Speaker 1: I think one of the most like the coolest parts
Speaker 1: about being middle aged can't.
Speaker 2: I can't hear you is this like.
Speaker 3: Turn it's gonna worl sorry my back hurts, you're in
Speaker 3: a new debt.
Speaker 1: I love these moments where you like just kind of
Speaker 1: general competency, like you can try new things and like
Speaker 1: be good at them or like and the best moments
Speaker 1: are when there's something that you never thought you would
Speaker 1: have interest in or be good at. I have really
Speaker 1: enjoyed cutting my son's hair. I have taught myself Like
Speaker 1: it was just one of those out of necessity things
Speaker 1: like I don't want to have to go pay for
Speaker 1: a haircut, and Alex didn't like to do it anymore,
Speaker 1: and he just never wanted to get a haircut. So
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, we're gonna watch a show and
Speaker 1: you just sit there and I'm going to figure out
Speaker 1: how to cut it, and now.
Speaker 4: Like I enjoy it. I'm like I can do this.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 1: So you guys have anything that you figured like like
Speaker 1: if you told yourself that, like you're kind of good
Speaker 1: at and you kind of enjoy that, you would tell
Speaker 1: your you know, eighteen year old self that like if
Speaker 1: you could go back and.
Speaker 4: Say you're one day going to really enjoy cutting hair.
Speaker 4: You had been like, what are you talking?
Speaker 1: Yeah, what are you?
Speaker 5: What is that?
Speaker 4: You must have something like that, right?
Speaker 2: I do gardening. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 6: I really I love getting out there, getting my hands
Speaker 6: in the dirt.
Speaker 2: Like I'll look at a patch of land in front
Speaker 2: of my house and be like, no, I want to
Speaker 2: move flowers over here. I want to do it.
Speaker 6: And then I put on some headphones and I am
Speaker 6: in seventh Heaven.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, gardening it is mine.
Speaker 3: Yeah, gosh, you know I did during the pandemic, I
Speaker 3: cut both Jensen and and Adler's hair. I cut, so
Speaker 3: I did, and it was kind of fun, but the
Speaker 3: pressure felt like a lot, especially on Jensen. I was like,
Speaker 3: you're a grown man, Like if I really screw this up,
Speaker 3: this feels this feels big. But I did. I did
Speaker 3: like it, And honestly, writer, you should go to Laurie's
Speaker 3: and pay her for like a haircutting tutorial, like yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: to teach you, you know, Like.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think part of the thing for me
Speaker 1: is that, like you know, Indy has very similar hair
Speaker 1: to me, like, yeah, my hair. So it's also kind
Speaker 1: of satisfying because like I used to get really bad
Speaker 1: haircuts before professionals like Laurie and said, like when I
Speaker 1: was a kid, it was just a disaster and like
Speaker 1: and it's you know, it's just thick, it's weird, it's
Speaker 1: there's a lot of it. So like I feel like
Speaker 1: I got you, I got you kids, Like being a
Speaker 1: good dad is like hair, and I could take care
Speaker 1: of this.
Speaker 4: So but it's just so satisfying.
Speaker 1: So so I don't know if I would be get
Speaker 1: the same thing from doing anybody else's hair for instance.
Speaker 1: You know, I think it's a very specific skill that
Speaker 1: maybe I've mastered, but yeah, sure I could expand it
Speaker 1: because it is like it's a it just like you're saying,
Speaker 1: will it's like this fun challenge of like, right, I
Speaker 1: think I know how I want this to look and
Speaker 1: should look, and I'm going to figure this out how
Speaker 1: to do that and getting through that and like, you know,
Speaker 1: being very scared the first time I did it, because
Speaker 1: of course you're like if I messed this up.
Speaker 6: Yeah it'll go, but still you have a couple of
Speaker 6: months of not looking great. Yeah that's a big one.
Speaker 4: But I just love I don't know to me.
Speaker 1: It's it's a function of age where you're like, you
Speaker 1: know what, I'm going to try this thing that I
Speaker 1: might not be very good at, but I'm going to
Speaker 1: try it, and then you realize like, actually I can
Speaker 1: kind of do it, and I enjoy it.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think one of the things for me that is
Speaker 3: that was true for me back then that I couldn't
Speaker 3: have necessarily ever seen how it was going to play
Speaker 3: out in my life is that I was a very
Speaker 3: athletic teenager, even though I didn't get to play sports
Speaker 3: or do any of that stuff as a kid because
Speaker 3: I was on Boy Meets World. But I was like,
Speaker 3: I've always been kind of naturally athletic and good at
Speaker 3: sports and kind I had good balance, and I can
Speaker 3: pick up things pretty quickly.
