Why You Can Finally Watch ‘Moonlighting’ on Streaming

Welcome back to the Bulwark Coast of Hollywood. My name is Sunny Bunch. Culture editor at the Bulwark. And I’m very pleased to be joined today by Glenn Gordon Karen. Now, he has had a wide and ranging career.

We’re talking an you know, you you you, worked on taxi, breaking away, Remington steal. I could go on and on medium, tyrant on FX, bull on CBS, most recently. But we today, we’re here to talk about moonlighting, which is, one of the great shows of the nineteen eighties gonna talk about a lot of stuff there. I wanna get into it too much just yet. But it is now on Hulu for the first time it’s available on streaming, and It’s a very exciting thing because I think people I think it’s I wouldn’t describe it as lost.

It’s not a lost TV show. It’s still out there. People But it people have not had the chance to actually sit down and watch it for a long time. So it’s exciting to get it back out there. Glenn, thank you for being on the show today.

I really appreciate it.

Yeah. My pleasure. And I’m nobody’s more excited about moonlighting being on Hulu than I am. It’s been about a four year quest to get it, back on streaming. And, I have to say that people over at Disney, really stepped up.

They actually spent quite a bit of money restoring the show and, you know, attempting to get most of the music rights and, So it brings me a lot of pleasure knowing that, peep it’s available for people to see.

I wanna I wanna talk about rights because I am I am a rights nerd. I, like, find all of the discussions about, music rights and all that to be really fascinating. And that that’s one thing I wanna dive into. But first, a little bit of sad news, Robert Butler, who was the director of the pilot, of moonlighting recently passed away. I was wondering if I could get your your thoughts on him as an artist both working with him, but also, I mean, he worked on Star Trek.

He worked on all sorts of,

I say this, and there’s a touch of hyperbole in it, but the essence of it is the truth. He is the history of twentieth century narrative, television, dramatic television. I mean, you say Star Trek, but there’s also Hogan’s Heroes. There’s Batman. Mhmm.

I mean, one day, I was sitting with him and I said, wow, you kind of invented op art, didn’t you? Because if you remember in Batman, the guy would throw a punch and you’d see the pal. Yeah. He He did Hill Street blue the pilot for Hill Street Blue is probably one of the most seminal, you know, in terms of in terms of saying, hey, let’s change how we do this. I mean, he was that guy.

There was a thing called the police tapes, which was a documentary. And he looked at that documentary, and he said, I want this show to feel like that. And everything he wanted to do to do that was against, get went against the grain of the way were done, and the network had very strong feelings against those. He said, you know, I I wanted he wanted to do it in black and white. They wouldn’t let them.

But he said I wanna all the camera heads to be loosened. I want everything to wobble and shake. And, I mean, he he was he and and he was so terrific with actors. He was a musician, and he would talk to them like a musician. I I he would he he’d say, hey, let’s do it one more time.

Let’s let’s put a little wiggle in it. Let’s let’s give it a little jazz. Let’s and he he was just just just a phenomenal human being. I was lucky we did three pilots together. I I actually sort of set out like a heat seeking missile.

When I first came to California, there were two directors I wanted to work with. I wanted to work with James Burrows, And I and I had the good fortune in doing that when I was at taxi, but it was very, very brief. And the other one was I wanted to work with Robert Butler. I just admired his work enormously, and I had foolishly turned down the opportunity to work on the first season of Hill Street Blues at the time. It was called Hill Street Station.

But I found out he was gonna be on Remington Steel. So I, you know, campaigned for a job on Remington Steel got it. We became friends, and I started giving him scripts and saying, boy, would you get involved with this? Would you get involved with that? So we did three, movie of the week pile They were called back then back at ABC.

The third one was moonlighting. Everything I know about directing. I learned from him, mostly about how one comports oneself on a set. Mhmm. What it means to be a director, how you lead people, how you how you start to see a world and then how you share that with other people.

He he was just the most extraordinary person. Just the most extraordinary person. You know, he was a member of I can’t remember the name of the band. It was one of those teen bands, like from before I was born. And, just the coolest guy.

And and so unexpected I remember we were we were shooting in New York once and it was back when people smoked cigarettes.

Mhmm.

They would have these people on the corner who would pass out little tiny four packs of cigarettes. You know, in hopes of course getting you hooked on their cigarette. And, we were walking down the street and somebody handed Bob pack cigarettes. And as far as I knew Bob didn’t smoke, He opened up the pack. He took out one cigarette threw the other three away and smoked it.

I said, what are you doing? He said, well, I just felt like a cigarette. Astea smoke said, no. I thought, I I was I mean, I know it sounds ridiculous, but he had such great control over himself and his environment, and he was just, and just a great, great, great great human being. And a terrific director.

And, you know, sort of like the the American film directors of the forties who not paid much attention to for an awfully long time until, I guess, Andrew Sarah Longwell shine a light on them. Bob, to me, is an extraordinary guy who spent most of his life in television, and never really got, I didn’t think as much attention as he deserved. I at one time actually thought about doing a documentary about him and sort of presenting, hey, here’s here’s this guy, and here’s the body of work. And it’s not just episodes, because episodes are episodes are challenging and really interesting, but you’re basically taking a song that’s already been written and sung and saying, well, here’s another version of that.

Mhmm.

Pilots. Pilots are this fascinating sort of, you know, and they become only more fascinating in the ensuing years. But but and Bob did so many important American television pilots. You can tell I get paid by the word, by the way. I’ll just go on and on and on, but

No. No. This is this is great. And I I I wanna talk about I wanna talk about the pilot of of moonlighting in specifically the sense and how it it is different from how the show from what the show became or or or or how it evolved because it’s So I had not I had not seen the the full pilot of moonlighting until recently till, you know, until it was on Hulu. And so I was sitting there watching it.

I was just this feels this feels different than the show I remember watching. And and it feels, it it’s more cinematic in a way, but it’s also it just it’s it it is it’s a different it’s a slightly different thing. So when you were when you’re looking at when you revisit the pilot, when you look at it, now, what do you what do you make of it and what do you think, like, okay, here’s, I could see what we needed to change, or did it just kind of happen spontaneously as the show goes goes on?

