August 2006 – Day 3 – “Love That Bob!”
Sunday was yet another early morning, but it was all for a good cause – to see the legendary Bob Schiller in person! Bob, of course, is a writing god and he and Bob Weiskopf were responsible not just for putting words into the mouths of Lucy and Ricky Ricardo, Ethel and Fred Mertz, Lucy Carmichael and Vivian Bagley, and Theodore J. Mooney, but they also wrote and produced other groundbreaking series’ like the Carol Burnett Show, All In The Family, and Maude.
For a whopping $100 ticket, participants were able to have a professional photo taken with Bob on the replica of the Ricardos’ Beverly Palms Hotel set in the Desilu Playhouse, a breakfast, an I Love Lucy screening and a question and answer session with Bob himself. I couldn’t guess at how many people attended this event, but it seemed to be just a little less than the Shirley Mitchell legend event last May. When we lined up to get our pictures taken Ric asked us not to extend out hand for Bob to shake because his arthritis, which was flaring the night before, was still going strong. Poor Bob! (He later put this down to all those hours he spent slaving away over a typewriter before computers became available). Bob was so cheery and gracious when I went to have my picture taken with him despite his flare which, I know first hand, can sometimes put one into a bad mood.
My picture took about a minute to take and after that I grabbed a mini bagel, small Danish, a juice, and some fruit to take upstairs to the Tropicana room. The bagel was in my hands for two minutes before I promptly dumped it on the floor. Oh well… it landed cream cheese side up so no harm done. All the tables in the Tropicana were set up in groups of flour and Neil and I scored a table in the front row just off to what would become Bob’s right. Just a few minutes after we were all seated, we were treated to a screening of “Lucy’s Italian Movie” which, it turns out was specially selected for us by Bob himself. Right after the screening, Bob was introduced to loud applause. As he entered from stage right he turned to the audience and deadpanned, “Don’t get up!”
Listening to this legend in person was an amazing experience. He told us about his experiences at Desilu and how Jess Oppenheimer brought him and Bob onto ILL’s writing staff. He spoke about some of his favourite episodes, favourite guest stars (John Wayne was a standout), least favourite guest star (Tallulah Bankhead: “She was always drunk…. Never said a line the same way twice…”. He didn’t mention anything about her alleged Desilu striptease though…LOL!). He also talked about how any good writer has to be able to write for any project thrown at them so it wasn’t too difficult two write for two completely contrasting characters like Lucy Ricardo and Archie Bunker.
Bob also talked a bit on how he was able to incorporate his own family experiences into the shows. For example his wife, Sabrina Scharf, told me after the show that when she made a run for the California State Senate, her experiences were incorporated into Maude. His son, Saturday Night Live’s Tom Schiller, was also in the audience and he told how he tried to get writing credit on ILL when he was just a child. Apparently he wrote a joke for Fred where the cast would be sitting around eating fish. Inspired by Laurel and Hardy, Tom wanted Fred to say, “Thin and Fattie are eating Fin and Hattie.” When Bob asked how he could possibly give him writing credits on the show, he suggested that after Fred said the joke, he could unfold his napkin in the air and when as it flutters down onto his lap, it could read, “This joke supplied by Tom Schiller.” Tom also gave the option of having this written on Fred’s tie. I’ll apologise right now for butchering Tom’s story. He also talked about how he was on the set for Lucy’s Italian Movie and was shocked when he stuck his hand into the vat and found that they were real grapes! Lucky kid…
Bob also told his great story on how Desi bought him a jaguar. Desi got himself into a jam when he was trying to sell the Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse to the network. To close the deal, Desi promised that Lucy would appear in every episode, something he knew was impossible. Desi asked Bob how he could get out of the jam; so after thinking it over he suggested Lucy appear at the beginning of each episode appearing on the phone telling what was going to air that week. At the end of the show, she could appear again saying what would be on next week. This solved the problem neatly so Desi offered him a reward, “What do you want? Money? Cars? Women?” so Bob says he took the car and picked out the most expensive Jaguar on the market. After he got the car, it gave him nothing but problems so he had to spend all his money having it in and out of the garage.
Bob showed throughout his seminar – just as Madelyn demonstrated in her recent book -- that his sense of humour is still as sharp as ever. What I wouldn’t give to have one-tenth the brilliance of these wonderful people. Some of his comments were just flat out hilarious: “Some people come up to me in the street saying, ‘I just watched your Lucy show this morning,’ and I’ll say, ‘Good! Give me a dime!” And that he once got a stack of 60 cheques from Paramount in the mail for his “residuals” and each cheque was made out to $0.00, “And what really gets me is that the envelope was postage due!” When Tom was said at the end of his story how proud he was to be there with his Dad today, Bob turned to Ric and said, “I wrote that speech for him myself.”
