Twitch Upon a Star (31 page)

“The Fun Couple” … that's what Lizzie and Bill were considered in and around Hollywood, and that's the title of the TV show on which they intended to work together when they first approached Screen Gems.
Couple
was based on the novel by John Haase, who later teamed with writer Neil Jansen to adapt the book for a Broadway play (that opened and closed within three days at the Lyceum Theatre in October 1962).

Bill's TV edition of
Couple
featured a character named
Ellen
, the world's wealthiest woman who falls for “an average Joe” actually named
Bob
, who was an auto mechanic. Fiercely independent,
Bob
was intimidated by
Ellen's
elite status. As Bill explained it in 1988,
Couple
was “a real Getty's daughter– type thing,” which was set at the beach where “nobody really knows each other's last names.” In this way,
Couple
was a kin to his
Beach Party
movies of the era and the
Gidget
series he directed for ABC, Columbia, and Ackerman. It also sounded an awful lot like Lizzie and Bill's reality, minus the auto-mechanic aspect.

Notwithstanding, somewhere between the first
Beach
movie and
Gidget
, Bill brought
Couple
to Dozier, who later gave the green light to high concept Twentieth Century Fox shows for ABC like
Batman
(1966–1968) and
The Green Hornet
(1966–1967). He liked the
Couple
premise, but suggested that Bill meet with Ackerman. “He's got something in mind that's very similar,” Bill recalled Dozier saying, “and you might like it better.”

Dozier, of course, was referring to
Bewitched
, which was an opposites-attract comedy that featured an attractive young woman who just so happened to be a witch.
Couple
was an opposites-attract comedy that featured an attractive young woman who just so happened to be rich. Consequently, Dozier's instincts proved to be “on the nose.” Bill not only favored
Bewitched
, he said he and Lizzie “flipped over it.”

In retrospect, it appears Columbia merely stored the
Bewitched
pilot until Lizzie and Bill arrived on the scene. Due to Ackerman's
Lucy
affiliation with Bill, the studio was aware of his strength in directing TV female leads. The studio also respected Lizzie's artistic body of work, and as she perceived it, those in power merely saw the writing on the wall. “Columbia purely felt that Bill and I would work well together,” she intoned in 1989 with a wink and a smile. “An extraordinarily good producer/director teamed with someone who at least looks like she could do the job.”

While a few key players viewed the near “breech birth” of
Bewitched
with ease, creative conflicts continued to arise which almost thwarted the game. Beyond the basic script and casting decisions, the series was having issues with budget and the Writers Guild, the latter of which claimed the show's premise was lifted from the 1942 feature film
I Married a Witch
.

A revered fantasy comedy classic,
Married
is considered to be one of the best English-language motion pictures of its time. As directed by French film maestro Rene Clair, the ingenious story (based on a novel by
Topper
author Thorne Smith) cast the enchanting Veronica Lake as
Jennifer,
a sexy seventeenth century sorceress, who appears in modern day New England to haunt a gubernatorial candidate played by Fredric March, a descendent of the Puritan who condemned her. But she falls for him instead. Adding to the fun, March portrays various incarnations of his character through the years, which only adds to the film's style, wit, and inventiveness.

After the pilot for
Bewitched
was filmed, Bill Asher was asked if he had seen Clair's masterpiece. He had not. “And besides,” Bill clarified in 1988, “there wasn't any valid comparison between the two concepts, certainly none which would have invited any legal ramifications.
Bewitched
began where the movie ended. Our story was about a married couple and the movie was about a courtship.”

One bullet was dodged, at least until former child star turned studio executive Jackie Cooper came into the fold. According to what
Bewitched
director Richard Michaels said in 1988, “Bill was the unnamed producer of the show from the beginning.” But when Jackie Cooper replaced William Dozier as a top executive for Columbia, the studio sought to avoid bestowing series control to husband and wife business teams due to a not-so-positive experience with
The Donna Reed Show
, which was produced by its star and her spouse Tony Owen.

“Jackie came in and saw me controlling things from a distance,” Bill explained in 1988. “He tried to institute a policy which would prohibit Liz and me from working on
Bewitched
, and we damn near didn't do the show.”

Cooper alluded to the derision in his autobiography,
Please Don't Shoot My Dog
(Morrrow/Avon, 1981), and learned rather quickly the “art of dealing with people, and specifically, how to be an executive.” He also never doubted
Bewitched's
potential and was eager to work with Lizzie, whom he had met when she was just a teenager years before
Robert Montgomery Presents
. She was “already beautiful and already very strong and positive,” he said; and she would remain so when they met on two future occasions: first, when she was married to Gig Young, and later when she was with Bill Asher whom Cooper, like Harry Ackerman and many other industry insiders, had known as the director of
I Love Lucy
.

