Back in the sixties, Western Publishing Company (Gold Key Comics) began to have increasing problems getting their comics distributed. All the publishers were having this problem but it was most acute for Western. DC and Charlton owned their own distribution companies so they were able to push a little harder and at least they were paying their distribution fees to themselves. Marvel was distributed by DC until they jumped to a company owned by the same conglomerate that owned Marvel. The other companies, like Archie and Harvey, were hurt…but they (like DC and Marvel) were largely using their comic book publishing as a loss leader for the merchandising of the properties depicted in their comics. DC didn't consider it fatal when sales on the Batman comic went down since they were making money off Batman t-shirts and games and spatulas and such.

Western, however, did not control their own distribution, nor did they make any money off the merchandising of most of the characters in their comics. They had the Disney properties, Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, etc. — all properties owned by others. The few comics Western did own did not yield any real licensing money.

So they began hustling to find a way to sell comics in other venues — bookstores, toy stores, anywhere. They explored other forms of distribution and to this end began experimenting with different sizes and shapes of comics. Long before anyone at DC or Marvel was ready to break from the conventional funny book format, Western tried oversize comics, paperback comics, comics bundled in plastic bags and a few other ideas. Some received limited test marketings or never made it that far. Others came out and were widely ignored. The one thing that did well for a time was the digest comic — a little paperback about 6 and 3/4" tall with (usually) a little under 200 pages. Today, the Archie people have done quite well with their digests and the rumor is that other companies are gearing up to try them — especially for "funny" comics, whose less-detailed pages suffer less when reduced in size.

I don't believe this format will ever catch on big. Archie's success with it has largely been a matter of skillful (and expensive) marketing. They've managed to get excellent display in airports and at supermarket checkout counters. It often costs a lot of money to get your wares into those locations…which can accept very limited amounts of product. I also think there's a fundamental problem with the format in that its very size makes comics look cheap and unimportant.

One thing that some publishers seem to have missed is a lesson that Western learned when they were the only publisher doing them. When the digests were successful, they were only successful in stores that were completely isolated from regular-size comics. If a store had both sizes, no one bought the digests. If a store didn't carry regular-size comics but the one across the street did, no one bought the digests. I forget the actual sales numbers I was shown but it was something like this: When no regular-sized comics could be purchased nearby, a store that carried the digests might expect a 75% sale, which was very good. If the same store had regular comics, the digests would sell 10%. Therefore, Western was in the odd position of trying very hard not to distribute one of their products to some outlets. This they did until the digests died out in the early-seventies — about the time DC and Marvel were both enjoying some success with larger-than-normal comics. Western's distribution was crashing anyway by then but I've often wondered if the appearance of the tabloid "super-size" comics made the digests just look so puny that they helped finish them off.

Someone wrote to ask me about the best night I can recall spending at the Comedy Store.  There were a lot of them, backstage as well as onstage.  One night, Garry Shandling was on, and he wouldn't get off.  Just wouldn't stop.  The audience was loving him but he was way over his time and the next comic up — Arsenio Hall — was backstage fuming.  Arsenio finally turned to me (because, I guess, I was the biggest guy around) and said, "Come on.  Help me get this guy off."  And before I knew it, he and I were on the stage, physically carrying Mr. Shandling off…as Garry continued to clutch the mike and talk about his hair.  Never saw an audience laugh so hard in my life.

Another night that comes to mind was one evening when Sam Kinison was in fine form.  This was when he was still something of a cult figure — the private "discovery" of a select group of Kinison fans.  A guy in the audience made the mistake of heckling Sam, and Sam turned on him.  He began calling the guy names and like a really demented high school kid, describing graphic sexual perversions that (Sam claimed) he'd performed on the guy's mother.  You instantly realized that Kinison had decided he was not going to be satisfied to merely get the heckler to shut up.  He wanted to see if he could drive the fellow out of the room in tears.  On and on he went, making up deviant sex fantasies about the heckler's mother, each lewder than the one before.  After three or four, the heckler had not only stopped heckling but was muttering, "Come on, I'm sorry.  I won't interrupt again." That was not enough.  Kinison kept after him until the guy finally threw down some bills to cover his check and stormed out of the club.  Sam ran down to the table, counted the money and looked at the check, then ran after the fellow screaming, "You didn't tip, you cheap [multiple expletives deleted]!  You're just like your mother!"  Sam was on a wireless mike so we were sitting there in the Comedy Store, listening to him out on Sunset Boulevard yelling at his victim for about three minutes, apparently as the guy got into his car and drove off.  Finally, Sam returned to the stage, calmed down and said, "So…anyone else wanna fuck with me?"  Then he went right back into the story he was telling when the heckler first heckled.  Needless to say, no one interrupted him again.

