Search Results for: Bridget Holloman

Since I'm busy paneling today, this is a rerun from November of 2012. In fact, I've run it here before and will probably run it here again. Nothing has changed since I first posted it except that now, due to a loss of hair, I've taken to wearing hats when it's sunny or sometimes when I'm having my picture taken. Hope you enjoy this replay of my Larry Hagman story…

Here is my Larry Hagman story. Get comfy. This will take a while.

The year is 1980 and I am the Head Writer on Pink Lady, an infamous variety series that was forced by high-level corporate interests on All Concerned: Its producers, its staff, some of its stars, certain folks at NBC who didn't want to put it on…and on the American public, most of whom opt not to watch. Working on it presents every conceivable problem one can have making a variety show and a biggie is that guest stars do not wish to guest. Or at least, the ones you'd want for promotional purposes don't want to guest. Even before the show airs and anyone has any idea if it's good or bad, we cannot secure a guest star whose name means anything.

A man named Fred Silverman is running NBC that week, trying frantically but nobly to enrich the disastrous ratings levels he inherited upon his arrival. Mr. Silverman did not want to put Pink Lady on the air but was so ordered by those above him. Seeking to make the best of things, he adds his clout to our endless pursuit of guest stars. This means going after performers not on NBC shows since there are so few of those viewers will tune in to see. He sets his sights on Mr. Hagman, the star of Dallas over on CBS. Hagman is very popular, though not as popular as he'd be a few months later.

Silverman himself gets on the phone to try and arrange a Hagman guest shot on Pink Lady. Failing to navigate through a sea of agents, he decides to call the star directly. You can do that when you're Vice-President of Programming — I think that was his title — at NBC. Time is of the essence so he phones him on a Sunday. The following is the story as told to me by Mr. Hagman and if it isn't true, it oughta be.

Larry Hagman lives in a big house in Malibu where he observes certain rituals which some might call superstitions. One is that he does not speak on Sundays. He whistles. He can whistle in a manner that goes up in pitch at the end. That one means "yes." He can whistle in a manner that goes down in pitch at the end. That one means "no." He has a few others but those are the key ones — The whistle for "yes" and the whistle for "no." Those who know the star know all about this and Fred is well aware. He starts the call by saying, "Larry, I know you don't talk on Sundays but please listen to this…"

He tells him about the show and how all we want is a day or two of his time. The pay will be $7500, which is more or less standard for a Big Name Star in this kind of gig — or at least it was then. Hagman will be in a sketch or two and he will not be alone in these as Sid Caesar is also a guest. At he mentions Sid Caesar, Silverman unknowingly scratches a long-held itch of Mr. Larry Hagman. Larry grew up watching Sid's old Your Show of Shows, thinks Caesar is the greatest genius ever on television, and once fantasized about being Carl Reiner or Howie Morris — a second banana supporting player to Sid Caesar.

When Fred asks, "Will you do it?," Larry Hagman gives his whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $10,000.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $12,500.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $15,000.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and says, "Well, I can't go higher than that but I'll tell you what I can do. You have your own production company, right? I'll arrange for it to get two commitments to produce TV-movies for NBC. There's good money in those and if one of them becomes a series, that could mean millions."

Hagman says, "You've got a deal!" There are some situations for which one will break one's vow of silence.

Fred's happy. We're happy. Larry is happy. Who is not happy? The producers of Dallas are not happy. They're shooting a key episode that coming week and are horrified when their star announces that on two days — Wednesday and Thursday — he will be walking off their set at 6 PM so he can come over and do our show. They want him to be able to stay later if they need that, then they want him to go home and rest and learn lines for the next day. Wednesday evening, he will rehearse with us. Thursday evening, he will tape with us.

There's apparently no point in getting angry at him so they get angry at us, like it's unprofessional of us to make an offer to their actor. I have nothing at all to do with schedules nor did I hire Larry Hagman but one of their Production Managers phones me to complain and to say things like, "How would you like it if we hired one of your stars to moonlight while you're shooting?" I tell him (a) he's quite welcome to any or all of them and (b) if he doesn't like it, he should call Fred Silverman at NBC. In a semi-threatening tone, he tells me we'd better not keep Hagman up late. "He has to be in makeup for us by 6 AM each day."

Wednesday evening, Larry Hagman walks into our rehearsal at around 7 PM. He is utterly charming and human and just about the nicest guy you could ever want to meet. He is so thrilled to be working with Sid Caesar but he is also genuinely polite and gracious to everyone…and very humble. Well aware he is new to this "variety show thing," he asks everyone if he's doing this or that right, if we're okay with how he's reading certain lines, etc. He even comes up with one great joke to add to a routine.

During breaks, he and I get to talking and I tell him — true story — that I was in a "test" audience once that was shown the pilot to his earlier TV series, I Dream of Jeannie. I was among those in the test group that voted to put the show on the air. He loves me for that and thanks me like I am wholly responsible for his career. He also likes that I don't ask him what's up in the current Dallas storyline…though he did let me in on a secret. He'd just come from filming a scene in which his character, J.R. Ewing, was shot and may die. "It's going to be the cliffhanger at the end of this season. Everyone will have to wait until September to find out if J.R. lives or dies and who shot him." I am not a watcher of Dallas but I have to ask, "Okay, so who shot him and are you coming back?"

He says he doesn't know who shot him. "I don't think the producers have figured that out yet or if they have, they ain't telling." As for coming back next season, he says that all depends on how contract negotiations go. In other words, how much they pay him. It is at this moment that he tells me and some of the others who work on the show, the story of how he agreed to do it — Fred Silverman, the whistling, the commitment for two TV-movies. The commitment is one reason he can say, "If they [the Dallas folks] don't meet my price, I'll star in one of those TV-movies, we'll make sure it becomes a series and I'll do just fine."

We hurry Larry through rehearsals, well aware he has to get back to Malibu (a 30-45 minute drive) and learn lines and sleep before he has to be in Burbank at 6 AM but he doesn't seem to care. We tell him at 10 PM he can go. Still, he sticks around, discussing his scene with Sid and then chatting with us. I mention a movie he was in that I had recently seen — Fail Safe with Henry Fonda — and that elicits a half-hour of anecdotes, all of them riveting, about how green and nervous he felt on that set with all those seasoned actors. He segues to tales of his mother, the great Mary Martin, and what it was like to grow up in her world.

We talk of Jeannie and of his hat collection. The man collects hats. He has come to us wearing what he says is his favorite. It's a baseball cap imprinted with the logo of a company in Texas that sells, presumably for purposes of artificial insemination, bull semen. I can't imagine what else you'd use the stuff for. Sun screen?

Hagman calls that cap the supreme metaphor for show business. He also likes the looks he gets when people who are talking to him suddenly read his hat. He says, and this is clearly a reference in some way to his upcoming negotiations to return to Dallas next season, "Life is a whole lot more fun when you can keep other people just a little off-balance."

The stories go on and on. Every ten or fifteen minutes, I hear the voice of that Production Manager and I say something like, "Well, Larry, I know you have that long drive back to Malibu and an early call tomorrow…" Larry nods and grins and starts another anecdote. I finally escort him to his car and we stand there in the parking lot for another half-hour until, just past Midnight, he grudgingly heads home. I have no idea how he managed to get there, sleep, learn lines and be on the set the next morning at six but he did that. He filmed there all day, then came to us with a full load of energy to perform.

He was perfect in every capacity: Charming, funny, gracious to all, etc. At one point, we encountered a production delay that added at least an hour to our evening and forced all to sit around and wait. Not a peep of complaint was heard from Larry Hagman.

