NB 32, once again, stopped airing us. This was not good because we had a following developing. Suddenly to be off the air could hurt us. I was so frustrate I went as far as taping a final episode (show #15) The cast begged me to go on. That week I made a phone call to a bigger outlet. TCI CABLE 8. This was a cable access station that aired in more than just one town. We would reach 1,000's of viewers by broadcasting here. Actually as I found it it much later it was more like 100,000's viewers! It was also a more professional outlet and involved us signing a contract. I told them about the show and they set up a time for me to sign a contract. NB 32 was history. We had enough. We had become very excited and motivated by our new home with TCI channel 8. This would be a great place to be. Many people would pass channel 8 as it was in-between all the major networks (ABC 7 and 10, NBC 4 and 12, CBS 2 and 3, FOX 6 and HBO 5 on TCI) We had a great chance of being seen by many in the state of Connecticut. The same time I signed with TCI we also got a new band for the show. Dagger. I over heard the band talking in school. So John and I talked to them and we got them. This would bring the show into a new place.

The band spiced up the show and made us more professional and efficient. We used music in-between skits to get ready. This helped the show move quickly and gave us a live feeling. There were no cuts. This episode (show #16) would be our first for TCI. The band only lasted one episode. It became a matter of committing to be here every Saturday. But we were able to get a new band right away. One member of Dagger (Paul Mele) who played bass also had another band. Dementia was a five member rock/ heavy metal band with Paul on bass, Jason Tucker on guitar, Melissa Lantz on keyboards, Nikki Coleson on guitar, and my neighbor Chad Blanchard on drums. They were good but would improve greatly as the show sailed on. Most were just learning their instruments. By the time they left the show they were ready to be rock stars! This band powered up the show and we became very wild. I had become somewhat dirty, along with John. We were a bit controversial. I am not proud of it but that is what happened. We were edgy and wild. Our skits were crazy and off the wall. The show had tons of energy and most important honesty. We believed in being ourselves. When the show aired on TCI the audience loved this about us. The show had a professional format and we were churning out great episodes every week. More like semi-pro. We were no budget after all.

The show aired on TCI in October of 1992. It was huge. The show was watched by 1,000's. We couldn't believe it! In my high school it seemed as though every student watched and so did the teachers. There were those few wise asses who insulted us (out of jealousy) but overall everyone loved us. I never minded the insults however. We would use it as fuel and sometimes even mention on the show. As our popularity grew they wanted more and we gave them more. Our energy was unstoppable. The show premiered on TCI at number 1 and stayed there to the end. We made history, according to the head of programming, who told me we were the most watched show in their history and perhaps nation wide in their other outlets. She said the cable station would receive hundreds and hundreds of calls about the show. Especially when we had controversial shows. We'll get to that in a moment. We ended the year on top. We were loving the show. It was not easy though. Even with a number one position on TV it remained a difficult challenge. Out of the original cast only Lawrence, Chris, and John were left. Jennifer Soules (Wetmore) would make appearance once in a while but everyone else was gone. We had some new faces though. Besides the band we had Jason Ansaldo, who would eventually become our camera man. We also had crappy equipment so that was difficult. We had no money. What we did have was chemistry. The show was mostly improvisation and we mastered it. We played off each other with perfection. We all got along well and just clicked. On Fridays and sometimes after the show we would go the movies together. During our last show of season 1 (Dec, 1992) I had an on-air fight with Lawrence. The comedy had gone too far and no one knew if it was real or part of the comedy. Lawrence left the show. In Feb, 1993 I was able to convince him to come back. When he did return he was funnier than ever and became a co-producer and writer with the show.

1993 would be our best year. We were tops in the ratings. The audience was our family and inspired us. The more they liked us the better we performed. They were our fuel for our fire. We had a new camera and a great new set. The cast was very close and our comedy worked with perfection. I loved doing this show. It was my everything. I felt alive when we would do it. I was comfortable and it felt right. I loved being able to be creative and working with the cast was like being with my extended family. These were the best days of my life. I didn't want it to end. Karl Peterson joined us in 1993. He would have joined earlier but he had a conflict with his job. He was able to schedule his job around the show. He eventually became the fourth producer and the dream team was born. John, Lawrence, Karl, and I had became close friends and a team. We all shared the same type of humor yet had our own styles that created this perfect square (if you will ) of comedy. We knew how to connect and how to perform as a team. People still come up to me today and talk about the four of us. Former cast members tell me that they loved when we were together because of how funny we were. The rest of cast fell in around us to make the square complete. In April we took the show to Washington D.C. It was a great thrill for us. For a bunch of 17 year olds this was great! We raised enough money, Karl drove the eight hours it took to get there, and the show went perfectly. We performed in front of the White House and had a great time. I was dressed as President Bill Clinton in front of the White House who was actually there that day working in the Oval office. The thought of him seeing me performing as him made us laugh even more. It was one of the best times of my life. The show itself, when it aired, was one of our highest rated episodes. We also got to be free. I must say though, 17 year olds are not suppose to travel out of state with our parents but we were like true adults. Our parents tried to stop us from going but we convinced them that the show was a serious thing and were responsible people. We were. We proved that. This show was not a joke to us.

