Cancer on Five Dollars a Day* *(chemo not included): How Humor Got Me through the Toughest Journey of My Life Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Introduction

  SESSION ONE - “GETTING THE NEWS”

  MONDAY MORNING, JUNE 5, 2000

  MONDAY AFTERNOON

  MONDAY NIGHT

  TUESDAY

  SESSION TWO - “FINDING YOUR PURPOSE”

  TUESDAY EVENING

  WEDNESDAY, JUNE 7, 2000

  SESSION THREE - “GETTING SICK”

  TEN DAYS LATER

  SESSION FOUR - “TRYING ANYTHING”

  EMBRACE THE CANCER

  SESSION FIVE - “GETTING LAID”

  SEX DURING CHEMOTHERAPY

  SESSION SIX - “GIVING UP”

  TWENTY-ONE WEEKS

  SESSION SEVEN - “FIGHTING BACK”

  LOVE STORY

  SESSION EIGHT - “GETTING STUNG”

  DECEMBER 12, 2000

  LESSONS

  THE GODFATHER

  MARCH 2007

  Acknowledgements

  Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book and Da Capo Press was aware of a trademark claim, the designations have been printed in initial capital letters.

  Copyright © 2008 by Robert Schimmel

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Printed in the United States of America. For information, address Da Capo Press, 11 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142.

  Designed by Linda Harper

  Set in 12 point Adobe Garamond by the Perseus Books Group

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Schimmel, Robert.

  Cancer on five dollars a day (chemo not included) : how humor got me through the toughest journey of my life / by Robert Schimmel with Alan Eisenstock. p. cm.

  ISBN 978-0-7382-1158-9

  eISBN : 97-8-073-82126-6

  1. Schimmel, Robert—Health. 2. Cancer—Patients—United States—Biography. 3. Cancer—Humor. I. Eisenstock, Alan. II. Title.

  RC265.6.S29A3 2008

  362.196’9940092—dc22

  2007044913

  All photographs courtesy Robert Schimmel.

  First Da Capo Press edition 2008

  Published by Da Capo Press

  A Member of the Perseus Books Group

  www.dacapopress.com

  Note: Information in this book is general and is offered with no guarantees on the part of the authors or Da Capo Press. The authors and publisher disclaim all liability in connection with the use of this book. The names and identifying details of people associated with events described in this book have been changed. Any similarity to actual persons is coincidental.

  Da Capo Press books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the U.S. by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut Street, Suite 200, Philadelphia, PA 19103, or call (800) 255-1514, or e-mail [email protected].

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Robert: for Derek

  Alan: to B, J, K, and Z

  This book is also dedicated to those who have fought the fight.

  And to those of you that are just starting. Think positive.

  Keep the faith. Find something to be thankful for each and every day.

  And laugh. Take it from me, laughter is the best medicine.

  INTRODUCTION

  I met Robert Schimmel in spring of 2000. Schimmel was riding high. He’d previously won the Stand-Up of the Year Award, his HBO special Unprotected was a huge hit, he was a frequent Howard Stern guest, and his Fox sitcom Schimmel had been picked up and was slated for a September start in the time slot following The Simpsons. Schimmel was white hot, somewhat surprising for a comic who was about to turn fifty, but long overdue to those who knew him. Schimmel was the comedian’s comedian, the guy other comics would actually pay to see, the ultimate compliment because comics never pay for anything.

  It was also surprising because Schimmel worked blue. Deep blue. He would often start his set without a hello and would instead begin by saying, “So this girl’s giving me a blow job . . .” and he was off and running, segueing into a celebration of sex, a ninety-minute nonstop onslaught probing the pitfalls, frustrations, awkwardness, and sheer comedy that comes from coming. Was Schimmel ready for prime time? Or, more accurately, was prime time ready for Schimmel? Fox, known for taking chances and working close to the edge, apparently was unconcerned because the network had committed to thirteen episodes. Emmy magazine asked me to profile Robert, which I did for the June 2000 issue. Robert and I hit it off. After the article came out, we spoke for an hour on the phone and he invited me to attend his show at the El Rey Theater and the industry party in his honor afterwards.

  And then it all came crashing down.

  Schimmel was diagnosed with stage III non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. His chances of survival hinged on undergoing an immediate and aggressive course of chemotherapy. Robert informed his manager, the Fox executives, and the show’s producers. The network put the sitcom on hiatus, which, in TV talk, means they dumped it. No sense investing in a show called Schimmel if Schimmel was about to die. So Robert lost his sitcom. And, of course, his fire went out.

  But as his heat faded, he discovered something else. Something deeper.

  When Robert Schimmel got cancer, he found himself.

  Further, he came face-to-face with his soul. He saw that what he had been chasing his whole life up until then were mere things, material objects. Symbols of success and status. He realized that they didn’t matter. A person’s life is not defined by the size of one’s house or bank account. Material things, Robert Schimmel realized, are immaterial.

  Originally we called this book I Licked the Big C—And I Beat Cancer because during his chemotherapy, Robert never lost his sense of humor, his knifelike edge, and, most of all, his passion to entertain. At the core of Robert Schimmel’s being is his absolute, basic need to make people laugh, even if the only people around him are suffering from cancer and the room he’s playing is the Mayo Clinic infusion center. Going for the laugh is his survival mechanism, an instinct as primal as another person’s need for food or water.