No. It’s it’s I’m gonna answer the question by not answering the question. Okay. The great thing about There’s a lot of things that are horrible about serious television. That and they’ve become less horrible over the years as the form is more But one of the things that was horrible about serious television back in the eighties and the nineties was you typically you got a pilot.

You did a pilot, then you did thirteen episodes, and then you did twenty two episodes. And the idea of making twenty two good movies in a year is is an insane proposition. But the good part of it was, it was sorta like jazz. There was a moment at which you shoulda had to embrace the reality that there’s an element of stream of consciousness that comes in new So what you’re doing, if you are a and I showrunner is is is a word that wasn’t around back then. But if you’re somebody who creates a show and then has the good fortune, to to run that show.

What I’m always doing is I’m going I’m looking for I I used to say to people. They’d say to me, do you know where the show’s going? And I and I’d say that as a badge of honor, to me, that was the great thing about this form. You’re gonna do a twenty two chapter book. You’re gonna do a hundred chapter book.

And it’s very dickensian in in its way. You know, it’s in that you don’t know how long it’s gonna last. It may be thirteen episodes. It might be six episodes. It might twenty episodes.

It might be a hundred and twenty episodes. So what you’re constantly doing is you’re you’re taking your premise and you’re retuning it based on the talents of the people that you’re working with or the lack of talent of some people that you’re working with, of the things that are going on in the moment in society that you could not have possibly anticipated of the new understandings you have as a human being because we’re all growing and changing as we as we move through things. So and moonlighting is, to me, a perfect example of that. We cast civil. I I had only half written the pilot.

We cast civil. But casting the Addison part proved to be almost impossible. ABC at one point wanted to pay us off and say, just don’t make it. We don’t think the part’s gastable. I mean, they literally said they said Bill Murray has a movie career.

We We don’t think anyone is gonna put it with that kind of talent. And I brought Bruce in eleven times.

Mhmm.

I just as soon as I met him, I thought, oh, he’s perfect. But as much as I knew that, I had no idea what the breath of that perfection was. So I remember we were shooting the pilot, and, we were shooting, I think at the Bonaventure Hotel, and I I heard this sound, and it was it sounded like somebody playing the harmonica. And so started sort of walking around behind things and, you know, where you weren’t supposed to go. And I found Bruce, and he was sitting on the floor playing on Mona Charen and once I realized that he did that, I thought, well, I’ve gotta work that into the show.

And we did. In fact, if you look I mean, one of the great lies of the pilot is ABC, the only way they’d let me hire Bruce was if I promise swore that he and Civil Shepherd wouldn’t get romantically involved. Because they looked at Bruce Willis, and he was so not an ABC leading man. It it was absurd to them. That those two people would be together.

I, obviously, felt differently, and I lied and said, oh, no, no, they’re not gonna get romantically involved in the pot. Of course, they do. But it took a really long time to convince them that not only was it a good idea, that it was a great idea. But my point is as you move along, you suddenly discover, oh, your touchstones are this other person’s touchstones. That Sibyl had this whole encyclopedic understanding of classic movies because she had lived Peter Bugovich.

And every night, Peter would show her a movie. Mhmm. And then explain to her why that movie was important. So she and I had that touch tone. And and when I tell that story, of course, it sounds like a a conversation of equals, but it wasn’t.

Right.

Right. I mean, literally, when I gave her the half of the script, convince her to do the show. She said to me, oh, this is a Hoxie in comedy, and I had no idea what a Hoxie in comedy was. She had to explain that to me. Bruce and I had this other set of touchstones, which were the three stooges and the Bowery Boys, I mean, just the stupidest stuff, but it but, you know, we we’re virtually the same age.

We came from a very similar backgrounds. And so we could we could talk in that language. Having said that, Bruce was the guy who also turned me on to Preston sturgeon. I mean, there was There was this idea that I was the cinephile, and there were certain directors that I loved. And, yes, I I was sort of a cinephile, but so was Bruce Willis, so was civil shepherd, So for that matter, it was at least beasley.

So everybody understood the grammar of what we were doing, but as we were moving through it, I would discover things or try things. I mean, I remember we did a I don’t know how far you are into the show, and I wanna say it’s in the first very first short six episode season, we did to see when they had to get into a big important event, and there was a with service guy like guarding the door, and they went up to the door. And Bruce said, have you any chance do you suppose? Have you ever seen a man with a mola’s nose? And the guy standing at the door answers back.

Anyway, they go through this thing. It goes back and forth, and it’s all written like a Doctor. Seuss book. And ending with they get in the room, of course. I remember when we shot that, They called from ABC, and they said, you can’t do that.

And I said, why not? And they said, well, because it just it takes all the jeopardy away. I said, what, what, jeopardy? And they said, well, you know, then maybe they can’t get in. Maybe they’ll get hurt.

Maybe they’ll get found ass. I said, it’s a television show. Everybody knows that they’re not gonna get hurt. They have to come back next week and do the television show. And They honestly thought I was out of my mind, and we would have that conversation through all of those five episodes in different.

I remember he, at one point, have to get into a door. So and I I was bore by the way, you have to understand you I was someone who hated those shows.

Mhmm.

Boy girl detective shows. I worked on Remming to steal only so I could get close to Bob Butler. I I just thought they were silly shows. So when ABC came to me, and I I had this three pilot deal with them, and we shot two of the pilots. And, frankly, they were way too already for the room.

Mhmm.

And they came so now that we’re gonna do the third part, and they said, we’re gonna tell you what to do. And I said, oh, what what’s hell? And he said, we want a boy girl detective show. I said, oh, I hate those. They said, yeah, we want a guy who looks good in a tux, And a girl looks good in a gown.

I’m like, oh, man. You know, I just wanted to blow my brains out. And but at the end of the conversation, they said you can do anything you want with it, but that’s what we All I heard was the you can do anything you want with it. So it was sort of a the reason I think the pilot feels somewhat different it was like a band getting together, and then learning what everyone could play. And at the same time, me willfully ignoring, frankly, a lot of stuff.

