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Rhoda, She Wrote: ‘Mary Tyler Moore’ Writer On Creating Valerie Harper’s Alter Ego
Article in Washington Post 9/02/19
In writing Rhoda on ‘Mary Tyler Moore,’ I drew from my ‘pushy’ side.
Stacy Knows, Connecting people to good things. Features Hot Pant’s in Hollywood!
This year I’ve been lucky enough to take the plunge into memoirs—and now I can’t put them down!
Volume 18, Number 1, January 2019
Pioneering Sitcom Writer to Join Upcoming Book & Author Events
Susan Silver became a trailblazing television sitcom writer at a time when women weren’t invited into the male-dominated industry. Teamed with Iris Rainer Dart, who later wrote Beaches, she helped break the glass ceiling with “Love American Style.”
Following that, Silver’s credits include a dazzling cornucopia of many of the most-iconic programs in TV history—“The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “Maude,” “The Partridge Family,” “The Bob Newhart Show,” and “Square Pegs,” among others—thoroughly disproving the theory that women can’t write comedy.
In her hilarious and sometimes shocking, but honest, memoir, Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms, Silver, a midwestern girl from Milwaukee with its Sixties values and normalcy, tells (almost) all about her encounters over the years with a wide- ranging cast of characters from Steve McQueen, Lenny Bruce, and Bill Cosby to Bill Clinton and Shimon Peres.
Along the way, she has had a weekly radio commentary, “Susan Says,” on NPR covering news, politics, and culture; had a long-running online column, “The Search for Mr. Adequate,” aimed at Baby Boomers dealing with divorce, dating, aging parents, or young women of today, looking for advice on work or love; appeared on CNN, “The Today Show,” and “Good Day New York”; and written op-eds for The New York Times.
In talking about Hot Pants in Hollywood, the late Gary Marshall, director of “Happy Days” and “Pretty Woman,” said: “Susan Silver examines everything funny, including her own life. [She is a] talented writer, whose book should be read by those who like to laugh.”
Now, capping off her string of triumphs, Susan Silver will be featured at Book & Author, February 27 and 28, 2019. Be sure not to miss it.
Recent Podcasts
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Leonard Lopate at large interviews Susan Silver.
Writers Bone, Pop Literacy with Susan Silver.
SUSAN SILVER
by Kathryn Boughton
With the recent unsavory revelations coming out of the entertainment industry, Susan Silver’s new book, Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms, has a timely quality not always enjoyed by tell-all memoirs.
Silver, who wrote laugh lines for some of the most iconic sitcoms of the 1970s, writes in her book that she is like Woody Allen’s character, Zelig, who stood next to every famous person in history. In her case, some of those persons were Jim Morrison, a college acquaintance she knew before he assumed his bad-boy persona; Bill Cosby, who she escaped by inches; Elvis Presley, whose intentions she did not wait around to assess; Steve McQueen, who abruptly withdrew his dinner invitation when she pointed out a man she had had a crush on, and Richard Nixon, who, blessedly, did not make any advances.
Still, she says, she did not face the kind of sexual pressure many women—and men—are reporting today. “I was either the luckiest person or nobody wanted me,” she quipped. I knew Harvey Weinstein but he was just nasty. I know it was prevalent, but if I said ‘no’ to men, they were just fine with it. Stupid men, that they would risk everything to be with us. Good for us.”
In the book, which she will discuss and sign November 18th at 1PM at the Merritt Book Store in Millbrook, Silver chronicles her years as a trailblazing comedy writer on 1970s blockbusters such as The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Bob Newhart Show, Maude and The Partridge Family.
Her tour de force career was, ironically, enhanced by the very paucity of women in the business at that time. A Midwestern girl who grew up near Milwaukee, she was the daughter of parents who did not encourage—or really discourage—her career choice. “I started writing when I was about ten years old and was always a funny kid, mainly to keep myself sane,” she said. “I don’t think they wanted me to be in show business. I was an only child and wasn’t allowed to cross Main Street by myself until I was twelve.”