  As soon as he was able to stay on his feet for an hour, Schimmel played Vegas. But he had changed. He refused to ignore his battle with cancer. In fact, he embraced it. He adjusted his act to include comic riffs about being diagnosed, smoking pot to alleviate his nausea, sex during chemotherapy, and losing all his hair, including his pubic hair.

  But talking about cancer wasn’t enough. Robert went way beyond that. He closed each set with a ten-minute Power-Point presentation featuring photographs taken during his chemotherapy. He punctuated each picture with a joke, but the underlying message was clear: my comedy is raw but my life is rawer.

  Few comedians had ever revealed so much about themselves onstage. Here was Schimmel, emaciated, frail, hairless, at his most vulnerable—and his most powerful. For with this naked truth—this fearless depiction of his disease, his decision to share it publicly, and his daring to laugh at it—something rare, if not unique, was happening nightly between comedian and audi
ence: a connection that broke all barriers. It resulted in both a creative release and an unspoken bond. I’ve experienced this before after certain extraordinary evenings in the theater. I’d never before experienced it in a comedy club. Schimmel would call himself a comedian; I would now call him an artist.

  Interestingly, he wasn’t less funny. If anything, he was funnier. This was measured by the sheer quantity and volume of the laughs. Before cancer, Schimmel was merely hysterically funny. After cancer, he nearly killed you. Every night when he finished his set and clicked off the last slide, the audience as one leapt to their feet. And as the house lights came up and the audience filed out of the club, their faces alternated between those who were still smiling and those who were overcome with tears.

  One Thursday night in January at the Improv in Irvine, California, a young man named Jesse Gonzalez shared a table with his family. Jesse’s brothers, sister, and mother had bought seventeen tickets to see Robert, Jesse’s favorite comedian. The occasion was Jesse’s twenty-fifth birthday—and the one-year anniversary of his father’s death from cancer. Jesse and his dad had discovered Schimmel together a couple of years before during one of Robert’s frequent appearances with Howard Stern.

  Jesse remembered that first time. “Howard introduced him, then got out of the way and let Robert roll. He was amazing. At that moment my dad and I became his biggest fans.”

  That night in January, Robert had arrived late, just a few minutes before his set was to begin. In street clothes, his trademark suit in a plastic garment bag, Robert rushed into the men’s restroom and changed for his show. Five minutes later, he strode down the center aisle of the club, applause rolling like a wave at his back, sweeping him onto the stage. Ninety minutes later, all pretenses at politeness had exploded. The audience was on their feet, howling, clapping, five hundred strong delirious with joy and love, emotionally spent from both laughter and heartache.

  Moments later, Robert, as usual, stood in the lobby signing autographs and selling CDs and DVDs. A line of people waited patiently to make their purchases, and possibly exchange a word, a handshake, and more often these days, a hug. Because Robert Schimmel, a newly crowned hyphenate—comedian /cancer survivor—now represented them, not only those who found sex funny and identified with Robert’s raw and raucous take on life and love, but also those whose loved ones were battling cancer and those who were fighting or had survived cancer themselves. Robert spoke to them and for them. They waited to talk to him. They were in no rush. They would wait as long as it took to see him. And Robert, in turn, would wait for them, as long as it took to see them. He was in no rush either.

  That Thursday, Jesse Gonzalez waited in the lobby with his girlfriend, his mom, and his older brother. Jesse was a big man, well over six feet tall and three hundred pounds. He wore a loose-fitting hooded sweatshirt atop a chocolate brown T-shirt that announced in sunny, happy-face script, “Boobies Make Me Smile.”

  As I stood to the side watching Robert interact with wellwishers, autograph seekers, and CD purchasers, I heard a soft moan. I turned and saw the big man, Jesse, begin to crumble. His knees buckled, and his brother and girlfriend grabbed him under his arms to keep him from falling. Jesse moaned again and started to sob. His face contorted in pain, he shook his head in a continuous windshield wiper motion. Somehow defying gravity, Jesse stayed in that position, hunched over, crying, clinging to his family, his arms draped over them as they held him up, for twenty minutes, until the line moved forward and he found himself facing Robert Schimmel.

  Suddenly Jesse let go of his family and grabbed Robert with both of his meaty arms and held him in a body lock that fell somewhere between a bear hug and a boxer’s clench. His body heaved as he continued to cry.

  “It’s okay, man,” Robert whispered.

  Two beefy security guards approached, prepared to step in between Robert and Jesse. Robert waved them away. They retreated, pressed themselves against the wall, a few feet away, just in case. Robert gently rubbed Jesse’s back.

  “I got you,” he said.

  To a stranger walking into the lobby at that moment, the tableau they made would appear ludicrous: an enormous man-child, his body towering above and folded over fivefoot-six-inch Schimmel who, through the sheer strength of his heart, was holding up three-hundred-pound Jesse Gonzalez. Standing there, I knew that Robert Schimmel wouldn’t let him go, that he would hold on to Jesse until he was strong enough to stand alone.