Maybe the best night — and there are many from which to choose — was one evening when a comedienne friend of mine, Louise DuArt, was the closing act in the big room.  That meant five comics would each do 15 minutes, then Louise would close by doing thirty.  The first comic was Argus Hamilton, who would hang around and serve as m.c. for the others.  Louise called and suggested I come that evening because (she'd heard) certain "surprises" were likely — and she somehow arranged for my date and me to get Mitzi's table in the otherwise sold-out show, Mitzi being Mitzi Shore, owner-operator of the place.  Sure enough, the announced line-up was strong enough on its own — but added to it were impromptu sets by Yakov Smirnoff and Roseanne Barr, both of whom were unadvertised.  I didn't think either was that great but there's still something kind of thrilling about a surprise guest star.

It was the same way after Louise finished her very successful set.  The evening could have ended there, as it was scheduled to, and everyone would have left very happy.  Instead, Argus Hamilton returned to the stage and everyone thought he was going to say, "Thanks for coming."  Instead, he said, "Have you got time to see one more comedian?"  The audience, of course, yelled "Yes!"  Hamilton asked, "If you could see anyone in the world, who would you like to see walk out here?"  One black woman screamed out, louder than anyone else, "Eddie Murphy!"  Argus glared at her: "Do you think I can just snap my fingers and Eddie Murphy will walk out here?"  And sure enough, as he snapped his fingers, You-Know-Who walked out.  The audience went crazy, and Murphy — who was practicing for a concert film or HBO special he was about to do — stayed out there for a full hour, talking to the audience and delivering one of the funniest stand-up routines I've ever seen in my life.  A lot of it was about how he'd just been asked to play Little Richard in a biographical movie.  He got a copy of Little Richard's autobiography, he said, flipped it open and found a description of Little Richard receiving anal sex on his piano.  Eddie went on and on wondering aloud how they'd film such a scene…maybe bring in a stunt butt or something.  Much of his time was spent chatting with the lady who'd hollered his name out to Argus, and who was unabashed about announcing that she was ready and eager to engage in any kind of sex act with Mr.  Murphy — right there on the stage, if necessary.  I think she was even suggesting some of the things Kinison had claimed to have done with that heckler's mother.

Now, I need to explain that this was the early show on a Saturday night.  It was supposed to end around 10:30 and then the Comedy Store staff would do a fast clean-up of the place and begin seating for the 11:00 show.  Because of the addition of Yakov and Roseanne, it was already 10:45 by the time Eddie walked out.  Throughout, you could see personnel fretting and hear the griping of people who were lined up outside on Sunset…but no one was about to cut off Eddie Murphy's mike or carry him off the stage.  Finally, a little before Midnight, he finished — to a tremendous ovation, of course.  Immediately, waiters begin shoving us out the door and as we exited, we all had to walk past the folks who had been waiting more than an hour longer than they'd expected.  They were mad about that, and even madder at reports that we'd gotten to see Eddie Murphy and they wouldn't.  I believe the biggest name on the line-up they'd be viewing was Charlie Fleischer.

Walking past the line, pedestrian traffic jammed-up and a bunch of us found ourselves face-to-face with some angry ticket holders for the 11:00 show.  One woman was yelling at us, "Liars!  You're lying!  You did not see Eddie Murphy! Eddie Murphy was not in there!"  Her theory, I guess, was that we'd all decided to play a trick on the folks outside: "Listen, let's all wait in here an extra hour and we'll make raucous laughing sounds.  Then when you leave, tell everyone in the line outside that Eddie Murphy was doing a set."  Something like that.  Anyway, she was screaming this when suddenly, a black stretch limousine pulled up at the curb. Everyone could see the Artists' Entrance (i.e., back door of the club) swing open and then an entourage of black men in dark glasses marched out and into the limo, with E. Murphy clearly visible in the center.  In ten seconds, the limo, Eddie and the entourage were gone…and the hysterical lady was just standing there with her mouth open and her chin scraping the pavement.

Those were the golden nights of the Comedy Store.  They don't make 'em like that anymore.