And thinking, if if this doesn’t work or if this fails, I at least wanna be able to fail on my own terms.

Mhmm.

You know, It’s a long answer to a short question, and I’m not sure it’s a clear answer, but it’s it’s it’s No. You know, the other great discovery was they could do it. Mhmm. I mean, I remember when we were shooting the pilot, and, We’d we’d we’d we’d get a scene and and Bob would turn to me like, you okay? And I go one more faster?

And he would go faster. And I would go faster. And we do, like, we amp it up three or four times because it was always fascinating to see How fast you could go and still have the audience comprehend what was going on. It also sounds ridiculous, but it who’s very forgiving of the writing, the speed. I used to say that the faster you do it, the more they’ll forgive the writing.

Boom, And, it gave it a kind of a lawn that made it seem very, very different. And the courage of our convictions with all of that stuff increased as we moved through it. So the pilot is probably in some ways the most conventional of the shows that we did. It was also a pilot, and I constantly needed ABC’s blessing to do it. So you sort of your worst impulses don’t come out.

You know, that isn’t when you say. Iambic pentameter,

Yeah. Right.

You know?

We’ll get we’ll get to the Shakespeare Okay, sir. In a couple seasons. No. I I mean, alright. So so the one thing the one thing about the pilot that is that is immediately apparent.

I mean, like, it’s it’s wild to watch. Bruce will disappear on the screen fully formed as Bruce Willis. I mean, like, it it is it is it is it is a genuine kind of revelation to be like, oh, that’s That’s him. That’s the guy who I have watched my whole life being a movie star. Like, it’s it is it is fascinating.

And I I just wanted to I I was hoping you could talk a little bit about mister Will Saletan his his work for you, but also just just him as an actor and and as a as a, you know, a kind of force, on the on the screen.

Well, I mean, what can you say? He We used to like I say, I knew when I saw him. I actually chased him after he auditioned. I turned to the people I was with and went, wow. And they thought I was talking about the guy before him.

I chased him down the street can you come back tomorrow? Cause he was dressed very unconventionally. He was in town to audition for desperately seeking Susan. His hair was all shaved off, and he was wearing a bunch of earrings. He was wearing camo and It’s just, but I kinda knew it.

It’s this has happened to me a few times in my life where I’ve I’ve encountered an actor and just went I can write for that person or I can direct that. I there’s some connection. I had the same, it seems ridiculous to talk about this now because he’s so thought of as a great, traumatic actor, but it was not the case at the time. I had the same feeling about Michael Keaton before we did clean and sober, and there were certainly a lot of people who thought that was an insane idea. With him in the middle of that movie.

I had the same we never worked together, but I had a number of conversations with with Richard Dreyfitz because I just felt this sort of understanding and blah, blah, blah. But with Bruce, it was immediate. There was just this immediate sort of thing. And I also thought we could talk to each other. When we were doing the pilot of moonlighting, Bruce’s instinct was to play the tough guy.

That was what his where his comfort lived at that moment in his life. And I kept going and going, no. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. You wear that.

That’s you. You you don’t need to help sell that. I said you’re Lee Marvin, but I want you to be in Cat blue first.

Mhmm.

I want you to lead with your heart, not your I don’t know if you can curse on this. Go ahead. Yeah. No. I I I actually said to him, I said, I want you to lead with your heart, not your dick.

I said, you have to stop selling that. I said, it comes with you. And it took him a little bit to get that. I think partly because he was intimidated. They were Civil Sheppard.

There were all these lights. There were all these cameras. And the only film work he’d done at that time was he he’d been an extra in a Frank Sinatra movie back in New York. I mean, he he was an accomplished actor in that he was in the third cast of fool for Love Off Broadway. But he hadn’t done film work.

Mhmm.

And by the way, neither had I. I mean, we were both fucking idiots, to be honest with you. I remember we we’d be doing this big fight scene and he had a, a fireplace tool. And he was swinging at this guy, and then he would punch him. But every time he would punch the guy, he would go Like, like, you’re a kid in a kid fight.

Sure. And I had to go to him and put him aside. I said, Bruce, you can’t. He went, I was doing that? You know, I mean, we’re gonna ship both such virgins and such primitives, if you Will Saletan the same time, it created a kind of trust.

You know, we knew we could talk to each other. And he would come in every week and go. What do you wanna do this week? And let’s say, let’s do a musical. Let’s do a fight show.

Let’s do this. Let’s do he was game. He was game for anything. He like me could not believe they were allowing us to do this. And was convinced that at some point, somebody was gonna come up to us and tap us on the shoulder and say you have six hours to get out of town or onto.

Civil had a very different perspective. She had been a huge movie star and then had seen her career Cool. And that that’s just a very different place to be. So it took her a while. To understand what we were doing or to care about it, to be perfectly honest with you.

But once she got it, she got it. And what’s extraordinary, she was so good at it. I’m not sure I fully appreciated how good she was at at the time because she was much more, She required a lot more attention, you know, and and there was part of me that, resented that a little bit, I think. And, so I wasn’t quite as able to see my god. She’s amazing in the show.

I mean, amazing in the show. You know, anyway, a lot

And it and that’s a and that’s a hard role that she’s playing in a way because it it it it can it could very easily morph into, you know, pure straight man, pure kind of shrewish, you know, like, hectoring, like, but in in but she very much holds her own with, Willis on the screen. I mean, it it’s again, it’s interesting watching the evolution of the series. And, frankly, I think she’s I think she’s pretty good with him right at the start. I mean, I I they they seem to have pretty good chemistry. I agree.

No. No. I agree. She just She she was less excited about being there than the rest of us.

Yep. That makes sense.

So, yeah, So, you know, and and so you go, hey, we’re having a party and this person doesn’t wanna be part of the party. And, you know, and she’s, she was a tough cookie. And she was a little older than than we were. And I was the village idiot. I mean, it wasn’t like I had something I could point to and say, look what I did.