His key sketch, the one he'd been looking forward to, was just him, Sid Caesar, one other actor and two allegedly naked women. The actor was Jim Varney, who was later famous for his "Hey, Vern" routines. The ladies were not naked but you only saw their legs and were supposed to presume that somewhere above the top of your screen, each was indecently attired.

Caesar and Hagman play two businessmen going out to discuss contracts and terms at a restaurant. It turns out the restaurant has strippers and as Hagman tries to talk about financial matters, Caesar struggles to take his eyes off the young ladies and to focus on what Hagman is saying. Hagman is brilliantly deadpan throughout, making like the dancers aren't there. Caesar cannot take his eyes off them, especially as items of clothing fly from the stage and land upon him. It's a very short sketch but it's pretty funny and Larry Hagman is thrilled to have done it. Afterwards, he tells all, especially Sid, over and over what it means to him to appear in a sketch with the great Sid Caesar.

I again walk Larry to his car and we stand out in the parking lot for another half-hour as he tells me about his love of Caesar and of that style of comedy and how he wishes he had grown up to be Howie Morris. (As I will learn later when I work with the man, even Howie Morris wished he had grown up to be Howie Morris.) Larry finally heads back to Malibu around 1 AM, which I'm sure thrilled the crew over on Dallas no end.

Time passes, as it has a way of doing. I finish the sixth episode of Pink Lady (all anyone was contracted to do) and move on to another show. J.R. Ewing is shot on the final episode of Dallas that season and all of America wonders whodunnit. Those who are aware that Larry Hagman is renegotiating his contract are equally intrigued to know if J.R. will live or die. Larry does sign. J.R. comes back. It turns out J.R.'s mistress Kristin shot him. And at some point, Fred Silverman leaves NBC.

One day, I am over at the studio of that very same network, walking through a corridor and I hear a voice say of me, "I know that man." It is Larry Hagman. He doesn't recall my name — I wouldn't have expected him to — but he does recall me. I wouldn't have expected that, either. He hugs me and tells the folks he's with all about this sketch he got to do on our show with Sid Caesar and how it was a childhood fantasy come true. In the course of the chat, he casually mentions, "I had such a great time that it doesn't even bother me I didn't get paid."

"Didn't get paid?"

No, he tells me. He was supposed to get these two TV-movies to do for his production company but NBC kept stalling his lawyers on when…and then after Silverman departed, the network said, "What commitments? Nobody here knows anything about any TV-movie commitments to Mr. Hagman." He literally did not receive anything for doing our show.

I tell him, "That's awful" and I say I'll call Marty Krofft (he was the producer) and maybe we can get him paid some amount in some way. Legally, he must at least receive union scale.

Larry interrupts and tells me not to bother. "If you saw the deal I made to come back to Dallas, you'd know why this doesn't bother me. They're paying me millions." He insists I drop the entire matter saying, "I just told you that on account of I find it so funny the way they love you one moment in this town and the next, it's like "who the f are you?'" And he says it with a twinkle that reminds me why he is able to play J.R. Ewing so well. Then he adds, "Hey, you know what I would like? I don't have a copy of that show. If you could arrange that, I'd call it even."

I assure him that will be arranged and he gives me his address saying, "Now, if you lose that, just call the National Enquirer and ask them. They send a nice man around every night to go through my garbage." We part and I go home and phone Marty Krofft who arranges for a videotape to be messengered to Hagman's home.

End of that story. Here's the sequel…

A few days later, Marty's secretary Trudy phones and tells me, "Larry Hagman's assistant just called. He wants to send you something to thank you. Is it okay if I give them your address?" I tell her it's fine and I figure I'm about to get an autographed photo or a note or something. Two days later, a delivery man brings a large, cylindrical package to my door. It's from one of the most expensive stores in Beverly Hills and I want to say it was Abercrombie and Fitch. Maybe it wasn't but I'm going to say it was Abercrombie and Fitch.

Helping me open it — because she was there at the moment — is a young lady named Bridget Holloman, who was one of the dancers on Pink Lady. In fact, she provided one set of the legs Sid Caesar had ogled in that sketch. The box, we discover, contains a quite-lovely white Stetson-style cowboy hat. There's also a handwritten note. It says, "Thanks for being one of the good guys" and it's signed "Larry."

What a nice, thoughtful gesture. I certainly wasn't expecting anything from him, particularly something like this. But I don't wear hats and I certainly don't wear hats like this. Bridget, on the other hand does. She looks good in everything but she really looks good in this white Stetson except, of course, that it's a size or two too big for her. Fortunately, the box also contains a slip that says that if it doesn't fit, bring it back to the store and exchange it. I tell Bridget the hat is hers. "Take it back and get one that fits." Three days later, she goes to do that.

I'm working at home when I get a frantic call from her — from a pay phone at the store in Beverly Hills. At first from her tone, I think she's been mugged or beaten up or that something horrible has happened. "Calm down, Bridget," I tell her. "Take a deep breath and tell me what happened."

She takes a deep breath and says, like she's telling me the Earth has been invaded, "It's…it's a fourteen hundred dollar hat!"

She says they cheerily took it back and told her she had a little over $1,400 in store credit. This is around 1983. That was even more money then than it is now and it's a lot of money now. "What do I do?" she asks me. I tell her she can pick out another hat or anything else she wants or she can see if they'll let her take some or all of it in cash. I say, "Maybe you can buy a pair of $20 earrings and take $1,380 bucks in change." What she does is to buy a cheaper (and to my eye, almost identical) hat and take the rest in currency.

The almost-identical hat costs her under $200 and it makes a good point. If Larry Hagman wanted to send me a white cowboy hat, he could have spent $200 and I would have been perfectly pleased and impressed by the gesture. But he didn't. He spent $1,400.

Bridget wants to give me the change or at least split it with me but it's almost her birthday so we make a deal: She'll keep the cash but for the next six months, whenever we go to a restaurant, she pays. I kind of enjoy that when our server brings me a check, I can point to the cute blonde lady and say, "She's paying." I get some awfully odd looks.

Larry Hagman was right. Life is so much more interesting when you can keep other people just a little off-balance. I'm sorry his is over. There may be other stories about him that paint him as another kind of guy but this is my Larry Hagman story and I'm sticking to it.

This is a rerun from November of 2012 and maybe the second-most-linked-to article ever on this site, the Mel Tormé story being the first. It's my Larry Hagman story…

Here is my Larry Hagman story. Get comfy. This will take a while.

The year is 1980 and I am the Head Writer on Pink Lady, an infamous variety series that was forced by high-level corporate interests on All Concerned: Its producers, its staff, some of its stars, certain folks at NBC who didn't want to put it on…and on the American public, most of whom opt not to watch. Working on it presents every conceivable problem one can have making a variety show and a biggie is that guest stars do not wish to guest. Or at least, the ones you'd want for promotional purposes don't want to guest. Even before the show airs and anyone has any idea if it's good or bad, we cannot secure a guest star whose name means anything.

A man named Fred Silverman is running NBC that week, trying frantically but nobly to enrich the disastrous ratings levels he inherited upon his arrival. Mr. Silverman did not want to put Pink Lady on the air but was so ordered by those above him. Seeking to make the best of things, he adds his clout to our endless pursuit of guest stars. This means going after performers not on NBC shows since there are so few of those viewers will tune in to see. He sets his sights on Mr. Hagman, the star of Dallas over on CBS. Hagman is very popular, though not as popular as he'd be a few months later.

Silverman himself gets on the phone to try and arrange a Hagman guest shot on Pink Lady. Failing to navigate through a sea of agents, he decides to call the star directly. You can do that when you're Vice-President of Programming — I think that was his title — at NBC. Time is of the essence so he phones him on a Sunday. The following is the story as told to me by Mr. Hagman and if it isn't true, it oughta be.