  Robert had told me that at every show, people with cancer, friends and family of people with cancer, people who had lost loved ones to cancer, and cancer survivors would come up to him afterwards and tell him their stories. Sometimes they would just say thank-you—for his courage, his inspiration, and for making them laugh. And after each show, Robert would end up hugging strangers in the lobbies of comedy clubs across the country because even though they were strangers, they shared the same bond, they belonged to the same exclusive club.

  Even though I’d heard about these moments, these instantaneous connections and spontaneous outbursts, I was unprepared for how emotional it felt. I saw how important Robert Schimmel, the man, was to someone like Jesse Gonzalez. I saw how approachable Robert was, how real, and how responsibly he reacted to Jesse’s feelings. Other comedians I’ve known would have brushed him off. Seeing Robert hug Jesse and refuse to let him go, I knew that I was watching an act of extraordinary compassion, something that bordered on the spiritual, not the first word that comes to mind after a knockout comedy performance rooted in sex. I know now that in every Robert Schimmel audience there is always at least one Jesse Gonzalez and that Robert will always hold him up.

  You can say that cancer gave Robert Schimmel more material. That would be true. But it also gave him more heart. The disease made him see the world through wider, wiser eyes. He became more patient, more resolute, and more conscious of the power of the moment. Cancer stirred him up and awakened him. And cancer taught him how to love what he has—his wife, children, parents, brother, sister, friends, and his gift, making people laugh; to love every day he’s alive. His cancer story is a love story.

  “My dad died of cancer,” Jesse Gonzalez told me. “That destroyed me. I really thought I couldn’t go on. When I heard that Robert was coming to the Improv, I had to see him. I had to talk to him. So I e-mailed him. He answered me. I couldn’t believe it. He wasn’t too good for me, you know? And when I saw him after the show, he hugged me and held me and told me that I had to live my life, but that I could talk to him or e-mail him anytime. I know that if he can get through cancer, then I can make it, too. He’s a walking miracle. He saved my life. I love the guy.”

  That’s why I’m writing this love story with Robert.

  For Jesse. And Jesse’s dad.

  And for everyone who has been tapped on the shoulder by the Big C and told they were it.

  Alan Eisenstock

  SESSION ONE

  “GETTING THE NEWS”

  MONDAY MORNING, JUNE 5, 2000

  So I’m sitting in a chair in my room at the Mayo Clinic waiting for the results.

  I yawn and scratch my beard. I feel so spacey and hung over from the anesthetic they gave me. I think the guy went a little crazy on me. He was squeezing that IV in my arm like he was pumping up a tire. I check the room. There’s my mom, sitting across from me, her legs folded at the ankles as if she’s waiting for a bus. There’s my dad, staring out the window, hands clasped behind his back. Contemplating the desert. Or wondering if my insurance is picking up the tab for the private room. And there’s Vicki, my wife, sitting on the bed, flipping through a magazine. She’s actually my ex. Well. Sort of. Kind of. It’s complicated. I’ll explain later because thinking about it now is starting to give me a migraine, which would really be the cherry on top of this sundae.

  Nobody says a word. The room smells like ammonia with a hint of pine. And it’s as cold as an igloo. At least it feels that way to me. You couldn’t tell by my dad, who’s wearing a short-sleeve shirt.
I’m freezing. My teeth start chattering. A whole mountain range of goose bumps appears up and down my legs.

  And this stupid hospital gown is riding up my ass. I try to pull it down and it snaps right back up like a window shade. I cross my legs and suddenly I’m Sharon Stone. Vicki sees this and rolls her eyes. Yeah, right. Like I’m flashing her in front of my parents.

  “You’re hanging out all over,” Vicki says.

  “What, you don’t think my mom has seen me naked?”

  “At fifty?” Vicki says.

  She has a point. I cover myself as best as I can. Then I yawn, close my eyes, and shiver.

  And suddenly, impossibly, I’m above them. Looking down on them. Hovering overhead like a bird. This is nuts. I must be dreaming. I’m either dreaming or I’m dead. Can they hear me? Wait a minute. There I am. Still sitting in that chair. I am dead.

  Ma! Dad! Hello? Hello.

  They really can’t hear me. My mom uncrosses her ankles and sighs. My dad keeps staring out the window, then looks at his watch. Vicki tosses the magazine onto the bed.

  I can’t be dead. Okay, I wasn’t feeling great so I went in for some tests and . . . I died? How did that happen? A thousand questions slam into my head, one after another, machine-gunned through my brain—

  When did I die? Where is my spirit gonna go? Do I even have a spirit? Is there a God? What about Jesus? How does he fit in? I didn’t believe in him on earth so is he gonna be pissed at me now? Maybe not because, after all, he is Jesus. What about my kids? Where are they gonna go? Did I ever finish my will? Who’s gonna talk at my funeral? I’m not really close with any rabbis. I probably should’ve gotten close with some rabbi so I don’t get the generic funeral eulogy. I hate those. You know he never knows the dead guy. He could be talking about anyone. Robert was so special, such a good son, he will be missed. That’ll be twelve hundred dollars.