Here’s the problem with being a stand-up comedian: people expect you to be funny. Maybe not all the time—hopefully not all the time—but certainly at a higher rate than Alan from accounting.
As recently as two years ago, I was a funny guy. I’d dabbled in stand-up for about three or four years, had made random strangers laugh, (very) slowly moved up ranks. That time has passed me now, I’m just a working stiff. But, every so often I like to think back to those days with a rose-colored tint.
With all that in mind, you could imagine the pause I took when I came across Lorna Landvik’s Best to Laugh at the Book Expo America a few months back. I spoke with a few reps from her publisher, learned Mrs. Landvik had been a stand-up comic herself and figured, what the hell—it is best to laugh.
I say all this because I went in to this book expecting, as you’d rightly imagine, to do a good deal of laughing. And right there, in that undercut, I did the thing I hated most when I did stand-up: expect only funny.
Don’t get me wrong, Best to Laugh does have its humorous moments, but it’s far more than a whimsical tale about a young gal’s journey through Hollywood in the late 1970s.
Candy Pekkala never truly had any real dreams of being a successful comedienne. She was funny, sure, and could make her grandma laugh with her spot-on impressions of the characters they’d watch together on The Carson Show, but Minnesota is a long way from La La Land. After an out-of-the-blue (forced) invitation from her (awful, jealous) cousin Charlotte to sublet her place in old Hollywood’s Peyton Hall, Candy’s journey officially begins.
As you’d expect, she goes through the normal trials and tribulations (compounded daily by the fact that she’s not only a woman, but a part-Korean one at that) of a starting up, struggling comic. She has a number of interesting temp jobs (one of note at the comically and thinly disguised Playboy Mansion) and makes friends with a host of characters from her building complex.
And truly, they are characters. There’s Ed Stickley, the substitute teacher and poolside pal with a penchant for government conspiracy theories. There’s also Maeve, the bodybuilding daughter of TV superstar Taryn Powell, Jaz the building manager/actor, Francis Flover, former owner of the spot-of-spots in old Hollywood, the Bel Mondo, and Madame Pepper, soothsayer to the stars. I could keep going, but you get the point.
Somehow, Landvik doesn’t lose you in all the characters, in all the peculiarities and storylines. Instead, you find yourself just as interested in how their lives are turning out as you are in the protagonist’s. Will Jaz land the part of Errol Flynn in that bio film? How about Ed, will his relationship with TV starlet Sharla West last? Akin to Jerry in Seinfeld, the main character is the straight man (or woman) and it’s not the least bit concerning.
However, above all the frivolity and fun, there’s a serious underbelly to the novel, one that cut even closer to home for me in the aftermath of my mother’s recent passing. You see, Candy grew up primarily without her parents. Her mother died when she was a young child and though her father didn’t pass away til high school, he had checked out on his only daughter soon after his wife died.
So while you’re reading along, laughing at the silly characters or stories, empathizing with the struggle of the young comic ‘just trying to make it’, you’re also acutely aware of just how much this specific young comic has gone through.
It’s a powerful combination, one that ensures that while it’s certainly best to laugh, that’s not the only thing you’ll be doing.