Some of Bob’s humour on show on Sunday morning wasn’t just funny, but one comment of his really put all his achievements in profound perspective. He and his wife were talking back and forth about some of his work in the seventies and he said, “This week on Maude, we’re doing a two-part episode on abortion. On the Mary Tyler Moore Show they’re doing a three-parter on mayonnaise.” Bob was and still is a pioneer and it was thrilling and an absolute privilege to be able to spend and hour and a half of my Sunday morning in his presence.
For a whopping $100 ticket, participants were able to have a professional photo taken with Bob on the replica of the Ricardos’ Beverly Palms Hotel set in the Desilu Playhouse, a breakfast, an I Love Lucy screening and a question and answer session with Bob himself. I couldn’t guess at how many people attended this event, but it seemed to be just a little less than the Shirley Mitchell legend event last May. When we lined up to get our pictures taken Ric asked us not to extend out hand for Bob to shake because his arthritis, which was flaring the night before, was still going strong. Poor Bob! (He later put this down to all those hours he spent slaving away over a typewriter before computers became available). Bob was so cheery and gracious when I went to have my picture taken with him despite his flare which, I know first hand, can sometimes put one into a bad mood.
My picture took about a minute to take and after that I grabbed a mini bagel, small Danish, a juice, and some fruit to take upstairs to the Tropicana room. The bagel was in my hands for two minutes before I promptly dumped it on the floor. Oh well… it landed cream cheese side up so no harm done. All the tables in the Tropicana were set up in groups of flour and Neil and I scored a table in the front row just off to what would become Bob’s right. Just a few minutes after we were all seated, we were treated to a screening of “Lucy’s Italian Movie” which, it turns out was specially selected for us by Bob himself. Right after the screening, Bob was introduced to loud applause. As he entered from stage right he turned to the audience and deadpanned, “Don’t get up!”
Listening to this legend in person was an amazing experience. He told us about his experiences at Desilu and how Jess Oppenheimer brought him and Bob onto ILL’s writing staff. He spoke about some of his favourite episodes, favourite guest stars (John Wayne was a standout), least favourite guest star (Tallulah Bankhead: “She was always drunk…. Never said a line the same way twice…”. He didn’t mention anything about her alleged Desilu striptease though…LOL!). He also talked about how any good writer has to be able to write for any project thrown at them so it wasn’t too difficult two write for two completely contrasting characters like Lucy Ricardo and Archie Bunker.
Bob also talked a bit on how he was able to incorporate his own family experiences into the shows. For example his wife, Sabrina Scharf, told me after the show that when she made a run for the California State Senate, her experiences were incorporated into Maude. His son, Saturday Night Live’s Tom Schiller, was also in the audience and he told how he tried to get writing credit on ILL when he was just a child. Apparently he wrote a joke for Fred where the cast would be sitting around eating fish. Inspired by Laurel and Hardy, Tom wanted Fred to say, “Thin and Fattie are eating Fin and Hattie.” When Bob asked how he could possibly give him writing credits on the show, he suggested that after Fred said the joke, he could unfold his napkin in the air and when as it flutters down onto his lap, it could read, “This joke supplied by Tom Schiller.” Tom also gave the option of having this written on Fred’s tie. I’ll apologise right now for butchering Tom’s story. He also talked about how he was on the set for Lucy’s Italian Movie and was shocked when he stuck his hand into the vat and found that they were real grapes! Lucky kid…
Bob also told his great story on how Desi bought him a jaguar. Desi got himself into a jam when he was trying to sell the Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse to the network. To close the deal, Desi promised that Lucy would appear in every episode, something he knew was impossible. Desi asked Bob how he could get out of the jam; so after thinking it over he suggested Lucy appear at the beginning of each episode appearing on the phone telling what was going to air that week. At the end of the show, she could appear again saying what would be on next week. This solved the problem neatly so Desi offered him a reward, “What do you want? Money? Cars? Women?” so Bob says he took the car and picked out the most expensive Jaguar on the market. After he got the car, it gave him nothing but problems so he had to spend all his money having it in and out of the garage.
Bob showed throughout his seminar – just as Madelyn demonstrated in her recent book -- that his sense of humour is still as sharp as ever. What I wouldn’t give to have one-tenth the brilliance of these wonderful people. Some of his comments were just flat out hilarious: “Some people come up to me in the street saying, ‘I just watched your Lucy show this morning,’ and I’ll say, ‘Good! Give me a dime!” And that he once got a stack of 60 cheques from Paramount in the mail for his “residuals” and each cheque was made out to $0.00, “And what really gets me is that the envelope was postage due!” When Tom was said at the end of his story how proud he was to be there with his Dad today, Bob turned to Ric and said, “I wrote that speech for him myself.”
Some of Bob’s humour on show on Sunday morning wasn’t just funny, but one comment of his really put all his achievements in profound perspective. He and his wife were talking back and forth about some of his work in the seventies and he said, “This week on Maude, we’re doing a two-part episode on abortion. On the Mary Tyler Moore Show they’re doing a three-parter on mayonnaise.” Bob was and still is a pioneer and it was thrilling and an absolute privilege to be able to spend and hour and a half of my Sunday morning in his presence.
posted by Brock at 1:05 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home