by Larry Brody
Brian’s Song.
Purple Rain.
Roots.
A couple of writing Emmys, the Paddy Chayefsky Laurel Award, and the all around best episodes of one Acme Ton O’TV Series that had hundreds of millions of 1960s thru 1990s viewers hunched before their TVs–
That’s the showbiz legacy of a very good guy named Bill Blinn.
The good guy who taught me everything I needed to know about writing so that I could learn the rest of it myself, died about 10 days ago, and I’ve been struggling to find a way to talk about him ever since.
Back in 1968, when I first came to L.A., Bill was the first person to ever hire me to specifically write a TV script. He was the sole story editor for a series called Here Come The Brides, and although I had no way of knowing it then, he was the best boss I ever had.
Anywhere.
Ever.
We were never anything but work friends, Bill and I. Our relationship was at the studio only. So I can’t speak much about Bill Blinn the Man except to say that the one time he and his family came over to my house in the early ’70s, he was quiet but cordial, which pretty much was how he was in the office as well.
Except that in the office he didn’t have to deal with strange toddler poops floating in the toilet when he excused himself to go to the guest bathroom like he did that Saturday afternoon thanks to an undiscovered exploit by my firstborn daughter. (No, she doesn’t do things like that anymore.)
I particular admired him for not saying anything about the event occurring until the next time I saw him in his office, at which time he was pretty damn cool about it.
“Congratulations,” he said.
“For what?” I said.
“For doing such an excellent job of toilet training your little girl,” Bill said. “But maybe this week you should teach her how to flush.”
In showbiz we usually say we worked “worked” with this or that person or those persons, but I have to be honest – as Bill always was with me – and say that I worked for him off and on for almost a decade, on shows ranging from Brides to The Young Interns to The Rookies. (I had to turn down Roots because I was producing Police Story.)
After all, how could I possibly claim to be working alongside someone when my entire being was focused on proving that he’d picked the right writer for the gig no matter which gig it was, and my modus operandi for doing that was to study every single damn change he made in every script I wrote and dedicate myself to not making the same mistake again the next time I delivered a draft to him – whether in anybody else’s eyes, including my own, it wasn’t really a mistake at all?
Did Bill know what I was doing? That I cared as much as I did about following his wishes and working my butt off so he wouldn’t have to work as hard as he did to, well, to rewrite me, for God’s sake? Did it mean anything to him?
To this day, I don’t know. Just like the business with my daughter’s bathroom treat, he never said anything about it. And now that it’s way after the fact he isn’t able to.
But a part of me is still hoping that His Writing Eminence William F. Blinn never looked at anything I wrote or produced in the years after our professional relationship ended and saw it as shit that should have been flushed. (I would have welcomed his notes and any rewrites he had time for though.)
Thanks for everything, Bill.
LYMI,
LB
A More Thorough Look at Bill’s Career via Variety.Com is HERE