The the here’s the reason you should listen to me. You know, it it was I was asking for a leap of faith. So, you know,

That’s fine. It I mean, it’s you know, it’s it’s hard. It let’s I one more just one more question about, Bruce Willis, and then we’ll Sure. We’ll move on. I I I mean, I I understand you have been, in touch with him recently.

You know, he, was diagnosed with aphasia and It’s it’s, I’m sure, very hard for, him and and his loved ones. I’m I’m just curious if you if you have anything you can share about how he’s doing now.

I always hesitate to do this. I made it. I I I I I made a statement about his condition, I guess, about a month, month and a half ago, and it just I went all over the world, and I I I felt badly about it because frankly, it’s not my place to talk about it. It’s the families. Here’s the good news.

He is surrounded by people who love him. His his family, his kids, his wife, Emma. To me, I mean, the they love him, and they are devoted to him, and they are, dealing with this thing With such enormous grace, and it is devastating. It is devastating. Especially to see somebody.

I I’ve said this before, who has so much, and then It’s just channeled in a different way. I don’t quite know how to explain it. You know, we’ve always stayed friends. Partly because we came from the same place, partly because when we were doing moonlighting, nobody knew who we were. And then people knew who we were, and then, of course, he became a huge international movie star, but but when you go through that experience together, I think it’s just, you know, and, he he was always been an an amazing person.

I, you know, I I I mentioned this before, and I think people were surprised by it. Bruce Willis was a voracious reader.

Mhmm. Yeah.

I don’t think people people don’t look at him and think voracious reader. You know, this is a guy who put up his own money to make a movie based on a current vonnegut story. Bruce’s Bruce is is is much there’s a lot more there, and I used to get angry with him and say, you know, you need to go to Marty Scorsese and say, I’ll be the third guy through the door. You need to work with great people, and he did. You know, obviously, he worked with Quentin, and he worked with Robert Rodriguez, and he worked with, you know, m Knight and, my favorite performance of his is was for Robert Benton.

He did an amazing movie for Bob Zemeckis. But but He he much, much, much more talented than I think people understood. There there was a moment when he realized, oh my gosh, they’re gonna They’re gonna pay me a king’s ransom to hold a gun. I guess I should probably hold a gun. But but an enormously talented person.

And and, when you frankly, when you look at moonlighting, his virtuosity verbally, is the thing. And you know, that’s the reason we looked at three thousand men. To be able to do that, is is a rare gift, and he was able to do it because he understood that it was music. And he was a musician I mean, he would call me from the set, and he’d say, you better get down here. They’re messing with your stuff.

They don’t understand the meter. And, He understood meter, and he understood and Civil understood. She understood it in a different way, but she understood it. And, anyway, I I I love him to death and, What was the question?

No. No. No. It’s, I mean, it’s it’s just sad. I and I, you know,

But the good news is he’s surrounded by people who love him and he’s he’s think having the best life he possibly can, if that makes any sense.

Yeah. Yeah. No. It’s just I, you know, I, again, as somebody who grew up, essentially just grew up with Bruce Willis kind of in my life all the time as a movie and TV watcher. It’s, you know, it was, it was sad news, but that that is to hear.

Look, let’s you you you mentioned you’ve mentioned music and the show being like music and and the way but let’s talk about actual music here for a second because here is the thing Here’s the thing you always hear when a classic show has had trouble getting on DVD or on streaming you know, they they couldn’t they couldn’t clear the rights. And I would like I would like to get your perspective as somebody who has just had who you say spent, you know, several years. We’ve spent a long time trying to get this on TV. As, as a showrunner as an executive producer, what is it like to get the rights clearances. I mean, what is the actual step by step process here?

You have an episode. There’s a song in it. How do you actually go about getting that performance allowed for a new medium?

Well, it’s changed. I mean, when we were doing moonlighting, nobody was doing it. There was basically me and Michael Mann, but as much as Michael was doing it, we were doing it much more so. I mean, just to give you a perspective, we had sixty six episodes of moonlight, and we used three hundred songs. So we had to go back and re clear or attempt to re clear three hundred songs.

So there was no There was no template legally or any of that stuff. We found I wish I could remember his name. He was a guy who worked in the music business who sort of said, oh, I’ll help you out. And he would make the calls and get the clearances. And, I mean, I remember once Phil Spector actually came and hand delivered at the master for, I can’t remember the name of the song.

It’s a Charel song, so that we could use it. I mean, no one was doing this back then. So the rights that were cleared, no one had anticipated even VHS, no one had anticipated cable. So we didn’t get any of those rights. The rights we got, with the rights we got.

And when I wanna say when ABC sold the show to Lionsgate for DVDs, they wouldn’t back and were able to clear a lot of stuff but not all of it, and they also made a couple of mistakes, in terms of inserting music that wasn’t should have been where it was and stuff like that. Most of which we were able to correct before it went to who. But There was no formal system. Now since then it’s changed, like, when I was doing medium and we wanted to clear a song, there was a whole apparatus set up at CBS to tell you no. That’s a joke.

You can laugh at it later. But but, you know, and it it also had become a big business. You know, very, very expensive business. So you had to be much more judic judicious about, but, I mean, when I had an instinct about music on on moonlight, I just went after it. Mhmm.

And a couple of times, we gotta know, but not often. People are like, sure. Yeah. You know, and we would break music on the show. You know, the pet shop boys or, you know, a lot of different things, you know, I I would hear something and go, oh, I love the sense of that.

I love the feel of that. And we we’d incorporate it in the show. The the probably the most famous story is, you know, Phil Ramone called me And he said, Billy Joel wrote a song, and he wrote it with your show in mind. Can I send it to you? Like, you’d say no.

Yeah. So he sends me this nine minute song. Big Man on Mulberry Street. I had been dying to do to find an excuse, frankly, to do storytelling through dance. And I decided, okay, this is this is where I was gonna plant my flag.

So we did that, and I I actually was able to talk Stanley Don and to coming No. And directing it. And, you know, I mean, it was I part of it was you know, how they say ignorance is bliss? I I was completely unafraid because I didn’t know how afraid to be. I mean, it was the same thing that allowed me to pick up the phone call or some I think a lot of people assumed, oh, that must have been civil, but it wasn’t, because Orson had actually lived at Peter Bartonovich’s house for a while.