Larry Hagman lives in a big house in Malibu where he observes certain rituals which some might call superstitions. One is that he does not speak on Sundays. He whistles. He can whistle in a manner that goes up in pitch at the end. That one means "yes." He can whistle in a manner that goes down in pitch at the end. That one means "no." He has a few others but those are the key ones — The whistle for "yes" and the whistle for "no." Those who know the star know all about this and Fred is well aware. He starts the call by saying, "Larry, I know you don't talk on Sundays but please listen to this…"

He tells him about the show and how all we want is a day or two of his time. The pay will be $7500, which is more or less standard for a Big Name Star in this kind of gig — or at least it was then. Hagman will be in a sketch or two and he will not be alone in these as Sid Caesar is also a guest. At he mentions Sid Caesar, Silverman unknowingly scratches a long-held itch of Mr. Larry Hagman. Larry grew up watching Sid's old Your Show of Shows, thinks Caesar is the greatest genius ever on television, and once fantasized about being Carl Reiner or Howie Morris — a second banana supporting player to Sid Caesar.

When Fred asks, "Will you do it?," Larry Hagman gives his whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $10,000.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $12,500.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $15,000.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and says, "Well, I can't go higher than that but I'll tell you what I can do. You have your own production company, right? I'll arrange for it to get two commitments to produce TV-movies for NBC. There's good money in those and if one of them becomes a series, that could mean millions."

Hagman says, "You've got a deal!" There are some situations for which one will break one's vow of silence.

Fred's happy. We're happy. Larry is happy. Who is not happy? The producers of Dallas are not happy. They're shooting a key episode that coming week and are horrified when their star announces that on two days — Wednesday and Thursday — he will be walking off their set at 6 PM so he can come over and do our show. They want him to be able to stay later if they need that, then they want him to go home and rest and learn lines for the next day. Wednesday evening, he will rehearse with us. Thursday evening, he will tape with us.

There's apparently no point in getting angry at him so they get angry at us, like it's unprofessional of us to make an offer to their actor. I have nothing at all to do with schedules nor did I hire Larry Hagman but one of their Production Managers phones me to complain and to say things like, "How would you like it if we hired one of your stars to moonlight while you're shooting?" I tell him (a) he's quite welcome to any or all of them and (b) if he doesn't like it, he should call Fred Silverman at NBC. In a semi-threatening tone, he tells me we'd better not keep Hagman up late. "He has to be in makeup for us by 6 AM each day."

Wednesday evening, Larry Hagman walks into our rehearsal at around 7 PM. He is utterly charming and human and just about the nicest guy you could ever want to meet. He is so thrilled to be working with Sid Caesar but he is also genuinely polite and gracious to everyone…and very humble. Well aware he is new to this "variety show thing," he asks everyone if he's doing this or that right, if we're okay with how he's reading certain lines, etc. He even comes up with one great joke to add to a routine.

During breaks, he and I get to talking and I tell him — true story — that I was in a "test" audience once that was shown the pilot to his earlier TV series, I Dream of Jeannie. I was among those in the test group that voted to put the show on the air. He loves me for that and thanks me like I am wholly responsible for his career. He also likes that I don't ask him what's up in the current Dallas storyline…though he did let me in on a secret. He'd just come from filming a scene in which his character, J.R. Ewing, was shot and may die. "It's going to be the cliffhanger at the end of this season. Everyone will have to wait until September to find out if J.R. lives or dies and who shot him." I am not a watcher of Dallas but I have to ask, "Okay, so who shot him and are you coming back?"

He says he doesn't know who shot him. "I don't think the producers have figured that out yet or if they have, they ain't telling." As for coming back next season, he says that all depends on how contract negotiations go. In other words, how much they pay him. It is at this moment that he tells me and some of the others who work on the show, the story of how he agreed to do it — Fred Silverman, the whistling, the commitment for two TV-movies. The commitment is one reason he can say, "If they [the Dallas folks] don't meet my price, I'll star in one of those TV-movies, we'll make sure it becomes a series and I'll do just fine."

We hurry Larry through rehearsals, well aware he has to get back to Malibu (a 30-45 minute drive) and learn lines and sleep before he has to be in Burbank at 6 AM but he doesn't seem to care. We tell him at 10 PM he can go. Still, he sticks around, discussing his scene with Sid and then chatting with us. I mention a movie he was in that I had recently seen — Fail Safe with Henry Fonda — and that elicits a half-hour of anecdotes, all of them riveting, about how green and nervous he felt on that set with all those seasoned actors. He segues to tales of his mother, the great Mary Martin, and what it was like to grow up in her world.

We talk of Jeannie and of his hat collection. The man collects hats. He has come to us wearing what he says is his favorite. It's a baseball cap imprinted with the logo of a company in Texas that sells, presumably for purposes of artificial insemination, bull semen. I can't imagine what else you'd use the stuff for. Sun screen?

Hagman calls that cap the supreme metaphor for show business. He also likes the looks he gets when people who are talking to him suddenly read his hat. He says, and this is clearly a reference in some way to his upcoming negotiations to return to Dallas next season, "Life is a whole lot more fun when you can keep other people just a little off-balance."

The stories go on and on. Every ten or fifteen minutes, I hear the voice of that Production Manager and I say something like, "Well, Larry, I know you have that long drive back to Malibu and an early call tomorrow…" Larry nods and grins and starts another anecdote. I finally escort him to his car and we stand there in the parking lot for another half-hour until, just past Midnight, he grudgingly heads home. I have no idea how he managed to get there, sleep, learn lines and be on the set the next morning at six but he did that. He filmed there all day, then came to us with a full load of energy to perform.

He was perfect in every capacity: Charming, funny, gracious to all, etc. At one point, we encountered a production delay that added at least an hour to our evening and forced all to sit around and wait. Not a peep of complaint was heard from Larry Hagman.

His key sketch, the one he'd been looking forward to, was just him, Sid Caesar, one other actor and two allegedly naked women. The actor was Jim Varney, who was later famous for his "Hey, Vern" routines. The ladies were not naked but you only saw their legs and were supposed to presume that somewhere above the top of your screen, each was indecently attired.

Caesar and Hagman play two businessmen going out to discuss contracts and terms at a restaurant. It turns out the restaurant has strippers and as Hagman tries to talk about financial matters, Caesar struggles to take his eyes off the young ladies and to focus on what Hagman is saying. Hagman is brilliantly deadpan throughout, making like the dancers aren't there. Caesar cannot take his eyes off them, especially as items of clothing fly from the stage and land upon him. It's a very short sketch but it's pretty funny and Larry Hagman is thrilled to have done it. Afterwards, he tells all, especially Sid, over and over what it means to him to appear in a sketch with the great Sid Caesar.

I again walk Larry to his car and we stand out in the parking lot for another half-hour as he tells me about his love of Caesar and of that style of comedy and how he wishes he had grown up to be Howie Morris. (As I will learn later when I work with the man, even Howie Morris wished he had grown up to be Howie Morris.) Larry finally heads back to Malibu around 1 AM, which I'm sure thrilled the crew over on Dallas no end.

Time passes, as it has a way of doing. I finish the sixth episode of Pink Lady (all anyone was contracted to do) and move on to another show. J.R. Ewing is shot on the final episode of Dallas that season and all of America wonders whodunnit. Those who are aware that Larry Hagman is renegotiating his contract are equally intrigued to know if J.R. will live or die. Larry does sign. J.R. comes back. It turns out J.R.'s mistress Kristin shot him. And at some point, Fred Silverman leaves NBC.

