"I succeeded by saying what everyone else is thinking."
Everything now seemed hopeless. “What’s the point?” she thought to herself.
Only a few months earlier, Joan Rivers had everything she had ever wanted: fame and fortune, the job of her dreams, a loyal husband, a loving child, a lavish estate — and a future that beckoned with enticing possibilities. After years of struggle, she had not only succeeded as a comedian, but made history on the newly launched FOX Network as television’s first and only female late-night talk show host.
And now she had lost it all. In May 1987 the First Lady of Comedy was fired from her job, and publicly humiliated. Her husband, Edgar — unable to bear his own failure as her manager and producer — had killed himself. And their daughter, Melissa, in a state of shock and devastation, seemed very dubious about the reported circumstances.
Reeling with her own grief and rage, Rivers then discovered she needed money. She had earned millions of dollars and lived a life of baroque luxury, but her husband had squandered her wealth on bad investments. She was $37 million in debt, and her opportunities for making more money had seemingly vanished.
At the Bel-Air mansion where five telephone lines once buzzed relentlessly, the phone never rang. Nobody wanted to hire her as an entertainer. Even her social life evaporated. No one invited her to anything.
As her 55th birthday approached, she couldn’t see any reason to keep on living. It was hard enough for young women to succeed in show business, but for an aging has-been, the prospect of resurrecting a ruined career looked hopeless.
But Joan Rivers refused to give up and slink into oblivion. Written off as a lost cause, she started over, invented new opportunities for herself, and went on to achieve the impossible. Working with maniacal fervor through her 60s and 70s and well into her 80s, Rivers recreated herself as a cultural icon, a vastly influential trailblazer, and a business powerhouse who built a billion-dollar company before dying in 2014 following a minor diagnostic procedure for her larynx. By that time, it had almost been a half century since the miraculous night when her career caught fire with one star-making appearance on “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.”
South Coast Repertory presents the world premiere of one of the biggest comedy legends ever, in JOAN, an authorized bio-drama written by Daniel Goldstein (“Kane and Abel,” with music by Frank Wildhorn, and “Unknown Soldier,” co-authored with Michael Friedman), and starring an impressive handful of phenomenal actors, including Elinor Gunn (“Sugar Daddies”) as Melissa and Young Joan; Tessa Auberjonois (“The Roommate”) playing Joan and her mother, Mrs. Molinsky; Andrew Borba (“Sight Unseen”) as Dr. Molinsky and Edgar Rosenberg, as well as Johnny Carson and others; and Zachary Prince (Brdwy: “Mother Play”) as Jimmy, Blake, Harold and multitasking ensemble. Playing through November 24th, the production is directed by Artistic Director David Ivers with Melissa Rivers serving as Creative Consultant and central character, highlighting the life and legend of Joan Rivers.
The daughter of Russian immigrant parents, Joan Rivers — originally Joan Alexandra Molinsky — was born on June 8, 1933, in Brooklyn, New York. The youngest of two daughters, Rivers attended Barnard College, where she pursued her interest in the performing arts. With her parents giving little support, she became determined to succeed, and appeared in a number of plays, including a role as a lesbian opposite an unknown Barbra Streisand. When it became apparent that acting was not her forte, she switched to comedy and spent the next seven years doing the rounds of New York's comedy clubs.
Fast forward to the early-60s, and we find Rivers covering new terrain as a comic entertainer: giving voice to women’s experiences, bravely pushing the boundaries of taste, and drawing grudging respect from her fellow stand-up comics for pummeling her way into their largely male preserve. Even so, nightclub managers were quick to fire her after dicey performances. Audiences sometimes found her grating. And her parents continued to regard their coarse, strident daughter as a failure — childless, divorced, and unable to find steady work in a respectable profession.
To help pay the bills, Rivers offered her services as a comedy writer. Getting hired by ABC’s The Phyllis Diller Show seemed like a coup. Then Diller dropped out of the show, which was cancelled. But Rivers soon landed another gig, with Allen Funt’s Candid Camera.
