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Based on a true-crime, coming-of-age memoir, The Comic’s Daughter: A Chicago

Tale begins in 1963. When the teenaged daughter of a talented, philandering

nightclub comic testifies at a Mafia murder trial, it launches her dramatic and

sometimes funny struggle to break free from the vice grip of her father’s suffocating

narcissism, her mother’s icy rejection, and dark secrets that threaten to annihilate

the family.

 

SYNOPSIS

The Comic’s Daughter centers on the conflicted and enmeshed relationship

between 13-year-old protagonist CATHY and her father DINK, THE COMIC, the

story’s charismatic antagonist.

 

CHICAGO, 1963: Cathy jumps into the front seat of her family’s Datsun, ready to cut

7th-grade volleyball. “Hi, Mom.” HELEN, The Comic’s Wife, stares straight ahead and

delivers the following with her cool, deadpan panache: “Plans have changed. We’re

not going to the dentist. Joni shot Johnny, and he’s dead.” This event informs the

next seven years of her life. Cathy is – was, their constant babysitter and the last

person to see Johnny alive.

 

(JOHNNY MANCUZZO is The Comic’s new agent. His wife JONI is a beautiful blonde

singer. When Cathy and her mother are subpoenaed to testify for the defense at The

People vs. Joni Jaden Mancuzzo trial, the FBI is unexpectedly stationed at their house

day and night. Because Johnny’s father is the “John Gotti” of Chicago, the Mafia

wants Joni and all witnesses in someone’s trunk. In the evenings, Cathy makes

covert, late-night visits to Joni’s safe house in the belly of downtown Chicago.

 

After the stunning and rapid 90-minute “not-guilty” verdict, Joni escapes to Florida

with her kids and leaves a vaporous trail, never to be filled. While the fog of trauma

sticks to Cathy like black tar, she enters high school grappling with an untreated

nervous disorder, a fondness for her dad’s pills, and a shoplifting arrest. With newly

sprouted breasts, she foils sexual advances by Murph the Surf (a jewel thief in

Miami), her lesbian counselor, and her Robert Redford look-alike senior drama

teacher. In each case, she replicates the artful dodger. Cathy has learned well from

cheaters, sociopaths, and wife-beaters like Johnny.

 

In 1969, Cathy embarks on a fleeting, impactful romance with David, a brilliant

young writer. Both lover and mentor, David challenges her with one question:

“What are you going to do with the rest of your life?” She shrugs. “You’re very

smart. You have a great brain. You should get an education.” CUT TO:

SOUTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY: Cathy earns stellar grades, trips on orange

sunshine, and swims naked in the local lakes. When the Symbionese Liberation

Army throws smoke bombs into her dormitory one night, she calls The Comic. “Dad

– I’m scared. Can you come get me?” He does.

 

On the five-hour drive, Dink tells Cathy that she has a secret sister, three years

younger. “I had an affair with a cocktail waitress in Kansas. I thought she was 18.

Your mom doesn’t know.” Cathy wants to jump from the speeding car, but the doors

are locked.

 

Back home and devastated, she cannot look at her mother. Within weeks, Cathy

lands a scholarship to UNLV. By this time, The Comic’s Wife has at last come to

adore and even bond with her daughter, however, it’s too late. Cathy must leave.

O’HARE AIRPORT, 1970: At the gate with Cathy, Dink suggests they take his old

flame to dinner when he visits Vegas. Cathy won’t have it. Summoning newfound

maturity, Cathy finally slaps him down. “No, Dad. You’ve been doing this to me my

whole life. I’m not your buddy. I’m your daughter. Normal fathers don’t tell their

daughters this stuff. I love you, but I’m done here.”

 

Without looking back, she boards the Pan Am jet for Las Vegas. The Comic stands at

the terminal window and watches her plane taxi down the runway as she embarks

on an entirely new life.

 

For what do we live,
but to make sport for our neighbors
and laugh at them in our turn?
—Jane Austen

Throughout my formative years, no two neighbors stand out more than Dotty and Irmgard, whom I have labeled The Bad and the Beautiful. Both women were opposites in every way. Dotty, the “bad,” was a sociopath, who tried to stab me, and Irmgard, the “beautiful,” was a sweet, mild-mannered German immigrant who baked jelly donuts and had clean, but hairy armpits.
***
When I was around nine years old, we moved into a two-story apartment building in Park Ridge, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. It was situated on Northwest Highway, one-half mile from Maine East Township High School.

Dorothy, our landlady, was basically Cruella Deville on steroids. She and her husband lived downstairs with their two young children, whom Dorothy beat regularly with the metal end of a belt buckle. I observed the violence regularly. I watched her chase the kids down a long hall, and slash their flesh. Dorothy’s violent insanity appeared to be arbitrary because the children BEHAVED. In retrospect, she probably drank.

About five foot, ten inches tall, with dyed jet black, unruly hair and old, crusty makeup smeared under her eyes, “Dotty” hunted her children outside on the sidewalks like a neighborhood madwoman, usually wearing a sheer negligee. This woman’s regular costume was the pastel negligee – She even served cookies and milk in that nightgown and had no qualms about answering the door in that manner. More importantly, Dotty locked her two kids OUTSIDE, in sub-zero, Chicago temperatures with no provisions. On many occasion, my mother gave those kids food and brought them in out of the freezing cold. Looking back, The Comic’s Wife probably saved their lives.

When we moved into their building, Dorothy and her husband neglected to mention one little caveat: They were selling the apartment building BUT kept the impending sale a secret. In order to collect some money, they rented it to my parents under false pretenses. Dotty and her husband wanted stream income for a few months – once the two-story sold, the Freeman’s were supposed to move…again. The Comic and his wife didn’t like this one little bit and retained an attorney. In addition, we eventually found out that the couple upstairs, (of Polish descent), were bigots! They did not like Jews. Too late.

