Richard Pride starts us off:
I recently watched Shelley Long's 1983 Emmy Award acceptance speech. She was eloquent, gracious, and beautiful. She spoke just like Diane Chambers; in fact, that speech could have been delivered by Diane Chambers without changing a word. So my question is, how similar was Shelley Long to the character she played?
Similar enough that Shelley was able to really understand that character and how to play her to perfection, but different enough in that Shelley is not nearly as neurotic and buttoned-down as Diane.
Diane was too in her headto have a committed relationship. Shelley was a wife and mom.
Another difference: I don’t think I’d like to have lunch with Diane Chambers. Shelley Long is delightful dining companion.
From Daniel:
I guess this could be a Friday question. I'm from Baltimore. When you worked for the Orioles back in 1991, which area of town did you live in during the season? Hopefully you have mostly pleasant memories of the area?
Owings Mills and it was lovely. There was a great deli nearby. We lived in a condo complex not far from the expressway. A nice townhouse and there was a pool.
Chad Holmes asks:
In which of your jobs did you feel the most pressure? You talked about how Cheers was a low rated show in the first season while you knew it was good material. What kind of pressure was that? Or taking over as the lead people at MASH? Or the struggles with a new show with a big star like Mary? Where did the pressure really hit you the most?
David Isaacs and I were chomping at the bit to take over the writing of MASH.
On CHEERS we always felt we were turning out good shows. We never felt there was anything more we could have done. We were on the lowest rated network against a hit show on CBS. That wasn’t our doing.
But what really took the pressure off was NBC president, Grant Tinker who very much believed in the show. So we knew we had the network’s back. That is HUGE.
Creating a show for Mary Tyler Moore was indeed pressure filled. It was our own show, so we wanted to prove ourselves. There were the comparisons to her old show, which was a classic. And CBS put us in a terrible time slot against a top five show. So for all those reasons, I’d say MARY over MASH or CHEERS.
And by the way, I’m very proud of the work we did on MARY and stand by it to this day.
And finally, from Brian Phillips:
Which TV show have you directed that has had the least amount of retakes (a no-reshooter? No-taker?)?
The “It’s a Wrap” episode of ALMOST PERFECT because there was a giant pie fight. I shot it twice – once on camera blocking day (at the end of the day). Then crews worked all night to clean everything up and we shot it once more in front of the audience.
That’s probably a seven or eight minute chunk of the show. I had five cameras (one a steady-cam) and no second chances. I shot the pie fight scene then wrapped. The audience got out probably an hour early.
Many factors go into retakes. The director needs additional coverage, new lines are inserted, actors slip up, there’s a boom shadow, a camera missed a cue to move, an actor is off his mark, etc.
What’s your Friday Question?
from By Ken Levine
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