Speaker 2: You're coordinated.
Speaker 3: I'm coordinated, and I'm strong. And now having two boys
Speaker 3: that are in my case, very stereotypical athlete boys. They
Speaker 3: love to be physical. The fact that like al Adler
Speaker 3: and I can look at each other and go all right,
Speaker 3: squat contest, and like, you know that I can participate
Speaker 3: in his karate, in his baseball, in his like let's
Speaker 3: go outside and throw a ball. And I bought a
Speaker 3: pitching machine this weekend. He's you know, and like, because
Speaker 3: I've always been comfortable with it. It's not a thing
Speaker 3: I have to be like, Well, your father's gonna have
Speaker 3: to do that. Jensen can do it too, because Jensen's
Speaker 3: also athletic. But I get to participate in it. So
Speaker 3: if anything, I'm just like, man, I'm glad I'm a
Speaker 3: boy mom. It worked out in my favor that never
Speaker 3: I never would have thought like, oh, that's gonna end
Speaker 3: up having any sort of benefit to me, But I do.
Speaker 3: I do, actually really enjoy it. So welcome to Pod
Speaker 3: meets World. I'm Daniel Fishal, I'm right or Strong, and
Speaker 3: I'm Will Fordell. On our mission to find everyone who
Speaker 3: even just saw a sip a red drink on the
Speaker 3: set of Boy Meets World, we have been very lucky
Speaker 3: to reunite with some of our favorite people, and a
Speaker 3: lot of those familiar faces have come straight from the
Speaker 3: writer's room, and let's be honest, they were tasked with
Speaker 3: arguably the hardest job of all creating storylines, crafting dialogue,
Speaker 3: and satisfying network notes, all while eating massive amounts of cuckaroo.
Speaker 3: We now analyze their scripts thirty years later as the
Speaker 3: premise of our podcast. And one thing we do not
Speaker 3: mention enough they did it all with an amount of
Speaker 3: pressure and a hurried timeline that would make it difficult
Speaker 3: to print the pages fast enough. We've already heard from
Speaker 3: a ton of great writers who spent time on Boy
Speaker 3: Meets World, and they've made no secret of the job's
Speaker 3: difficult nature. But most have also called it the best
Speaker 3: time of their professional careers. And today we get to
Speaker 3: speak to another one these fascinating and prolific humans, a
Speaker 3: writer who, along with her creative partner at the time,
Speaker 3: Laura Olson, wrote some of the most memorable and strange
Speaker 3: scripts of the series. Was she forced to send us
Speaker 3: to the forties to deal with the drama and horror
Speaker 3: of World War Two?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 3: Was she one of the two names on the front
Speaker 3: of a script where we all met Lauren the Temptress,
Speaker 3: snow Bunny ready to ruin the happy teenage home of
Speaker 3: Corey and Topanga. Also Yes, And now for season six,
Speaker 3: we're going to ask her all about the day a
Speaker 3: young art prodigy walked on set and Corey was metaphorically
Speaker 3: compared to Celery. Her first big gig may have been
Speaker 3: Boy Meets World. But since our final episode, she hasn't
Speaker 3: stopped working. Here's just a quick hit list of what
Speaker 3: she's done. Riba Till Death, Private Practice, nine O two
Speaker 3: one zero, Mixology, Rain, and The Good Doctor. But today
Speaker 3: we're making her talk about her three seasons on the ABC.
Speaker 3: Thank goodness, it's funny family sitcom where she's fifty percent
Speaker 3: to blame for Corey cheating on to Penga. Welcome to
Speaker 3: Pod Meets World, Patty Carr. Yes, Hi, Hi, can you
Speaker 3: hear us?
Speaker 1: Cus?
Speaker 7: Can I can hear and see you?
Speaker 4: Yes, it's so.
