Sometimes you hear horror stories about the time that people met celebrities and how they were nothing like they are on TV or in movies. Bob Saget is the absolute opposite of that…
In 2006, I was a new comedian, teaching special ed by day and then pounding the open mic circuit in Seattle by night. One of the highlights of my week was getting to take the comedian headlining Giggles Comedy Club to their radio appearances. I always loved it when really big comedians came into town because that meant that I got to go to a radio station. Sometimes I even got to be on the air with the comedians. Looking back now, those were some of the best mornings of my life, getting up early and hanging out with legendary comedians and then going to teach elementary school kids.
My weekend with Bob Saget was one that I will never forget. I was of course excited when I got the nod to be the opening act for him when he was headlining the club in Seattle. Up until that point in my life, I really hadn’t ever met a famous person, let alone Danny Tanner, America’s dad. I had so many questions for him that I would be too afraid to ask, like what ever happened to Kimmy Gibler?
This is how I know that I was nervous to drive Bob Saget to his appearance on the BJ Shea Show on 99.9 KISW… I vacuumed my car the night before. You know that it’s serious when a 23yo cleans their car. I knew it was going to be a great morning when Bob Saget got into my beaten up GMC Jimmy and said “They pulled out all the stops with this one huh… I appreciate the new air freshener… We can all smell like pine tree today.” I am sure I over laughed and also stuttered an incoherent attempt at comedy.
The thing that I will never get to thank Bob Saget for is how much of a real human he was to every one that he came in contact with. When we stopped at Starbucks to buy coffee, he insisted in going in and took pictures with everyone in the coffee shop who were all stunned to see “America’s Dad.” He even paid for coffee for anybody who told him that he was the hottest guy on Full House and to laughingly denounce Uncle Jessie. He was comfortable with owning the character that people knew him for and that was magical to see.
When we for to the BJ Shea show, I of course like always tried to blend into the wall around all of these famous people in media… Bob was having none of of that. His first statement to BJ Shay was to ask me what cologne we were wearing since we both smelled like Pep Boys Pine trees.
He will never know this, but that moment sold me on radio.
Our weekend didn’t stop there. He was of course awesome to all of the comedians and the club and hilarious on stage. If you don’t know Bob’s style of comedy, it is vulgar and flies in the face of his Danny Tanner character in an offensive yet endearing manner. The wonder of Bob on stage was that we were all in on the joke… This was how all amazing parents want to be and are in their private moments… Raging against the Olson twins.
I watched every show that weekend and almost crashed my blackberry recording his Saturday early show on my phone camera. I uploaded a clip below and as you can imagine from 2006, the camera quality on the Blackberry wasn’t exactly HD.
After the late show, all of the comics were sitting in the Giggles bar, as we did to hope to get one more hang out with the celebrity playing the club before they went back to their Hollywood lives and we went back to our day jobs until the next Thursday show at the comedy club.
Bob came out and announced… “Alright… Who is in for IHOP next to my hotel?!?!?!” Of course a few of us immediately text our significant others that we were about to get pancakes with Bob Saget. I still laugh at that statement. What happened the next 2 hours is hard to put into words. It was a legend in comedy making a bunch of young comics with day jobs feel like we all mattered.
I will say that again… For 2 hours in the middle of the night in the IHOP in the University District, a table full of nobodies felt famous. A table of some people who have moved onto great careers in comedy, careers in other things, parents… But a table full of people with a great story about late night IHOP with Bob Saget.
*Still shot from Brian’s Blackberry in 2006
