They All Became Famous Except Us: Good Times Comedy Club

By Rico Guerriero and Dorothy Guerriero

About well-known performers starting from audition nights to well-known performers: Jerry Seinfeld, Brad Garrett, Chazz Palminteri, Andrew “Dice” Clay, Yakov Smirnoff, George Wallace, Gilbert Gottfried, and singers Pat Benatar and Laurie Beechman.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jul 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9781662420252

Book preview

The Beginning

Let’s start from the beginning. Rick Newman, Danny Fierstein, and I, Americo Guerriero, were childhood friends growing up in the Bronx. We were two Jewish boys and an Italian. Danny found a little bar and grill on the corner of Thirty-first Street and Third Avenue; Danny had asked Rick if he wanted to become partners and of course, he said yes! Bars in the sixties were saloon-types, where the husband would stop off before going home and have a shot or two. The price back then was forty-five cents a shot. These gin mills, as they were called, were eventually converted to pubs by the younger generation. Danny paid a whopping nine grand, money which neither of them could afford, not even a measly down payment. Most buying saloons in those days received their down payment from jukebox companies for the placement of their jukebox in your location. The loan was paid off by the revenue received from folks putting a quarter inside the slot to hear their favorite song. The loan seemed to take forever to pay off.

They named their venue The Clan. Danny took credit for coming up with the name. It had parking next door which was free after six o’clock. A bar with free parking next door was unheard of in the city. During that time, no one went below Forty-Second Street or above Eighty-Sixth Street. When asked where The Clan was located, you would reply with Thirty-First Street. People would say, What the hell are you doing down there?

At the time, I was selling liquor and also running dances on Friday nights at a place called La Vie, which was located on First Avenue. Friday nights at La Vie became so popular that Dorothy Kilgallen came down to see what all the fuss was about. Little did I know, during the rest of the week, it was home to hookers and their Johns. In Ms. Kilgallen’s column she wrote, The attraction was for the oldest profession in the world.

Most of my crowd went up to Pine Hill Lodge, which was a singles resort in New Jersey on the weekends. However, during the summer, The Clan was frequented, especially during the week. The crowd consisted of single guys and girls from the five boroughs. The Brooklyn crowd stood in the back as the Manhattan crowd stood in the front. The rest were spread throughout the middle. Police also frequented The Clan. We got along with most of them. When I came in, I would give everyone a little hug. One cop even asked if I was frisking him. Unbeknownst to me, I might have! One night, I walked