Despite her parents’ doubts, there were telltale signs of their pride in her accomplishments. Her father, Morey Bensman, kept everything she wrote until his death at age 91, and her mother, Dorothy Horowitz, initially dubious about her daughter’s writing career, was immediately converted when Emmy Award-winning actor Ed Asner mentioned Silver in his acceptance speech.
At eighteen she escaped Milwaukee, going to Northwestern University, where she became involved in theater and soon identified herself as a writer rather than as an actor. “I wrote a sketch and when it was performed I could hear people laughing,” she said. “I said to myself, ‘That is what I want to do.’”
She was literally forced to look beyond the careers then open to women, confessing that she couldn’t be a secretary because I have the worst skills. I was told you have to take typing and shorthand, but I couldn’t do it so I took speed writing. But when I got a job at a local television station in LA, I would have to make up the letters I sent out because I couldn’t read the squiggles I put on paper. It was a nightmare.”
At the University of California at Los Angeles she studied screenwriting with Francis Ford Coppola, acted in local theater productions and appeared on-camera stints at TV stations. In 1969 was casting director for Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In, but it was putting stories on paper that still attracted her.
“I wanted to be a writer,” she said, “but I was told men didn’t want any women in their office, which was an apartment. I was told they wanted to walk around in their underwear and fart. Farting almost cost me my career.”
Instead, she closed the door to her Laugh-In office and wrote anyway. She formed a writing partnership with Iris Rainer Dart, author of Beaches. The two wrote Love American Style and co-wrote an episode of That Girl with Marlo Thomas. The episode called for Anne Marie to marry her long-time boyfriend but Thomas nixed the idea, not wanting to let down single women.
Then serendipity struck. Dart took a hiatus to have a baby and Silver saw the Mary Tyler Moore Show, which had debuted mid-season. She was then managed by sitcom icon, Garry Marshall. “I told Garry I could do that show because I was from the Midwest and had worked in a small television station.”
With Marshall backing her, she was allowed to pitch stories for the series, stories that reflected a previously unexplored female perspective. “I wasn’t aware that I could make up stories,” she revealed, “so I pitched stories from my own life.” Her first was one most women can relate to, about being a bridesmaid in a gown you detest for someone you don’t like very much.
“It was the best experience,” she said. “Allan Burns and Jim Brooks wanted an authentic female point of view. I went in with stories that most women could have shared but men hadn’t heard them before. It was the best possible place to start.”
She said there are three schools of comedy: realistic (Bob Newhart),political (Maude) and “recess” (Happy Days and its ilk). “I managed to do all three.”
She explained that sitcom writing is all about listening to the characters’ voices and how one sounds different from others. She based some of her characters on people she knew, fashioning Bob Newhart on her laconic ex-husband while her mother was the model for Maude.
Mary Tyler Moore was both very close to the character she played and executive producer of her show. “She was just that person on the show,” she said. “She never acted like a diva and at readings she would always get it immediately. Valerie [Harper, who played Rhoda] experimented a little and Cloris [Leachman, who played Phyllis] was just nuts and was all over the place.”
Silver said the prospects for writers has not gotten better since the 1970s, when many episodes were written by freelancers. “It’s very different,” she said. “Now they have this writers’ room thing, where there are seven people in a room writing a show. I don’t like it. I call it ‘spritzing’ and don’t consider it writing. There is no pride of ownership. We had our meetings and then went home to write.”
Worse than the lack of individual craftsmanship is ageism. “If you are over forty, don’t show up,” she said. She recounted the story of one successful writer who partnered with his son. “He was told to let his son talk in meetings and then go home and do the writing.”
It is not a wasteland in entertainment, however. She points to comedians like Amy Schumer Tina Fey, Amy Poehler and Mindy Kaling. Pressed for a television show she likes, she termed Veep “brilliant” but said she is now more of a news junkie. She offers a weekly radio commentary, Susan Says, on the NPR affiliate robinhood.com.
https://lifewiselady.com/sitcom-writer-sex-career-stars/
THE INTERVIEW WAS THE SHORTEST EVER..BUT THE EVENT WAS GREAT! DON’T BLINK.
