Bill Hicks, the black-humored articulator of doubt

When the show ended, I asked the manager if I could speak to Bill. He burst out of the backstage room and came over to where I was sitting, very focused, intense but friendly. We talked about his change in management, and his newest album-in-progress, "Arizona Bay." He thanked me for introducing him to Magnuson, and said he was looking forward to working with him. Over his shoulder I spied the tape recorder.

Hicks had always been obsessed with recording his work. Leaving a legacy was very important to him. But there was another reason for taping all the shows. A month earlier, doctors had diagnosed him with pancreatic cancer. It had already spread to his liver. In most cases, it was quick and fatal. At this point he hadn't told even close friends. That was the last time I saw him.

In the coming weeks, Magnuson talked to Hicks frequently, and kept me updated. Publishers offered book deals. The Nation invited him to contribute. He envisioned a live performance film of his "Rant in E Minor" material, shot in San Francisco, filmed in black and white. Hicks called Magnuson and asked him to do the film. Magnuson was amazed. First he got to work with Lenny Bruce, and now Hicks. As the two discussed the project, Hicks didn't seem at all to Magnuson like the kind of guy who had been told he was going to die.

In October, Hicks was scheduled to be a guest on Letterman, his 12th appearance. I was feeling out of the loop, juggling a magazine and a column, and made it a point to stay home to watch. This was Letterman's new CBS persona, tassle-loafered and double-breasted, no more sweaters and Adidas sneakers. He introduced Hicks at the top of the show, guests came on, I saw another comedian I'd never heard of, and then the program ended. I thought, was I drunk? What happened? Hicks' entire segment had been cut at the last minute.

The censorship made national news, and ended up the centerpiece of a New Yorker profile by John Lahr. In the article, Lahr referred to a letter Hicks had written to him, a 40-page explanation of the Letterman circumstances and a script of the jokes in question. Hicks also sent a copy to Magnuson, who passed a version to me. It's an impressive and heartfelt document, a first draft written longhand. The Letterman staff, especially producer Robert Morton, come off as complete hypocrites, first approving Hicks' material, then deciding at the last minute to scrap the entire segment, and blaming it on the network. Hicks admitted to Lahr that because of the Letterman incident, his awareness of the industry had changed: "I began working quite young, writing, growing, maturing, always striving to top myself -- to make people laugh hard at things they know and believe deep in their hearts to be true," he wrote. "It has been a long road, let me tell you, but after sixteen years of constant performing up until this little incident on October 1, 1993, the cold realization finally struck me. A sobering answer to the wish of that young boy I once was back in Houston, Texas, all excited with the idea that 'if they like these guys, then they're going to love me.' The realization was -- they don't want me, nor my kind. Just look at 90 percent of television programming. Banal, puerile, trite scat. And this is what they want, for they hold the masses -- the herd -- in such contempt."

With the ensuing media coverage, people were finally talking about Hicks. Because I'd written about him, I answered my share of "so what's he like?" questions. One day Magnuson invited me over to his apartment, and we watched the "Revelations" TV special Hicks had shot in London the year before, taped at the 2,000-seat Dominion Theatre. Hicks was introduced with loud Jimi Hendrix music, and walked onstage through a circle of flames, wearing a black, floor-length duster coat and cowboy hat. I thought the opening was cheesy, the cliché Wild West theme, with coyotes howling in the background, but Hicks immediately took off the hat and coat, and did his material. The Brits ate it up, the naughty American making jokes about the "United States of Advertising." Bits that had gotten a cool reception in a U.S. comedy club were understood in the nation that invented wit. Maybe this was Hicks' destiny, the direction he was heading -- a rock and roll theater act, with a smart audience instead of drunk tourists at a club.

Toward the end of the year, Hicks' management sent me another package of materials. A press release described projects in the works. Besides the book and magazine offers, he was nominated for an American Comedy Award. HBO was planning to air the "Revelations" show. Channel 4 in the U.K. had signed him to do a new program. The package also included a home videotape of Hicks performing at Igby's, a Los Angeles club, in November 1993.

This would be one of his last-ever performances, and it was a memorable one -- onstage for over an hour, a cavalcade of what he called the "comedy of hate." The audience was with him all the way, cheering even through a perverse scenario of Rush Limbaugh lying in a bathtub, with Reagan and Bush peeing on him, and Barbara Bush defecating into his mouth. At the end of the show, Hicks played Rage Against the Machine, singing along with the chorus, "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me!"

I've screened this video to friends over the years, and the reaction is chilling. Comedians in particular stare at the screen like they've seen a ghost. It isn't the Bill Hicks they remembered, performed with, opened up for, introduced to the stage. No trademark black shirt and jeans. He was frighteningly skinny, wore a patchy beard, tweed sport coat and saggy khakis. Three months away from dying, and he was going for it, still in the saddle, riding the horse all the way down. The performance was sharp as a tack.

Next Page: A new television show Hicks would host, called "Let's Hunt and Kill Billy Ray Cyrus"

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