But it wasn’t. I literally picked up the phone and called him and said, Hey, we’ve got the show and doing this Bulwark white thing, and we need someone to introduce and explain it. And he said, oh, he said, well, what do you want me to say? And I said, well, I don’t know. And he said, well, write it up and send it to me.

And if I like it, maybe I’ll do it. And so I wrote that, that intro up, you know, about locking the kids and the dog and grandma in the basement and the Latin. He thought it was funny. And so he came over by the way, one of the greatest days of my life. I mean, there’s orson Wells, and you’re supposed to direct, you know, which is an absurd proposition anyway.

And Sound stage was filled with people, three hundred people. Everybody just wanted to be there to see him. And, Anyway, you would we would find a song. We’d try it against the picture, unless it was something that we imagined prior to that. And if it worked, I would tell this gentleman whose name I can’t remember, and he would call and he’d secure the rights.

And the other thing we did have to understand moonlighting was weird because and if I get too much in the weeds here, just stop me.

That’s a good plan. The show is weeds.

Back then, if you ran if you owned a television network, you could not make Television shows because it was a thing called the Finson rules.

Mhmm.

And it wasn’t that you couldn’t make the television shows. What it said was if you made the television show, couldn’t syndicate television shows. Those were two separate businesses. And ABC decided to take a flyer and see if they couldn’t chips away at that. And moonlighting was the flyer.

They said, we’re gonna make this show. And, we’re gonna own this show. And back then, people didn’t knew that. So as a result, they didn’t have any I mentioned that only because they didn’t have any of these sort of internal workings that other studios had. So if I said I want a song, they were like, well, that’s good.

You want a song. Okay. Fine. They know what to do with that. They also no one can tell you what the first six episodes cost.

They we didn’t even have accounting stuffing. But and then once we had accounting stuff, they went, oh my god. This kid’s crazy because I would shoot them until I was happy with them. It’d say, you know, you have seven days and I’d go, no. No.

I I I mean, it was so naive. And so I suppose others might say arrogant. But I really felt and I would lecture them and I’d say, if it’s really good, People will watch it more than once. You can repeat it. And it was true.

They would run it three, four times, and it would get, you know, a thirty two share. And so they were like, okay. You know. So we would shoot them till they were right, you know, and we’d go after guest stars that other people didn’t go after, and we’d we’d we get music. Yeah.

Well, it’s it’s funny. You you drop two names there. I mean, I the, the Orson Wells episode is great. It’s, you know, kind of, this classic Bulwark and white dream sequence thing. It’s it’s it’s amazing to watch, but then you also you mentioned you just kinda casually tossed off Stanley Donon who, of course, the director of singing in the rain, and and, for this episode, Big Man on Mulberry Street, there’s this I mean, feature film quality, twelve minute dance sequence right in the middle of it with Bruce Willis just all over the place.

I mean, I, like, it’s a it’s it’s a it’s a crazy sequence. I and how long did that actually take to shoot? I mean, I feel like that’s the sort of thing where you you sit down and you think, like, alright, I’m gonna do a dance sequence. And then, you know, three weeks later, you’re still trying to put together the thing? Or was it or was it just so past because you had, you know, one of the great

Well, it was all Stanley. And I I knew Stanley Because he produced the Academy Awards the year before, and he asked me to help right at with, Larry, Gilbert. So I knew him a little bit. So I called him, and I said, listen, I’ve got this dance sequence. Will you do it?

And he said, well, how long will I have? I said, you’ll have a day. And he started laughing. And he said, well, how much will you pay me? I said, well, I can’t pay you.

But I convinced him to do it. We ended up shooting it in three days.

Okay.

I mean, actual shooting days, three days.

Right.

The key to that was, obviously, Stanley and Stanley’s genius, but also we hired Sandal Bergman who was the lead dancer in all that jazz about Fosse’s movie, a terrific actress, but an amazing legendary dancer. And, to dance the female, it was constructed, frankly, so that Civil wasn’t in it. Because the civils process was such that we knew that we’d we’d never be able to get through it. So she comes in at the very end kind of swoops in. But it took three days.

And, again, one of the greatest experiences in my life. You know, you’re watching this master, kind of do what he does. And he was help, you know, he he hired Jackie Blanderim with the choreographers. And they did a fantastic job. But, of course, it was Stanley Don and who, who oversaw the whole thing.

And I I was very inspired by something he had done earlier in his career, and I showed it to him. And I said, these are the things that I’m sort of reacting to. Blah blah blah blah. And this is the reason why I wanna tell this story and this thing. But honestly, one of the great highlights of my life.

Yeah. I I and again, like, I think this is the third season. I’m trying I’m trying to,

but the second season.

Oh, second season. Yeah. So, I mean, it’s early. It’s early in the

relatively early in the run. Our stride really early on. That was one of them. The Bulwark and white episode was one of them. There are a bunch that are I’m still, like, I’m still sort of amazed that we pulled up.

Well, let let’s talk about that a little bit because, again, I you know, I I’m seeing I I get again, as I’m watching the show, and I’m I’m kind of skipping around a little bit because I I frankly I sixty some hours of TV. It’s it’s hard to

this one’s in. But but

but I I know it’s I know it’s hard to believe, you know, in two kids under the age of eight. I’m running all around. But the, but the the the things that are in this show, are things that if you had told them to me, I would have been like, what are you talking about? I mean, like, it is a, not just dance sequences, dream sequences, frequent fourth wall breaks, the the claymation episode. You know, I like, I’m watching the show and I’m thinking to myself, These are the sorts of things that I see on a show like, community or rick and morty.

And I’m like, oh, this is, you know, this is real groundbreaking stuff, but it it but here it is all before.

Yeah.

And I it’s it’s wild. It’s wild to watch, but I like, you know, I I’ve I I don’t need I haven’t even asked a question yet. I don’t know what the question be because it’s it’s I’m I’m curious to get your, your take. You know, you say we we just didn’t didn’t have rules. We we we didn’t ask.