Click image or this link to get more details.
HERE IS MY RADIO BROADCAST PROMOTING MY BOOK STORE EVENT IN MILBROOK. MERRITT BOOK STORE NOV 18. 1-2PM
PLEASE COME BY AND SAY HI ESPECIALLY IF YOU ARE A LISTENER TO “SUSAN SAYS”
Most fun interview with the hysterical host Cody LaGrow on Newsy
A Pioneer Looks Back at Life at the Writers’ Table Which Was Not a Common Place for Women
The Emmy Awards are this Sunday, and as good as the acting may be, it’s really about what they’re saying. Writing can make or break a sitcom. And it always helps when the writer can get into the mind of all kinds of people. A criticism so often heard about Hollywood is the lack of diversity, especially in the writers’ room. Even now, in 2017, there aren’t that many women at the table so imagine what it was like in the early ‘70s. Susan Silver was there. Silver wrote for shows like The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Bob Newhart Show and Square Pegs. She sheds details of those days in her latest book, Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets and Sitcoms, and gives us the juicy “behind the scenes” view.
Click here to listen to the interview.
I AM THRILLED INTO CAPITAL LETTERS!
This great interview in print and on podcast brought the book up to #9 on the Amazon Kindle list! Very appreciative…hope you enjoy.
‘Mary Tyler Moore’ writer tells all about her life among Hollywood’s A-listers
By Stephanie Nolasco
Published August 24, 2017
When TV director Garry Marshall helped Susan Silver land a writing gig on a sitcom called “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” in 1971, she thought nothing about bringing the leading lady to life.
“I thought I wasn’t allowed to make anything up,” Silver told Fox News. “That’s how naive I was. So I went in with stories from my own life. And they thought I was so brilliant! I wasn’t.”
Silver, one of the original writers behind the hit show about a news producer living in Minneapolis, relied on her own personal misadventures, which inspired new episodes. Silver insisted it worked because other women could easily identity with them. She described her tales in her new memoir, titled “Hot Pants in Hollywood.”
“Every woman I know loves their best friend more than anything, but you don’t necessarily want to have them in your workplace, too,” said Silver. “When Rhoda [Valerie Harper] lost her job and there was a position available at the station, Mary kind of hesitated… I think we all have those feelings. I just pitched stories from my own life.”
The one idea Silver did not come up with was the concept of having a character who was single.
“It started out that she was supposed to be divorced,” said Silver. “And the network said, ‘No, no, we can’t have a divorced woman because they’ll think she divorced [former co-star] Dick Van Dyke, because she had been the wife on ‘The Dick Van Dyke Show.’”
And not all of Silver’s past experiences made it on the screen. Before she took on the role, the comedy writer from Wisconsin attended UCLA where she befriend a poet who would go on to become a rock star.
“[Jim Morrison], he was my pal,” she described. “Jim Morrison was not the guy that we know from The Doors in college. He was very preppy… He had that little bowl haircut. He was very shy. He was a poet. And we used to hang out in the theater department of UCLA. He always had these poems.”
Silver recalled how Morrison befriended a biker name Max Schwartz, who ultimately became a prominent beatnik poet in San Francisco. She claimed it was Schwartz who inspired Morrison to take on a new look.
“[Schwartz] wore a lot of leather and had long hair,” she recalled. “I believe Jim took his persona, I really do. Because that’s the kind of persona he developed. He was so shy, quiet, and clean cut. But years later when I saw Jim at the Troubadour, it was like who’s that? It was another person.”
Silver also told us about an unwanted encounter with another future star. In 1963, a family friend, who was managing a new comedian named Bill Cosby, suggested he could drive her home after attending a party for “Hootenanny,” a musical variety show on ABC. It was one of Cosby’s first TV appearances. She revealed how Cosby seemed interested in giving her a chance to collaborate with him.