Her big break finally came in 1965: a booking on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” ignited her career and she became an instant hit and an overnight sensation. For comedians then, and for decades to come, "The Tonight Show" was the Holy Grail, a launching pad for aspiring talent as well as the template for a new kind of television programming.
As the USA Today put it when Carson died in 2005, “He made stand-up comics’ careers with simply a mere gesture, a ‘that’s nice stuff’” compliment that meant you now have an invitation to come sit and chat. Jerry Seinfeld, Roseanne Barr, David Letterman, and Carson’s successor, Jay Leno, among many others, vaulted to stardom by warming his couch.
And for Joan Rivers, on that one night, everything clicked. Her chemistry with Carson was immediately apparent, and those few minutes changed her life forever, producing an instantaneous career turnaround. By the time she had finished, Carson was wiping his eyes. “God, you’re funny,” he said, right there on the air. “You’re going to be a star.”
And the next day… she was. In a flash the endless struggle was finished. A lifetime of battling against the people who told her no, who said she couldn’t do it, who thought she wasn’t good enough — all the rejections and hardships had been magically wiped away. “Just ten minutes on television, and it was all over,” Rivers reminisced in her book. Carson, the all-American boy from Iowa, the WASP who epitomized genial Midwestern masculinity, proved to be the perfect foil for Rivers’ edgier, neurotic, and far more ethnic comedic identity.
And, being Joan Rivers, there was also that sexual innuendo in many of her “The Tonight Show” jokes: “I’m using the coil now.” “A coil?” Johnny asks. “It’s the new birth-control device,” she says. “Does it work?” says Johnny. “Yes!” she says, “but every time Edgar and I have sex, the garage door opens.”
She was finally riding high in the late 1960s. She had finally gotten married, and she and her husband, Edgar, lived in an apartment on Fifth Avenue. Rivers had a monthly slot on "The Tonight Show," and she had Rodney Dangerfield writing her jokes for her. Edgar fancied himself a film producer, and she relished her status as the producer’s wife, meeting people like David Niven and Rudolf Nureyev and going to parties on Sam Spiegel’s yacht in Monaco. In return, Edgar drove her to gigs in the Catskills and hung out at the Stage Deli after her performances, sharing sandwiches at 4 AM with Dangerfield, Dick Cavett, George Carlin, Dom DeLuise, Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara.
By 1983, Rivers was not only headlining in Vegas, but had a Grammy Award-nominated comedy album and two best-selling books as well. That same year, she became Carson's permanent guest host. Rivers' relationship with Carson, however, would sour a few years later, when FOX offered the comedian her own late-night talk show — a direct competitor to Carson — and she accepted. When “The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers,” began airing in October 1986. Carson was so infuriated by her decision that he never spoke to her again.
During that period, Rivers suffered a series of career setbacks. Her show was canceled and the entertainment industry turned its back on her. In 1987, she tragically lost her husband of 22 years when Edgar Rosenberg committed suicide. And, this is where we came in. What happened next took much strength and determination.
Gutsy and tenacious, Rivers moved back to New York and began rebuilding her life and career. Around 1989, she launched her own syndicated daytime talk show, and went on to win an Emmy Award and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (1990). In 1994, she co-wrote and starred in “Sally Marr...and Her Escorts,” which also garnered her a Tony Award nomination for Best Actress. Who said she couldn’t act?
During that time, she transitioned her career yet again as an entertainment commentator, serving as host of the E! series Live from the Red Carpet from 1996 to 2004. No celebrity was spared from her quips and cracks during her tenure.
Even in her 80s, Joan Rivers continued to juggle a number of different ventures. She designed and sold her own line of costume jewelry and other products on QVC. And in 2010, she was the subject of an acclaimed documentary, “Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work.” She served as host of “Fashion Police,” which allowed her to continue to critique celebrities on the Red Carpet, and she had her own reality TV show, called “Joan & Melissa: Joan Knows Best?” (2011-14), which centered around her daughter Melissa. While that show was going on, she published two more book: “I Hate Everyone...Starting with Me” in 2012 and “Diary of a Mad Diva” in 2014.
