THE JOURNAL OF THE CAUCUS: ARCHIVE

Entering Paradise


Dave Bell has spent his television career producing a wide variety of quality programming resulting in the George Foster Peabody Award, Emmy Awards among numerous others.

Kitty Stallings hopes someday to have the credits of Bill Blinn and Dave Bell. She currently hosts a lively radio show about food and weight issues every Thursday out of her home state of Mississippi.
by Dave Bell and Kitty Stallings

Dave: When I moved to Los Angeles in the winter of 1960 I had a 13-week contract to produce a public affairs television series which aired Sunday afternoons on KNBC. I had been an associate producer/writer of an ABCTV series, "Johns Hopkins File 7", for a couple of seasons and had put New York’s first so-called Educational TV Station on the air, not in New York City as you would think, but in Buffalo. Ever been to Buffalo? My wife didn’t even unpack. It was snowing when my three little kids and wife got on the plane to meet me in California. When they got off at LAX and walked down the stairway to the tarmac, it was a bright, warm day. My kids couldn’t believe it. Where’s the snow? My wife gave me a kiss and said, "I’m home!" That first 13-week contract became a TV series that lasted 26 years. At the end of the first year producing "On Campus" out of my garage, I turned my employer, The Independent Colleges of Southern California, into a client and started my little one-man production company, Dave Bell Associates. No one complained that there were no "associates."

Kitty: My dream of a life in "entertainment" started on stage at the age of five starring in my kindergarten school’s play "The Wedding". Snagging my first starring role was all it took... but 1960’s Mississippi was not full of opportunities for this budding mega star. There was no "American Idol" and only one professional theatre in the entire state. Since I couldn’t get permission to ride my bike that far, I made do with school plays. As I got older, I sang with any rock band that would have me. My Grandmother was the Godmother to Stella Stevens and so my Mother, realizing how badly I needed and wanted a life on the stage, told me that after college she’d see if Stella would agree to show me around, maybe even allow me to stay with her for a short time. There would be no need to ever make that call because there would be no "after college". This was 1970’s Mississippi and if a 16-year-old girl found herself pregnant, she got married. No call to Stella. No show biz. No way.

Dave: A pattern soon developed, one where I would hear of a young and energetic man or woman who was casting around for a starter position of some sort, one that could be filled by, say, becoming an associate at Dave Bell Associates. It’s self-serving perhaps, but I think I had a better than average rate of success with those I picked. There was Bonnie Hammer, Shari Cookson, Barbara Fisher, Gary Tarpinian, Bruce Nash, Erik Nelson, John Cosgrove, Terry Meurer, Bruce Johnson and Arnold Shapiro whom went on to carve out substantial and admirable careers in our business. You see, that’s the downside of choosing bright and talented young fledglings to fill the nest. Eventually they have to fly on their own. This mentoring thing can be a bittersweet accomplishment.

Kitty: I was divorced by the ripe old age of eighteen and met my new guy, Neil, just a short time later. Neil’s rock and roll band was looking for a female singer and I looked in the mirror and found her. We were seeing too many juke joints that were playing Ferlin Husky, so we struck out on our own playing any beer joint or nightclub -- and yes, there is a difference – they would pay us, sometimes as little as twenty-five dollars a night. I know you’ve heard of "high on the hog." We were more like "knowing on the hoof." Early in the 80’s, we were playing at one of the nicer seafood restaurants along the Gulf Coast when a welldressed lady approached the stage. I assumed she had a request, but she came right to the point with, "Hoagy Carmichael would like to buy you and your husband a drink." She must have seen the look on my face, because she went on to say: "He’s the man who wrote Stardust". Oh. We had a lovely conversation with Mister Carmichael, him telling stories of Hollywood and movies, offering compliments to Neil about his music, and all that while I kept thinking how wonderful it was to listen to someone who had a world of experience and the kind heart to share it with those just starting out. Heaven knows where I’d find that again.

Dave: DBA produced a special for NBC about a one-armed gymnast who was in the news and that got a couple of my associates interested in Nadia Comaneci who had just chalked up the world’s first perfect "10" in the Olympics. Our friend Jim McGinn wrote the script, and we got Tribune Broadcasting to put up the money for our first movie, "Nadia," which wasn’t great, but tweeners as they’re now called, really loved it. It was the highest rated television movie in television history, up to then. "Nadia" whetted my appetite for movie producing and I finally succumbed to the prodding from one of my associates to try to do a movie about Alzheimer’s Disease, which back then was barely on the radar. Vickie Patik, whom I met because I knew her writer-boyfriend Walter Davis, volunteered to write a treatment. Anytime anybody volunteers something, they have made me an offer I can’t refuse. All of the networks turned it down while admitting it was a brilliant treatment. With a bit of chicanery too complex to go into here, through mutual friends, Joanne Woodward read the treatment and mailed me a handwritten note saying, "…if the script is as good as the treatment, I’ll do it." Even with that, I couldn’t get a network to pay for a script. I went to my old pals at Bristol- Myers with Joanne’s note and they agreed to finance the script for "Do You Remember Love." When Joanne read the script and signed on, Bristol- Myers put up the production money. It won Emmys for me, Joanne, and my first time writer, Vickie Patik. You may have noticed that I hired a lot of women, back in the years when women executives weren’t too common. I realized early on that women worked harder, were less distracted from their mission, complained less, and appreciated their opportunities more. Some of those opportunities were well disguised as hard work and long hours, but the women got it quicker than most men. Besides, I like women. And they work for less. I shouldn’t admit that, but what the hell, I bill myself as an old time truth-teller.