“He said, ‘I’ve just done my first album. Would you like to work on my second?’ I said, ‘Are you kidding? Of course I would,’” she said. “I was so excited. We got to my apartment and he lunged at me and I did the Lucille Ball, falling out of the car with my legs up in the air.
Susan Silver embracing Valerie Harper. (Courtesy of Susan Silver)
“And he just reached over, slammed the door, and drove away. So I escaped. I was very fortunate, knowing what we now know. [But] at the time, I thought, ‘Oh, he just tried to kiss me, so I got away…’ I was extraordinarily lucky.”
It was also during her time at UCLA that Silver decided to get a job as an extra in the 1964 film “Viva Las Vegas” starring Elvis Presley and Ann-Margret. Silver appeared as a showgirl and it apparently impressed The King.
“Elvis always had these six guys hanging around him,” she said. “They came up to me the day after I was working there and they said, ‘Elvis is having a party tonight and he wants you to come.’ Oh my gosh, I was so excited.
“I think the party was at six so at 6:30 I drove up. I didn’t want to be the first one. The electric gate opened in Bel Air and there was only one car there, which was Elvis’ big Cadillac… I was so terrified I backed out of the driveway and went home. I was this little virgin from Wisconsin!”
Silver had better luck in 1965 when she was set up to go on a date with Lenny Bruce — by his own mother Sally Marr.
“It was a New Year’s Eve party and his mother, a stripper, this cute little woman, said, ‘Are you single? I want to fix you up with my son… I’ll call him, he’ll come to the party,'” she described.
Bruce did arrive and they instantly hit it off. She was even invited to see the controversial comedian perform, but was forced to be chaperoned by her uncle, a Hollywood writer.
“The three of us had a date,” said Silver. “He and my uncle got along beautifully… I only went on one date with him, but he was so brilliant and so amusing. He had beautiful eyes. He was very soulful. He was really good looking! I have a T-shirt [now] with his face on it… I didn’t go to bed with him then, but now I sleep with him occasionally at night. And it’s safer that way!”
Bruce passed away in 1966 at age 40 from a drug overdose.
Susan Silver and Mary Tyler Moore. (Courtesy of Susan Silver)
Silver would go to carve out her own identity in Hollywood, writing for hit shows, such as “Square Pegs,” “Maude,” and “The Partridge Family,” among others. Still, her fondest memories come from getting to know the very private Moore, who later lived two doors down from her in New York City.
“She went out to dance every lunch hour,” said Silver. “She was such a perfectionist and so disciplined. She started as a dancer, so she did that all the time. She could have been a diva, but she never was. She really was the Mary you wanted her to be.”
Moore died earlier this year at age 80.
I am so happy to be profiled in the Forbes.com website by Jeryl Brunner. She writes about inspiring young women and I’m honored to be included in the sources!
How To Thrive Despite Your Fears: Pioneering
TV Writer Susan Silver Shares Her Best Tips
We all experience fear and self-doubt, no matter where we are in life. But Nelson Mandela said, “The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.”
Which, speaking of talent, our friend and sometime contributor to NYSD Susan Silver called to tell me she’s been on a book tour for her memoir “Hot Pants in Hollywood.” Susan was one of the very first women to gain a solid foothold (and an onscreen credit) as a writer for television. Before she decided to retire from the game, she was very prolific and wrote for the best of them — including Newhart, Mary Tyler Moore and many Movies of the Week.
This photo of Susan is from a talk she gave at the Explorer Bookstore in Aspen where her book was on the top 10 Bestsellling Books. She’s a natural comedy writer and you can get that just from the title. But there’s a very serious message to Susan’s work. Even more importantly, she’s a very serious professional and her success was the result of her natural talent and her ability to work like a dog. Now the result is she has a very comfortable Fifth Avenue apartment and gets around New York, sees the world; does commentary for NPR, wrote a brief series for us – “The Search for Mr. Adequate.” Right now she’s out there publicizing her book. Like a pro; that’s the real story.