In August 2014, however, Rivers underwent surgery on her vocal cords in a New York medical clinic. She stopped breathing during the procedure and was immediately rushed to New York's Mount Sinai Hospital. News reports indicated that she had gone into cardiac arrest and was placed in a medically induced coma and on life support.
On September 4th, Melissa Rivers released a statement saying her mother, Joan Rivers, had passed away peacefully surrounded by family and friends at the age of 81. Three days later at New York's Temple Emanu-El, fans lined the street to pay their respects to the icon, celebrities and notables alike, among them Barbara Walters, Michael Kors, Donald Trump, Howard Stern, Whoopi Goldberg, and Kathie Lee Gifford.
An unparalleled legend in the entertainment industry, Joan Rivers was more than just a comedian – she was a force of nature. Joan had wanted an open casket at her funeral. Cremated, that didn’t happen.
Still, after death, Joan got in the final words, in this cavalcade of one-liners she wrote well in advance:
“When I die (and yes, Melissa, everything’s in your name), I want my funeral to be a huge showbiz affair with lights, cameras, action. I want it to be Hollywood all the way. I don’t want some rabbi rambling on; I want Meryl Streep crying, in five different accents. I want to look gorgeous, better dead than I do alive. I want to be buried in a Valentino gown, and I want Harry Winston to make me a toe tag.”
“And I want a wind machine so that even in the casket my hair is blowing just like Beyonce’s.”
SOUTH COAST REPERTORY PRESENTS, THE WORLD PREMIERE OF JOAN; Written by DANIEL GOLDSTEIN; Directed by DAVID IVERS; Scenic Design by WILSON CHIN; Costume Design by KISH FINNEGAN; Lighting Design by PHILIP ROSENBERG; Sound Design by BETH LAKE; Dramaturg JERRY PATCH; Script Supervisor LARRY AMOROS; Voice & Dialect Coach DAVID NEVELL; Casting JOANNE DENAUT, CSA; Stage Manager MATTHEW MEEKS; Creative Consultant MELISSA RIVERS; SCR Artistic Director DAVID IVERS; Managing Director SUZANNE APPEL; Founding Artistic Directors DAVID EMMES & MARTIN BENSON; Honorary Producers TAYLA NEVO-HACOHEN & BILL SCHENKER; Honorary Producers SUSAN SHIELDKRET & DAVID DULL. JOAN is presented with permission from Mills Entertainment and MELISSA RIVERS in association with Sheboygan Productions and LARRY AMOROS. MELISSA RIVERS serves as Creative Consultant.
CAST: ELINOR GUNN as Melissa/Young Joan; TESSA AUBERJONOIS as Joan/Mrs. Molinsky; ANDREW BORBA as Dr. Molinsky/Edgar Rosenberg/Johnny Carson/Others; ZACHARY PRINCE as Jimmy/Blake/Harold/Chet/Others.
UNDERSTUDIES: LILY HOLLEMAN for Joan/Mrs. Molinsky/Melissa/Young Joan; RAFAEL GOLDSTEIN for Dr. Molinsky/Edgar Rosenberg/Johnny Carson/Jimmy/Blake/Harold/Chet/Others.
JOAN runs from October 27th through November 24th on the Julianne Argyros Stage at South Coast Repertory. Performances are Wednesdays through Fridays at 7:45pm and Saturdays at 2pm and 7:45pm, Sundays at 2pm. Tuesday, Nov. 19th at 7pm. Approximately 100 minutes in length, no intermission. Tickets range from $35-$114 and are available at: www.scr.org
Chris Daniels
Arts & Entertainment Reviewer
The Show Report
Photo Credits: Charles Bush
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