In 1988, a young, mid-level employee named Art Bell pitched a novel concept—a television channel focused on just one thing: comedy—to the chairman of HBO. The station that would soon become Comedy Central was born. Bell’s new memoir, Constant Comedy: How I Started Comedy Central and Lost My Sense of Humor (Ulysses Press, 978-1646040896, $24.95, available now), takes readers behind the scenes into the comedy startup on its way to becoming one of the most successful and creative purveyors of popular culture in the United States.
“Ever since the idea had first occurred to me while writing and performing with the Wharton Follies, I kept thinking about how great an all-comedy television channel would be,” Bell writes. “New cable channels were launching all the time and I expected someone would announce an all-comedy channel any minute, but nobody did.”
From disastrous pitch meetings with comedians to the discovery of talents like Bill Maher and Jon Stewart, this intimate and laugh-out-loud funny memoir peers behind the curtain and reveals what it’s really like to work, struggle, and ultimately succeed at the cutting edge of show business.
I got the chance to talk to the man behind one of the biggest TV networks in the world, and here’s how it went down;
Hi Art and Welcome to OLC! It’s an absolute pleasure having you here. You are the founder of the hit TV network Comedy Central, so tell me how did you come up with the idea?
I was a comedy nerd from the time I was seven years old. I watched standup comedians on television whenever I could. As I got older, I listened to my parents’ comedy albums (Nichols and May, Redd Foxx) and my own (Robert Klein, George Carlin, Bill Cosby) and I read everything I could about comedy. When I started working in the television business, I thought it would be fun to work in comedy, but I wasn’t a writer or comedian. New cable channels were starting, and I thought, “If there’s an all music channel (MTV) why isn’t there an all comedy channel?” So in the mid 80s, I started thinking about what that would look like, including programming and financing. The more I thought about it, the more I knew it was a good idea, and I knew it was only a matter of time before someone started an all comedy channel.
How exactly did you land the pitch?
I had already pitched some people at HBO but nobody liked the idea, so I started to write it up to send to other television companies (along with my resume). My boss’s boss saw what I was doing and instantly took me to pitch HBO’s chairman (Michael Fuchs). I had no presentation materials and no prep time, but I’d been thinking about a comedy channel for so long, I had no trouble explaining the idea and its benefits. My passion came through during the 15 minutes I was in the chairman’s office. I think the things that got his attention were 1) I had worked out the financials; 2) HBO should not let someone else start one first and steal the television comedy space; and 3) A successful comedy channel would become a cultural icon, the center of the comedy universe, and a magnet for creative comedy. Michael Fuchs loved comedy, too, so I had a receptive audience. That certainly helped.
How did you find programmes to fill up a station that was 24/7 pure comedy? I would assume in the early day it must have been pretty challenging?
I hoped to use comedy clips, short comedic scenes from movies, television, and stand-up comedy shows in addition to long form programming (movies, series). Just before we launched, we ran into legal problems and couldn’t use most of the clips we’d gotten, so we had to make do with what we had, and that meant lots of repetition of a small amount of programming. We actually played some things every day for a number of months until we could source other programming. The good news is that some great comedy programming came to us in the mail (literally), including Mystery Theater 3000, a show that was a hit and our signature show for the first couple of years. We also sourced all the standup comedy we could, and it turns out that there was a lot of it because comedy clubs routinely taped their performances. But you’re right, shoveling enough comedy programming into the channel turned out to be more difficult than I thought.
Is there any comedy show that’s ended, you wish you could bring back and why?
Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist was an award winning animated show that ran for a couple of years. Jonathan Katz is a talented comedian, and he was the voice of the animated psychiatrist.
Each week his “patient” was the animated version of a standup comedian who would basically do his or her routine while lying on the couch. A lot of comedians have material about their rough childhoods or their difficult lives, so it worked. A comedy writer friend of mine said at the time that it was the best written sitcom on television. I understand Jonathan is doing cast reunion performances live, but I haven’t gone to one yet.
What would you say is your favourite comedy show or movie? For myself I’m going to have to say Seinfeld.