On my book tour, one of my favorite places to visit was my home town, Milwaukee for all the obvious reasons. Old friends, a lovely bookstore, Boswell’s and this neat interview with Milwaukee Magazine. Enjoy! OUR Q&A WITH ‘MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW’ WRITER SUSAN SILVER Susan Silver Interview in Aspen Susan Silver | The Lift from The Lift on Vimeo. I did a live show in Aspen for Aspen 82 the local station. The show was run by great looking young people in a downtown outdoor site. Great fun and terrific questions…only bad thing…my hair! We must comb all of our hair, the back and sides…not just the front. Ok, next time I will. No makeup staff , no hairdressers obviously….alas. But lots of fun anyway! Thanks Oliver Sharpe, Host and Danielle, Producer for finding me. Growing Bolder Interview
I frequently guest on Growing Bolder, the popular Baby Boomer site which is an inspiration to all of us “between 50 and death!” Seriously I love these guys and they feature our interview in this issue of their newsletter. Thanks Bill and Mark! The hilarious and insightful TV writer Susan Silver opens up about her battle to get into the writers’ room during the 1960s and how she made her mark on landmark shows such as The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Maude. Click here to listen to our conversation to hear these stories and more nuggets from her new book Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms.Growing Bolder Magazine The Jerry Bovino Show – “Hot Pants in Hollywood” with Susan Silver and Host Jerry Bovino Jerry Bovino, my friend and talk show host in Aspen is very very good at what he does. Even if he goes to places you are not prepared to go. So, hold on to your seats folks, it’s a fun and naughty ride! Click here for interview. THE MORNING BLEND A great TV show in my hometown Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
My friend, you maybe can tell, David Patrick Columbia, brilliant chronicler of New York Life and times honored me with this great piece. We had a fun lunch even though the pouring rain almost made me cancel! So glad I didn’t!I used to write my dating column “The Search for Mr Adequate” for him for many years. He is a voracious reader and Roger Ailes, Richard Nixon and Laugh-in
Q&A with Susan Silver Local author Susan Silver’s new memoir, Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets, and Sitcoms, Michael Gross in Avenue MagazineFun Stuff!
When the television comedy writer and author of the dating advice column “Searching for Mr. Adequate,” Susan Silver, started talking about the vibrator that stars–as the love interest, no less–in the first pages of her new memoir, Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets and Sit-coms, the crowd at Michael’s laughed heartily. They already knew this is not your typical feel-bad baby-boomer memoir, even if it is also the sort of reinvention story that frequently tops the best-seller list. And that was before she mentioned being excluded from all-male writers’ rooms because the boys liked sitting around in their underwear passing gas.But then, the soigné host, Estée Lauder executive group president John Demsey, had attracted a sophisticated crowd to the garden room of the media-elite cafeteria to toast one of their own. Among those laughing along with the former show girl-turned-writer for The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Maude, The Bob Newhart Show and The Partridge Family: Judy Licht and Jerry Della Femina, Jeff Greenfield, Richard Johnson,, Susan Magrino Dunning, David Patrick Columbia, Mark Cross head Neal Fox and Martha Kramer. Even the bestselling author Ed Klein was cracking up, indicating that right-wing politics don’t always trump appreciation of left-coast comedic skills. “This Morning” Show, TV Canada.
