Chapter from "The Yellow Paint Chip" - Amazon link 

This memory comes back to me like looking into a snow globe where you shake it to get the snow swirling around and it's a delightful effect that just doesn't seem to last long enough.

On many nights we would hang outside the Improv waiting for something to happen or more often than not try to make something happen. This night there was a celebrity headliner performing so we couldn't hang out inside because Budd had locked down the Improv for paying customers only and we most assuredly did not fit that criterion. But that didn't matter as there were always people waiting in line to get into the next show so we could count on having a ready audience for our shenanigans. 

You probably never heard of Slow Mo Kung Fu but if you had visited any of the comedy clubs in NYC back in the seventies and were lucky enough to see Overton and Sullivan perform you might have caught a particular bit called Kung Fu and You.

Basically the premise was a Kung Fu demonstration, part of which was performed in Slow Motion and the two of them would fight with kicks, strikes, and throws at less than half the speed of an actual Kung Fu demonstration which was very physically demanding but it made for some really great visual comedy.

So this one evening Roger and I were fooling around in front of the Improv doing some Slow Mo Kung Fu and also some not so Slow Mo Kung Fu. We were switching it back and forth from slow to fast and one of the things I did during fast Kung Fu was to add sound effects with my mouth when I moved my hands. Like a fast swishing sound as my hands would fly about in what I perceived to be authentic Kung Fu moves. And during one energetic bout between Roger and I a woman in line exclaimed out loud "Wow, you can hear his hands!"

Roger and I stopped dead in place and looked at each other with surprise as this was what we lived for. This moment was golden because we had transcended the boundaries of the real world and entered into another realm. My simple vocal pantomime had been interpreted as a real world sound. We were both smiling like idiots as we stepped up our Fast Kung Fu as he too added sound effects to his moves and we danced around wildly hoping to impress even more people and then the Improv door opened.

Have you ever slid down a hill in the snow on a piece of cardboard because you didn't have access to a sled and just reveled in the sheer madness of it all and not caring if you fall off or hit  something on the way down because it's the journey that matters and not knowing the outcome is worth the risk. 

Well that is what happened next...

Out of the Improv's door at the very moment Roger and I had stepped up our game came the headliner for that evening, Andy Kaufman along with his entourage. Andy was never one to shy away from interacting with anyone for any reason and this night was no different as he saw Roger and I going at it and he quickly approached me in his Tony Clifton persona and right away started some shit. We both immediately started tossing words at each other and because I was still high on what that woman had commented about the sound my hands made so I was amped up.

Andy and I started to throw hands (and yes I was still adding sound effects) and I could see Andy's eyes light up when he heard me and we both went mental.

Roger grabbed me from behind and someone from Andy's group grabbed him as we both started swinging in earnest. As they were trying to pull us apart no one noticed that it wasn't punches we were trading but slappy slaps while we were still trading loud shouts and threats of imminent death and destruction. All around us people were reacting including the ones waiting in line at the Improv's door. People were aghast (always wanted to use that word in its proper context and I think I nailed it here) and they started to surround us when someone from Andy's group pulled him into the backseat of a car and they sped off. 

It was all I could do to not laugh and break the spell while everybody who was watching were still in shock. Roger finally let me go but he was really freaked out until he saw me laughing behind my hands. "Gee Dykes I thought you were trying to kill Andy Kaufman"

Like a sleigh ride, Andy and I both saw the moment and we climbed on that cardboard for the ride and it was great!

One of the more obscure things I remember from that night was when we got slap happy, I could smell his hands. His hands smelled like Ivory soap.