The Sunday Memory Drawer - Oh, Yeah, One More Star I Almost Worked For

Following up on my Sunday Memory Drawer entry of several weeks ago, I was reminded that I had also written about another celebrity that we had dabbled with. 

I penned this piece about two years ago, but it's worth repeating.

You probably heard that actress Suzanne Pleshette passed away over the weekend at the age of 70. She had been battling cancer for the past few years, and I'm almost certain it was lung-related. And, that wouldn't surprise me given she was second only to U.S. Steel in terms of smoke output. As I write that last line, I am thinking she would no doubt laugh heartily if it turned up in that great blog in the sky.

Now, the passage of time creeps on and closer still. I'm realizing that people that I have have enjoyed on television in my own young adult years are now passing on. I can remember being glued to the TV set every Saturday night during those years when the Mary Tyler Moore Show and The Bob Newhart Show held down the 9-10 hour on CBS. Coupled with All in the Family, M*A*S*H*, and The Carol Burnett Show for one season (1973-74), there was no better nightly line-up on TV ever. And that includes all those so-called "Must See TV" Thursdays on NBC. But, I digress...

Suzanne's passing reminded me of a very odd connection we had with her about 14 or 15 years ago. When two gullible writers in New York were starting out and trying to make as many Hollywood connections that we could. From 3000 miles away.

The truly amazing thing about celebrities like Suzanne and others who worked in "the business" in the 60s and the 70s is how accessible they are. There's probably no way these days that anybody, without a conduit at a major talent agency and/or an act of God, could get hold of somebody like a Patrick Dempsey or a Teri Hatcher. And, the younger and hipper the star, the bigger the wall. Yet, you would be surprised how this older bunch deals with the public. If you reach out to them, they do eventually reach back to you. And, they do read their mail!

Such was the case a decade and a half ago. My writing partner and I were working to gain some footholds in the TV world, after having some early developmental success in NY. That was the time when television was going back into its history and trying to pull forward one of the classic stars for one last fling with the public. For Pete's sake, some genius actually thought they could make a sitcom star out of Faye Dunaway.

We decided to try and tap into this trend. From our vantage point, it was high time for Suzanne Pleshette to come back to series television. So, we did what we always did when we had a bright idea like this. We wrote a letter. Perhaps it was the way we framed the prose, but we had frighteningly good success at making connections in this way. To this day, some of our letter recipients remain friends and even business associates.

Well, we had three ideas we wanted to pitch to Suzanne. My writing partner hit on a brilliant angle. He remembered that, as she did brilliantly for so many years, Suzanne had been on The Tonight Show (the real one with Johnny Carson) one night and complained that she was not getting many film or TV offers anymore. She made a comic plea that she would be happy to consider anything and would do so if somebody sent her one dollar. So, we sat down and crafted a note, citing this very request. And, of course, we attached one crisp new dollar bill. We found her business address and off it went.

Two weeks later, I am in my then-new NY apartment and I am having a stove delivered and installed by two guys who made Stan and Ollie look like Rodgers and Hart. The password for that day was apparently "inept." As I watched these two morons try to figure out to connect electricity without turning us all into Gary Gilmore, my phone rings.

Calling from California, it is Tom Gallagher, Suzanne's manager and husband. I Ralph Kramdened for about ten seconds. This was the very guy I had her lovingly complain about on the Carson Show for years. He asked if it was a bad time. And, then, almost on cue from my kitchen, there was a loud clang.   And then a crash.

I was so annoyed by the clumsy goings-on in my apartment that I started to vent on the phone with Tom. And, it must have sounded pretty damn funny because I had the guy in laughter-provoked convulsions for about ten minutes. All because I was saddled with expert appliance installers, Hose-A and Hose-B. Gallagher wanted to know if my partner was as funny as I was. I replied that, not only was he just as funny, he also selects day laborers a lot better than I did. More gagging and coughing on the other end of the phone.

"Send me your ideas. We want to read them. And, by the way, Suzanne loved the dollar bill bit."

We sent off our ideas the very next week. Over a short while, I got to have two other phone conversation with Tom Gallagher. Each time, we would chat and the guy would be coughing his head off with guffaws. When I later heard that he had died from lung cancer several years later, I realized where all the coughs were coming from. Probably the same carton of cigarettes that Suzanne was smoking from.

Ultimately, Tom called and passed on the ideas. He acknowledged they were clever, but Suzanne was focused on some other things, perhaps designing a nifty new pattern for her line of bed linens. But, I am still astonished how this all began. With a single letter. And, just to show you how nice these two were, we eventually received a note thanking us.

And they even sent back the dollar bill. Top notch people and they are always missed.

Dinner last night:  Risotto with sausage, mushrooms, and tomatoes at Fabiolus Cafe.