Hired & Fired, Auditioned & Propositioned
- 4 hours ago
- 5 min read
By Lydia Hope Wilen / New York City
If you’re expecting a story by The Maiden and The Maven, you’ll get them, but in this issue, we won’t be joined at the hip or the lip. The Maven will be giving you insight, an education and a tour that only he can do. And so, this is my Maiden voyage, letting you in on three show biz experiences that should make you glad you’re otherwise employed.
The Pilot That Didn’t Clear Takeoff
Bob Stewart, TV game show genius creator/producer (google him and be impressed) gave me my first TV writing job on a celebrity-driven game show called Personality, followed by a year of writing material for Three on a Match.
By then, Bob knew my sense of humor and my work ethic and hired me as head writer of a pilot for a comedy show called Off the Wall starring Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, a successful husband and wife comedy team.
Eager to get started, I wrote a dozen blackout gags, each to precede the opening credits. A couple of examples:
ANNE
I want to wear something that
makes me look pencil thin.
JERRY
Put on a yellow leotard
that says Fort Ticonderoga.
JERRY
Honey, it’s our anniversary.
Let’s go out and have some real
fun tonight.
ANNE
Good idea. If you get home first,
leave a light on in the hallway.
The opening gag turned out to be a closing gag. Due to a disagreement, the network fired Bob Stewart and pulled the pilot. Off the Wall was off the network’s new season schedule.
And the Plot Thins
One day, I got a surprise call from Steve Weiss, my William Morris agent. He was the one surprised. Bill Cosby looked at the agency’s list of comedy writers and pointed to my name. “She’s the one to write my idea for a TV sitcom.”
I looked at the list, and my name was the only nonrecognizable one… the only one without any sitcom credits.
(In case you’re wondering, this took place in the late 1970s, long before Bill’s criminal woes came to light, along with trials, sentencing, prison and his eventual release in June 2021.)
Bill and I met in the agency’s conference room. He told me his idea: a man would be the family dog. He acted out being that talking dog, dealing with members of his family. I couldn’t stop laughing, all the while taking notes based on his funny performance. He was really funny.
My deal was to write a treatment laying out a cold open (a teaser), then three acts, and end with a tag line (a stinger). Once the treatment was approved, I was to write the script. Since I was not yet a member of the union (Writers Guild of America East) the network and my agent agreed that I would be paid $10,000. I was thrilled … and naive, entering into this agreement without a union contract, or any contract.
I wrote the treatment in record time, handed it to my agent who submitted it to Bill. The following day, while I was out, Cosby called. My mother answered the phone and had a great conversation with him. He promised my mom that he would introduce me to a nice Jewish doctor. But first, he told her to tell me to write the script.
Halfway through the assignment, my agent called and told me the network nixed the project because Cosby didn’t want to play the lead … the dog. “But I’ll still get paid, right?” The agent told me that it’s not smart to ask for the money. He said, “They’ll never want to use you again.” I didn’t ask for the money and–you guessed it–they never used me again.
By the way, Bill Cosby never did fix me up with a Jewish doctor. Little did we know, he’d be needing a Jewish lawyer.
Brought to you by the letters “N-O”
PBS had The Electric Company; a program intended for children who had graduated from Sesame Street and were ready for more mature humor.
Paul Dooley, the head writer, wanted to hire another writer for the show. Paul and I were clients of the William Morris Agency and so my agent made an appointment for me to be interviewed by him.
The meeting went well and I left with a fun assignment. On my short walk home, I figured out how to humorously handle the intended lesson. Once I was home and in front of my typewriter (that’s how long ago this was), I was on a tear. In no time, I completed the audition, walked back to Children’s Television Workshop offices and dropped off my pages.
The following day, my agent called to tell me the bad news. “Sorry, but you didn’t get the job. Dooley hired someone else.”
That evening, the phone rang and it was Dooley. I thought he changed his mind and is giving me the job. WRONG! He apologized for NOT hiring me. I asked, “You found a better writer?” He said, “Oh no. I hired a man who’s married and has a kid.” And then, while I was steaming, this yutz had the nerve to ask me out to dinner…the real reason he called.
A few years later, Dooley left The Electric Company and became a successful character actor. He’s 98 now and living in California. If I could talk to him, I’d ask how he would feel if a man in a hiring position treated either of his daughters the way he treated me. DOOLEY NOTED!
Looking back at the jobs that fell through, I realize they made room for better opportunities that followed. That's how it seems to be, especially in Show Business. Legendary actor Mickey Rooney, whose career spanned nine decades, summed it up perfectly when he said, “You always pass failure on the way to success."
Lydia Hope Wilen began her professional career as a comedy writer on Personality, a celebrity-driven game show. Her greatest gig was her extremely successful collaboration with her late sister Joany as nonfiction bestselling authors (18 books), which led to the sisters becoming popular TV personalities. They continued as journalists (NY Daily News Sunday full-page feature, Celebrity Surveys for Cosmopolitan Magazine, cover stories for Parade Magazine) and got the opportunity to write and talent coordinate a Nickelodeon series hosted by Leonard Nimoy. The Wilens had an unusually versatile writing range from Reading Rainbow episodes, to off-color comedy skits for Dr. Ruth Westheimer’s TV show, Sexually Speaking, plus three optioned screenplays. And that's just for starters . . .
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