One day, I am over at the studio of that very same network, walking through a corridor and I hear a voice say of me, "I know that man." It is Larry Hagman. He doesn't recall my name — I wouldn't have expected him to — but he does recall me. I wouldn't have expected that, either. He hugs me and tells the folks he's with all about this sketch he got to do on our show with Sid Caesar and how it was a childhood fantasy come true. In the course of the chat, he casually mentions, "I had such a great time that it doesn't even bother me I didn't get paid."

"Didn't get paid?"

No, he tells me. He was supposed to get these two TV-movies to do for his production company but NBC kept stalling his lawyers on when…and then after Silverman departed, the network said, "What commitments? Nobody here knows anything about any TV-movie commitments to Mr. Hagman." He literally did not receive anything for doing our show.

I tell him, "That's awful" and I say I'll call Marty Krofft (he was the producer) and maybe we can get him paid some amount in some way. Legally, he must at least receive union scale.

Larry interrupts and tells me not to bother. "If you saw the deal I made to come back to Dallas, you'd know why this doesn't bother me. They're paying me millions." He insists I drop the entire matter saying, "I just told you that on account of I find it so funny the way they love you one moment in this town and the next, it's like "who the f are you?'" And he says it with a twinkle that reminds me why he is able to play J.R. Ewing so well. Then he adds, "Hey, you know what I would like? I don't have a copy of that show. If you could arrange that, I'd call it even."

I assure him that will be arranged and he gives me his address saying, "Now, if you lose that, just call the National Enquirer and ask them. They send a nice man around every night to go through my garbage." We part and I go home and phone Marty Krofft who arranges for a videotape to be messengered to Hagman's home.

End of that story. Here's the sequel…

A few days later, Marty's secretary Trudy phones and tells me, "Larry Hagman's assistant just called. He wants to send you something to thank you. Is it okay if I give them your address?" I tell her it's fine and I figure I'm about to get an autographed photo or a note or something. Two days later, a delivery man brings a large, cylindrical package to my door. It's from one of the most expensive stores in Beverly Hills and I want to say it was Abercrombie and Fitch. Maybe it wasn't but I'm going to say it was Abercrombie and Fitch.

Helping me open it — because she was there at the moment — is a young lady named Bridget Holloman, who was one of the dancers on Pink Lady. In fact, she provided one set of the legs Sid Caesar had ogled in that sketch. The box, we discover, contains a quite-lovely white Stetson-style cowboy hat. There's also a handwritten note. It says, "Thanks for being one of the good guys" and it's signed "Larry."

What a nice, thoughtful gesture. I certainly wasn't expecting anything from him, particularly something like this. But I don't wear hats and I certainly don't wear hats like this. Bridget, on the other hand does. She looks good in everything but she really looks good in this white Stetson except, of course, that it's a size or two too big for her. Fortunately, the box also contains a slip that says that if it doesn't fit, bring it back to the store and exchange it. I tell Bridget the hat is hers. "Take it back and get one that fits." Three days later, she goes to do that.

I'm working at home when I get a frantic call from her — from a pay phone at the store in Beverly Hills. At first from her tone, I think she's been mugged or beaten up or that something horrible has happened. "Calm down, Bridget," I tell her. "Take a deep breath and tell me what happened."

She takes a deep breath and says, like she's telling me the Earth has been invaded, "It's…it's a fourteen hundred dollar hat!"

She says they cheerily took it back and told her she had a little over $1,400 in store credit. This is around 1983. That was even more money then than it is now and it's a lot of money now. "What do I do?" she asks me. I tell her she can pick out another hat or anything else she wants or she can see if they'll let her take some or all of it in cash. I say, "Maybe you can buy a pair of $20 earrings and take $1,380 bucks in change." What she does is to buy a cheaper (and to my eye, almost identical) hat and take the rest in currency.

The almost-identical hat costs her under $200 and it makes a good point. If Larry Hagman wanted to send me a white cowboy hat, he could have spent $200 and I would have been perfectly pleased and impressed by the gesture. But he didn't. He spent $1,400.

Bridget wants to give me the change or at least split it with me but it's almost her birthday so we make a deal: She'll keep the cash but for the next six months, whenever we go to a restaurant, she pays. I kind of enjoy that when our server brings me a check, I can point to the cute blonde lady and say, "She's paying." I get some awfully odd looks.

Larry Hagman was right. Life is so much more interesting when you can keep other people just a little off-balance. I'm sorry his is over. There may be other stories about him that paint him as another kind of guy but this is my Larry Hagman story and I'm sticking to it.

Pesho Karivanov wrote in on two topics. I'll deal with them one at a time…

Hi Mark. Pesho here. I find your advice for people who want to have a career in writing quite profound. Your stories are very amusing. And your article on Gwen Verdon really highlights that underrated of actresses true greatness, in my opinion. I wanted to ask you why do you keep insisting that neither Trump or Biden will be nominees of their respective parties? There is 0 indication that the candidates will be anyone but them.

Democrats are going to lose New York's electoral votes for the first time in years if Warren or Bernie get selected, because Wall Street despises both of them. Biden will probably lose because of the sniffing and touchy-feely and likewise Trump might lose because of all of his crimes, scandals and just his petty and childish behavior. But A) Biden has the best chance of beating Trump without alienating New York B) Even if Trump gets impeached, he will be elected by his party. Well, what indication is there that Weld, Sanford or Walsh are even electable? No one is talking about them.

You're misunderstanding my prediction…because it really wasn't a prediction. I said "I'm still not convinced that either Biden or Trump will be on the final ballot." This has nothing to do with the polls. It has everything to do with, first of all, the fact that Election Day is still 403 days away. I know with all we're hearing about the election, it feels like it has to be this November, not next November but trust me on this. 403 days.

At this point in the battle for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, the front runner was Herman Cain. And the political situation is a lot more volatile now than it was then. It's easy for me to imagine Biden, Warren and Sanders all faltering and someone else — maybe even someone who has not yet gotten into the race — slipping in there. (Much less easy for me to imagine New York not going Democratic, no matter who the nominee is.)

And remember, I would happily vote for Joe, Elizabeth or Bernie. I just think there's a long, grueling campaign ahead and it's possible any of them could have new scandals or health issues or major gaffes or voter fatigue (sometimes, we just get sick of someone) or any of a dozen other things knocking them down. Republicans are going to throw unprecedented quantities of mud at them and even bogus mud sometimes sticks or provokes a damaging response.

As for Trump, I certainly am not thinking that Weld, Sanford or Walsh would be the candidate. There's more chance of you being the Republican nominee with me as your running mate. But we're going to have one of these scandals about Trump every week or two for the rest of his time in office. Even some voters who still favored Nixon's policies decided he was too mired in criminal charges to stick with, plus he was starting to look seriously unstable. Trump's ability to utter a coherent sentence is diminishing another notch each time Seth Meyers takes "A Closer Look."

This is not a prediction. It's just a scenario I see as possible. Polls start to show a G.O.P. bloodbath with the loss of the Senate quite possible. Some Senators and Congressmen with constituencies that aren't solid red start to worry and decide that to survive, they have to distance themselves from this guy. Today, a lot of them are hiding under their desks, afraid to go on the record as soundly defending his conduct.

In Nixon's case, several leading Republicans (including Barry Goldwater) who were still officially on his side went to him and said they'd be deserting the ship rather than go down with it. Already, you can see certain prominent Repubs who recognize this as possible positioning themselves to be able to leap in if there's even a hint of an opening. Why do you think we're suddenly hearing from Mitt Romney?

