Can Freddy Got Fingered, the film Tom Green wrote, directed and stars in, possibly make him more famous than testicular cancer, a certain white mouse and Drew Barrymore already have?
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I know what you're thinking," says Tom Green, holding my elbow and steering me through the throngs of New Yorkers rushing around on this clear day. "You're saying to yourself, 'This guy only has one ball. How does it look? How does it work? Can he still have sex?' Am I right?"
I would like to say that those thoughts had never crossed my mind. That I have never (never!) imagined Tom Green's testicles. But I'd be lying.
"Looks fine. Works fine," says Green. "Any other questions?"
Tom Green had been mining his own weird experiences for years before he started making light of his testicles. On "The Tom Green Show," which originated in Canada before it was picked up by MTV, he sucked milk from a cow's udder, let farm animals loose in his parents' home, escorted Monica Lewinsky around his hometown of Ottawa, and even set his own feet aflame. The first US film in which he had a major role, Road Trip, was a big hit in part because of his wacky slurping of a live mouse. But the challenge to bring humor to territories never before laughed about hit an unexpected peak when Green was "touching [his] balls one night" and felt something unfamiliar. Two doctors told him it was a skin condition, but the third realized that it was testicular cancer. He went through surgery and grueling chemotherapy, making sure the doctors saved his cancerous testicle in a jar. A few months later, he did an MTV special about it in which he sang the song "Feel Your Balls." The special was a smashing success and Green says he's heard from hundreds of boys and their parents, thanking him for giving them the warning signs of a disease that most people are, to put it mildly, uncomfortable with. "They write to say that I helped save their lives," says Green modestly. "That makes me feel good."
Nothing can really top testicular cancer for comedy of discomfort, but last fall, Green made a good try when he was a guest on "Saturday Night Live." The running gag throughout the show was that Green and his girlfriend, Drew Barrymore, whom he met while making Charlie's Angels, were going to get married in a sort of millennium version of Tiny Tim's stunt. But at the end of the show, Barrymore bolted. Did she leave Green at the altar, as some of the papers suggested the next day, or was this all part of the joke? "Whatever I say," says Green, "people are going to believe their own version. But truly, the whole thing was scripted just that way. I thought people would get it, but apparently some of them thought I was the jilted lover. I think Lorne Michaels might have even given a quote saying that Drew didn't think it was the right thing to do on TV. Drew and I were looking at each other and I think she was a little embarrassed for me, because neither of us wanted to get married on TV, but we also didn't want people thinking that she stood me up at the altar. She would never do that. I hope."
"Are you an old-fashioned guy?"
"Yes, absolutely. I want to marry Drew and have it be just the way we picture it. Not on 'Saturday Night Live,' for sure."
Having walked up and down the street for a while trying to decide on a place for lunch, Green and I finally settle on a funky little diner and grab a booth looking out on the street. Within minutes of our getting settled, a 12-year-old girl comes to the table. "Can you sign this for me?" she asks Green, handing him a filthy napkin. Green doesn't flinch.
"Sure. Why aren't you in school?"
"Lunch break," she says.
"How do you know him?" I ask the girl, trying to figure out which part of Green's oeuvre she's a fan of.
"He wrote 'The Bum Bum song,'" she says proudly.
This is a part of Greens history I am not familiar with. When she leaves he explains simply, "It's exactly what it sounds like. A song about my bum."
Soon there is a line of kids waiting for his autograph. They are black, white, Asian, Hispanic, and range in age from 10 to 18. "I loved your show when you made your friend learn the trapeze and he puked after," one of them says. Another tells him that she loved Charlie's Angels. One says truthfully, "I wanted your autograph because your girlfriend is that famous woman from E. T. right?" Green chats with each of them.
"Doesn't this get you crazy?" I ask when the 20th one has left.
"Nah. It's funny, because Drew and I feel the same way about fans. These are the people that like our work, and it's fine to sign autographs or have pictures taken. It's the people who are with us that get crazy. Like, I can see that this is getting you more uncomfortable than it's getting me."
Now the kids have gone and gotten more of their friends, who all come in for autographs and then congregate outside, telling everyone who passes that the legendary Tom Green is eating corned-beef hash right inside. The kids are dancing and laughing, mugging for Green, and when one of them drops his pants and moons us, Green cracks up. "My fan base," he says joyously. A woman in her mid-20s, her face literally oozing with piercings, walks by, does a double-take, and comes in, too. She has a camera and wants her picture taken with Green. "Loved Road Trip," she tells him with a wink.
None of this should really surprise me. The 29-year-old Green has been semi-famous for half his life now. He started doing standup when he was 15, and went on to star in a comedy rap group. They put out a record and he also started hosting a college radio show of his own in Ottawa. It was on from midnight till six in the morning, and was "a favorite among stoned college students cramming for tests." Then he decided he wanted to do his brand of zany humor on television. So he made short films, screened them for groups of teens and found out which ones got the most laughs. Although "The Tom Green Show" has had its share of misses, when it's on the mark, as it often is, it's side-splittingly funny, sort of the Farrelly brothers without the mean edge. Not that he isn't edgy, but the joke seems always to be on him.
