At The Movies

Man On The Moon'

Brought up in a Jewish household in Great Neck, Long Island, Andy Kaufman
grew up to be a brilliant performer whose light went out too soon.

Jim Carrey stars as Andy
Kaufman in Milos Forman's
`Man on the Moon." Says
Kaufman friend Bob Zmuda,
"Carrey was literally born
to play the role."

Inset: The real Andy Kaufman:
"Here I come to save the day"

ALICE BURDICK SCHWEIGER
Special to the Jewish News

S

hortly before comedic
genius Andy Kaufman
died of lung cancer on
May 16, 1984, at the age
of 35, he told friends his biggest
fear was that he wouldn't be
remembered. He needn't have wor-
ried.
This month, Man on the Moon,'
the film based on Kaufman's life
starring Jim Carrey in the title role,
opens across the country, premier-
ing in the Detroit area on Dec. 22.
The late comic and performance
artist is the subject of a Biography
feature on the A&E cable network
on Dec. 27. And two new volumes

.....

.,......

— Andy Kaufman Revealed! Best
Friend Tells All, written by Bob
Zmuda, and Lost in the Funhouse:
The Life and Mind of Andy
Kaufman, by Bill Zehme — have

hit bookstores.
"Andy would be doing flips if he
knew what was going on," says
Bob Zumda, who was Andy's clos-
est friend. "Before he died, he
asked me to write a book about
him. He was afraid he would be
remembered only as Latka on Taxi,
and I think in some ways that terrified
him even more than death."
Zmuda, portrayed by Paul Giamatti
in the film, says Andy would have
been pleased that Jim Carrey was cast
in the lead part. "Carrey was literally

tx-.
12/17
1999

96

Alice Burdick Schweiger, a former
Detroiter, is a freelance writer living in
New York.

born to play the role," says Zmuda,
who is creator of HBO's Comic Relief
telecasts.
"Jim has the same birthday as Andy
and is the biggest Andy Kaufman
fanatic in the world. He could be trav-
eling the country lecturing on
Kaufmanism."
The long-awaited film, directed by
Jewish-Czech director Milos Forman
and co-starring Danny DeVito as

Kaufman's friend and manager,
George Shapiro, and Courtney Love
as Kaufman's girlfriend Lynn
Margulies, chronicles the comic's
short, and often eccentric, life.
Featuring only a couple of scenes
from childhood, Man on the Moon
focuses on Kaufman's early days as a
stand-up comic, his leap to stardom,
obsession with professional wrestling
and the highs and lows he faced along

the way. The film's title is taken
from a ballad about Kaufman per-
formed by REM.
"The movie was shot in
sequence, which is very unusual,"
notes Zmuda. "Milos wanted all
the actors to experience Andy's life
in the order things happened. We
shot for 85 days and it was like a
psychodrama, especially at the end
when Andy is dying. For me, it was
too emotional to be on the set dur-
ing the death scenes — it was too
3,
close to home.
The film, Zumda says, portrays
Kaufman's life accurately. Born in
New York City and raised in the
affluent Jewish suburb of Great
Neck, Long Island, Kaufman was
the eldest of three children. His
father, Stanley, was in the costume
jewelry business, and his mother,
Janice, had been a model before
marrying. Janice liked to tell stories
of her baby Andy singing and
dancing to music in his crib.
Destined to be an entertainer,
Kaufman began inventing routines
during childhood — behind closed
bedroom doors = putting on
adventure shows, horror shows,
old-time movies, Howdy Doody
and cartoons, playing all the parts
himself.
In his book Lost in the Funhouse,
Bill Zehme writes: "He would break
the afternoon down into eight half-
hour shows. He would sing, dance,
play heroes and apes, judges and
defendants, villains and monsters,
damsels and dogs and cowboys." To
placate his parents, who were con-
cerned about his lonely world of make