His Answer to Question Number Four Contains Both Real and Fake Hands
It all started with my email to Dana Carvey and David Spade. As if you didn’t know, Dana and David are both former Saturday Night Live cast members (and stand ups, and television actors, and movie stars, and friends) who now host the super-popular SNL-centric Cadence13 Fly On The Wall podcast. Each week they interview various SNL hosts, SNL cast members, SNL musical guests (Paul McCartney!), SNL writers, and other SNL-adjacent individuals.
Almost every episode mentions SNL’s legendary (1985–1998, 2001–2002) writer Jack Handey.
When I wrote my email to Fly On The Wall to suggest Dana and David interview Jack Handey about his new novel, Escape from Hawaii and his years on Saturnday Night Live, I cc’d Jack Handey himself. Much to my surprise, the very next morning, I received a reply from Jack Handey thanking me for plugging the book to Dana and David. We exchanged pleasantries. I asked him if he’d do an interview for you, my loyal readers. He said “Yes.” A week later, it was done and dusted. Enjoy!
JON MEYERS: Hello, Jack Handey. Thank you so much for taking the time to answer my questions.
JACK HANDEY: Sure. Thanks for the invite.
MEYERS: Let’s start with the new novel. July 13th will mark the 10-year anniversary of the publication of your first novel, The Stench of Honolulu. Had you always intended to write and release this sequel, Escape from Hawaii, now in 2023 to coincide with that anniversary? In 2013, you told Esquire that you wondered at one point if you had put too many jokes into the first one. Now that 10 years has passed, was that still a concern as you wrote the new one? How has your writing changed over the last 10 years?
HANDEY: Wow, has it been ten years? I must have taken some long naps in the interim.
Yes, I wondered if I had put too many jokes in Stench. But I can’t help it. My thinking is, Why do a purely expository sentence, when you can make it funny? I am a follower of Woody Allen in that regard. The downside may be that it maybe the reading too dense. But, on the other hand, it makes it more re-readable. You’rereading not so much for the story — which in Stench is negligible — but to discover, or re-discover, the jokes. Which, hopefully, are good.
Am I being pretentious enough?
My sequel to Stench — Escape from Hawaii —is shorter and has a tighter plot, but is still jammed up with jokes.
I’m not sure how my writing has changed over the years. I asked my wife Marta this question, and she (laughingly) pointed her thumb down.
My friend Ian Frazier (great writer) says you’re not the same writer you were even just a few years before.
MEYERS: Great answers. Not pretentious at all. I sense your wife and her thumbs down gestures help keep you in check. Nevertheless, if you start bragging to Ian Frazier (great writer, I agree) that you’re being interviewed by Jon Meyers, we may need to revisit that issue.
Speaking of revisiting issues, I promise this will be the last time I bring up your 2013 Esquire interview. Ten years ago, you spoke about the notion that your previous books (Deep Thoughts, Fuzzy Memories, and so on) didn’t generate the angry reviews that Stench did — and you hypothesized that perhaps there’s a contingent of novel readers who don’t appreciate silliness. That surprised me when I read that. As of today, I’ve read the first five chapters of the new novel — and like the first one, there’s a joke in almost every line so far. I literally laughed out loud several times, and that’s just in the first five chapters. Are you anticipating similar reviewer hostility, or do you think the critics have evolved over the last decade? How about the reading public? Aren’t we more culturally silly these days? You said you’re not sure how you’ve changed as a writer in the last decade, but talk a little about how we’ve changed as an audience.
“I can write a pretty decent joke.
— Jack Handey.
I think I could prove that to a jury.”
HANDEY: Happy to hear you are enjoying Escape from Hawaii.
I am not the first one to point this out, but many people — maybe most — do not have a sense of humor. Of course, everyone claims he has a great sense of humor. But, for some, it’s like you’re speaking French to them. They don’t understand why you’re doing that, and it makes them mad.
A reviewer of one of my Deep Thoughts books on Amazon quoted the thought, “If you ever reach total enlightenment while drinking a beer, I bet it makes beer shoot out your nose.” Then he said, “How is that funny?”