But I I it has to be it had to have been kind of daunting to just sit here and be like, we’re gonna do all these things.

A lot of them were born of necessity. You mentioned the claymation episode. We were going through a really difficult period. Civil was wildly unhappy. And frankly, wouldn’t come to work for a week or two at a time.

She would claim she was sick. And the the network was so terrified of discovering she wasn’t sick that they wouldn’t send her doctor. And but we had episodes to finish. And, It sounds like a sick joke, but I I thought, what if I got a claymation symbol? And so I called, again, you know, dumb fearlessness.

I called Will Saletan in Northern the guy who did the California reasons. And I said, can you make me a claim? It’s just simple. And he went, oh, yeah. I could do that.

And, And the the the punch line of the story is so we created the whole episode because we had to complete an episode. And I went to Cybil’s house with inaugural, which was the, at the time, the way you recorded sound. And she laid in bed and recorded the whole part. It probably took her an hour, and she thought this was the greatest invention in the history of film. But that’s how that was born.

I’ll I’ll tell you a better one. We did an episode that I’m still really fond of called the straight poop. And it was at the height of the media about the show. And at the height of all the gossip about he hates her, and she hates him, and all they do is fight on the set. And she threw a briefcase at me and bubba Olak nonsense.

And, We hadn’t had a new and there was a lot of discord. And, frankly, I was probably the reason for a lot of it because I had the same attitude about the scripts as I did about the shows, which is we’ll shoot them when they’re ready. We’ll shoot them when they’re good. This whole medium is filled with a bunch of crap that presumes the audience doesn’t deserve to be authentically entertained. I was very, very, very highfalutin about all this.

And, as a result, we were way behind on episodes. And, I went to an event. I think it was a thing for Brandon Tar, off. And I was standing on a valet line waiting to get my car back, and I looked down the valet line, and I saw this Little tiny woman, and I realized it was Rona Barrett. And Rona Barrett back then was the number one sort of gossip columnist I don’t know who you I guess you’d compared a TMZ today.

Sure. So I walked over to her. She didn’t know me. I walked her as I introduced myself. I said, hi.

Do you have any interest in being on moonlight? Waiting. And she went, what? And I said, are you available tomorrow? Could you come to twentieth Century Fox tomorrow?

And she went, sure. I said, okay. Be there at at six AM. So she showed up at six AM, and I I put earwigs in Bruce, and I put an earwig in Sippel, and we literally created the the framework for what was basically a clip show. Mhmm.

But the premise of the show was Rona Barrett was gonna come on a set find out why the heck we couldn’t make an episode on time. Why was there so much fighting? Why didn’t she like him? Why didn’t he like her? And she was gonna get the scoop bottles.

And we made it up as we went along. I would just whisper things into Bruce’s ear, whisper things into civil’s ear, And then even run over to Ronin and say, ask this question. And I mean, at one point, I actually ran over to him. I said, ask him about his hair. Because he was gradually, you know, losing his Mhmm.

Natural. I mean, anything nothing was off. I had Civil come out and hold up a piece of gauze. When she realized she was being filmed as if to to acknowledge the fact that we tend to shoot her through filters. It’s I mean, it was it’s just a really meta And I’m still really proud of it, but we did the episode in a day.

Mhmm.

But my point is that that necessity was what created the inspiration. It wasn’t it wasn’t like I said, I’m gonna do an episode with Rona Barra or I’m gonna do a claim. I in a million years, I wouldn’t have said I mean, there were things I wanted to do that I never got around to. I always wanna have Bruce light a light a match on the edge of the screen, you know, like a as if it were. Sure.

You know, sort of a bugs bunny moment. And we wanted to do and did test to do a three d episode. Which, interestingly, I ran into him before he died. P. B.

Me Herman. Paul.

Paul

Rubin’s bought the test footage. Somehow, they told me. He said, I have that footage. I want fun. But, a lot of it was, like I say, you know, your back’s against the wall.

You’re trying to think of a creative, you know, and some of it’s just emotion. Like, I remember the Christmas episode. I just felt like we need to acknowledge that three hundred people come together every day to make this thing, and those people have, you know, wives and husbands and partners and children. And what the hell is Christmas but that, you know, so we turned around the camera and showed everybody in there. You know, I I I if I’m also, if I’m being completely honest, a lot of the stuff that we were giving credit for being wildly original about wasn’t wildly original.

I mean, I was shocked when the fourth wall thing took off because I was like, did you guys never see a Hopin Crosby movie? Did you Sure. Never see Burns and Allen? Did you, you know, I mean, I I that was one of the things that Bruce and I used to joke about was how in the Hope and Crosby movies, you know, Bob Hope would turn to the camera all the time ago. Can you believe we’re doing this?

You know, and I always loved that conceit. And I loved as a kid, I would see these old reruns of the Abbott and Castello show. I mean, they were long done by the time I was a kid, but they’d show the reruns, and they would come out in front of the audience before the show started. And they would talk to the audience. And I loved it.

So I started to do the same thing. That was also, by the way, born of we would shoot the show, and I was always in the editing room. And sometimes the show would come in a minute and a half, two minutes short.

And it

was an advertising medium, you know, it was about and so they the shows had to be to time. So I would just set up a camera and we’d shoot these the openers, or when we were first nominated, I think it was we were nominated for sixteen ME’s. We went to the ME’s, and we lost we didn’t win a single freaking Emmy, and we had been nominated for more enemies that but part of it was we were just so different than every other show and we were young and buh blah blah.

Yeah.

But I thought we can’t let this get unspoken to. And it was a Sunday night, and the show was on Tuesday. So literally on Monday that came in, And I’d written this whole thing where about Bruce and his mother’s ill, and good news will make her feel better. Maybe she’ll live. And we shot it in one shot, but this was in the old days.

So in order to mix it, we had to mix it without anything to look at. And and then somehow beam it up and get it to ABC in time to broadcast on Tuesday. And we did it. We pulled it off. But again, it was born of, to some extent, you know, necessity and also wanting to be in the moment.

