I didn’t know him really, but I went to the funeral anyway. After all, it was the end of a show business era. The last of the great vaudevillians, Maxie Marko, was gone. There were others of course – Jolson, Burns and Benny, Fanny Brice, Jessel, Cantor to name a few. I did know some of them -- especially Nattie -- but that was later on. In the old days, these vaudevillians were real Broadway hounds, hitting all the hot spots from El Morocco, with its zebra pattern upholstered booths, to breakfast at a bustling Lindy’s, where tourists gobbled up the legendary cheesecake. Vaudevillians, for the most part, really liked to eat. And, yes, they liked to drink, too — but most of all they loved to entertain.
Not that life was always so glamorous in show business. Sometimes it could be downright dangerous. Why, the buck and wing man, Malachy Moore, was once shot in the leg by an irate customer outside the Belasco Theater because he wouldn’t do an encore. Of course, you couldn’t do an encore unless you were next to closing. It was right there in the contract. Moore bought a polished wooden dummy from Eddie Dale and became a ventriloquist so he could sit on a stool during performances. Dale got the dummy back pretty quick because the act died at the Morosco. But that was Broadway.
Years later, when vaudeville itself was dying, talent started moving to California where there was work in pictures and eventually television. That's where I first met George Burns -- his friends called him Nattie. It was 1956, and I was a kid doing rewrites at Fox. Now, Fox Studios was on Pico Boulevard just across the street from the famous Hill Crest Country Club.
Back in the 40's, most country clubs refused to admit members of the ‘Hebraic persuasion,’ so Jewish performers founded Hillcrest. Not many of them actually played golf, so I guess it must have been the principle of the thing. Ironically, as it turned out, The Hillcrest Country Club was exclusively Jewish -- Groucho Marx, Jack Benny, George Burns, Danny Kaye, and the Hollywood moguls Sam Goldwyn and Louis B. Mayer were members. Those two studio powerhouses didn’t always get along. One time Mayer punched Sam Goldwyn in the nose while they were taking a ‘spritz’ in the in the steam room. MGM was never the same.
When the club finally decided to open membership to non-Jews, they didn’t exactly push the envelope. Their first choice was Danny Thomas, a Lebanese Catholic, who looked -- well, very Jewish. I mean they weren’t asking Randoph Scott or Van Johnson or anything.
Anyway, I used to sneak into Hillcrest every morning for breakfast. I loved the heady atmosphere of the Club’s dining room, with its high-backed chairs and white linen tablecloths -- not to mention the terrific food and select company. One Thursday morning, I sat at a small table, settled in and ordered my usual. I still savor that breakfast because it turned out to be the best one of my life.
I had a cup of coffee and was eating smoked sturgeon and rye toast. Suddenly a hand reached in and grabbed a piece of sturgeon.
“Hey!” I shouted, turning around. It was George Burns.
“I wanted some of yours,” he said. “You know, the non-members’ food – it always tastes better."
“You're a real comedian.”
“No, I'm a straight man, that's why I wanted yours.”
“Mr. Burns, whose breakfast is this?”
“If you were eating it, it would be yours . . . Kid, I stopped by to tell you, you’ve got a good agent.”
“And you know this because . . . ?”
“Well, for one, apparently he’s booked you into the Hillcrest for breakfast.”
“That’s funny,” I said, meaning it.
“And second, Swifty Lazar is my agent, too, so he’s a very good agent. Oh, and third, he sent me over some of your material.”
“How was the third?” I asked, trying to appear nonchalant.
“I’m here, aren’t I? I could use another joke writer. That way when Groucho insults me I can tell him, ‘You wouldn’t talk that way about me if my new writer was around.’”
“Are you hiring me Mr. Burns?”
“Hire is a strong word, kid, but think about it. . . . You know, if you don’t mind maybe I could have another small piece of the sturgeon there?”
Well, I said it was the best breakfast of my life, not the biggest. I did think about it, how thoughtfully is open to question since I gave him my answer just as he was polishing off the last of the sturgeon.
“Mr. Burns you’ve got yourself a new writer,” I said . . . after that, I always called him Nattie.
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