In January of 1964, two months after filming was completed on the
Bewitched
pilot, Jackie and Lizzie reconnected, at her invitation. She wanted to discuss a business matter. He suggested they have lunch at the Beverly Hills Hotel. After the meal, her tone apparently became formal and she requested that Cooper honor the promises allegedly made by William Dozier, his Columbia predecessor:

She wanted Bill to be secured as
Bewitched's
core producer and show runner, with Harry Ackerman serving as executive producer. She had her own ideas of which direction
Bewitched
should go and she wanted those concepts incorporated into future scripts. She was to retain casting and director approval, and wanted Bill to direct the first eight or nine episodes.

Cooper thought such “promises” sounded quite unlike Dozier. In response, Lizzie apparently just glared at him with what he described as her “big blue eyes,” which were actually green and could become “very steely when she wanted them to.”

Lizzie's animated pupils merely added to her arsenal of unique facial expressions which, according to Cooper in this instance, emphasized a very straightforward decision not to do
Bewitched
. “It's too bad,” she told him upon leaving their lunch/meeting. “It would have been a nice little show.”

Back at his office, Cooper contacted her agent, Tom Tannenbaum, and said he'd have to inform Columbia's New York office head Jerry Hymans of the recent developments. Hymans would then be obligated to notify ABC which undoubtedly would cancel
Bewitched
before it hit the air— unless a mutually satisfactory lead replacement actress could be found, which Cooper assumed would be highly unlikely. Needless to say, Tannenbaum was concerned. “Please, hold the fort,” he told Cooper. “Don't do anything until I talk to her.”

A short time later, Tannebaum called back with what Cooper expected to be a mere confirmation: Lizzie was indeed quitting. But Cooper stood his ground. As he wrote in
Please Don't Shoot My Dog
:

Cooper made further calls, next to Tom Moore, then head of ABC. “Tom was a good, level-headed person, not given to hysterics,” he said. Cooper explained what had transpired, and despite the odds, Moore thought there was a possibility of finding another actress to play
Samantha.
Consequently, Cooper instructed his casting office to start looking for another actress who would fit Lizzie's age and type. He didn't tell the press of the recent developments, and neither did Lizzie, which he was pleased to learn. But still somehow there was a leak.

In those days, Hollywood gossip columnists had “moles” in every studio on the payroll. Consequently, the story seeped into the trades, stating that “Elizabeth Montgomery was unhappy at Screen Gems,” and no one denied it.

During the casting search, the studio found three actresses who proved they could play
Samantha.
Screen tests were arranged, a director was hired, and Dick York, already signed to co-star, was brought in to work with the potential new replacements, all of which was funded by Screen Gems, at a not inconsiderable sum.

But the day before the screen tests were to commence, Cooper claimed a messenger appeared at his office door, bearing Lizzie's handwritten note of apology. Apparently, she realized that her demands were incongruent with her contract, and that she should have respected and trusted Cooper's discretion. She promised not to insist that Bill produce or direct, and she would work well with Harry Ackerman. She hoped Cooper would keep Bill in mind for the future.

In Cooper's eyes—and hands—Lizzie's note was a victory, but he wanted to officially secure her words. So he brought the note to the studio's legal department and integrated it as a new contract addendum, which she agreed to and signed.

From that day forward, and for the first five seasons that
Bewitched
was on the air, Lizzie never spoke to him again. “On the other hand,” he explained in his book, “she was never late, she always knew her lines, she never caused anybody any trouble, she was a perfect lady, and she made the show a huge success.” Also, too, Cooper ultimately agreed to Lizzie's previous creative “suggestions”: Bill ended up directing the first fourteen episodes of the first season and, by the fourth year, was promoted to producer, ultimately supplanting producer Danny Arnold, who switched over to ABC's other popular female-driven sitcom,
That Girl
, starring Marlo Thomas. Arnold later created and produced
Barney Miller
for ABC in 1975.

On the other hand, Harry Ackerman was executive producer from day one.

During those early tense contract negotiations with Jackie Cooper and Screen Gems/Columbia, Lizzie and Bill Asher required at the very least a strong Hollywood player in their corner. Consequently, in stepped none other than Lizzie's father, Robert Montgomery. “I asked him if he'd back me up,” Bill acknowledged in 1988. “I told him that Columbia didn't want me to do the show and that Liz wouldn't do it without me.”

Without hesitation Robert consented to support his daughter and son-in-law in any way possible, which meant helping to schedule a meeting between Bill and Jerry Harmon. In that meeting, Bill promised Harmon that he would be financially responsible for all of
Bewitched's
production costs and that Columbia would own distribution rights and overhead. “I was accountable from a creative and financial standpoint,” Bill said. “But from a logistical standpoint, the studio owned the copyright, which is something I really shouldn't have let happen” (though Bill later controlled even that).

That provision proved an attractive choice for Screen Gems, and it was not dismissed. With a final agreement signed and sealed, all parties were in accord, and as Bill acknowledged in 1988, “The studio backed off, I proved them wrong and, on a very precarious note, Elizabeth and I began to shoot the show.”

Eleven