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The Hollywood lifestyle does not seem to have altered hard-working Joe Medeiros.
True, the 54-year-old has a close-knit relationship with Jay Leno, whose office in Burbank, Calif., is right next door. And, yes, he did put out a new CD earlier this year, finally getting the chance to showcase his musical talents to a wide audience.
But Medeiros, the head writer for "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno," still possesses an East Coast mentality that has lead to his many successes. He certainly has come a long way from selling his shtick in his spare time for as little as $2 per gag.
"It’s certainly a terrific opportunity to be with ‘The Tonight Show,’" said Medeiros, who was born at Sixth and South streets. "It’s the major league for any kind of comedy writing."
Medeiros makes countless people chuckle coast to coast, even if he comes across as a mild-mannered guy with a serious tone over the phone.
But don’t be fooled; he’s a jokester at heart.
Medeiros, for example, casually mentioned during this interview he occasionally returns to the area to "visit family and friends – not in that particular order." He followed up the statement with an almost-silent laugh under his breath.
Medeiros has had practice crafting his rib-tickling punch lines while writing material for comedians Yakov Smirnoff and the late Bob Hope. However, he admits he could never hold a full-time job as a stand-up comic.
"Comedians like the attention. They like talking about their lives, telling the joke and getting the laugh," he said. "I like writing the jokes and getting the check."
GRADUATING FROM TEMPLE University in 1973, Medeiros soon found a job with an advertising agency.
"I was interested in the media," he said. "I always wanted to be in show business, but I never wanted to leave the area because I had my family and friends here. So being in advertising was the closest thing to show business."
In the early 1980s, Medeiros decided to test the comedic waters by taking a correspondence course in joke writing at the Hollywood School of Comedy Writing.
He would wake up at 5 a.m. to write gags for the course before heading to work three hours later. He eventually started to sell his "homework," as he called it, to publications sent to disc jockeys, greeting card companies, cartoonists and the like. Each joke would sell anywhere from $2 to $10 apiece, supplying Medeiros with $400 of additional income a month.
"It was a nice hobby," he said. "It helped pay for a couple of trips to California and a computer."
But the writer craved more after doing this as a side gig for four years. He took the advice of Philadelphian Gene Perret, writer for the "Carol Burnett Show" and one-time head writer for Hope:
"In his book, he said to network with the right people, so I wrote him a letter," he said.
At Perret’s suggestion, Medeiros went to Los Angeles to join the Round Table, which was a group of aspiring comedy writers.
He later learned Leno, who was guest hosting "The Tonight Show" for Johnny Carson, was performing at the Valley Forge Music Fair. Medeiros seized the opportunity and sent Leno a packet of his material. At 12:30 a.m. in August 1988, Medeiros received the phone call of a lifetime.
"When you get a call at that time of night, you think, ‘who died?’" he said. But on the line was Leno himself, asking Medeiros to pen jokes for cash. He accepted on the spot.
If that was not enough, Medeiros soon began writing for Hope through a recommendation from Perret.
The comedic king first asked Medeiros, "How much do you want for your jokes?"
"Leno’s paying me $50 a joke," Medeiros remembers responding. "There was silence at the other end of the phone. I didn’t know if [Hope] was going to pay me $75 and I offered less or $25 and I offered $50."
Hope did match Leno’s price.
The basis for Medeiros’ jokes came partly from news headlines. Noticing a story about the ancient Syrians who had beer goddesses, he came up with the joke, "Well, she actually wasn’t a beer goddess, but after a few beers she looked like a goddess."
In December 1988, he was a full-time NBC employee cracking wise for Leno, but still working from his house in Glenside, Montgomery County. Once Carson decided to retire from the show in 1992, Leno took the position – forcing Medeiros to make a decision.
Joking aside, he said "it was an opportunity of a lifetime, but boy was it hard. I was 41. I only lived in Philadelphia. My parents were both ill, my kids were young and we had a house that we liked. It was really an emotionally charged time. You really don’t know how much you miss a place until you leave it."
But leave he did and his family, which includes wife Justine (nee Mestichelli) and children Justin, 25, and Julie, 19, somehow acclimated to their new setting, he said. However, he still can’t seem to find a decent cheesesteak on the West Coast.
Medeiros’ day is relatively "nine to five." He is partly responsible for shooting and editing "production bits" out in the field, which includes the show’s famous "Jay Walking."
Medeiros now has another outlet for his creativity. It combines his two loves: writing comedy and playing music. He sings, plays guitar and wrote the 13 songs on his new album "Too White to Sing the Blues."
He refers to this venture as "building up my musical career later in life, just like I started a joke career when I was in advertising."
The blues-influenced album, featuring backing by other musicians, includes the track "Manmade Woman." The song jokingly describes a lady who has augmented her body from head to toe.
Rather than use his real name, Medeiros refers to himself as "Papa Joe Grappa," which is his alter ego and the artist listed on the CD released earlier this year. "Papa" awoke a passion that always lurked inside Medeiros, who fondly remembers performing musically at bars in Wildwood, N.J., before the invention of his alter ego. He recalls meeting his wife Justine at the Oasis Bar. The couple married and lived at 20th and McKean streets for two years. Now soaking up the California rays, Medeiros – and Papa Joe Grappa – are happy with their places in life.
"The opportunities that this job has given me and my family are just unbelievable," he said.
For more information on Papa Joe Grappa and his CD, visit www.papajoegrappa.com.