I'm not saying it will happen…just that this whole race and the whole Trump administration are so unpredictable that you can't rule anything out. Trump could suddenly up and convert the entire Executive Branch to a chain of vape shops. Would you bet that a month from now, we won't be talking about a new Trump scandal, twice the severity of the Ukrainian matter, that suddenly came out of nowhere?

On to your other question…

My second question is far more simple. I recently heard on Gilbert Gottfried's podcast that Jay Leno eulogized Joe E. Ross? Do you know if this is true and — out of morbid curiosity — What is your opinion of Joe E. Ross? In my opinion, the man was very funny.

I think Joe E. Ross was very funny when he was performing a script in a TV show produced by Nat Hiken…but nowhere else. On the Sgt. Bilko show or Car 54, Where Are You?, he was hilarious but from all accounts, very hard to work with. I wrote about that back here.

What I didn't mention in that piece was a negative feeling I acquired about Mr. Ross in the early eighties when I was dating a lovely young lady named Bridget Holloman. Sweetest person you ever met in your life. When Bridget first came to Hollywood, she was immediately roped into a co-starring role in a dreadful movie called Slumber Party '57, which she hated. She hated the way she was treated during the filming, she hated doing nude scenes which she felt she was forced into, she hated fighting to get her check, she hated encountering people who'd seen this movie and wouldn't let her forget it…

…and what she hated most of all was being groped by one of her co-stars, Joe E. Ross. He only had a small role in it but he was around long enough to give her nightmares and to cause her to jump if someone said, "Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!" around her. I won't go into the details she furnished (this ain't no porn site) but Bridget was absolutely honest and if she said you were a pig, a pig you were. Guys like him are why we have a #MeToo movement today and needed one for a century of two before. Every single person I've ever met who worked with Ross has stories that basically describe the same Master of the Inappropriate.

I don't think Jay Leno said he delivered a eulogy at Ross's funeral. I think he said he was there and reported on the cavalcade of hookers who traipsed up to the podium to mourn their favorite customer. The first one allegedly said, "Joe E. was a great guy. He always paid."

There are a lot of stories around about Ross. As told in the recent book by friends Jeff Abraham and Burt Kearns (this one), he died in the middle of a comedy performance in the rec room of an apartment complex where he was then living. He was supposed to be paid $100 for it and his widow, who needed the money I guess, asked a friend to go to whoever was going to pay it and collect the fee. The friend went…and was handed fifty dollars by someone who said, "He only did half the show."

Who was the friend? I dunno. I've heard a half-dozen acquaintances of Joe E. say it was them. It's one of those stories that's so good, some comedians can't resist claiming it as their own. The funeral with its parade of older hookers is apparently another. It was so infamous and so many people told stories from it that a lot of folks who weren't there claim that they were. I don't know if Jay Leno was one of the ones who actually was but I don't think he claimed he spoke at it. Thanks for the questions, Pesho.

I continue to enjoy the Neil Simon Fest on Turner Classic Movies, ably hosted by our pal Ken Levine. I wish I knew how to do Chromakey on my computer. They have Ken standing in a blank blue setting and it would be fun to matte him into backgrounds of the North Pole or the Star Wars cantina or a gay bar or something.

Let's see. I watched Murder by Death the other night and didn't enjoy it as much as I did the first time I saw it. I watched The Cheap Detective, which I didn't like in the theaters, and liked less on TCM. Got about a third of the way through, then TiVo-skipped my way to see Ken's outro.

Does anyone know what the story was with Phil Silvers in that movie? He was billed as a star but only had one line and three seconds on screen. Obviously, he was suffering from the effects of his stroke but I'm wondering if that role was much larger when it was cast or if he was signed for a larger part then downgraded when it became obvious he couldn't deliver lines? Either way, it's sad to see such a great performer in such an easily-missable cameo.

I watched Plaza Suite and thought how wonderful Maureen Stapleton was in the first part and how good Walter Matthau was in (only) the third part.

That third playlet — the one about the bride locking herself in the bathroom — is killer material. I saw Carol Burnett and George Kennedy do it on stage (directed by Danny Simon!) and it was one of the funniest things I ever saw in my life. Fifteen or so years ago, a producer I knew was trying to set up a new production of Plaza Suite for cable and he was asking everyone for recommendations of which current stars to cast in each of the acts. I offered to give him the contents of my wallet — about $28 at the time — if he'd make the third couple British and book John Cleese and Tracey Ullman. Alas, the production never happened but I would have spent $28 for that.

I saw California Suite on stage with the original cast and liked three of the four plays a lot better there than in the movie. Actually, Simon changed the Bill Cosby-Richard Pryor one so much for the film that it really wasn't the same play, just the same theme. The one I liked in both venues was the one about the British actress who was in town for the Academy Awards.

I don't think a lot of people know that Simon wrote a sequel to that one. It was in his little-seen London Suite, which I saw on stage (though off-Broadway) in New York, and in it the character Maggie Smith played in the film (Tammy Grimes on Broadway) had turned into Angela Lansbury. She was starring as a detective on a hit U.S. television series — wink, wink — and her gay husband was off living with his new, male life partner.

It was the standout act of London Suite and I thought at the time that Simon must have been planning to write one more playlet about the couple — he left things somewhat dangling at the end of that second one — and then mount a play that would consist of all three chapters. If this was ever his intention, I'm sorry he never did it.

This week, Ken will be hosting The Goodbye Girl, Chapter Two and Only When I Laugh — three movies that all star the second Mrs. Neil Simon, Marsha Mason. The Goodbye Girl is easily the best of them, largely because of a volcanic performance by Richard Dreyfuss. He's great in it and it took me until I saw the failed Broadway musical adaptation of the movie to realize how great. Dreyfuss is very funny and adorable but he's abrasive enough that you can believe it takes the first two-thirds of the movie for Paula (Mason's character) to fall in love with him. On stage, Martin Short had the part and he was funny and adorable…but you couldn't comprehend why Paula (Bernadette Peters there) didn't fall for him halfway through his introductory song. So the show didn't work, at least for me or anybody.

Quick story: I've written here before about my actress friend Bridget Holloman. She had a tiny part in the movie of The Goodbye Girl. — one whole line, which wound up being cut, downgrading her to "extra" stature. You can see her in a couple of shots in a scene at an audition but that was it.

Her line was not even filmed and on the set, Mr. Simon apologized to her for that. She said to him, "I understand. It's just that I was in —" and here she listed for him some of the really awful movies and TV shows she'd been in and then she told him, "I was just looking forward to having a good line for a change."

She said Neil Simon was pleased by that…but not enough to reinstate the line or give her another one. That was not why she'd said it, by the way. She really meant it.

Chapter Two, I think was harmed by the miscasting of James Caan, who did not seem to get Simonesque dialogue. Judd Hirsch did when he did the role on stage and it was quite wonderful. I also felt that Marsha Mason was miscast in the film not because she couldn't be believable as a woman who marries a writer getting over the death of his first wife but because she was that. It was hard, at least for me, to get my mind off the fact that she was essentially playing herself, reliving personal torments slightly fictionalized for our entertainment. It was like the way you cringed in All That Jazz (or should have) when Ann Reinking played a woman who expressed her hurt to Bob Fosse Joe Gideon for not being faithful to her. Anyway, I thought Chapter Two was an okay movie made out of a better play.

Before I saw it, I also thought Mason was miscast in Only When I Laugh, which was Simon's screen adaptation of his play, The Gingerbread Lady. The lead role is that of a recovering, self-destructive alcoholic and the role was originated on the stage by Maureen Stapleton. I bet she was great in it. I could buy her as that kind of person in an instant. Marsha Mason struck me as just too lovely and too strong to play a person of such weakness…but I guess I forgot how good an actress she was. It was a pretty good movie which didn't get the attention it deserved. Glad to see it included here.