Speaker 3: Good to see you. Thank you so much for being
Speaker 3: here with us. We recently sat down with your former
Speaker 3: writing partner and your still friend Laura, and she talked
Speaker 3: about your start in Hollywood, capitalizing, paying two women for
Speaker 3: the price of one, fighting for gigs. What do you
Speaker 3: remember about those old days writing on animated shows like Extreme,
Speaker 3: Ghostbusters and Jumanji.
Speaker 5: Oh my gosh. Well, first of all, thank you for
Speaker 5: having me. I don't remember many.
Speaker 7: Things, so neither do I. Yeah, this is going to
Speaker 7: be I'm going to make stuff up.
Speaker 2: We all know the difference. Y.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I remember getting the studio and a horse and
Speaker 5: buggy and different time, you know, as far as our start,
Speaker 5: and I'm sure Lara Lara is much better at having
Speaker 5: the old timey stories at her fingerstips that I do
Speaker 5: remember that we started on Boy Meets World.
Speaker 7: Was our was our first you know, uh.
Speaker 5: Network show job, got some animation and things like that.
Speaker 5: Generally speaking, at that time, things were very segmented, very separate,
Speaker 5: and so doing animation didn't mean anything. Yeah, no, I
Speaker 5: guess they not only didn't care, they didn't want to
Speaker 5: know that you did it.
Speaker 7: Don't I pretend you didn't do that.
Speaker 5: So but the interesting one of the interesting things was
Speaker 5: that when we when we started and we worked on
Speaker 5: on Boy Meets World during the hiatus, we would still
Speaker 5: you know, do animation work, and we you know, got
Speaker 5: through other animation people, animation writers. We got connected with, uh.
Speaker 5: I think it was Kim Possible. That was also that
Speaker 5: was also a Disney thing, right. So we'd been on
Speaker 5: Boy Meets World, we'd written you know, three scripts as
Speaker 5: staff writers for Boy Meets World, we were produced writers,
Speaker 5: and when we went into pitch you know, for Kim Possible,
Speaker 5: they said, well, you have to meet with the studio
Speaker 5: of people. We're like, okay, and and they questioned us
Speaker 5: as it's like, so, what have you done?
Speaker 7: Really? I said, I just worked for you, you know,
Speaker 7: and there could we see more examples? It was.
Speaker 5: For three years, right like, and for you guys, for
Speaker 5: this company, but not for our animation.
Speaker 7: And you know it really it was I think that.
Speaker 5: Was particular to Disney where the mouse, the mouse is everything,
Speaker 5: you know.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, do you remember about getting the Boy Meets
Speaker 3: World job?
Speaker 5: What what I remember was that we were such novices
Speaker 5: to the industry that we were coming in.
Speaker 7: And we knew that, you know that Michael Jacobs had
Speaker 7: two shows.
Speaker 5: He had Boy Meets World, which was going into season four,
Speaker 5: and a new show called You Wish, And in our
Speaker 5: minds were like, well the new show has that's the
Speaker 5: one you want, so you can get in on the
Speaker 5: ground floor and just ride that gravy train to the end.
Speaker 6: You know.
Speaker 5: The Boy Meets World is it's going into season four,
Speaker 5: and I think that was the it might have been
Speaker 5: the last year that they were in well in high school,
Speaker 5: like it had the air.
Speaker 7: Of well wouldn't that you know, right? Right?
Speaker 5: So, you know, so we were really working up our
Speaker 5: Genie pitches, right.
Speaker 3: You were really excited for getting staffed on you.
Speaker 5: They go to you Wish and then then we got
Speaker 5: the offer in Boy Meets World, which was you know,
Speaker 5: obviously we were thrilled to do anything where they.
Speaker 4: Had you guys written a spec script for another show.
Speaker 7: Oh, we had a couple of specs scripts. I think.
Speaker 2: You Wish fans and you're just like, oh God, I
Speaker 2: can't believe we're doing that.
Speaker 5: Can't believe everything that we did was was magic relating Now,
Speaker 5: I mean I think we as I recall it was
Speaker 5: probably it was probably mad about you. That was what
Speaker 5: they what they looked at that was there were a
Speaker 5: lot more. It was a lot easier to specush show
Speaker 5: as a sample back then than it is today. It's
Speaker 5: in particular today, I know, you know, with writers coming
Speaker 5: into the business, when they try to spec an existing show,
Speaker 5: there's so many existing shows that everybody isn't familiar with
Speaker 5: that it's hard to find one where you're not going like,
Speaker 5: I don't know if this is a good episode of
Speaker 5: you know, you know whatever, I've never seen this thing,
Speaker 5: and you know.