I I, you know, when I was in college, Saturday night live premiered, And Saturday was like a revelation. And part of the reason I felt it was a revelation was it lived in the moment. There was no artifice about this is gonna live forever. It was right there. And that was something that, hour long television, didn’t do at that time.

And I felt, you know, that was an element that would make the show special. It was important to me. And and, you know,

Well, let me I can we talk a little bit about your your process? Cause I I was reading a little bit about, the writing of the show and and your and and how you guys did it. And there you you you had mentioned, you you had mentioned something about the you wanted all the all the all the scripts went through your typewriter, at least you know, like, more more or less.

And But and I don’t think that’s unusual. I think that happens more than people realize on show.

Well, so that’s what I wanted to ask. It it, like, how, you know, that because that’s the sense I get with something like with something like Madman or the Soprano certainly in this age of the, like, auteurist showrunner type thing. I like, that is the sense that I but I I don’t know. I don’t know if that was also true for network television. I mean, I’m I

I I can only speak to the television that I did, and it was true for the television that I did. But the reason I felt the right to do it, the first show I did was taxi. I was brought on as a writer on taxi. And I wrote an episode that was it was a big sweeps episode, but the truth is when I handed in the script, it was rewriting done on it. And it was one of the first things I’d ever done, and I was devastated to discover that someone was gonna rewrite me.

And then I was devastated to discover they were gonna rewrite me, but they weren’t gonna put their name on. And I was I was very grateful, but at the same time sort of puzzled And I asked, why is that the case? And they explained to me that Jim Brooks’ philosophy was, hey, I’m the executive producer, and I hired you. And to the extent that you were able to do the thing that I needed you to do, I’m grateful. But to the extent that you couldn’t at that moment do the thing that I needed you to do, That’s my responsibility.

And I thought, oh, he’s right. Oh, wow. That’s interesting. And I sort of carried that with me. You know, when I was in a position, I always wanted people to know.

I wouldn’t put my name on your I mean, it’s interesting because some of the shows you mentioned, people have said got that person’s names on every script. But the truth is there’s a reason there’s a staff there. And a lot of the great ideas for shows, I mean, one show I almost completely didn’t touch was, atomic Shakespeare.

Mhmm.

It was just so well executed. Ron, Ron and Jeff, Ron Osborne and Jeff Reno just did a phenomenal job, but most of the scripts were phenomenal. They just Sometimes they just needed some tuning. They needed, you know, it’s really about keeping the voices the same and keeping the style the same. But again, I know I wasn’t the only one who did that.

I know that others, I think David Kelly,

Sure.

You know, and then, of course, when as you said, when we got into the more our tourist period, a lot of people started to do it. But everybody does it differently. Aaron does it differently, sorkin. And I’m just gonna say this because nobody says it. His movie returned to the Chicago seven and not returned to the cigars.

The Chicago seven. Do you know what I’m talking about?

No. I’m not I’m not see that.

Okay. It’s a phenomenal. Anyway, and it kinda got lost in COVID. Yeah. Amazing piece of work.

Anyway,

Oh, no. Oh, the the trial of Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I did see. I did see that.

I actually did see that. I I take it back. I’m sorry. I was

It’s a lot of good stuff that got lost during COVID because it it didn’t get a launch if you know what I mean. But that was really, for me, one of the really hard breakers Anyway, everybody does it differently and everybody does it the same. It it whenever I meet a showrunner, the first thing I ask them is, so how do you do it? Because it’s an insane proposition. Mhmm.

And that’s why I marvel like it mad men, which I, for me, is like one of the all time amazing shows. And you say, how did they do it? How do you get that much greatness? Not just in the writing, but in the directing, in the production design, in the use of music, in the casting, it’s a monumental feat because you’re doing it on a moving train. A movie is a, you know, I’ve directed movies.

A movie is a painting, and there’s a tremendous amount of contemplation involved. But a television series doesn’t allow for much contemplation because you always have the next one and the next one, the next one, the next one, the next one on moonlighting, I again, youth stupidity, arrogance call at which you will. I tried to ignore that as much as possible. And I’d say, no, I’m not ready yet. No, I’m not ready yet.

No, I’m not ready yet. And at the point, they said, you know what? We’re done with you and they sort of move you aside. But but most television shows even moonlighting, when we were making it, there’s a there’s a bell ringing all the time going, you’ve got to get this done. You’ve got to get this done.

You’ve got to get this done.

Let me I I wanna I wanna go back to the trial of the Chicago seven for a second year because it it got a it it did kind of run into the COVID thing, but it also ran into the being a Netflix original, being on streaming thing. And here’s here’s here. I I bring this up because, you know, looking looking back at moonlighting, you have a show that is putting up a thirty nine share, at a tight. Right? It is it is dominating.

The the the the attention because tens of millions of people are all watching it on a given night, and it’s like we’re tuning in, we’re watching it. People are leaving restaurants early because they gotta get home because they they can’t tape it. You know, it that like, that doesn’t exist. And now now we have a very different media ecosystem, where it’s not just the network TV shows, and it’s not just the, you know, prestige cable networks, you know, your FX or your HBO or whatever. But there’s also, you know, a functionally limitless number of hours that are being filled by Netflix, Paramount plus, HBO Max, etcetera, etcetera.

I I I just wonder, I, as somebody who has been making television now for forty some years, I, like, what do you what do you think of when you see this the fracturing of the monoculture into this wildly diverse set of I don’t know. A set of set of things that nobody is is all watching at the same time. I, like, I find I find it maddening as a critic. I’m curious what your take is as a as a creator.

It’s frustrating. But it is. And you can only lament it for so long before it becomes counterproductive. And I only lament it because I think there are some great things that get missed. I still run into people who have never heard of normal people.

You know, and you go, I mean, to me, again, one of the great, really great accomplishments, in television the last five years. That’s the thing that that disturbs me is that you can make something that’s truly special, and it can Just kinda go up in the ether. But it is what it is. This is the moment that we live in. And I love what I do, so I’m not gonna let the fact that there aren’t forty million people watching it at the same time stop me from doing it.

You know, it’s a very practical answer, but it’s the only one I have.