Note to Ken: You stated in your intro to The Odd Couple that when Walter Matthau and Art Carney originated the roles of Oscar and Felix on stage, they at some point traded roles. A leading authority on this kind of thing (i.e., me) believes this is an Urban Legend and not at all true. You also stated that you felt Klugman and Randall eclipsed Matthau and his co-star in the movie, Jack Lemmon, as those characters. Next time we lunch, I will tell you why I don't agree and our meal will probably devolve into an ugly fist fight and the busboys will have to separate us. I can tolerate people who hold differing political or religious viewpoints but not this.

Incidentally — and leaving the topics of Neil Simon, Ken Levine and Turner Classic Movies: In the piece I just linked to, I was writing about when Art Carney won the Oscar for his role in Harry and Tonto. I said…

No one expected that win, up against Nicholson in Chinatown, Pacino in Godfather II, Dustin Hoffman as Lenny, and Albert Finney in Murder on the Orient Express. When they called the name of Art Carney, he had a reaction I don't think I've ever seen from anyone else on the Academy Awards. It was kind of a stunned "Really?" not just at the name but at a sudden roar of approval from the audience. They liked that choice even if the recipient couldn't quite wrap his brain around it for a moment. You kind of got the feeling that he was used to being first runner-up in life and couldn't quite grasp that he'd climbed out of the "also starring…" pit. Still, being a pro, he rose to the occasion (and his feet) and did a little victory gesture that I can't describe but which seemed to say, "Hey, I did it." I don't recall what he said, other than that he was charmingly unprepared. But I remember that little gesture which said more than any acceptance speech by anyone I've seen before or since.

I couldn't show you that moment before but I can now. It's in the video below…and watching it made me think of one reason why the Academy Awards aren't as exciting as they once were. They used to often be about people we'd known for a long time. When Carney won in 1975, he was someone America had been watching for more than two decades. Back then, they went to people like him, John Wayne, Jack Lemmon, Marlon Brando…people with more of a sense of history. Now, they go to folks who, while they may have been around for a while, weren't really on most filmgoers' radar longer than about ten years…or maybe three or four outstanding films.

This is a generalization and there are plenty of exceptions but I don't think we often get that sense of someone finally being rewarded for a lifetime of exemplary work. Listen to how pleased this audience was to see the Oscar go to a longshot TV actor they first knew as Ed Norton. They won't be that happy if an Oscar goes this year to the actor named Ed Norton for Birdman…

Here's a video with a story behind it. It's about a lovely lady who used to be part of my life. Her name was Bridget Holloman and she died way too soon. Way too soon.

Bridget was a dancer and an actress and she did other things, as well. One week, she went to audition for a role in a Diet Pepsi commercial that was scheduled to shoot the following weekend in San Francisco. It went well but when she didn't hear anything for days after, she figured she didn't get it — not at all unusual. Most actresses don't get 96+% of what they audition for. Her batting average was around one in eight. That's high.

So Friday evening around 6 PM, she came over to my place. Being an actress, first thing she did was to call home and check to see if there were any messages on her answering machine. There was one and it went roughly like this: "Hi, Bridget! This is Isabel. I'm the wardrobe person on the shoot tomorrow. You have to be on the set at 9 AM so come to my room at eight and we'll get you all fitted. I'm in room 720 at the Fairmont. Bye!"

Bridget knew the Fairmont was a hotel in San Francisco but no one had called about her being in that city or being on any set there. She called her agent and her agent hadn't heard a thing. She called the ad agency where she'd done the Diet Pepsi audition. Someone there told her, "There's no one from that department here. They all left this morning for San Francisco." She turned to me, told me what they'd said and asked, "What do I do?"

We called the Fairmont and checked. They had a reservation in her name and the clerk said it was charged to that ad agency. I said, "I think you go to San Francisco" and then I called Western Airlines — this was before I personally put them out of business due to their lousy service — and I bought her a ticket, then drove her to the airport. I would have gone with her on the trip but I had script deadlines that had to be met.

Bridget flew to S.F., checked into the room at the Fairmont and went to bed. The next morning, she reported to Isabel's room at 8 AM and they fitted her for an outfit. There was already another lady there — a stuntwoman who'd been cast because she looked enough like Bridget. The stuntwoman was dressed the same way they dressed Bridget. At 9 AM, both of them reported where Isabel told them to report and they spent the day shooting the commercial. Once she was dismissed, Bridget checked out of the Fairmont, took a cab to the airport, flew back to L.A. and I picked her up. She was more than a little stunned at the whole whirlwind experience.

Monday morning, her agent called the advertising agency and asked, "How was Bridget?" They said she was great. The agent said, "Fine. Now, let's discuss what you're going to pay her."

The agency guy said, puzzled, "Just what we agreed to pay her." That was when they learned that no one there had ever called to book her. Apparently, everyone thought someone else had taken care of that minor detail.

On the set, they'd had her sign a contract that specified union scale. Her agent argued that he, as her lawful dealmaker, had not had the opportunity to negotiate or at least approve the compensation. That was a breach of ethics if not law and the agency agreed to pay her a lot more. They probably could have stood their ground, sent her scale and said "Sue us" but they wanted to thank her for finding out and showing up anyway. If they'd all gotten to the shoot that morning and there was no Bridget, it would have been a very costly disaster. As soon as she got the check, she reimbursed me for the cost of the airline tickets.

A few weeks later, almost the exact same thing happened with a commercial for Aplets & Cotlets, a sweet confection that I'd never heard of and which Bridget said she'd never seen anywhere except on the set of that commercial. Again, no one called and told her she'd booked the job. Again, she found out about it by accident and went in and did it. And from then on, whenever she did an audition, I'd ask her, "Did you hear anything?" and she'd say, "No…that's a good sign."

This is the Diet Pepsi commercial she did in San Francisco. In most shots, the blonde lady is Bridget but in one or two, it's the stuntlady. She said she wished her double had done the hardest part: The 109 takes of the shot of her drinking the Diet Pepsi…

Here is my Larry Hagman story. Get comfy. This will take a while.

The year is 1980 and I am the Head Writer on Pink Lady, an infamous variety series that was forced by high-level corporate interests on All Concerned: Its producers, its staff, some of its stars, certain folks at NBC who didn't want to put it on…and on the American public, most of whom opt not to watch. Working on it presents every conceivable problem one can have making a variety show and a biggie is that guest stars do not wish to guest. Or at least, the ones you'd want for promotional purposes don't want to guest. Even before the show airs and anyone has any idea if it's good or bad, we cannot secure a guest star whose name means anything.

A man named Fred Silverman is running NBC that week, trying frantically but nobly to enrich the disastrous ratings levels he inherited upon his arrival. Mr. Silverman did not want to put Pink Lady on the air but was so ordered by those above him. Seeking to make the best of things, he adds his clout to our endless pursuit of guest stars. This means going after performers not on NBC shows since there are so few of those viewers will tune in to see. He sets his sights on Mr. Hagman, the star of Dallas over on CBS. Hagman is very popular, though not as popular as he'd be a few months later.

Silverman himself gets on the phone to try and arrange a Hagman guest shot on Pink Lady. Failing to navigate through a sea of agents, he decides to call the star directly. You can do that when you're Vice-President of Programming — I think that was his title — at NBC. Time is of the essence so he phones him on a Sunday. The following is the story as told to me by Mr. Hagman and if it isn't true, it oughta be.