Without realizing it, the Polish anti-Semites rented their upstairs apartment to German/Ashkenazi Jews. Uh oh. Not good. Secretly, stealthily, living upstairs. The awful truth surfaced one day when Dorothy, and her extraordinarily unattractive, husband, Adolph, were sitting in our kitchen, drinking coffee. This was before things went “south” over the rent issue. Dorothy’s husband, who owned a tavern downtown, said something like “Those damn Jews” and he did so with a sneer. It was my first experience of discrimination – Of being a shameful, persecuted minority. As “those damn Jews” sunk in, an awkward moment ensued as I observed furtive glances shoot back and forth between my parents, almost like cartoon bubbles above their heads.

 

Helen’s bubble: “Oh shit.”
Dink’s bubble: “Oh, this could be fun.”
Helen’s bubble: “NO! Don’t.”
Dink’s bubble: “Oh come on, Helen…Get a sense of humor.”
Helen’s bubble: “Don’t! “Dink! I’m telling you…”
My mother’s last bubble: “DON’T”….

Her tone – her familiarly arched eyebrow. They both lit cigarettes. She, a Marlboro. He, a Pall Mall. Smoke billowed, as I watch with baited breath. The Comic wanted DESPERATELY to cause trouble and say something funny and awful. My mother continued giving him wifely warning glances, urging him to behave. Dink liked to dick around with ignorant people. He called it “putting them on”. It was a very British concept: “putting people on.” It meant kidding them in a way that’s confusing, passive but highly amusing to the individual doing the “putting on”. That particular day, my mother didn’t really give him a chance to do that. That day in the kitchen, my mother managed to quell The Comic’s comic impulses. She won. It was one of the rare occasions when Dink kept his mouth shut. It didn’t matter much because, within a month, World War III broke out over the rent and moving. To make matters more awkward, the Polish couple found out that the family upstairs were purebred YIDS.

One day, Dorothy scared the absolute crap out of me. She chased me up two flights of stairs with a butcher knife. With our families feuding like the Hatfields and the McCoy’s, Dorothy went insane when she saw me playing with her two children after school. Unfortunately for me, a shiny butcher knife was in her hand when she saw the “Jew girl” laughing with her children. With cutlery in hand, the outraged Slavic landlady came flying towards me, as I went AIRBORNE, and flew up those stairs. As Dorothy yelled, her one arm poised with the knife, like the shower scene in Psycho.
I yelled for my mother to open the fucking door. I was nine. “MOM, MOM. Open up. She’s got a knife. MOM. MOM”.

I had clearly seen what Dorothy could do with a belt buckle. I could only imagine what she was capable of with a knife. Our kitchen door flew open and I fell to the linoleum floor panting. Mom slammed it shut in Dorothy’s ravaged face. I heaved and hyperventilated while my mother called the police. Sirens blazed quickly and the cops showed up. They took her away and booked her. As usual, my mother was annoyed and my dad was out of town. On advice, we got a restraining order and moved within weeks. Like many bizarre incidences in my life, it was never discussed. I was left to assume that this kind of drama and violence was, well…. sort of normal.

A few days after the butcher knife incident, The Comic arrived at O’Hare airport from a club date in Ohio. When Dink gave the cab driver our address in Park Ridge, the cabby turned around and smiled broadly at my father. Showing some stained yellow teeth (according to my father), the driver said, “Ohhhh…you goin’ to Dotty’s place?” And then he winked.
Years later, Dorothy got killed in a tavern brawl.

Incredibly, Dorothy, our violent and insane landlady, inspired me to write. I suspect that writing emerged as a coping mechanism, much like art therapy provides emotional expression. It helps troubled children illustrate the inexpressible. At such a tender age, I tried to do the same – I tried to make sense of what evil I had experienced up close and personal. After the butcher knife “incident”, I sat at our dining room table on a cushion and cranked out dialogue on a Smith-Corona typewriter. And so it came to pass that Dotty, the drunken, violent, racist slut inspired me to become a writer.

***
Our next landlady, just down the street on Northwest Highway, inspired me to BAKE. Irmgard was a gentle, very plain German immigrant who was very clean but did not shave her legs, or armpits. Helmet, Irmgard’s serious husband, liked it that way. Body hair aside, she was easily forgiven because every Sunday morning, Irmgard made jelly donuts from scratch and delivered them to our door.

Our new German landlords were the polar opposite of Dorothy and her husband, Hitler. Irmgard and Helmut were sweet, gentle and quiet. Each and every Sunday in fact, our entire building smelled like a bakery. Unbelievable smells wafted into our apartment while 40 German immigrants piled into the upstairs apartment for celebration. I don’t know what they celebrated, but it happened weekly.

As her English improved, Irmgard became a welcome regular in our kitchen, along with their 3-year old daughter, Birgit. I played with Birgit, but I never understood a word she said. Birgit had the uncanny ability to speak in both German and English at the same time, making interpretation impossible. And she spoke fast – like in double time. Whenever we played, I simply nodded over and over, pretended to understand, but I did not grok a word she said. Nevertheless, Birgit was a sweet little girl, just like her mother. Pretending to understand Birgit is probably where I developed calcium deposits in my neck.

Within three months of our family moving into the new building, Irmgard began shaving her legs and armpits. Helmut became furious over the Americanization of his wife and stopped speaking to my mother. It was tense, but the donuts kept coming. By the time we moved to St. Louis, all hell had broken loose. Irmgard began wearing lipstick and mascara. Helmut thought my mother was the devil.