The Late Joan Rivers: 'Does this urn make my ash look fat?' — Page 27

As a deeply closeted gay child growing up in the 1980s I felt very alone. I was bullied, I was shunned. Both at home and at school.

There were three people who I discovered all around the same time (1982-83) who made me feel less alone. Who made me feel there was more in the world than what was in my town in New Jersey. Who made me feel a sense of belonging.

One of these people was Joan Rivers. Here was a woman who'd had a rough time of it. Not attractive in the Hollywood sense, who was a bit of an outcast. She overcame it by the sheer force of her talent. When you watched her on The Tonight Show it was almost like "Hey, lets go peek behind the celebrity curtain, and make fun of it. Together." I listened to her What Becomes a Semi-Legend Most? cassette until I wore it out. I VCR'd every appearance she ever did on The Tonight Show, and even bought her book about Heidi Abromowitz. Joan helped people like me in ways she likely never knew about.

Ironically, the second of these three people who helped me get though my teen years was Howard Stern. First on WNBC and later WXRK.

I treasure these people and to lose one of them is painful, indeed.

Melissa should send her mother's ashes on a national gay bar tour. She could charge big bucks and claim an urned income credit on her tax return.

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When panning for gold and getting nothing but silt, it's exhilarating when you finally find two 24k nuggets!

Thank you SonofrobbieJ, I know you know a thing or two about funny.

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Debbie Reynolds rehearsing for the June 1983 benefit in San Francisco for the AIDS/Kaposi Sarcoma Foundation. The dancers left-to-right are Randy Val Clupp, Thomas Anthony and Steve Lane. I believe none of the three dancers survived.

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Which means he's in this clip!

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"It's clear to me that you were a poor man's comic in another life,"

It was also crystal clear to you that I was a professor of yours. At a school you never went to. And that I never taught at.

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I've been looking for this picture! This is Shirley MacLaine co-hosting and judging the 1982 "dog show" held by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence in San Francisco. You'll notice that the "pup" she is judging is not canine.

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lovebway, who was the third?

How weird is this? I don't remember this at ALL.

A 1987 People magazine article on Reagan Junior's attempt to make an AIDS PSA.

http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20096714,00.html

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Eric it was David Letterman.

Remember David Letterman in the early '80s was NOT the David Letterman of today. His show was so subversive back then. It was another show that made you feel like you belonged to an exclusive little club. Late Night with David Letterman from 1982 to 1987 was the greatest talk show ever on the air.

I don't like him very much today. Too cranky, and the humor is very lame. But back then he was something else.

Joan said she wanted her ashes "thrown in my agent's face".

She thought about everything.

"Urned income credit" made me laugh so hard.