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Radner was the godmother to Zweibels three children, who called her Aunt Gilda.
One of my favorite moments inLove, Gildawas the segment on her relationship with John Belushi.
According to Jane Curtin and others, Belushi didnt think women were funny.
Gildas relationship with John, and vice versa, was they made each other laugh a lot.
So John wasnt really a problem for her.
He also liked hitting her, and she liked being hit by him.
But I cant remember him once refusing to be in anything.
But did he insult Gilda?He may have.
Look, it was so long ago that when he was railing against women he mayve included her.
Dont forget: Theyd worked together before; he knew who she was.
He mightve regarded her as the girl as it says inLove, Gilda.
It was kind of like,Cmon, John, we got a show to do.
He wouldnt have been John if he didnt act up.
He was a bad boy, naughty.
How competitive was Gilda as a performer?She probably had the insecurities of any performer or actor.
I dont think she had the need to be ultracompetitive because she had her own niche on the show.
She had a luxury there that shed be taken care of.
Gildas last TV appearance was on your show,Its Garry Shandlings Show.
Was she nervous about appearing?A little bit.
Before she decided she was going to do it, she was worried the studio audience wouldnt recognize her.
We werent going to bill her.
She was a surprise she came through the door, Hey, everybody!
They had no idea.
She said to me that her comedy was her only defense against the fucker, meaning the cancer.
And she asked me to make cancer funny.
We wrote a bunch of jokes, which you see in the Shandling show.
Garry and I wrote some, but Gilda engineered those, since we didnt want to overstep bounds.
But the moment she came through the door during dress rehearsal, all the butterflies were gone.
When we did the real show, she was fine.
She was excited, fueled by what she was getting back from the audiences.
It had been many, many years.
Shed had cancer and, before that, the movies, where you dont have an audience.
She died in 89, and we filmed the show in 87 or 88.
So itd been seven or eight years.
I havent been able to watch it.
It doesnt seem to be online anywhere.Youre lucky.
God forbid you find that fucking thing.
She did a segment that Pat Birch did.
Pat was the premium Broadway choreographer who did Gilda and Steve Martins dancing across the studio floor.
She choreographed a piece because it was the Winter Olympics.
Its weird you cant findThe New Show.
Its one of those shows, for the most part, that people leave off their resume.
We were able to do pretaped stuff, but it just didnt work.
We were all too into theSNL-live kind of thing, and we were caught somewhere in between.
We thought she was in remission.
I have the notes somewhere at home.
We met two or three times Gilda, Shandling, and I.
She was going to play the star of a variety show, a la Carol Burnett.
And youd see her at the office, at the show, and at home.
What her life was.
So likeLarry Sanders?In a way.
I dont think we got as far as the name.
It was all about the concept.
So that was in the works.
I was one of ten writers who wroteGilda Live.
And I had written a movie for her that almost got made at Fox in 1980 or so.
She helped me write her part.
It was my first screenplay and came very close to being made.
Prototypically I want her to have these traits: cute, physical, have her own wisdom, vulnerability.
Ill write it for Gilda, then see who plays it now.
I wanted to ask you aboutDragnet, which you co-wrote with Dan Aykroyd.
Pep Streebeck is one of the weirdest names …It came from Aykroyd.
Most of the names in that came from him.
Danny wrote a couple drafts while I was doingIts Garry Shandlings Show.
He called me up and says, Do you want to rewrite this for me?
And did he know you were a Jack Webb fan?No, there was no history, noDragnetnexus.
He wanted to collaborate with me.
We had good experiences when we were atSNL.
I was living in L.A. at the time.
I read this script.
There are names in there: the virgin Connie Swail …
I didnt do any of that.
Pep Streebeck this is the way Danny thinks.
He had a bungalow on the Universal lot, this was sort of winter for L.A.
He had a fireplace …
He would take logs the size of my car and throw them in there, and wed write.
But we wrote most of it in Marthas Vineyard, his house there.
Because Dannys Danny, its like I was living with Jack Webb for a couple weeks.
He had the voice and we just wrote.
He was the engine; I was just hanging on.
Some pockets of the internet are still fascinated withCity of Crime,the rap song Aykroydperforms with Tom Hanks.
Id expected to be hearing [the iconicDragnettheme].
But then theres a shift, I nearly got whiplash.
Whats this all about?
Love, Gildamentions that Gilda dated Dan Aykroyd and Brian Doyle-Murray in addition to Bill.
Is that why they werent in the documentary?I highly doubt it.
Youd have to ask the director.
My guess is the scar tissue has mostly … it was a gazillion years ago.
She and Billy were on again, off again.
All the other stuff predatedSNL.
Was her relationship with Bill Murray serious?Serious enough.
They werentengaged; they didnt get married.
It says in the movie he had another girlfriend, which bothered her.
I was usually the last to know this shit.
I was that guy.
I had no idea shed dated Martin Short in Toronto.Well, Marty I knew about because theyd lived together.
That was our initial commonality: Wed both had relationships with Gilda.
I first heard about Martin ShortfromGilda.
Ive heardGilda was scheduled to hostSNLin 1988, before the WGA strike truncated season 13.
Were you going to return to write for her then?This is the first Ive heard of it!
So I guess not.
But youve guest-written since leaving the show.I did it three times back then.
[How I connect] to Jesse Jackson?
I have no fucking idea.
I didnt want to.
Its not like Eddie called me.
Eddie was really, really funny.
It was around Christmas time.
Were looking at maybe the lighting of the tree; I know we were looking at the skating rink.
And Eddie had just doneBeverly Hills Cop.
If I jump out of this window, theyll come see me.
I said, Why do I think if I jumped out the window, theyd do the same thing?
He was really young and I marveled at how versatile he was.
I saw him a few years later, when Garry and I were looking to castIts Garry Shandlings Show.
We went to, I want to say, the Comedy Store.
I dont know if hed already recordedRawor was about to.
But he did a lot of the material that night.
He was doing this stuff aboutCosby calling him.
I went backstage afterward and Eddie had a posse now.
I had to go through three people just to see him.
I finally got into his dressing room and he said, Boy you gained weight!
I said, Great, I went through all of that to be insulted like this.
Sammys Roumanian downtown on Chrystie Street.
Its one of those restaurants where the waiters get up and sing.
Gilda couldnt come to the actual wedding because she was doingGilda Livein Chicago that Saturday night.
So the preceding Sunday, we rented the restaurant and had a pre-wedding or engagement party.
Did you get along withODonoghue?I got along with him really well.
I was scared shitless not to.
He was unlike anybody Id ever met brilliant, so dark.
We did some speaking engagements together, so wed spend time together.
I think we both were amazed a creature like the other existed.
So there was something very anthropological about it.
It isnt a whole helluva lot!
Its the same war stories and everything.
You wrote many of Gildas classic appearances on Weekend Update.
What did you think ofEmma Stones takeon Roseanne Roseannadanna duringSNL 40?I thought it was a nice homage.
I didnt look at it technically; I just took in the spirit of it.
