Yesterday, when embedding the latest Naked Lunch podcast -- in which hosts Phil Rosenthal and David Wild talk about both being in the Writers Guild, their time walking on the current picket line and how their careers in writing got them to this point -- I mentioned that this especially resonated with me because I'd met Rosenthal during the 2007-8 WGA strike in the picket line at Fox Studios. As I noted, Everybody Loves Raymond was on the air at the time, and one of the several columns I was writing for the WGA website was called "E-mail Interviews." I would email a set of core questions about writing to the person being interviewed -- occasionally expanding with a few questions more specific to the writer. (My reasoning for keeping the questions largely the same was that 1) it was about the process of writing, and those basic questions didn't change, 2) it wasn't the questions that were important, but rather how each individual writer answered about how they wrote. And perhaps more importantly, 3) being on the editorial board for the then-new WGA website, I wanted to build content and so was writing three columns, all of which were volunteer, and it just made things oh-so much easier...) The writers could then respond at their own pace when they had the time, and send their answers back along with a page from one of their scripts, ideally with edit notes written on it, and a photo. What I recall is how gracious Phil was when asked to participate, despite having been accosted on the picket line, and also how entertaining his E-mail Interview answers were. Both qualities that subsequently became apparent in his documentary series, Somebody Feed Phil on Netflix. (For the record, it began life on PBS as I'll Have What Phil's Having.) I've tracked down the interview, and here it is. Originally posted in 2008, as best as I can recall. E-mail Interview with Phil Rosenthal Edited by Robert J. Elisberg Phil Rosenthal is the creator and executive producer of the series, Everyone Loves Raymond. He began his career as a staff writer on the series, A Family for Joe, which starred Robert Mitchum (a show for which Rosenthal self-effacingly quotes NBC president Brandon Tartikoff saying, “It should be cut up into guitar picks".) He followed this with Baby Talk and The Man in the Family, both created/developed by ed. weinberger. Alan Kirschenbaum's Down the Shore came next, followed by three seasons on Coach. In addition to his TV work, Rosenthal was also director and co-writer of the now-famous "The Final Days" comedy short film which starred President Bill Clinton, made for the 2000 White House Correspondent's dinner. It can be seen online here. >WGA: Were there any movies, TV shows or books that first got you interested in writing? PR: My earliest influences were The Honeymooners and The Jackie Gleason Show. Gleason and Art Carney got me interested in comedy at about age 4, and I wanted to do what they did. That was the same year Mary Poppins came out, and I wanted to marry Julie Andrews. When I was 15, I saw Jaws and was knocked out by the power a movie could have. Other sitcoms I loved growing up were Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore, All In The Family, The Odd Couple, Taxi, and Soap. I was acting in Neil Simon plays from age 14, and when I saw Woody Allen's Love and Death at 16, I wanted to be him. When I saw Annie Hall the next year, and saw all the trouble he had with women, I realized I was him. >WGA: When you write, how do you generally work? PR: When writing alone, I like bed. I've got a Mac Powerbook, and one of those little desktops-over-a-beanbag things from restoration hardware. >WGA: Is there a specific time you prefer to write? PR: I feel a little less like an old man in the morning. >WGA: Do you have any specific kind of music playing or prefer silence? PR: Quiet is nice. >WGA: Are you a good procrastinator? PR: The best. I'm the world's laziest workaholic. >WGA: What sort of characters interest you? PR: Believable ones. I love outrageous characters, but I still want to believe we're on earth. >WGA: What about stories? PR: The same. And a good structure. Nothing substitutes for a good beginning, middle and end. And it should maybe be about something that someone gives a shit about. >WGA: How do you work through parts of a script where you hit a roadblock in the story? PR: I would love to know of some tricks. If you have the luxury of time, forget about it for today, or this week, even. go get something to eat and see a movie. If it's got to be done today, what else can you do? I find that if I just start putting something, anything down, it helps. Because then at least you're working off of something instead of nothing. And nobody needs to see the first something. >WGA: What are the additional challenges (or advantages, for that matter) in doing a television show based on the life and works of the star of your show? PR: In first talking to Ray (Romano), he told me about his life, just in the way of getting to know someone. But, the more he told me about his actual life, the more I realized that this was the show. And what I didn't know about the personalities of his family, I filled in with my own. but obviously it was a blessing that Ray had such a screwed up life. >WGA: What is your best experience as a writer? PR: Working with my friends on "Raymond". We laugh like idiots every single day. I'm in love with them. >WGA: Was there any particular writer who acted as a sort of mentor to you? PR: My mentor in sitcoms was actually younger than me – Alan Kirschenbaum. We went to high school together, were in the school plays together. He became a writer first, and then, while I was a struggling actor, he showed up at my apartment in NY during the writers strike of '88 with one of those new fancy "word processors" (about the size of an oven), and we wrote a screenplay. The following year, I moved out to L.A., hooked up with a writing partner (Oliver Goldstick), and Alan taught me the basic, essential structure of a sitcom in about 15 minutes over a terrible seafood lunch. The best advice we ever got was from ed. weinberger, who said, "do the show you want to do, because in the end, they're gonna cancel you anyway". >WGA: Why do you write? PR: Because I couldn't stomach being an actor.
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AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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