Monday, May. 10, 1999
Vicki Lewis
By Joel Stein
Vicki Lewis is on NBC's NewsRadio and in the film Pushing Tin.
Q: Do you know what I do for a living?
A: All I know is, people tell me to be scared.
Q: Am I as scary as you hoped?
A: No. I thought you'd be weaselly, little, scrawny, darty.
Q: I'm pretty darty.
A: You're darty. But you're handsome.
Q: See, now I'll skip the questions. I got the quote I need. But O.K., do you feel a lot of rivalry with the wacky redhead on Suddenly Susan?
A: I do find it coincidental that I was on the air for a year and a half, and my real name is Vicki, and there appeared a character named Vicki dressed like my twin on a new show. They basically copied our set, and there's all the characters with their names different.
Q: Have you thought about a tug-of-war or bowling or some kind of challenge?
A: Here's a bigger word: suing.
Q: Aren't you secretly hoping they cancel NewsRadio and put it out of its misery?
A: I have two thoughts on that. One: yeah. And the other one is that this is the last year of our contract, and it's a chance for us to finally make some money: $60,000 to $70,000 an episode.
Q: Come on. You've got money.
A: I've sold out a lot. I did a commercial for Miller beer, which they never aired.
Q: I want to know how much you got, because Rick Reilly of SPORTS ILLUSTRATED did one of those.
A: I don't know how much everyone else made. I made $350,000.
Q: Who do you play on The Downtowners, the upcoming prime-time cartoon?
A: I play two characters: a fun character and an urban Jewish mom.
Q: Like my mom.
A: Are you Jewish? You don't seem Jewish. Did you have a nose job?
Q: I don't seem Jewish? My name is Joel Stein. Would "Menachem Schneerson" give it away?
--By Joel Stein