Speaker 3: Are specs as do people care about specs now?
Speaker 5: No, I mean I think it's pretty rare, but mostly
Speaker 5: for that reason, they really are valuable. You do have
Speaker 5: to know the show that the people are specking. So
Speaker 5: I would imagine for some for some types of shows
Speaker 5: that there's you know, if you have a Simpson Spec
Speaker 5: or something, everybody knows. You know, there's stuff that's current
Speaker 5: that everybody's familiar with, but that has become such a
Speaker 5: different that we're not all watching the same things.
Speaker 7: I know.
Speaker 1: It's also gone through like trends, Like it used to
Speaker 1: be never write an original pilot. Then it was like
Speaker 1: only write original pilot, and then there was like a
Speaker 1: little period where everyone was doing like bizarro mashups.
Speaker 5: I'm going to do an.
Speaker 1: Episode of you know, community meets mash and like just
Speaker 1: to be show your creativity and show that you can
Speaker 1: master two different forms. It's like, you know, whatever, whatever
Speaker 1: gets your gets gets you noticed, you.
Speaker 7: Know, right, yeah, something some you know.
Speaker 5: There there have been times where there have been showrunners who,
Speaker 5: particularly people who didn't come up through television, who were like, well,
Speaker 5: I want my show to be different than which is
Speaker 5: always kind of hilarious to me because it's it's like, well,
Speaker 5: people like television.
Speaker 4: Right, why do you want to make a TV show
Speaker 4: you hate so much?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I don't want it.
Speaker 5: I don't want it to be like one of those pesky,
Speaker 5: successful shows people love.
Speaker 3: Had you ever seen Boy Meets World before you got
Speaker 3: the job?
Speaker 5: That's a good question because I wasn't exactly in the
Speaker 5: prime demographic for uh, you know, because you know, being
Speaker 5: sort of mid twenty, you know, the like home watching
Speaker 5: TV on Friday evening. It wasn't like my mainstay. So
Speaker 5: i'd seen it before I was aware of it, definitely, Right.
Speaker 2: Were you a big television fan growing up?
Speaker 6: I mean, was this something that you knew you wanted
Speaker 6: to do and it just I mean again, I was
Speaker 6: addicted to TV my whole life, So were you Were
Speaker 6: you one of.
Speaker 2: Those people as well?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Well, I mean, first of all, TV was all we
Speaker 5: had back then, so and I think that's what's funny
Speaker 5: is if you remember way back when when they would
Speaker 5: occasionally show outtakes and I remember there being some kind
Speaker 5: of special about MASH and they showed outtakes from MASH
Speaker 5: and everybody looked like they were having such a good time,
Speaker 5: and I was like, that's awesome. You know, I would
Speaker 5: love to do that, you know, I love these shows.
Speaker 5: And then see the people were actually making them and
Speaker 5: working together, and at some point in my career I
Speaker 5: realized that those outtakes were actually blowing the take and
Speaker 5: that you.
Speaker 7: Were working longer.
Speaker 5: And then I stand to realize, like I've just been
Speaker 5: watching people having the best time, and everyone's going like,
Speaker 5: come on, just say the words.
Speaker 3: Just so you come on in season five and are
Speaker 3: Bluckman and bus Gang running the room at the time
Speaker 3: that you start or is.
Speaker 5: Michael Yes, Now that was because of the You Wish,
Speaker 5: because You Wish launched and Michael went over to You
Speaker 5: Wish and we came into the show and Howard and
Speaker 5: Mark were running it, and you know, and we sort of.
Speaker 7: Met the writers who were there.
Speaker 5: I think there were, I mean there was there were
Speaker 5: a couple other writers who were new to the show,
Speaker 5: a couple you know, a couple levels, and then there
Speaker 5: were people who'd been there the whole time. And yeah,
Speaker 5: you know, so we kind of came in and really
Speaker 5: learned the ropes of our writer's room, which was not
Speaker 5: something that you know, in animation, that's not how it
Speaker 5: gets done in the in the room. And so that was,
Speaker 5: you know, that was an exciting yeah process and see
Speaker 5: how that worked.
