Laraine Newman had developed serious eating disorders as well as a heroin addiction. She spent so much time in her dressing room playing Solitaire that for Christmas 1979, castmate Radner gave her a deck of playing cards with a picture of Laraine on the face of each card. Garrett Morris was feeling degraded from years of small roles and what he saw as racist sketches. At one point, the writers were going to have him do a fake ad for "Tarbrush" toothpaste, which would dull African-Americans' supposedly shiny teeth (the bit was pulled "mercifully" at the last minute). Morris also struggled with his status on the show, and began free-basing cocaine. During rehearsals for the Kirk Douglas-hosted show, Morris ran screaming onto the set, saying that someone had put an "invisible robot" on his shoulder who watched him everywhere he went. He pleaded with crew to get the robot off of him.