Ricky Gervais said: “Nothing polarizes people quite like comedy or maybe religion, because people take it personally. And it’s not enough for people not to like something — they don’t want other people to like it. They think it’s a threat.”
A director friend of mine once told me, “If you see a review of something that’s favorable, it’s probably O.K., and if it’s unfavorable, maybe it’s not so good. But if the person really hates it, check it out, there’s something there.”
For some people, story trumps funniness, and I can accept that — although a comedy-writer friend once said, “What are we, children, that we need to be told stories?”
And I admit, the story in Stench is pretty lame. Plot is not my strength. But I can write a pretty decent joke. I think I could prove that to a jury.
MEYERS (interrupts): Actually, you already have. You created SNL’s “Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer.”
HANDEY (continues): Again, I’m not the first to point this out, but the atmosphere for comedy is pretty dismal these days. People just cross their arms and say, “No, I’m not laughing at anything within a mile of that.” And certain things are taboo that should be taboo, like black-face minstrel shows. But the pendulum has swung way to the side of uptightness.
I don’t think Escape will generate as much hate as Stench. Stench siphoned off a lot of the ill will, I think. Escape isn’t quite as dark as Stench.
I self-published Escape from Hawaii. My agent had no interest. I wrote the publisher of Stench of Honolulu about Escape, but never heard back. I admit, I sorta like self-publishing. You have total control. Escape is selling like crazy, just through my web site.
MEYERS: Is “Toonces” your “Freebird?”
HANDEY: “Toonces the Cat” was an instant hit, immediately popular from read-through on. I was overwhelmed. Steve Martin was really funny in it. So was Victoria Jackson.
“Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer” took more time to catch on. It ran late in the show and got a so-so response. But people seemed to like it, especially comedy people. Phil Hartman was great in it.
If I may pontificate, “Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer” is a good example of pushing an idea to the next level, from “That’s a pretty good idea” to a better idea. I started off thinking about frozen cavemen. What if they found a bunch of them? What if they tried to unfreeze them, but wound up melting them? What if it was just one caveman and he came to life? Then — the next level — what if he was a sleazy lawyer, pretending to be a naive caveman?
MEYERS: I remember talking about Toonces at work the day after it first aired. Everyone had seen it. “Toonces, The Cat Who Could Drive A Car” was not only an instant hit, but it had (and still has) staying power. I’ve taught First Year college students at a state university — 18 and 19 year olds — and almost all of them knew Toonces.
As for “Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer,” yes! It really does two things at the same time, doesn’t it? You have an unfrozen caveman coupled with the idea that his winning persuasiveness is built upon a complex ruse: he’s really a smug materialist mendaciously acting as if he’s “just a caveman.” It takes two ideas combined. (I’ve long argued that the frequently-maligned “hat-on-a-hat” can often be quite funny. I wonder if you’d allow “Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer” to serve as Exhibit One the next time I have this argument.)
By the way, as an aside, I remember reading somewhere (not Esquire!) that it took a while for Lorne (Michaels) to warm to “Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer.” Can that be true? (As an aside to this aside, if Lorne does indeed retire after SNL’s 50th season ends in 2025, who do you think could do the job?)
“Among all species, our human hands are unique—not only in what they can accomplish but also in how they communicate. Human hands can paint the Sistine Chapel, pluck a guitar, maneuver surgical instruments… and write poetry. Our hands are extremely expressive; they can sign for the deaf, help tell a story, or reveal our innermost thoughts.”
— J oe Navarro, “What Every Body Is Saying,” Psychology Today, 2010
Getting back to my students, here’s my actual Question Four: In our daily freewrites (longhand writing exercises), one of the topics my students invariably write about a lot is hands. Joe Navarro in Psychology Today wrote, “Among all species, our human hands are unique—not only in what they can accomplish but also in how they communicate. Human hands can paint the Sistine Chapel, pluck a guitar, maneuver surgical instruments… and write poetry. Our hands are extremely expressive; they can sign for the deaf, help tell a story, or reveal our innermost thoughts” (“What Every Body Is Saying,” 2010). His mention of “our innermost thoughts,” of course, put me in the mind of your own Deep Thoughts, many of which involved, you guessed it, people doing things with their hands (such as whittling). Even your name, Jack Handey, begs the question, our actual fourth question:
What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever done with your hands?