My favorite sitcom is Get Smart from the 1960s. It starred Don Adams as the bumbling intelligence agent Maxwell Smart at Control, the agency fighting against the evildoers at a foreign (Russian-like) adversary called Chaos. His sidekick was the beautiful and incredibly competent Agent 99, played by Barbara Feldon. The show was created by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry, two of the all-time greatest comedy writers. Not only was it a great sendup of the Cold War, it was brilliantly written and always funny. So much of the show made its way into pop culture. To this day I still see and hear the term “the cone of silence” used constantly, and that was from a Get Smart gag involving an actual cone that descended from the ceiling to insure a private conversation between Max and his boss, Chief. The gag: it never worked, so Max and Chief would just say, “Huh? What? I can’t hear you.” A classic. By the way, Buck Henry wrote the movie The Graduate (Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft) which is my favorite movie. Fun fact: Anne Bancroft was Mel Brooks’ wife.
You’ve written a new memoir on launching Comedy Central, what inspired you to write it?
I started writing a few years ago and found that I enjoyed writing memoirs. I took writing classes, and I read the class something I’d written about a meeting I’d had at Comedy Central. It was very funny and the class loved it, so I decided to write some more. As I wrote, I realized that starting Comedy Central was not only my greatest adventure but also a story that needed telling.
What do you think the future holds for Comedy Central?
I’m proud to say that Comedy Central has been one of the two greatest and most enduring comedy brands of the last fifty years (the other: Saturday Night Live). Television has been evolving. Non-linear television, Netflix, Amazon, has been the rage. Many channels have developed an on-demand version and I suspect Comedy Central will migrate to that as well. But the Comedy Central brand is strong, and will ensure that their programming will find its audience no matter how and where it’s delivered. That said, I think linear television channels, those that have a fixed schedule, are here to stay. I expect Comedy Central’s will too, and they’ll continue to be known as the place for the best cutting edge comedy on TV.
What’s been the most memorable moment for you during the time Comedy Central has been a part of your life?
In 1992 we decided to broadcast the Presidential State of The Union Address live and have comedians hosting and commenting (comedically, of course) on the proceedings and the president’s speech as it was happening. Nobody had done anything like that before. We got Al Franken to do it—he was a writer/performer on Saturday Night Live at the time—and it was a triumphant night for us. Audiences loved it. Critics said Comedy Central had arrived with its breakthrough show. I knew that night that Comedy Central would be brilliantly successful and become what I always imagined: the center of the comedy universe. We went on to cover the Democratic and Republican conventions (the fabulous Jon Stewart was part of this) and of course this led to the launch and success of The Daily Show.
Do you think if Comedy Central hadn’t been born you would still have stayed in the entertainment industry?
Yes. I liked television and I’m sure I would have found other channels and jobs that would have interested me. After Comedy Central I went on to become president of Court TV, a channel about crime and justice. That surprises people because it’s certainly not comedy, but I found it fascinating and enjoyed my time there.
Do you have any more plans to write any more books, and if so what ideas do you have?
I would say they’re not so much plans as hopes. I’ve continued to write a memoir about my childhood. I’ve also written short stories, some of which have been published in literary magazines. I’d like to write a novel someday but I haven’t started writing one yet.
Who’s your favourite stand-up comic and why?
Richard Pryor. Nobody made me laugh the way he did. So much of his early standup comedy was about his experience growing up Black and that was not only funny but personally revealing. He never shied away from personal revelations in his comedy, and that made it not only funny, but insightful. I admired his jokes, but also his physical style—how he walked, his rubber face, his mimicry. He was truly a great comedian.
Thanks for stopping by Art it’s been an absolute pleasure, but before you go is there anything you’d like to say to all the television junkies out there in OLC! land?
Yes! Check out some of the performances of the great comedians from the early days on YouTube, like Richard Pryor, Sam Kinison, Lenny Bruce, and the early performances of Seinfeld and others. They’re the ones who influenced and inspired most of the famous comedians working today.