“He’d be all right if we could get him to tone down his material.”
The chairman of the committee looked around and said, “I’ll tell you what’s great about him, fellows. He’s in New York City and he can be here in an hour. The goddamned dinner is tonight!”
That was how the committee selected Toby Temple.
As Toby looked around the crowded banquet hall, he thought to himself that if a bomb were dropped here tonight, the federal government of the United States would be leaderless.
The President was seated in the center of the speakers’ table on the dais. Half a dozen Secret Service men stood behind him. In the last-minute rush of putting everything together, no one had remembered to introduce Toby to the President, but Toby did not mind. The President will remember me, Toby thought. He recalled his meeting with Downey, the chairman of the dinner committee. Downey had said, “We love your humor, Toby. You’re very funny when you attack people. However—” He had paused to clear his throat. “This is—er—a sensitive group here tonight. Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that they can’t take a little joke on themselves, but everything said in this room tonight is going to be reported by the news media all over the world. Naturally, none of us wants anything said that would hold the President of the United States or members of Congress up to ridicule. In other words, we want you to be funny, but we don’t want you to get anyone mad.”
“Trust me.” Toby had smiled.
The dinner plates were being cleared and Downey was standing in front of the microphone. “Mr. President, honored guests, it’s my pleasure to introduce to you our master of ceremonies, one of our brightest young comedians, Mr. Toby Temple!”
There was polite applause as Toby rose to his feet and walked over to the microphone. He looked out at the audience, then turned to the President of the United States.
The President was a simple, homespun man. He did not believe in what he called top-hat diplomacy. “People to people,” he had said in a nationwide speech, “that’s what we need. We’ve got to quit depending on computers and start trusting our instincts again. When I sit down with the heads of foreign powers, I like to negotiate by the seat of my pants.” It had become a popular phrase.
Now Toby looked at the President of the United States and said, his voice choked with pride, “Mr. President, I cannot tell you what a thrill it is for me to be up here on the same podium with the man who has the whole world wired to his ass.”
There was a shocked hush for a long moment, then the President grinned, guffawed, and the audience suddenly exploded with laughter and applause. From that moment on, Toby could do no wrong. He attacked the senators in the room, the Supreme Court, the press. They adored it. They screamed and howled, because they knew Toby did not really mean a word of what he said. It was excruciatingly funny to hear these insults coming from that boyish, innocent face. There were foreign ministers there that night. Toby addressed them in a double-talk version of their own languages that sounded so real that they were nodding in agreement. He was an idiot-savant, reeling off patter that praised them, berated them, and the meaning of his wild gibberish was so clear that every person in the room understood what Toby was saying.
He received a standing ovation. The President walked over to Toby and said, “That was brilliant, absolutely brilliant. We’re giving a little supper at the White House Monday night, Toby, and I’d be delighted…”
The following day, all the newspapers wrote about Toby Temple’s triumph. His remarks were quoted everywhere. He was asked to entertain at the White House. There, he was an even bigger sensation. Important offers began pouring in from all over the world. Toby played the Palladium in London, he gave a command performance for the Queen, he was asked to conduct symphony orchestras for charity and to serve on the National Arts Committee. He played golf with the President frequently and was invited to dinner at the White House again and again. Toby met legislators and governors and the heads of America’s largest corporations. He insulted them all, and the more he attacked them, the more charmed they were. They adored having Toby around, turning his acerbic wit loose on their guests. Toby’s friendship became a symbol of prestige among the Brahmins.