Ray Romano

By Joel Stein

Ray Romano, star of Everybody Loves Raymond, plays Carnegie Hall Wednesday in the Toyota Comedy Festival.

Q: You were in college for seven years and didn't graduate. Let me take a guess here: marijuana?

A: No. Actually, pinball. I would get my student loans, get money, register and never really go. It was a system I thought would somehow pan out.

Q: You went to high school with Fran Drescher. You must have been happy when you graduated, thinking you'd never have to see her again.

A: We had like 600 kids in our graduating class, so I never met her.

Q: You must have heard about her.

A: I heard her. Every time I thought there was a fire drill, it was her.

Q: You got fired from News Radio before it ever aired.

A: The second day of rehearsal my manager called me and said, "They decided to go in another direction." I said, "Tell me what direction. I'll meet them there."

Q: Your first season, you were 93rd in the ratings. Yet you continued to call the show Everybody Loves Raymond.

A: [CBS president] Les Moonves promised if the show made the Top 15, I could change the name. Now it's too late.

Q: What would you change it to? That Ray, He's All Right?

A: I would just add, Everybody Loves Raymond, Except Himself.

Q: Hey, buddy, I don't love you. How does that feel?

A: Good. You've got to understand that as a comic you have low self-esteem anyway. I don't like when things are going well. Like, you're just doing this because somebody canceled, right?

Q: No. We've been working on the Romano interview for two years now.

A: Yeah. What happened? Charles Grodin pulled out?

Q: I've actually already done Charles Grodin.

--By Joel Stein