The Guy Who Made Joan Rivers Laugh

There were two essential lessons that Larry Amoros, the script supervisor for Joan, learned when he became the go-to joke writer and ghostwriter for the legendary Joan Rivers.

The first: there was no line that couldn’t be crossed. Nothing was off-limits, a lesson Amoros learned backstage at the “Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.”

“I was one of the writers and Joan was one of the presenters and she said she needed a writer to work with. They put us in a room together and we just hit it off because I had the same sensibility she did,” Amoros said. “The first thing she said to me is ‘What makes you laugh?’ And I said ‘The folly of the Holocaust.’

Rivers must have immediately recognized they share the same sense of humor.

“She said, ‘Give me your phone number,’” Amoros said.

The second lesson? There were no sacred cows. Amoros learned this backstage at Royal Albert Hall in London. Rivers was about to go on in front of a sold-out audience for a performance that would be televised throughout the United Kingdom. That’s when Amoros’ phone pinged with the news the singer Adele had just given birth to her first child.

“Where’s the joke?” Rivers immediately asked him.

Without missing a beat, Amoros fired off, “Adele just gave birth to a healthy baby boy. He was 64 pounds, 12 ounces.”

Rivers laughed, walked on stage—and opened with Amoros’ joke.

“You don’t go in front of a sold-out audience and television cameras with a joke you haven’t tested out at a club beforehand,” Amoros said. “She knew the joke would work and she knew the joke would work as an opener.”

It’s that kind of inside knowledge that made Amoros a perfect contributor to Joan. Written by Daniel Goldstein and directed by David Ivers, Joan runs through Nov. 24 on the Julianne Argyros Stage.

Amoros describes the script supervisor position as “the punch-up guy.” He punches up the jokes and makes them funnier—not exactly a reach for the guy who wrote many of the jokes in the first place. But Amoros’ duties cover a more crucial role. Along with Melissa Rivers, Joan’s daughter, he ensures that everything in Goldstein’s script comes through in Joan Rivers’ voice.

To do that, Amoros worked with Goldstein and Melissa Rivers, bouncing lines off each other to ensure the “Essence of Joan” came through.

“Melissa is funnier in a more sardonic way than her mother, but she’s a great bouncer as well and very funny,” Amoros said. “This is reflected in Daniel’s play. As a writer, he is so great and easy to collaborate with. A lot of writers are territorial, but Daniel has the mindset that it doesn’t matter how we get there, let’s just get there. He is beyond talented.”

How Amoros got here started at SUNY Buffalo, where he quickly understood that his “only real skill was writing.” He joined a friend in a comedy writing class at the same time he learned that Joan Rivers was buying jokes from writers.

This led to a stand-up career, which taught Amoros that the stand-up life looks a lot better on TV. He went back to writing, starting a career that included a decade-long run writing for ESPN’s “ESPY Awards,” “The NASCAR” Awards” and “The NHL Awards.” It also included writing stints on “The Joy Behar Show,” The Rosie O’Donnell Show,” “The Nanny,” and Barry Manilow’s Emmy Award-winning PBS special, “Music & Passion.”

But it was Amoros’ partnering with Joan and Melissa Rivers that produced some of his most recognized work. They put three books on The New York Times Best Seller List: I Hate Everyone Starting With Me, and Diary of a Mad Diva, both with Joan Rivers, and The Book of Joan: Tales of Mirth, Mischief and Manipulation, with Melissa Rivers. Diary of a Mad Diva earned Joan Rivers a posthumous 2015 Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word album.

He and Melissa Rivers recently collaborated on Lies My Mother Told Me, and Amoros said he and Joan Rivers were working on a third book together and a revival of her play Sally Marr … and her Escorts when she passed in 2014.

“I became part of her tribe, and I’d spend Thanksgiving and Jewish holidays at her home or Melissa’s home. I spent Christmas holidays with them on vacation,” Amoros wistfully remembered. “When you saw Joan perform, it was a character. But in real life, she was the kindest, most generous person I ever met. If she met you today, the first thing she’d say is, ‘Are you hungry?’ She wouldn’t prepare the food; she’d have her staff prepare it.”

“She was one of the nicest human beings I ever met.”

That friendship and his versatile writing skills made Amoros an invaluable source for Joan.

 “As Daniel wrote this play, it was great. It was funny, touching and honest. It really speaks to a mother/daughter relationship. At its heart, it’s a relationship story.”