The Tears of a Clown

"Have you seen the picture in my book of me as a child?" he says, referring to young Rodney sitting on a pony, expressionless. "That's me. That's how I've always been. Sad. Just look at me."

Dangerfield held a slew of jobs as a child, ranging from selling ice cream to delivering eggs, but nothing -- save for his bar mitzvah -- won the approval of his mother.

Unathletic, unattractive and unloved, he found an outlet in coming up with jokes and even remembers the first one. At age 4, Dangerfield finished dinner and whined, "I'm still hungry."

"You've had sufficient," his mother replied.

"But," said Rodney, "I didn't even have any fish."

Hello? Is this thing on?

Sadly, humor is only so potent an elixir. Throughout a phenomenal career, Dangerfield has always struggled with depression. He began performing in his late teens and early twenties under the name Jack Roy, but found little success and spent nearly a decade installing aluminum siding in New Jersey.

He returned to the stage in the early 1960s, this time under the moniker "Rodney Dangerfield," and his "no respect" shtick caught the attention of industry bigwigs. Dangerfield appeared on "The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson" more than 70 times, but truly broke through in 1980, when he starred as the goofy Al Czervik in the golf classic "Caddyshack."

The years passed and he landed more and more roles in feature films and comedy concert specials, but his internal state remained the same. Dangerfield often stayed in bed under the covers, unable to face the world and wondering, as he famously rapped in the long-ago hit, "Rappin' Rodney," "Death, where is my sting?"

Hirshey's three days with Dangerfield were each memorable for their wild swings. "One day he was all amped up and full of stories," says Hirshey. "The next day he couldn't remember anything and didn't make an effort." On the third and final day, Hirshey recalls with wide-eyed detail, Dangerfield sat gloomily at the kitchen table, hovering over a pile of pills.

It is a strange combination -- the man who makes millions cackle, cowering in misery -- but it's logical, too. "If a really good comedian isn't depressed," says Bob Saget, "something's wrong." A veteran of the stand-up biz, Saget is best remembered for his role as Danny Tanner on the sitcom "Full House." But years before he broke out, Saget was discovered by Dangerfield at the Comedy Store, the famed club in Hollywood.

The two have remained friends. "When you're a comedian," says Saget, "you're looking at the world from the outside in. You're trying to be funny, but at the same time you're really asking, 'What's it all mean?' Rodney has always talked about the heaviness -- about how heavy everything is. It's funny when he says it, but the meaning behind it isn't. The weight is on his shoulders. He feels it, and it's torturous."

As a result, Dangerfield's life has been an ode to pain alleviation. He first tried marijuana as a 21-year-old in 1942, and has lit up a joint at least once every day for 60 straight years (Dangerfield even got high in the White House during a visit with Ronald Reagan in 1983). The original title for his autobiography was "My Love Affair With Marijuana."

Truth be told, much of his life has been devoted to trying to feel good. He's used most of the drugs out there, has slept with a number of prostitutes and has combined every conceivable genre of fattening food into one big sandwich.