The summer of 1993 would be a big summer for me. I would developed a huge crush on a girl (I won't say who) and talked to her through out the summer. The show would go through some changes and Karl, Lawrence, and I would develop a strong friendship. Unfortunately after our big 50th episode 1 year anniversary episode John would leave. It was now Lawrence, Karl, and I who produced and wrote the show. We also moved away from being controversial. We wanted a funny show that wasn't too dirty and everyone could watch it. Now what was funny about this was when we made this decision TCI had contacted me and said hundreds of protesters had called them wanting us to be pulled off the air because of our content. They were going to protest outside of TCI. This was more fuel to our fire. What was really great is they all planned on watching it together and would use our content for their protest but when they and others curious about our content tuned in they found out we were clean. They began to watch the show and became part of our audience and new fans! They went from hatred to loving us. In the summer Jessica Hawkins and Olga Toprovsky joined the show. They really added a lot. They were natural performers and brought even more people to our audience. I'm sure their good looks had something to do with that as well! They were hot and on fire. Jessica would go on the replace John as the new anchor of Weekend News. What made this work so well is that was very familiar with my impersonations so she knew exactly how to react to my characters. It made the segments very funny. I really liked the female aspect of Weekend News as she brought something different to it.  Olga was best known for role as Amy Fisher.

In the fall of 1993 we would experiment with the show. The band had left the show except for Nikki and Paul. They would become the Paul Mele band. Paul had also become an actor for the show. The cast would become smaller as Jay Ansaldo and Nikki were let go from the show due to the difficulties of them trying to make it here every week. In the fall we had developed an interest in making movies. We wanted to change from our regular format once in awhile to stay fresh and make it more fun for us. We had previously made two small 1 hour movies that were aired as an episode of the show but now we wanted a full length 90 minute movie. We created Murder After Dark, based on a skit we did in spring of 1993, a trilogy murder mystery movie. It was a comedy that would continue the mystery through three films. We started filming in Fall of 1993 and completed it in spring of 1994. It was very difficult and did not go smooth. In November we took a break and filmed a Christmas movie. It was a tradition to end each year with a Christmas movie special. I began to create props and sets in Sept. By the end of November we began. We would film "Comedy After Dark's Christmas Vacation" a parody of Chevy Chase's "National Lampoons Christmas Vacation". Now we took this very seriously. We love the movie and wanted to honor it. We knew nothing about making movies. We had to guess. We guessed right. I spent every waking hour planning the shoot, working on the script. My grades in school had dropped from A's and B's to D's. I got few hours of sleep and had become 100% involved in the movie. I loved every minute of it. It was thrilling and felt good. It was difficult though. I added some new cast members to the project, Carlarose Arnald, J.C Arnald, Ryan Burke, Jean Iaquinto, and Cheryl Iaquinto. When shooting began we developed a family like relationship. It felt warm. We had some arguments and stress but in all it was comfortable. We filmed this in December and we felt the Christmas spirit 110%. It was so much fun to film this. We took out the talk show set from the basement and built a living room, dining room, and den for the set. It was cool. Our total budget was 100 dollars. We used about 10 video tapes to shoot. It was fun because of the crazy comical stuff we were doing. None of us held back. We went all the way. I believe my performance to be my best to date. I held back nothing. I became the character. The cast also shined! The most difficult part was our failing equipment. The camera was not operating well, sometimes our footage had to be re-shoot. The audio was crap. This movie was my inspiration to become a film maker and started me up the road I am on now. It was the best days of my life and a time I felt I was at my best. I felt alive. I was happy. I have not felt that good yet. I hope to get there again someday. I look back at December, 1993 with pure joy. It was my number 1 best show.

1994 would become our last year. It was our third season and second year. It was also our worst year. TCI were giving us crap over the technical quality over the show and our original cast was gone. It was Lawrence (only for Jan/ Feb) Karl, and Paul. Carla and Jean (from the movie) just didn't have the same chemistry that we had with the cast of 1993. We just couldn't make it work. They were a much different age and had a different sense of humor that didn't click with ours. The show was weaker than the previous year. We also lost our joy for Murder After Dark trilogy that was on going and just wanted it over with. I really believe that serious of movies really sucked the life out of us and hurt the show because of it. It is my biggest regret with the show. In Feb I received the unfortunate news that my family had to move out of our house. After a long court battle we lost. We had built this house and now we were told to put it up for sale and leave (There is a lot to this story. An outside party was responsible but I am choosing to keep this personal for now) The bad news for Comedy After Dark was that the show had to come to an end. Our studio was in the basement and we had no other place to go. Besides I felt that without the chemistry we once had that I wanted to go out on top instead of on a sour note. Towards the end the show got better. I decided to spice things up a bit and go with a no holds bar direction. We ended the show by going back to our roots. Our final episode was on Saturday, June 25, 1994. We had a show reunion with many of the original cast returning. Those there were Lawrence Degley, Jessica Hawkins (who wowed us all) Heather Lang, Carlarose Arnald, Karl Peterson, Nikki Colson, Jason Ansaldo, and our shortest lived member (lasting only an hour during episode 3) Robert Liston. I went all out myself. It was a great show and we ended with a punch. It was also painful. The thing I loved doing for two and half years was now over.