I thought it was really funny. They flagged our cutaway setups, which had been getting a little fast and loose at the time. Props for that. RE: the cutaways themselves, though, they were off the mark a bit. The cutaways are actually the hardest things to write on the show. Story-centric jokes come a little easier, but when you have to conceive and invent a whole independent little sequence several times in a episode, it's challenging as hell. Like doing a Far Side cartoon 10-12 times an episode.
Her name was Tracy and I accidentally named Traci Reardon the same name - I came into the studio planning to name Traci Reardon Brittney Reardon and I just told Scott my name was Traci on accident! I did the original "tracy" again but changed her name to Amanda Calzone. You can hear her on the first Betsy Sodaro ep of WSGLL.
My parents were never informed of anything. They were never paid to do the show. They never shot promos for the network. They were just living their lives and we would show up and prank them. This was before anyone had seen anything like this on TV so it was a much different reaction from people watching back then. People freaked out!
I think I only called him once, maybe twice. I called him when I was representing People for the Valdheimers Association. A society devoted to helping raise money to help older Germans who had forgotten everything before 1945. I remember him laughing and going "thank you."
I was credited as a STORY EDITOR but that's more of a title than an actual job description. I was in the writers' room pitching jokes and ideas for scripts. I got to work with some real-deal TV veteran writer geniuses who I learned a lot from. Oh! And in season 4 when Jeff Garlin sneaks through a second-story window, the group of people watching him from afar are all the writers in the writers room. THAT IS THE ONLY EASTER EGG THAT'S EVER EXISTED ON ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT.
It was very fun. Amy is a joy to watch work. I learned a lot from seeing her on set. She is involved with every part of the shoot and she is extremely upbeat and charismatic at 5'oclock in the morning even if she didn't want to be because she knew it was important for everyone involved in the shoot.
Not necessarily like, "What's the blow for the end of Act 2?" But big-picture things of how should I live my life, how to handle this person, jobs to take or not take, ways of managing people.
The audition process for Drake and Josh was very extensive. Three auditions and a screen test. I KID! I auditioned at the Nickelodeon Studios and like every actor's first onscreen role, I shared a scene with a watermelon lamp that my character built for a science fair.
I still say "hey" to greet a lot of people like we did on the show, and I still will do thumbs up, like Kramer did. And I still say hello to people the way I said, "Hello Newman."
I love the new movie and can't wait for the second part. That book is a favorite of mine, and King one of my favorite authors. It was a really big deal for me to get that role, and insane to get to work with all those stars. I'd loved both Tim Curry and John Ritter for years, and taken tremendous influence from their careers and performances. Everyone was so cool and gracious- it really set a tone of epic collaboration. The director Tommy Lee Wallace was so clear in his vision, and really able to communicate. It showed me a lot about what a director can and should be.
I think Hitchcock had a good idea - he said shoot Love scenes like Murder Scenes and Murder Scenes like Love Scenes..maybe he felt that falling love was scary as shit.....? I think we've all felt that way sometime...
T Bunz and I met when he was just a 23 year-old stud in front of a rock club called "The Cat Club" on Sunset Blvd. We were doing the same show and he claims I was very sassy to him. At the time I smoked cigarettes and was like "Oh hey, whatever." That's his version. I thought he was very handsome and sweet and liked that he seemed mature for his age. He's now 60 years old. Doesn't he look amazing?
Paul Thomas Anderson