As he approaches 30, Green's humor doesn't just still border on the adolescent, it still is adolescent. And Green is unapologetic. "Fart jokes," he muses. "When do they stop being funny? Never. There are some things in Freddy Got Fingered that have been on my mind for years. Like wanking off an elephant. C'mon, you can't tell me that isn't hilarious. Or there's a scene where I deliver a baby and swing it around by its umbilical cord. What's not to laugh? Or there's this cripple in the movie who likes to have her legs caned with a piece of bamboo. Not funny? Please.. .I had cancer in my balls, for chrissakes. If I can find the humor in that..."
Freddy Got Fingered is the movie Green has written, directed and stars in. It's the story of a man/boy named Gord who wants to be an animator. His parents don't think it's a viable job, but Gord moves to Los Angeles to try his luck. When he fails, he starts work in a cheese factory, but eventually has to move back with his parents. Sort of like Tom Green and his parents, who couldn't believe their son was going to grow up to be a comic. "But they're proud of me now," he says. "And thrilled that I finally moved out from the basement." Green co-wrote the film with his friend of 20 years, Derek Harvie. Almost everyone involved with the filming of Freddy has either worked with Green on his show or is an old friend from Ottawa.
So what's a typical night like in the life of Tom Green, comedian/auteur, and Drew Barrymore, movie star? "We usually go to a restaurant and eat and talk. But I have a feeling all that's about to change. About a month ago I said I was going to cook dinner, and I went and got a vegetarian cookbook and I made shells stuffed with ricotta cheese. I thought I was being real cool, and actually it turned out all right. But I think she liked it too much, because for Christmas all she got me was cooking stuff. So I think the idea is that I'll start making dinner every night. And then we either go to the movies or to a museum..."
"Would you rather watch movies on video or put up with the hassle of going to a theater?"
"Oh, a theater, definitely. The whole thing of the lights going down and you have to be quiet...I think that adds to the feel of the film and makes you pay attention more. I watch video if I can't see it in the theater. Like I just discovered Peter Sellers. Have you ever watched his films?"
I nod.
"OK, so I'm a little slow. And maybe I had seen some of the Pink Panther films, and certainly Dr. Strangelove. But recently I saw I Love You, Alice B. Toklas, and The Party. It's incredible to be someone who grew up loving comedy and I never knew how brilliant Peter Sellers was. I realize now that I don't have a long view of comedy the way some other writers and directors do."
"Who were your comic idols when you were young?"
"In Canada, 'Monty Python's Flying Circus' was on TV every night and I didn't know for years that they were reruns. I thought it was all new. 'SCTV' 'Saturday Night Live.' Jim Carrey is Canadian, and when he made Ace Ventura, that was something I thought was really funny. And Letterman was always the thing. I watched him every night and thought, my God, this guy has the greatest job in the whole world. And after I had been doing my show for a year or so, I realized, holy shit, now I have the greatest job in the world!"
"Do people expect you to be a laugh riot every minute?"
"I think when you're playing a wild and crazy fuck-up on television, and making a fool of yourself and acting like an idiot, it's hard for some people to realize there's a lot of thought that goes into creating a joke, and I take it very seriously. And it's interesting when you start taking idiocy seriously. In a way it becomes like a mathematical thing--you can calculate where a laugh is going to come. That's my favorite part, figuring out how to keep the joke going long enough so the payoff is great."
"Was there a big difference between doing your show and doing a huge studio movie?"
Green nods. "At the beginning, I didn't think there would be. I mean, I've been shooting and editing stuff for years. But all of a sudden you have scenes with hundreds of extras and all kinds of weird shit happening. Luckily, the assistant director and lots of other people on the team had done big films before, so they weren't as fazed. And I'm a trouper. Show me something once and I never forget it."
"When you got cancer, did you stop drinking?"
"Honey, that's when you start drinking."
"No, I meant did you have to change your lifestyle dramatically?"
"You know, the first surgery [removing the testicle] was pretty painless. But when they took my lymph nodes, that knocked me back for a few months. Then I was getting chemotherapy. But I'll tell you this--once you've had cancer, it's very hard to worry about whether your little skit is working. But as soon as it was over, I felt better and just went back to being Tom Green."
Now the waiter is hovering. Green smiles at him but doesn't ask what the hell he wants. Finally, I do.
"I'd like an autograph for my daughter. She loves Charlie's Angels and I just called to tell her you were here."
Green signs the back of the guy's pad before we leave.
Naturally, on the way out, almost everyone on the street either stops to say hello or yells something. And naturally, Green waves back and smiles.
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Martha Frankel interviewed Johnny Depp for the March issue of Movieline.