The episode of CHEERS that sparked an uproar and protests

Heading to St. Louis to cover the Dodgers-Cardinals National League Division Series. Last time I flew to St. Louis in October it was to report to Basic Training at Ft. Leonard Wood, so this is better.

Here are some Friday Q&A’s.

Mary Stella wonders:

Is there an official phrase in the biz for giving big hints to the audience in case we're too dense to figure that a long shot of a kangaroo hopping where it has no place being might be significant?

I don’t know if it’s an “official” phrase but we call that “hanging a lantern”.

Michael Neff asks:

Whatever happened to a GREAT (but short-lived) laugh track-less social sitcom called UNITED STATES? Was it like POLICE SQUAD and too hip for the room at the time?

UNITED STATES was created by Larry Gelbart and his stepson, Gary Markowitz and was a unique experiment. It was sold to NBC with the proviso that all the scripts be written before the show went into production (a la UK sitcoms). The premise was to portray a marriage honestly. It was funny but also dramatic, and at times very dark (Y’know, like any REAL marriage). There was no laugh track, no studio audience, no obligatory happy ending every episode.

It starred Beau Bridges and Helen Shaver and although 35 scripts were written, only 13 were produced and 8 aired. NBC was so terrified of the series they scheduled it at 10:30 and kept moving the day. Imagine a sitcom at 10:30 at night? Needless to say, it crashed and burned.

One critic, Robert Lindsey said this about UNTIED STATES in his review: “While the network describes the show as a situation comedy, it promises to be about as close to THREE’S COMPANY or THE JEFFERSONS as POPEYE THE SAILOR MAN is to VICTORY AT SEA.

From Aron:

My question is about writing classic tv moments. IMHO, the Sam Malone rap is one of the funniest minutes in TV history. Even today, every time I hear an injury report, I play it in my head. When you guys write a gem like that, do you know that it's classic right away, or are you still unsure until the moment Ted Danson turns on the boombox?

We NEVER know if something is a classic. The minute we think we’re creating classic art is the minute an anvil falls on our heads. We (my partner David Isaacs and I) just try to write the best scripts we can. Sometimes we’re extremely lucky and something connects (but I'm still not sure they're "classics"). When that happens we just thank the Gods of Comedy.

Kurt has a FRASIER question:

Is the Seattle background a picture, bluescreen image, or one of those minature scale models?

It’s a backdrop. Actually, two backdrops – one for day and one for night. It’s a bit of a cheat because the photos were taken from the Queen Ann district, which is not downtown. But like everything else about that set – it’s the perfect panorama.

And finally, from Bob Chesson:

One of my all time favorite CHEERS is the Thanksgiving Orphans episode where the CHEERS crew goes to Norm's and a food fight ensues. Having unfortunately not viewed ALMOST PERFECT until directed to in your blog to youtube, I watched the WRAP PARTY episode where there is a food fight in the restaurant involving desert tarts. Did you and your partner write either? Was the WRAP PARTY episode a type of homage to the CHEERS episode? Am I just a conspiracy nut?

We wrote the ALMOST PERFECT along with Robin Schiff. We were consulting CHEERS during the Thanksgiving episode. A joke or two of ours might be in it but the brilliance of that script was all Bill & Cheri Steinkellner.

At the time CHEERS got a lot of flack for that episode because there was a big “stop world hunger” campaign and the show was criticized for wasting food.

In the ALMOST PERFECT episode, the staff of a TV show thinks they’re cancelled, says things to each other they never would have if they thought they’d ever see them again and then learn the show was picked-up for another year. It's a very funny episode. You can check it out here. And this is a detailed explanation of the making of that show. We needed a device to mend fences and a giant pie fight was our solution. We were thinking much more Laurel & Hardy than CHEERS.

What’s your question?