Larry Hagman lives in a big house in Malibu where he observes certain rituals which some might call superstitions. One is that he does not speak on Sundays. He whistles. He can whistle in a manner that goes up in pitch at the end. That one means "yes." He can whistle in a manner that goes down in pitch at the end. That one means "no." He has a few others but those are the key ones — The whistle for "yes" and the whistle for "no." Those who know the star know all about this and Fred is well aware. He starts the call by saying, "Larry, I know you don't talk on Sundays but please listen to this…"

He tells him about the show and how all we want is a day or two of his time. The pay will be $7500, which is more or less standard for a Big Name Star in this kind of gig — or at least it was then. Hagman will be in a sketch or two and he will not be alone in these as Sid Caesar is also a guest. At he mentions Sid Caesar, Silverman unknowingly scratches a long-held itch of Mr. Larry Hagman. Larry grew up watching Sid's old Your Show of Shows, thinks Caesar is the greatest genius ever on television, and once fantasized about being Carl Reiner or Howie Morris — a second banana supporting player to Sid Caesar.

When Fred asks, "Will you do it?," Larry Hagman gives his whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $10,000.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $12,500.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and offers $15,000.

Hagman gives the whistle for "yes." Fred mishears it as the whistle for "no" and says, "Well, I can't go higher than that but I'll tell you what I can do. You have your own production company, right? I'll arrange for it to get two commitments to produce TV-movies for NBC. There's good money in those and if one of them becomes a series, that could mean millions."

Hagman says, "You've got a deal!" There are some situations for which one will break one's vow of silence.

Fred's happy. We're happy. Larry is happy. Who is not happy? The producers of Dallas are not happy. They're shooting a key episode that coming week and are horrified when their star announces that on two days — Wednesday and Thursday — he will be walking off their set at 6 PM so he can come over and do our show. They want him to be able to stay later if they need that, then they want him to go home and rest and learn lines for the next day. Wednesday evening, he will rehearse with us. Thursday evening, he will tape with us.

There's apparently no point in getting angry at him so they get angry at us, like it's unprofessional of us to make an offer to their actor. I have nothing at all to do with schedules nor did I hire Larry Hagman but one of their Production Managers phones me to complain and to say things like, "How would you like it if we hired one of your stars to moonlight while you're shooting?" I tell him (a) he's quite welcome to any or all of them and (b) if he doesn't like it, he should call Fred Silverman at NBC. In a semi-threatening tone, he tells me we'd better not keep Hagman up late. "He has to be in makeup for us by 6 AM each day."

Wednesday evening, Larry Hagman walks into our rehearsal at around 7 PM. He is utterly charming and human and just about the nicest guy you could ever want to meet. He is so thrilled to be working with Sid Caesar but he is also genuinely polite and gracious to everyone…and very humble. Well aware he is new to this "variety show thing," he asks everyone if he's doing this or that right, if we're okay with how he's reading certain lines, etc. He even comes up with one great joke to add to a routine.

During breaks, he and I get to talking and I tell him — true story — that I was in a "test" audience once that was shown the pilot to his earlier TV series, I Dream of Jeannie. I was among those in the test group that voted to put the show on the air. He loves me for that and thanks me like I am wholly responsible for his career. He also likes that I don't ask him what's up in the current Dallas storyline…though he did let me in on a secret. He'd just come from filming a scene in which his character, J.R. Ewing, was shot and may die. "It's going to be the cliffhanger at the end of this season. Everyone will have to wait until September to find out if J.R. lives or dies and who shot him." I am not a watcher of Dallas but I have to ask, "Okay, so who shot him and are you coming back?"

He says he doesn't know who shot him. "I don't think the producers have figured that out yet or if they have, they ain't telling." As for coming back next season, he says that all depends on how contract negotiations go. In other words, how much they pay him. It is at this moment that he tells me and some of the others who work on the show, the story of how he agreed to do it — Fred Silverman, the whistling, the commitment for two TV-movies. The commitment is one reason he can say, "If they [the Dallas folks] don't meet my price, I'll star in one of those TV-movies, we'll make sure it becomes a series and I'll do just fine."

We hurry Larry through rehearsals, well aware he has to get back to Malibu (a 30-45 minute drive) and learn lines and sleep before he has to be in Burbank at 6 AM but he doesn't seem to care. We tell him at 10 PM he can go. Still, he sticks around, discussing his scene with Sid and then chatting with us. I mention a movie he was in that I had recently seen — Fail Safe with Henry Fonda — and that elicits a half-hour of anecdotes, all of them riveting, about how green and nervous he felt on that set with all those seasoned actors. He segues to tales of his mother, the great Mary Martin, and what it was like to grow up in her world.

We talk of Jeannie and of his hat collection. The man collects hats. He has come to us wearing what he says is his favorite. It's a baseball cap imprinted with the logo of a company in Texas that sells, presumably for purposes of artificial insemination, bull semen. I can't imagine what else you'd use the stuff for. Sun screen?

Hagman calls that cap the supreme metaphor for show business. He also likes the looks he gets when people who are talking to him suddenly read his hat. He says, and this is clearly a reference in some way to his upcoming negotiations to return to Dallas next season, "Life is a whole lot more fun when you can keep other people just a little off-balance."

The stories go on and on. Every ten or fifteen minutes, I hear the voice of that Production Manager and I say something like, "Well, Larry, I know you have that long drive back to Malibu and an early call tomorrow…" Larry nods and grins and starts another anecdote. I finally escort him to his car and we stand there in the parking lot for another half-hour until, just past Midnight, he grudgingly heads home. I have no idea how he managed to get there, sleep, learn lines and be on the set the next morning at six but he did that. He filmed there all day, then came to us with a full load of energy to perform.

He was perfect in every capacity: Charming, funny, gracious to all, etc. At one point, we encountered a production delay that added at least an hour to our evening and forced all to sit around and wait. Not a peep of complaint was heard from Larry Hagman.

His key sketch, the one he'd been looking forward to, was just him, Sid Caesar, one other actor and two allegedly naked women. The actor was Jim Varney, who was later famous for his "Hey, Vern" routines. The ladies were not naked but you only saw their legs and were supposed to presume that somewhere above the top of your screen, each was indecently attired.

Caesar and Hagman play two businessmen going out to discuss contracts and terms at a restaurant. It turns out the restaurant has strippers and as Hagman tries to talk about financial matters, Caesar struggles to take his eyes off the young ladies and to focus on what Hagman is saying. Hagman is brilliantly deadpan throughout, making like the dancers aren't there. Caesar cannot take his eyes off them, especially as items of clothing fly from the stage and land upon him. It's a very short sketch but it's pretty funny and Larry Hagman is thrilled to have done it. Afterwards, he tells all, especially Sid, over and over what it means to him to appear in a sketch with the great Sid Caesar.

I again walk Larry to his car and we stand out in the parking lot for another half-hour as he tells me about his love of Caesar and of that style of comedy and how he wishes he had grown up to be Howie Morris. (As I will learn later when I work with the man, even Howie Morris wished he had grown up to be Howie Morris.) Larry finally heads back to Malibu around 1 AM, which I'm sure thrilled the crew over on Dallas no end.

Time passes, as it has a way of doing. I finish the sixth episode of Pink Lady (all anyone was contracted to do) and move on to another show. J.R. Ewing is shot on the final episode of Dallas that season and all of America wonders whodunnit. Those who are aware that Larry Hagman is renegotiating his contract are equally intrigued to know if J.R. will live or die. Larry does sign. J.R. comes back. It turns out J.R.'s mistress Kristin shot him. And at some point, Fred Silverman leaves NBC.