Kitty: Neil and I were running faster and faster and not getting anywhere, which is Nature’s way of telling you you’re on a treadmill. I was appearing as Miss Hannigan in a South Florida production of "Annie" and at the same time using the internet to do revisions for a casino dinner theatre show I had written. Neil was fighting to swim upstream in the music business, and when he was almost killed in a knife fight in the nightclub where he was playing, we both decided it was time for a substantial reassessment. It brought to my mind my favorite Yogi Berra thought: "When you come to a fork in the road – take it."

Dave: The success and Emmys grabbed by "Do You Remember Love", raised the profile of DBA, but didn’t exactly provide me with the combination to Fort Knox. I moved back into the area of documentaries, initially with "Unsolved Mysteries," for NBC, moving on shortly thereafter to other TV movies. And while these projects were rewarding and done with delightful professionals, I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was a sameness in my days and that I ought to be on the lookout for something that would kick me in the butt. In a creative sense of the term, of course.

Kitty: After we got to Los Angeles, Neil got a job and walked out the door just knowing that I’d crack into the entertainment business without a problem. I mean how long could it take? For someone super duper talented like me we figured six months tops. (It’s okay if you’re laughing. I would be too - now.) I kept hearing about this book called "The Hollywood Creative Directory". I purchased one and then called every single name in it. Then I called every name in the book again. No one remembered talking to me the first time so it didn’t matter. After three months I decided I needed something better to pitch than just my lovely self and how fabulous I was. I needed a script and I knew the perfect story. I had an incredible experience that involved a Down syndrome hair client of mine and Dolly Parton, so I wrote a script based on that true story entitled, "Tell Dolly Parton I Love Her". When I picked up the phone this time I had something to sell -- and the story intrigued everyone I told it to. Several asked for a script so I’d send them one and then -- silence. Silence -- until October 22, 2002, five months after landing in California when I called Dave Bell Associates.

Dave: After the five-year run of "LAPD – Life on the Beat" for MGM, I downsized my company and was taking life kind of easy when Kitty Stallings came into my life. Here’s how. My secretary came into my office to ask if I was interested in talking to a new writer who had a script. She knew I wasn’t looking, but then she said, "It’s called ‘Tell Dolly Parton I Love Her.’" I stared out the window at the traffic on Cahuenga Boulevard, shook my head, and said, "Crap. Tell her to send it." Kitty brought the script by that afternoon. I had a good reader at the time who told me that it wasn’t a great script but it was a good idea. I read it. My reader was right. I asked Kitty to come and talk to me about her script. She came in and we chatted. I said, "You can’t have a script called, ‘Tell Dolly Parton I Love Her’ and not have Dolly Parton in the script! You’ve got to have Dolly in the script." Kitty told me that it was based on her own true story and she hadn’t met Dolly Parton. I said, "You’re gonna meet her in your script or there’s no movie." Kitty worked harder on that script than I’ve ever seen anybody work. I could send her a page full of notes and the next day I’d have a new draft with all of the changes. When it was as good as we could get it, I sent it to Dolly. After a lot of phone calls over the course of a year, Dolly said she’d do it.

Kitty: I know a lot of people reading this have a list of credits longer than I can imagine, but I wonder if some of you have done so much that you’ve forgotten the rush of hope that overwhelms you the very first time someone with clout tells you that what you’ve put on their desk isn’t all that bad, might even have a little bit of something going for it? I’ve heard some people describe that moment as a sunrise, and maybe that’s so for some, but it was different for me. For me, it was like somebody opened the refrigerator – not only did a light come on, but everything I was looking at looked delicious!

Dave: So far I haven’t sold "Dolly". It’s pending at a network where I can’t afford to produce it. If they said yes, barring a miracle, I’d probably have to say no. I’m going to another network where I might be able to afford to do it.

Kitty: Dave tells me that his philosophy is that if you give someone a job they’ll try like hell to do it. He’s taught me a great deal as well; I discovered a screenplay is very different than a dinner theatre production. (Duh!) And that writing for film or television is a skill not easily mastered. Who knew? Working for and with him has been the single biggest creative privilege in my life. He is a mentor who would never classify himself as such. To him, his generosity of spirit and eagerness to see a new mind succeed is just another day at the office.

Dave: When Kitty first showed up at my office, she was carrying a few more pounds on her frame than would be fashionable. In the following months, those pounds were melted away. (She is publishing a calorie conscious cookbook of traditional southern dishes.) This should have given me a hint about her focus and dedication to achieving her goals. If that didn’t, the fact that she showed up with a brand new script with a brand new premise surely did.

Kitty: It’s called "Entering Paradise" and it’s about all the people I knew back home and how wrong and shortsighted some people’s impressions of the South are. Dave liked it. We made some changes. We got a big deal writer to take a look and he liked it, too. That dad-gum refrigerator door keeps opening wider and wider. I can even see the cherry that goes on top of the hot fudge Sunday that is my life.

Dave: If you hang with young people, you’ll get back to that part of yourself, the part that’s all about tomorrow and hasn’t been bruised by commercial cynicism.

Kitty: He gets smarter and smarter every day.

Dave: I know that from a generational standpoint I’m supposed to be the wise old guy, but more and more I’m starting to see that this mentoring thing is very much a two way street.