Daddy Issues
Tiffany has issues on both sides of the parental divide. Her mother declines into mental illness following a horrific car accident, but the deal with her father springs forth from his guilt at simply not being very good at the job:
“Your goodness holds up a mirror to his ugliness, and that is too painful for him, so he has to project this onto you, by saying you make him feel less about himself.”
Vernacular
Tiffany is now regarded as an author as well as stand-up comedian and actress. Technically, of course, this is true: she did put words down on paper and that qualifies as authorship. This book is obviously directed toward her fans and as such, the demands of authorship are not raised to the level of scholarly academic writing. The vernacular rules even in the construction of metaphor and if you are not down with it, blame only yourself and don’t shoot the messenger:
“That man hadn’t wanted to dance at first, and I made him, and then I booty popped him . . . and now he’s dead! I just felt like a booty assassin.”
Stand-Up
The author turns to a number of different metaphorical imagery to discuss the processes of standing up alone on a stage and trying to make people laugh. The whole concept of being a stand-up comedian provides a rich vein of figurative language to mine and at one point extracts a highly poetic nugget:
“You start learning and it’s like playing a piano. You just know exactly what keys to stroke, ’cause really with comedy, you’re like fiddling with people’s souls. You resonate on the same frequency as them, trying to get them to relate.”
Strange Prescriptions
Tiffany mentions smoking marijuana and then immediately launches into a defense with claims that it is a prescription for back pain. This justification is then immediately called into question through a quick little fantasy she had concerning an upcoming tour. Not sure how the back pain and the fantasy are connected, but it does make for an enjoyable metaphorical fantasia:
“Oh man, this swamp tour’s gonna be so cool, I’mma smoke this weed and the alligators gonna be talking to me, the birds gonna be singing, the raccoons gonna be waving at me and stuff, it’s gonna be like I’m in a Disney movie, it’s gonna be great."
The Entertainment Industry is Weird
One thing that the reader will definitely learn from this memoir is that the entertainment industry is a very weird place to work. Meaning that there are some very odd jobs down in the lower depths below the arena of employment that brings one fame:
“I became an `energy producer’ at Bar Mitzvahs. Energy producer is what white suburban people call a `hype man.’ I was basically the Flava Flav of Bar Mitzvahs.”