Speaker 3: And so what was your feeling. Were you guys nervous
Speaker 3: at first to contribute? Did you feel like you fit
Speaker 3: right in? What are your This is like kind of
Speaker 3: a whole, whole new thing for you. How are you
Speaker 3: feeling when you started?
Speaker 5: I think, you know, one of the benefits in my
Speaker 5: mind that that Laura and I had was so much
Speaker 5: total ignorance that we didn't know.
Speaker 7: We didn't know what to be.
Speaker 5: Worried about or what to be afraid of. That I
Speaker 5: remember in particular, we're coming on as staff writers. It's
Speaker 5: the lowest level of writers, and there was another writing
Speaker 5: team who were I think like executive story editors, sort
Speaker 5: of to you know, two levels above us. And often
Speaker 5: when you come on to a show, they've assigned people
Speaker 5: their offices and their their space for whatever reason. Howard
Speaker 5: and Mark were like, you guys, just look around and
Speaker 5: pickwood office you want. So and this upper level team,
Speaker 5: who was also new to this show. One of them
Speaker 5: wasn't there that day, so it was sort of a
Speaker 5: two against one thing.
Speaker 7: But we didn't know.
Speaker 5: We weren't thinking about hierarchy or anything. We just found
Speaker 5: a really nice corner office and like, this is great,
Speaker 5: and this guy said, oh yeah, it is great. They
Speaker 5: were like, you don't mind if we take this one, right,
Speaker 5: you know, and he and his partner were she kind
Speaker 5: of got shunted into like the closet or whatever, and
Speaker 5: then she came Yeah, she came back to work and
Speaker 5: I guess looked at him and was like, are you
Speaker 5: kidding me? And came in and said, you're the staff writers,
Speaker 5: so you should have that office.
Speaker 7: We should have this office.
Speaker 5: Which as soon as she said it was like, that
Speaker 5: makes sense, That's how it should have been done.
Speaker 7: It was not, uh, you know, we we weren't.
Speaker 5: Looking at it again with any kind of malice or
Speaker 5: idea like. It was just just two goofballs going like, oh, it.
Speaker 4: Was pretty well.
Speaker 3: Your first script is then the Acid Trip that is
Speaker 3: No Guts, No Corey, which sent us toineteen forties wartime
Speaker 3: thanks to the Cat from Sabrina. Did you feel like
Speaker 3: this was a form of hazing?
Speaker 5: It turned into a form of hazing it. So that
Speaker 5: was a that was a theme night as the Cat
Speaker 5: from Sabrina was going to send all the TGIF shows
Speaker 5: back in time, and we were all supposed to pitch
Speaker 5: the time period that we got sent back to. And
Speaker 5: I think by the time we got it.
Speaker 7: I think.
Speaker 5: I think Sabrina the Teenage, which might have been going
Speaker 5: back to the sixties already. And then another show and
Speaker 5: I'm trying to remember. I can't remember the name of
Speaker 5: the show.
Speaker 3: I knew all the good ones were taken.
Speaker 7: They took.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so it might have been you wish, But wasn't
Speaker 6: it you wish. Weren't they TGIF two at the time?
Speaker 3: Maybe yeah, I mean.
Speaker 7: But so they went.
Speaker 5: So it was basically it was like, Okay, we went
Speaker 5: back to somebody went back to the fifties. Somebody went
Speaker 5: back to.
Speaker 7: The sixties. You know, we were in the nineties.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we had the last thing. It was like, you
Speaker 2: guys have to do nineteen twelve, Like wait, well, And I.
Speaker 7: Think initially we were like, oh, we'll do the.
Speaker 5: Forties and we'll do this World War two you know
Speaker 5: kind of thing, because it had a look and it had,
Speaker 5: you know, sort of some drama to it, and the
Speaker 5: idea of like we've got.
Speaker 7: Corey and Pangan you know, yeah lover.
Speaker 5: It seemed like that was you know, that was kind
Speaker 5: of cute, and so we started there and it seemed
Speaker 5: like it was fine. And then the process of sort
Speaker 5: of breaking the story at some point just fell apart.
Speaker 7: There was crazy. I mean, I think here's what.
Speaker 5: We just again, innocently not anticipating Nazis.
Speaker 7: Nazis ruined rething.
Speaker 4: You know, Yeah, where's the comedic Nazi beat?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 7: Yeah. There came a point where there were things pitched
Speaker 7: that the network.