HANDEY: I’m not sure this answers the question, but one Halloween, when I was a teenager, I got up on the roof over the front door. I had some big rubber hands. I tied each one to a thread. When a kid came trick-or-treating, I lowered the hands to scare him. But instead, the kid just grabbed the hands and took off, breaking the threads.
Lorne didn’t disparage “Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer” after it first aired, but he seemed surprised that his friends liked it. Which I guess is sort of subtle disparagement.
I’m not sure who should replace Lorne. Whoever does will probably be attacked in the press. So might as well get the ghost of Hitler, someone like that.
MEYERS: Yeah, Lorne is going to be a tough act to follow. I will go on the record though and say I think someone who is hyper-beloved by the public in front of the camera on SNL might be able to pull it off, someone with goodwill to spare, someone like Kenan Thompson.
Yes, your Halloween prank certainly answers the question. Technically I guess that story would fall under “The Weirdest Thing You Ever Did With Fake Hands,” although it was indeed your own hands involved in the dangling of the rubber ones.
Thank you for taking the time to answer these questions and to share a little about Escape from Hawaii. What’s next for you? What’s the next project you’ll be working on? Is there anything you’ve always wished you’d done, but haven’t yet? I once had the opportunity to ask Esai Morales, “If money were no object, and training were no object, what would you do?” (EDIT NOTE: Esai’s answer involved hands! The clip is available at the bottom of this interview.) How would you answer that same question?
Finally, as we sign off, would you mind giving my readers one last Jack Handey nugget, one you’ve never shared before in an interview?
HANDEY: I have been thinking about a third Hawaii book, but maybe not. Those things are really hard work, and I’m typically lazy. Another idea is The Adventures of Muscular Angry Clown. I’m also thinking about putting out a new collection of my magazine humor pieces.
I’m not sure this is a “nugget,” but my latest pet peeve is time travel. It is an overused plot device. I have been guilty of using it myself. I wrote a sketch called “Time-Traveling Viking” for SNL. It got to Dress Rehearsal but then got cut.
If money and training were no object, I would go forward in time and backwards in time and destroy all the time machines.
MEYERS: Although I feel the same way, the fiction podcast I’m producing which comes out later this summer, may or may not invove time travel. And speaking of time, thank you for being so generous with yours. You were a great interview. Thank you.
HANDEY: Good questions! Thanks again for your very kind words, and for the opportunity to spout off.
To order your own personalized copy of Escape from Hawaii, only available from Jack Handey, click on https://www.deepthoughtsbyjackhandey.com/escape-from-hawaii-book/
To order other books directly from Jack Handey, click on https://www.deepthoughtsbyjackhandey.com/bookstore/
If you insist on reading on your Kindle, some of the pre-2023 titles can be found on Amazon. Just click on https://amzn.to/45Ebu2a
Jack Handey is an Emmy Award-winning writer who worked for several years on “Saturday Night Live,” penning such sketches as “Toonces, the Cat Who Could Drive a Car,” “Unfrozen Cave Man Lawyer,” “Happy Fun Ball,” and “Anne Boleyn.” He also wrote and narrated “Deep Thoughts.” His humor pieces have appeared in The New Yorker, Outside, Playboy, Punch, The New York Times, and elsewhere. His books include the Deep Thoughts series, Fuzzy Memories, What I’d Say to the Martians and Other Veiled Threats, Untrue Stories of Fiction, and The Stench of Honolulu. He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
<><><>
<><><>
<><><>
<><><>
<><><>
The Esai Morales clip mentioned in the interview can be found here, courtesy of Game Changers With Vicki Abelson.
Vicki’s YouTube channel is here: https://www.youtube.com/@VickiAbelsonLive/videos
You can watch Vicki LIVE on the facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/vickiabelsonswomenwhowrite/?ref=mf (GAMECHANGERS, Weds at 5PM PT and SHOOTING THE ****, Mon at 5PM PT)
FILMIC THE PAGE 