No. I I I mean, it’s it’s true. I, like, again, it’s it’s

I lament more than that. I lament the death. Of movies being at the center of the culture. I mean, when I was growing up, we lived for, you know, getting the newspaper and seeing what was coming out. And it was a great extraordinary moment in American cinema.

You know, revolutionary moment in American sentiment. And the other thing too that was none of this stuff was ubiquitous. So if you said a I wanna see that again. You would have to wait Mhmm. To find it.

I I I tell this story. I was at a New Year’s Eve party, and Disney had just announced that they were gonna release the seven classics on VHS tapes. Mhmm. I thought this was sacrilege. Not not making people wait for it to come in the movie theater to see them.

And I, I, I told the head of Disney. I thought he was making them mistake. And he laughed at me. Anyway, and of course, I was wrong. But but but but It there was something special, and I try and explain it to my children.

There was something special about the anticipation. And then about the collegial experience, you know, you’re sitting in a place with a hundred, two hundred people. I mourn that I mourned the idea of a movie capturing the public’s imagination, and everybody having a conversation over four or five or six months about. Because it stayed in the in the system that long.

Yeah. No. That’s I mean, that is a the the ephemerality of of so much of of what comes out now is is also fairly frustrating. And hard to hard to deal with. You know, we’re we’re hitting an hour here, and that’s that’s longer than, I usually like to go.

So I’m gonna, I’m just I wanna make sure I think I’ve hit everything actually that I wanted to to discuss with you, but I always like to close these interviews by asking if there’s anything I should have asked. If there’s anything you think folks should know about about moonlighting or the world of TV and and movies in general.

The the one thing, and I think people know it, but it’s worth saying particularly in these kind of interviews because they they They tend to throw the light on on one or two or three people. Movies and especially television shows are made by villages. Lots of people. And, I had the the good fortune to work with amazing people. You mentioned Robert Butler at the beginning of this.

Jay Daniel, who was the physical producer of moonlighting was one of the most patient and inventive people I’ve ever worked with. I mean, I would say, Hey, let’s do a pie fight in a hotel ballroom. And I’d say at ten o’clock in the morning, knowing we had to shoot it the next morning, and Jay would figure out how to do it. He he was an amazing Co conspirator, if you will. But also the crews, I mean, Jerry Fineman was our cinematographer, and he was somebody who studied at the foot of Harry Straddling junior who was a studio cinematographer and shot a lot of the classic what we think of as classic films from the forties and fifties.

The cruise, the The other writers, I mentioned Ron and Jeff, but there there were many others, chick Yegley Karen Hall, Roger director. I know I’m gonna leave people out but it was, a collaboration, of the best kind, and the best shows invariably are we we they do it in the movies too. We create this sort of myth, the myth of a single person. And it’s true. I mean, Christopher Nolan is now standing an amazing person.

And by the way, Oppenheimer is an amazing mood. But part of what makes him so special is he surrounded himself with people who who get the joke. And who enjoy getting the joke. And I was very lucky and have been very lucky throughout my career most of the time. I’m able to do the same thing.

Not comparing myself to Christopher Nolan in any way, shape, or form, but I’m saying it is a it is a group enterprise. And that would be the one thing I didn’t get a chance touch on. So I appreciate the opportunity to do it.

Totally. I and look, folks, if you if you’ve never watched moonlighting, it It is, again, it is it is wild to, to see the Bruce Willis kind of appear and there he is. And he’s he’s the guy, and and just to watch the show and the Raditat Tat of the dialogue. I I’m curious. Oh, you know what?

I I take it back. I have one more question.

Okay.

The the the average I’m curious what the average script length was for an episode of this show because it it it the the rapidity of the dialogue, the the the the quickness of the back and forth leads me to think that this was not a minute a page. No. As as the standard the standard breakdown.

It was, just to give you an example, the pilot was a hundred and fifty six pages, and came in six minutes short. And we put everything in it. Typically episodes would be eighty or ninety pages long. And back then we were shooting, I wanna say forty five minute episodes, forty six minute episodes. That may be slightly off on that.

So and that was one of the first fights that I had because I would hand in these big scripts and they’d say, you have to cut this and I’d say, no. And then they they they they got it fairly quickly. You know, you you look at it when the reality hits you. And the good news as I said was we didn’t have an accounting department, so there was nobody saying, you know. But but, yeah, the the scripts tended to be about twice as long, but that’s been the case.

I mean, even on Bulwark, which is the last Bulwark show that I did, they certainly weren’t eighty six pages, but they were longer and denser than a typical script. The other thing that that I do on my shows is I probably write in a little more detail. I try and create as fully realized a picture as I can if only to make the discussions as specific as possible, even if it’s gonna change. I’m not saying it can’t change, but I’m saying, here’s where we’re starting. And I always say to actors.

It went on well, you know, when I went to Patricia Arquette to do media, I said to her, I said, I will never ask you to find the scene. You’ll never be put in that position. And I’ll do everything in my power, never to embarrass you. I would never knowingly embarrass you. So we put a tremendous amount of effort in detail.

Because it helps down the line for everybody, for all the departments, for all the other artists, So, yeah, long answer to a short question. I popped it.

No. No. No. No. No.

That’s great. Alright. I thank you so much for being on the show. No.

Thank you very much. I’m a big fan, man. I love love I listen to it all the time.

Thank you. Hopefully, met expectations. But I, I very much appreciate you saying that. Again, I’ve been talking to, Glenn Gordon Karen, the creator and showrunner on moonlighting. It’s on Hulu Now.

Go check it out. It really looks great. I you mentioned briefly earlier, the restoration process that Disney did on this, and it it looks great, for for a show that, you know, again, it’s forty years old. That’s you you would but it looks it looks really good on the, on the streaming.

I’ll tell them you said so. They they put a lot of work into it.

It it it’s it’s top Top notch. But anyway, thank you for being on the show. I really appreciate it.

Oh, thank you. Be good now.

Okay. Alright. I, my name a sunny bunch. I’m a cultreditor at the Bulwark, and I will be back next week with another episode of The Bulwark goes to Hollywood. We’ll guys