Actor and comedian Billy Crystal brought his show “Spend the Night With Billy Crystal,” to San Jose’s Center For Preforming Arts Theater recently.

It was a nice blend of standup and storytelling along with film clips you may not have seen before.  Crystal was joined by comedian/actress Bonnie Hunt who facilitated the interview portion of the show.

You can tell a lot of what they did was simply improvised on the spot which gave him freedom to tell a lot of good and funny stories.  There certainly was no shortage of material to work from.

Billy Crystal began his career in the 1970s doing mostly standup.  He received his first big break on the ABC sitcom “Soap.”

His career really accelerated after doing a single season on “Saturday Night Live” … if you recall he played a talk show host, telling guests “You look Mahvelous!”

Crystal also starred in some classic movie hits like “When Harry Met Sally,” “City Slickers,” Analyze This,” he also was the voice for the computer-animated “Monsters, Inc” as Mike Wazowski.

Some of the funniest memories I have of Billy Crystal come from him as a host to the Academy Awards which he did nine times during his career.  He also won a Tony Award from his autobiographical one-man-show, “700 Sundays,” and also made the best-seller list for his book “Still Foolin” “Me, Where I’ve Been, Where I’m Going, and Where the Hell are My Keys,” which is a look back on his first 65 years.

He also shared some very intimate thoughts about people who he was very close to in is life like Muhammad Ali, Mickey Manel and Robin Williams.

We were glad that Billy Crystal’s tour of 30 cities included San Jose … it certainly was a night that was unpredictable and very entertaining.

Cheers!
Rich Borell
Founder & Publisher