Excerpt

In the beginning I felt like Bob Hope when he referred to starting his career, “The only way I survived my early days in comedy was to pick up the food that had been thrown at me during the performance and take it home and eat it.” I found that the same thing happened to me as to Hope in my first days in comedy. The only difference was that when they threw the food at me it was still in the cans. (I’ll pause for a few seconds here to give you time to laugh.)

Eventually I put together a show that worked well to give the audience a wonderful time of fun and laughter. I became The Oldest Man in the World, born in 1742 and still around to tell about it. “And you ladies out there in the audience, I wanna tell ya, I might be old, but I’m still hot to go for dates. I’m not like those guys who go into the restroom, and they stand there, and squeeze away—one drop, two drops. No siree, every morning at six thirty, I pee buckets and buckets . . . and then I wake up at seven thirty.”

Later, one of those little happenings came along that causes us to make big changes in our lives. I called Ron Peña, a producer I happened to know who was putting together shows for comics. It turned out that he had just wound up a show of celebrity lookalikes and suggested that I portray George Burns. My first thought was “no.” And I looked in a mirror and thought “no,” and for a few days when looking in the mirror, I looked for George. Nothing! But one day I looked in that mirror, and there he was. I put on a tux with the big black bowtie, a hairpiece, the glasses, and the cigar, and George jumped right into my skin, as I appear on the cover of the book. That was years ago, and I’ve done hundreds of shows since.

Then, came the first miracle. One night I was doing what may have been about the thirtieth show. Right from the beginning the audience was with me, reveling in laughter, when it happened. I had the sudden feeling that I wasn’t doing the show. I felt as though I was in the audience, laughing along with the other good folks. Then who was it up on the stage? Of course, George!

During the following months we became very close. When on a road tour, it seemed that he was with me. Then came the second miracle. I could be anywhere, doing anything and thoughts would come to me—words in my head, as though he was talking to me. For all I know, he’s writing this.

The third miracle followed. He began to add to the show’s script. Sometimes during the show, sometimes between shows. It happened once when I was in a store and saw a young woman bending down to pick something up from a lower shelf. She was wearing hip huggers slung so low that I could see the crack of her behind. I heard George laugh and then the distinctive voice—the sound of pouring gravel out of a tin bucket. “Now, that will be a good one for the show. You know, where I do the part on changes I’ve seen in my life? Here’s what we’ll do. I’ll wrap up the seven or eight changes I usually talk about with this one, which will be the funniest.” He paused, probably taking a puff on his cigar. I didn’t know how it could work as a change in the way things were then and now. He knew what I was thinking, for he said, “If I wasn’t here to write this material for you, you would be a disaster. It’s simple. It will go like this, ‘When I was a little tot, you didn’t ever see any cleavage. No, you never saw cleavage. Now, you see it in the front and the back.’”

So now you see what I mean by having a conversation with George Burns, who as you know, was God in three movies. Therefore, it figures that we can allow him a miracle now and then. And in 93 years of performing, he played just about everything. Now it’s time for him to tell us his story.

When driving from Pipestone, Minnesota after a show at the Pipestone Performing Arts Center, on route to the Paramount Theatre in Austin, Minnesota, George comes into my life full force.

The show in Pipestone was very successful, and it wasn’t new to me to know that he had taken over and was on stage standing before the microphone. Up to that time, he had already been doing some of the shows and was a voice in my head on other occasions, but now I am aware of a fourth miracle. I sense that he is sitting beside me in the passenger’s seat, and that our connection has become so strong that we can actually converse.

I hear him say, “Good show back there. Standing ovation on the final bows.”

His voice is so clear that I automatically respond, but this time I speak out loud. “You’ve had a few thousand standing ovations, haven’t you?”

He laughs. His presence is so obvious that I’m only slightly surprised when he replies. “Look, at my age I get a standing ovation for just standing.”