Overture / Twenty Million People Evan Pappas

[BENJY STONE, spoken]
My name is Benjy Stone and 1954 was my favorite year. Not my best year, not the year I had the most success, but my favorite year. It's the year that separated my life into before and after. You see, in 1954 I made the jump from smart ass kid from the deli pushing a joke with every cruller, to freshman writer on TV's hottest show: The King Kaiser Comedy Cavalcade. And every Saturday night at 8 p.m. we went on the air...live!

[STAGE MANAGER, spoken]
Five minutes!

[BENJY, spoken]
God, once, just once, I wanted to sneak in and diddle the clock so we'd go on the air five minutes early; so America would see the show before the show. But back then they were a lot more careful about violence on television.

[KING KAISER]
Aargh!
I'm missing a button!

[SY BENSON]
This is crap!

[K.C. DOWNING]
Who's missing the last two pages?

[KING KAISER]
They told me the caveman sketch was out!

[ALICE MILLER]
Would somebody shoot me

[SY]
Total crap!