Speaker 4: Oh, we're not going to do that.
Speaker 7: That was that war. That's what we came to, which
Speaker 7: was a lot better than I think. At that point.
Speaker 5: They were like, why don't you do the eighties? And
Speaker 5: but the characters were alive in the eighties. They can't
Speaker 5: just go back to when.
Speaker 7: They actually you know, that's weird.
Speaker 5: So we wound up having to write a whole sort
Speaker 5: of pitch and everything for the eighties, like here's the
Speaker 5: jokes we do.
Speaker 7: We're doing our research.
Speaker 5: Is like, well Corey can't figure out his Rubik's cube,
Speaker 5: and you know, we just did all this, all these
Speaker 5: eighties beats so that they could all see like, this
Speaker 5: doesn't make any sense.
Speaker 7: You can't go back to when you were ten. Weird,
Speaker 7: it doesn't work on this show. So I did rewatch
Speaker 7: that and I was like, yeah, you that's a look
Speaker 7: for you.
Speaker 3: My I missed out. My that's my era.
Speaker 7: I know you really wrapped it, so thank you.
Speaker 3: I do appreciate that.
Speaker 2: I like that.
Speaker 3: I like that.
Speaker 7: Look.
Speaker 3: So then when the episode actually airs and it's like
Speaker 3: your first non animated script on the air, do you
Speaker 3: remember what you did? Did you throw a party? Did
Speaker 3: you invite people.
Speaker 7: To watch it? I mean that's what we used to do.
Speaker 5: We would have watch parties because also you know, back
Speaker 5: then you couldn't you couldn't stream the repeats or something
Speaker 5: that you had to wait to.
Speaker 7: See when they re ran your episode.
Speaker 5: So yeah, that was a big, a big thing, and
Speaker 5: we got I think, well, I think my parents took
Speaker 5: a picture of the TV screen with our with our
Speaker 5: credits on it, and then I was like, well that
Speaker 5: I can get editing to give us an actual like
Speaker 5: run off, an actually a screenshot of it without like
Speaker 5: the reflection of you and the TV.
Speaker 6: That's also how did you couldn't pause it back in
Speaker 6: the day?
Speaker 3: Exact?
Speaker 5: Yeah, but I mean my dad still has that on
Speaker 5: his on his mantle pieces, the picture from you know,
Speaker 5: our credit on Boy Meets World.
Speaker 3: So and so, how did it happen? How did it
Speaker 3: work for you guys? If you were given an idea
Speaker 3: for a script. Did you then, as a as a
Speaker 3: group as a writer's room, sit there and and work
Speaker 3: through the whole thing, or did you go home and
Speaker 3: work on it kind of privately and then pitch a
Speaker 3: script to the group for them to become the group effort.
Speaker 7: Well, it was kind of a combination of those things.
Speaker 5: I mean one of the things that we we learned
Speaker 5: early on was, you know, they'd say when we started,
Speaker 5: you know, the very didn't have episodes you know, assigned
Speaker 5: yet at all. It's like, well, everybody is going to
Speaker 5: come in tomorrow with a couple ideas, your ideas for episodes.
Speaker 5: And so what you realize right away is that depending
Speaker 5: on where you are on the you know, going around
Speaker 5: the table of like how about you, what have you
Speaker 5: got kind of thing? You were going to come after
Speaker 5: people who were going to pitch stuff that you were like,
Speaker 5: I had.
Speaker 7: That you do a whole sort of I had that.
Speaker 7: I had that.
Speaker 5: I don't think I didn't have any ideas because gets
Speaker 5: what you do is like you sit there and go
Speaker 5: like you know some and then you try to maybe
Speaker 5: you know, sort of piggyback onto it. I had that,
Speaker 5: but a little different, you know, to try to make
Speaker 5: sure that you.
Speaker 7: Got your your take in there.
Speaker 5: But I but I also remember you know, thinking like okay, well,
Speaker 5: you know, what what kind of ideas has the show
Speaker 5: done and and what might they do?
Speaker 7: And you know, it's it's like this is a.
Speaker 5: Straightforward family you know show and stuff like that, and
Speaker 5: you know, thinking that you kind of like like I
Speaker 5: could do that, I could do that my sleep. I
Speaker 5: could pitch ideas for these characters and having the other
Speaker 5: writers come and pitch things that you're like, oh man, oh.
