Really, improv is all about creating for what's around you, in the moment, so it fits in a way that you can't see the seams. It's like a great jazz combo. I still do it.

I come from Bridgeport, Connecticut and have friends I grew up with there.

[At Conventions] they give me all the photos to sign. Star Wars, Superman. And Hammy the Pig is right up there.

You've got to write for your audience.

Sure, the comedians who swear or use scatological humor can get laughs, but they're uncomfortable laughs.

I wrote another wrestling film script. And we finished the shooting [with Lloyd Phillips]. But Henry Winkler came out with his own wrestling film, which did poorly. So the studios passed on ours, and it never got released.

That was actually Lloyd Phillips who was a Kiwi film producer in L.A. And it was about Gorgeous George, not Haystacks Calhoun. I was in a couple of Lloyd's films and got approached to write the story. People don't realize it, but Gorgeous George had this flamboyant, camp stage persona that had a tremendous influence on other celebrities, like Elton John, Liberace, Elvis Presley, and Mohammed Ali, who all wanted to establish their own outlandish stage personas. The project died because Gorgeous George's wife refused to give up the rights.