FUN WITH ROSANNA AND GREG
Author Susan Silver Recalls Her Experiences With Mary Tyler Moore, Bill Cosby and Jim Morrison ‘Lunch’ with the boundary-breaking sitcom writer and author of new memoir Hot Pants in Hollywood By Diane Clehane, ADWEEK
Ever since I got my advance copy of Susan Silver’s new book Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms, I have spent every spare moment reading it. Talk about a page turner!At her book party last Wednesday, hosted in the Garden Room at Michael’s by Susan’s “closest platonic male friend” John Demsey, she wowed the crowd (which included The New York Post’s Richard Johnson and author Ed Klein) by sharing a few tasty tidbits from her hilarious, touching and sometimes shocking memoir. The book chronicles her years as a trailblazing comedy writer on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Bob Newhart Show, Maude and The Partridge Family. Susan is something of a female Zelig, having had encounters over the course of one helluva an interesting life with everyone from Steve McQueen to Shimon Peres. All of these episodes are described in the book in delicious detail, so when she invited me to rejoin her at Michael’s to celebrate the official April 27 publication date, I jumped at the chance. Read the full article here.
Susan Silver, one of the first female TV comedy writers, went to school with Jim Morrison, appeared in a movie with Elvis Presley, and was set up on a date with Lenny Bruce. But the story she told at Michael’s to debut her memoir, “Hot Pants in Hollywood,” was about the time Bill Cosby gave her a ride home in his “little, green sports car.”  Susan SilverPatrick McMullan/PMCSilver told Estée Lauder exec John Demsey, former congressman John LeBoutillier, TV reporter Diane Dimond and Clinton chronicler Ed Klein that Cosby spotted her at a taping of “Hootenanny” in the early ’60s.“When we got to my apartment building, he lunged at me, and, in a Lucille Ball effort to escape, I opened the door and fell out of the car and was on the curb with my legs up in the air,” Silver said. “Then, he closed the door and left. Thank God!” Article on NY Post here.
Book Excerpt: “Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms” The following is excerpted from Susan Silver’s “Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms,” which will be released April 27. (Author’s Note: Iris Rainer Dart, my then writing partner who later went on to write “Beaches,” had gotten pregnant and we had stopped working together. It was 1971. We were managed by comedy legend Garry Marshall and had written one script for “Love, American Style.”) After Iris and I split up as a writing team, I was starting all over again, trying to “make it on my own” as those famous “Mary Tyler Moore Show” lyrics said. I told Garry that I’d seen her new show and knew I could write it. How did I know? It’s called “chutzpah,” French for “balls.” And I had some, it seems. Actually, she was situated in the Midwest, worked in a small local TV station, and so had I, both those things. It seemed like fate. Read the full article here on Women and Hollywood. Susan Silver wrote for some of the most iconic sitcoms of all time, creating laughs for “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “The Bob Newhart Show,” “Maude,” “Partridge Family,” and more. She was one of the first females in an industry dominated by men. Now she dishes about the highs and lows of her comedy career and life in her memoir, “Hot Pants in Hollywood: Sex, Secrets & Sitcoms.”
Susan Silver was one of the original writers for some of the most iconic TV sitcoms.: The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Bob Newhart Show, and Maude, among others. In fact in her first season she had what was a record breaking number of assignments..read full article here.
Quick Hits-New York Post, April 2, 2017 For the Brandeis University installation of the Lenny Bruce papers, My part was the amusing one amidst the more formal academicians talking about first amendment rights and censorship and the iconic career of Lenny.. Yeah…and then I come on….
Refinery 29, Jan 26, 2017 How Mary Tyler Moore Revolutionized TV For Female Writers Like Me
Sex and That ’70s Single Woman, Mary Tyler Moore
Huffington Post, July 13, 2013 Mary Richards and I Made it After All!
Remembering Mary Decades.com January 30, 2017
It had an unprecedented number of female writers.In 1973, 25 of the 75 contributing writers on the show were women. To put that 1:3 ratio in perspective, consider that, at that time, the the Writer’s Guild claimed approximately 3,000 members and only 411 were women. One of the key writers, Susan Silver, was profiled under the headline “The Writer Wears Hot Pants.” Sure enough, she was sporting hot pants in the photo.
Susan Silver was one of the original writers of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Bob Newhart Show, Maude and many other sit-coms. She wrote two Top Ten Movies of the Week, feature films and pilots for her own sit-coms. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA |
Susan
