutes.

WILL YOU ALSO TRY YOUR DAILY JOKES?

Actually I only did that once with a joke that "Dennis Miller Live" rejected because I thought the joke was so good. Other than that, no. When I'm writing for people I'm writing for a specific voice, I'm writing for Dennis Miller's voice or Leno's voice... so it's not hitting my style of humor.

YOU ONCE SAID, EVERY SET YOU DO IS ONE

SET CLOSER TO WHERE YOU WANT TO BE...

Oh yeah! If you go up there and consciously work at something every time you go on stage, 'I'm going to break in these new minutes' or 'I'm going to change my delivery on this bit, I'm going to rework this punchline.' Then every set you've accomplished something. And every set you accomplish something is one set closer to your goal. Everyone's goal is somewhat two fold in stand-up; one, I think most people do truly want to become great stand-ups and two, I think most people want to be famous. I don't know if that rule holds true for the famous part of it, but I do know it holds true for the stand-up part of it. Look at the real working masters of the craft look at George Carlin and Bill Cosby and Richard Pryor before he stopped working; these guys go up there with an agenda every time they hit the stage. That's what set them apart from all of those comics from the sixties that nobody hears of.

WHEN YOU'RE PITCHING A PROJECT DO YOU ALSO

SELL YOURSELF AS A PERFORMER?

I'm not big on that because my love isn't for the camera. I love doing stand-up and I like being on TV as a stand-up, however acting isn't the most fun I have, if they want me for a show, sure, please call my agent but it isn't what I want to do. I get more of a charge writing the shows and producing the shows. The other danger of that is you get a reputation being jack of all trades, master of none. You don't want them to have any more misconceptions about you and the project then they are already going to have naturally.

WHAT WOULD YOU SAY IS THE MOST DIFFICULT PART OF

WRITING COMEDY? DO YOU ONLY WRITE COMEDY

 No I write comedy and drama. The most difficult part of writing comedy in script format is timing because everybody who does stand-up has their own sense of timing and when you are doing it in sitcom you have up to eleven characters to play with and each character should have their own sense of timing and it's very difficult to master the differences.

WHAT ARE YOU DOING RIGHT NOW?

Right now I'm finishing up the 7th film script that is salable and there have been six sitcom pilots that I've written or co-written that are going out there and are making the rounds and...

YOU JUST MADE SOME SHORT FILMS, WHEN YOU WERE MAKING WITH LARRY

HE TOLD ME YOU CAME IN AND THREW OUT SOME IDEAS AND WITHIN A WEEK

YOU HAD A SCRIPT, HOW?

You say there is a deadline and if someone is investing thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours, you will get it done. Nobody likes to fail in front of that many people. But they| were very short scripts and it was easier to write them, than to make them. Every writer  should have to direct and produce and all that at least once so they can see how hard it is to do all of that.

WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE WRITERS?

Write all of the time, write every day. Don’t think your stuff is so genius that it can’t be made better by good editing. Do try and develop a mentor relationship if you can. I  was very lucky. When I started out I had a lot of greats really give me wonderful advice and  take me under their wing. Everybody from Sam Kinneson and Bill Hicks, with whom I| toured a lot with, to Ron Richards, helped me  out. Barry Berry, who I believe the last he wrote was the "Robert Townsend Show.” Barry basically taught me how to write television. It wasn't formal in a classroom, It was sitting down at the bar at The Comic Strip| with him talking to me. Ron Richards, Richard Morris, all were incredibly helpful. So if you're willing to listen there are a lot of people out there with a lot of experience who are willing to talk to you.

SO YOU DON'T FIND JEALOUSY?

I'm sure there is a lot of jealously out there too, It'd be crazy to think that there isn’t. But I think more often than not, if you are a good and decent person and the person you are talking to is a good and decent person they’ll help you out or at least point you in the right direction where you can get the information. I’ve had people in clubs try to pick my brain and sometimes I give really detailed advice and other times maybe I'm tired, or maybe it’s been a rough week, maybe I just don'’t feel I know the person well enough but I'll at least tell them the right books they should read or the right classes they should take. I think most people will do that for another writer.

SO IS NETWORKING IMPORTANT??

Especially at the beginning. Without those two in the morning conversations with Barry Berry I doubt seriously that I'd be doing what I am today. I don't even know if Barry knows this. He's probably sitting in LA somewhere barely remembering who I am, but helped me tremendously.

DOES NETWORKING HELP TO GET IN DOORS?

Oh yeah! Especially in this industry, people work with their friends. If somebody likes you, if somebody respects you and they get a position of power they will take their friends with them. Just try and build up honest friendships and hopefully your friends are talented people and you're talented and you will all rise to the top together.

YOU WENT UP A WEEK AFTER YOU HAD BEEN TO A CLUB AND WENT ON FROM

THERE CAN I ASSUME YOU WERE COMFORTABLE WITH YOUR PERSONA?

No. I was just a tremendous knucklehead back then. I started about a week after my 19th birthday. I thought I knew everything and everyone and I had this unbelievable bravado and was too stupid to know I should be scared, that it's very, very difficult and it takes time. I had been kicking around acting prior to that, I studied with Bill Mickey whose probably one of the best acting teachers I've ever studied with. Everything that people teach you at 18 or 19 you think 'what a load of garbage this is, this doesn't matter, preparation, what preparation?'Then you realize fifteen years later 'hey, you know there was some validity to that.' So it wasn't so much I was comfortable with my character, I was comfortable with exploring my character and it took me a lot of years to find my voice and a lot of years to find my rhythm. I had also taken some time off to do other things and now that I'm back, going on two years, I feel just now I'm getting my stride.

IS IT ABOUT THE PERFORMING OR THE WRITING?

Standup wise it's all about the performing. As good as the writing is, it's a performers medium and if you can't perform it well you are not going to gravitate to anything more then just a journeyman.

WOULD YOU SAY THAT STAND-UPS MAKE BETTER WRITERS?

I am partial to stand-ups writing because they have a very dark wit about them in scripts. I think that's an opinion question. I've heard a lot of people at a lot of the interviews I've done for staff positions talk about stand-ups saying they don't always have the greatest discipline in the world. So I think it takes a marriage of having a stand-up who can also discipline themselves. DO YOU HAVE ANY ADVICE FOR COMICS? Listen to everybody about your act but remember that you have the final say, in other words, don't just think because an agent or manager or booker says you should change your act that you have to. They might have something very valid to say but ultimately comics all too often sacrifice their own artistic voice for salability and time after time you see it's the people that held onto their artistic voice who are getting the breaks. The people like Ray Romano and Brett Butler, people like that really just hold onto what they are doing and eventually they get noticed.

AS WILL YOU. THANKS SO MUCH AND BEST OF LUCK.