One day, I am over at the studio of that very same network, walking through a corridor and I hear a voice say of me, "I know that man." It is Larry Hagman. He doesn't recall my name — I wouldn't have expected him to — but he does recall me. I wouldn't have expected that, either. He hugs me and tells the folks he's with all about this sketch he got to do on our show with Sid Caesar and how it was a childhood fantasy come true. In the course of the chat, he casually mentions, "I had such a great time that it doesn't even bother me I didn't get paid."

"Didn't get paid?"

No, he tells me. He was supposed to get these two TV-movies to do for his production company but NBC kept stalling his lawyers on when…and then after Silverman departed, the network said, "What commitments? Nobody here knows anything about any TV-movie commitments to Mr. Hagman." He literally did not receive anything for doing our show.

I tell him, "That's awful" and I say I'll call Marty Krofft (he was the producer) and maybe we can get him paid some amount in some way. Legally, he must at least receive union scale.

Larry interrupts and tells me not to bother. "If you saw the deal I made to come back to Dallas, you'd know why this doesn't bother me. They're paying me millions." He insists I drop the entire matter saying, "I just told you that on account of I find it so funny the way they love you one moment in this town and the next, it's like "who the f are you?'" And he says it with a twinkle that reminds me why he is able to play J.R. Ewing so well. Then he adds, "Hey, you know what I would like? I don't have a copy of that show. If you could arrange that, I'd call it even."

I assure him that will be arranged and he gives me his address saying, "Now, if you lose that, just call the National Enquirer and ask them. They send a nice man around every night to go through my garbage." We part and I go home and phone Marty Krofft who arranges for a videotape to be messengered to Hagman's home.

End of that story. Here's the sequel…

A few days later, Marty's secretary Trudy phones and tells me, "Larry Hagman's assistant just called. He wants to send you something to thank you. Is it okay if I give them your address?" I tell her it's fine and I figure I'm about to get an autographed photo or a note or something. Two days later, a delivery man brings a large, cylindrical package to my door. It's from one of the most expensive stores in Beverly Hills and I want to say it was Abercrombie and Fitch. Maybe it wasn't but I'm going to say it was Abercrombie and Fitch.

Helping me open it — because she was there at the moment — is a young lady named Bridget Holloman, who was one of the dancers on Pink Lady. In fact, she provided one set of the legs Sid Caesar had ogled in that sketch. The box, we discover, contains a quite-lovely white Stetson-style cowboy hat. There's also a handwritten note. It says, "Thanks for being one of the good guys" and it's signed "Larry."

What a nice, thoughtful gesture. I certainly wasn't expecting anything from him, particularly something like this. But I don't wear hats and I certainly don't wear hats like this. Bridget, on the other hand does. She looks good in everything but she really looks good in this white Stetson except, of course, that it's a size or two too big for her. Fortunately, the box also contains a slip that says that if it doesn't fit, bring it back to the store and exchange it. I tell Bridget the hat is hers. "Take it back and get one that fits." Three days later, she goes to do that.

I'm working at home when I get a frantic call from her — from a pay phone at the store in Beverly Hills. At first from her tone, I think she's been mugged or beaten up or that something horrible has happened. "Calm down, Bridget," I tell her. "Take a deep breath and tell me what happened."

She takes a deep breath and says, like she's telling me the Earth has been invaded, "It's…it's a fourteen hundred dollar hat!"

She says they cheerily took it back and told her she had a little over $1,400 in store credit. This is around 1983. That was even more money then than it is now and it's a lot of money now. "What do I do?" she asks me. I tell her she can pick out another hat or anything else she wants or she can see if they'll let her take some or all of it in cash. I say, "Maybe you can buy a pair of $20 earrings and take $1,380 bucks in change." What she does is to buy a cheaper (and to my eye, almost identical) hat and take the rest in currency.

The almost-identical hat costs her under $200 and it makes a good point. If Larry Hagman wanted to send me a white cowboy hat, he could have spent $200 and I would have been perfectly pleased and impressed by the gesture. But he didn't. He spent $1,400.

Bridget wants to give me the change or at least split it with me but it's almost her birthday so we make a deal: She'll keep the cash but for the next six months, whenever we go to a restaurant, she pays. I kind of enjoy that when our server brings me a check, I can point to the cute blonde lady and say, "She's paying." I get some awfully odd looks.

Larry Hagman was right. Life is so much more interesting when you can keep other people just a little off-balance. I'm sorry his is over. There may be other stories about him that paint him as another kind of guy but this is my Larry Hagman story and I'm sticking to it.

I haven't seen it yet (and may not be able to even get tickets if and when I can go) but the revival of Pee-Wee Herman's show seems to be a big hit down at the Nokia Theater here in Los Angeles. Friends who've been say it's great and the ol' rumor mill is saying it'll tour, playing Vegas, maybe even stopping off on Broadway for a while. This all sounds like good news and it prompts me to recall seeing Paul Reubens playing Pee-Wee at the Groundlings Theater here in L.A., developing the character until it finally became what it became.

Around '81, it got to the point where there was a Midnight show done every Saturday night…a surreal evening that went on a little long, though its length somehow added to the quixotic nature of it all. Pee-Wee showed cartoons and public service films. He lobbed Tootsie Rolls into the audience, including one, inadvertently, directly into my eye. He welcomed an endless array of odd friends onto his playhouse stage. And at the end of the show, he learned how to fly, which I gather is the plot of the new show, as well. Two people who later became friends of mine separate from one another — Dawna Kaufmann and Bill Steinkellner — were highly responsible for assembling the proceedings, and it was full of fine performers including Phil Hartman, Edie McClurg and John Paragon.

Pee-Wee had a sweetness then. The character changed back and forth in the years after. Sometimes, he was a real innocent ten-year-old boy who just happened to be played on stage or screen by a much older man. And sometimes, he was a much older (and meaner) man who in some sort of sick dementia thought he was a ten year old boy. On the Saturday morning program, you generally got the sweeter Pee-Wee, and that's why I thought it all worked. That was the Pee-Wee of the Midnight show.

The night I went to it was one of the more memorable and oddest nights I've spent in a theater. It was sold out for the duration of its run and I was only able to get seats because I'd met Bill Steinkellner, who'd directed it. I took a lady friend of mine named Bridget Holloman (sad obit here) and we were there on time but the show was not. An understudy was going on and needed extra rehearsal so we all stood in the lobby for a half-hour or so…and then there were tech delays. The festivities started around 1 AM and went on and on and on, apparently a lot longer than they usually did. To make timekeeping matters even stranger, it was a night when we set the clocks ahead so when we got out two-and-a-half hours later, it was not 3:30 AM but 4:30 AM. And the show wasn't over.

No one at the theater had uttered the words "Canter's Delicatessen" aloud but somehow everyone there knew that was the place to go. Without consultation, we all piled into our respective vehicles and caravaned over to that wonderful open-24-hours deli on Fairfax. This included many of the cast members, some still in costume or at least character. It was like the third act of the play with corned beef added. People were performing at their tables or in the aisles and the Canter's waitstaff was sidestepping them and acting like this was the most natural thing in the world. In the booth next to ours was Phil Hartman, still wearing about half his makeup as the gruff Captain Carl and barking out his order for Matzo Brei the way an old sea cap'n would order Matzo Brei.

It was well after 5 AM, maybe closer to six when Bridget and I finally got back to my home. I asked her if she'd enjoyed the experience and she said, "I don't know…but I wouldn't have missed it for the world." The folks enjoying the current offering down at the Nokia may well feel the same way but I can't believe it's as memorable as the all-encompassing dinner theater production we attended. It was so very special to visit the playhouse and stay up with Pee-Wee 'til that close to dawn.