Buzz
On Friday, February 20, 1981, Andy Kaufman settled into a staged restaurant scene, read his lines, paused, and then suddenly snapped out of character. 'I feel really stupid,' he admitted.
The other actors—among them future Seinfeld star Michael Richards—were clearly bewildered, while the audience reacted loudly. On live television, Kaufman boldly declared that he found the sketch (involving two stoned couples at a restaurant) to be utterly weak and pointless. Richards rushed off-camera to retrieve cue cards, which he threw onto Kaufman’s lap. In response, Kaufman threw water at him. Someone threw butter. The crew had to physically separate the actors. The following day, newspapers nationwide were asking whether Andy Kaufman had truly lost his mind.
The show was Fridays, ABC’s attempt to capture the unrestrained spirit of NBC’s Saturday Night Live. Debuting on April 11, 1980, it struggled to gain viewership, airing only a handful of episodes due to conservative network orders for six or 13 episodes at a time. Executive producer John Moffitt later said that Kaufman’s controversial stunt likely earned the show an entire extra season.
Kaufman was aware that the series was struggling, so he assumed that Moffitt would be open to his unique comedic style. In his stand-up, Kaufman often took on the role of an antagonist, deliberately challenging the audience rather than winning their favor: Many comedy club-goers showed up only to watch Kaufman snooze in a sleeping bag or solemnly read from The Great Gatsby, threatening to start from the beginning if anyone dared interrupt. On one occasion, Kaufman gave a nightclub audience a choice: the book or a record. They opted for the record. It turned out to be a recording of Kaufman reading the book.
Kaufman’s avant-garde humor was not universally appreciated. After several appearances on Saturday Night Live, NBC executive Dick Ebersol grew frustrated with Kaufman’s provocative antics, dismissed him as 'not funny,' and effectively banned him from the show. Fridays, however, welcomed Kaufman as an established SNL personality, allowing him to do whatever he pleased.
After persuading Moffitt to let him and his partner Bob Zmuda perform a sword-swallowing stunt in the opening that would go 'wrong'—with Zmuda coughing up blood before the show cut to a commercial—Kaufman then informed Moffitt that he planned to break character during the show’s final sketch. Cast members Richards, Melanie Chartoff, and Maryedith Burrell were aware of Kaufman’s intentions; the crew was not. (There is some debate as to whether ABC had given approval: Richards says no, while Moffitt insists that they had to go through the network’s standards and practices.)
After the Fridays episode aired, ABC was inundated with inquiries asking whether the whole thing had been a joke. To Kaufman’s probable displeasure, a network spokesperson told the Associated Press that it had all been staged. A week later, a remorseful and tearful Kaufman appeared on the show to 'apologize' for his actions, putting on what Zmuda later described as his signature vacant, hostage-like expression.
'This has been a very hard week for me,' Kaufman confessed. He admitted that his role as Latka on Taxi was now jeopardized, and the altercation had 'resulted in a separation from my wife.' (In reality, Kaufman was not married.) While some in the audience recognized Kaufman’s antics as deliberate provocation, others likely wondered if he had completely lost his sanity. His parents, who had once taken him to counseling as a child, might have renewed their concerns about his mental state.
Fridays only lasted another year, moving to a later time slot due to the success of ABC’s Nightline. Kaufman continued to baffle audiences until his untimely death from lung cancer at the age of 35 in 1984. He never fully admitted that the altercation was staged. In a 1981 interview with People, he accused ABC of covering up the truth and denied that the incident had been planned. 'I like the kind of humor where nobody knows what’s going on,' Kaufman explained. 'I just want real reactions.'
Six months after the incident, Kaufman returned to Fridays for one final appearance, declaring that he had become a born-again Christian. Kaufman, however, was Jewish.
