Arsenio Hall Talks About Being a Happy Comedian

Reporter: Everything bills you as a happy guy. Are you a happy guy? Hall: Yeah. Yeah, people tease me about smiling all the time and being happy, being “the happiest man in show business.” I used to think, and this is true, and I can say thins now I think because I’m kind of comfortable in my business, I used to think I wasn’t going to make it because I am a happy person. And comics, Tom Dreesen, a lot of guys used to tell me, “Well, you know most comics are from tragic backgrounds.” They either have tragic lives or they have tragic childhoods. And he was showing me this thing in a book. Um, and I’ve heard that from different comics. Jimmy Walker and the Freddie Prinze thing happened when I first hit LA. I was really literally psyched out that maybe because I had a happy childhood and because I had a wonderful life and I thought I was blessed, I might not make it, I didn’t have what it takes to make it. My mother wasn’t a madam and my grandmother wasn’t a prostitute, and I was scared. And then Eddie comes along and his biggest bit is about his dad who was drinking or something. I’m like – For a long time I felt real strange about myself and that I didn’t fit into this business.