top of page
TV & Film
The opening credits of Love, American Style.
In 1962, I moved to Los Angeles, California, and worked in several managerial and executive positions.
But in 1965, I changed careers. Having always wanted to be a writer, I was offered a job to team up with another tyro writer, Jim Parker, and write for primetime television. In our first season, we wrote 17 episodes for four different situation comedies and our first pilot script.
Over the next ten years, we wrote for a number of series, including the premiere episode and subsequent episodes of THAT GIRL, starring Marlo Thomas, multiple episodes of THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW starring Andy Griffith, and one of the two teams writing the series, HE & SHE. During that time we also wrote two screenplays for Walt Disney Studios.
Our most satisfying and lasting contribution to primetime television began in 1969, when we created, wrote and produced the pilot of LOVE, AMERICAN STYLE. It was the first hour long television comedy series with multiple stories in each week’s hour; stories independent of one another, with different casts in each episode. It ran on ABC-TV for five seasons and we stayed with it for three of those years, as the Executor Producers and show runners. My partner and I also directed and acted in the series.
The only episode in which I performed during the five-year run of the show was with a young Cher and her husband Sonny. Unfortunately, I had the role of the other man.
I finally got her alone, at least for the photo.
We were twice nominated for Emmys for Best Comedy Series and I was awarded an Emmy for writing the lyrics for Best Series Title Song, “Love, American Style,” music by Charles Fox.
Our most lasting contribution with LOVE, AMERICAN STYLE, was that with our unusual format, we were able to spin off pilot episodes for several new series, but by far the most successful was our spin-off of a script by Garry Marshall for his classic series, HAPPY DAYS.
Once we walked away from that exhilarating experience my partner and I decided we wanted to pursue different goals, which took us in separate directions and career paths.
​
.jpeg)
In 1970, there I am (center) on the streets of New York, producing a comedy pilot written by Jim Brooks and starring (on my right) Todd Susman, and (on my left) director Lee Phillips.
I sold my first solo screenplay, PUBLIC KISSES, to 20th Century Fox Studios and began writing screenplays for feature films and television, both comedies and dramas. I stepped in to help two of my proteges with their first series, GROWING PAINS, and was Supervising Producer for the first season of that hit series.
I also wrote and produced a two hour movie for NBC-TV starring Robert Mitchum, which became a half-hour series, A FAMILY FOR JOE.
In sum, during my writing career in Hollywood, I either wrote, co-wrote or rewrote over 300 scripts – feature films, television movies, series episodes for comedies and dramas, pilot films and lyrics for various series theme songs.
bottom of page