Speaker 7: Wow, that's wild.
Speaker 5: That's amazing, Like realizing that the the you know, you
Speaker 5: don't you're not shooting for the middle. You're shooting for
Speaker 5: something really amazing. And and sometimes it gets through and
Speaker 5: sometimes it doesn't get through, and sometimes it changes, you know,
Speaker 5: as it goes. But that it was a lot more
Speaker 5: there was there's a lot more openness to these you know,
Speaker 5: let's see what these characters can do and you know,
Speaker 5: and not not hold back, not be like you know,
Speaker 5: they would.
Speaker 7: Never do that, you know that's what they'll do.
Speaker 6: Speaking of huge moments, Yeah, is that why did you
Speaker 6: come in specifically thinking I would like to scar an
Speaker 6: entire generation of younger people who love Corey and love
Speaker 6: Corey in Topanga by making Corey cheat on Topango because
Speaker 6: let's break these people up.
Speaker 2: Is that was that a thought coming in you just?
Speaker 7: Yeah, you think my whole reason coming.
Speaker 6: To was that before the season started, was there an
Speaker 6: idea of, all right, we're going to get something where
Speaker 6: they break up for a little while there, you know,
Speaker 6: Corey's going to cheat on Topango or is this something
Speaker 6: that kind of organically came for just one episode?
Speaker 2: Whre You're like, I got an idea.
Speaker 5: Uh, you know, I don't actually remember the origins of
Speaker 5: the idea for for heartbreak Corey.
Speaker 7: And then you know, I think.
Speaker 5: At some point the idea of going on a class trip,
Speaker 5: you know, the ski trip kind of thing, I think,
Speaker 5: you know, challenging the relationship sounded like, you know, it
Speaker 5: could be could be interesting. The thing I remember most
Speaker 5: about that episode was, you know, we weren't all involved
Speaker 5: in casting all the time, but the role of Lauren
Speaker 5: the other woman, yea was we wound up being in
Speaker 5: the casting sessions, and that episode I think almost didn't
Speaker 5: happen because, you know, the the idea of casting somebody
Speaker 5: who was an actual threat to the relationship was much
Speaker 5: more difficult.
Speaker 7: Than one would assume.
Speaker 5: So you know, we were we were reading all you know,
Speaker 5: these young women coming in and you know, there you
Speaker 5: could you could just tell that, like to Panga could
Speaker 5: eat her for lunch. Like it just wasn't it wasn't
Speaker 5: any competition. And I think part of that was because
Speaker 5: nobody believed that Corey was going to be tempted by
Speaker 5: just a pretty girl. Like he got a pretty girl,
Speaker 5: what is he going to be? You know, what are
Speaker 5: we going to believe is a possibility? And so we
Speaker 5: were just it was just pretty much almost not happening.
Speaker 5: And then when Linda Cardelini came in, it was like
Speaker 5: somebody had arrived from another planet and we were instantly.
Speaker 7: Like, Panga, better watch her ask.
Speaker 5: You know, And that was without even seeing her with them.
Speaker 5: But it was really, you know, a testament, I would say,
Speaker 5: a testament to what you guys did and what you
Speaker 5: would bring to it. Such young people, and you make
Speaker 5: it look easy, you know, to get up there and perform,
Speaker 5: but it's not. It's not something that even you know,
Speaker 5: reasonably talented young people can necessarily do. Everybody can't can't
Speaker 5: inhabit you know, this the world and the characters and
Speaker 5: in a really compelling way, you know. And and I'd
Speaker 5: say the other The other thing that made you know
Speaker 5: my sort of actor appreciation list was we started and
Speaker 5: I've done this on every show that I've done since,
Speaker 5: if I've if I've had my way, we did writer
Speaker 5: table reads where we would all take your parts and
Speaker 5: read your parts, you know, for the writer's room as
Speaker 5: part of the rewrite, in part because we wanted to
Speaker 5: make sure that Michael had read the script.
Speaker 7: When it's like I don't think I think he skimmed.
Speaker 7: I think he skimmed. Like you know what, we'll perform
Speaker 7: for it.
Speaker 5: We'll perform the script and we would work hard, you know,
Speaker 5: like we would go around. People would mark their scripts
Speaker 5: and they go around to the writer and say, did
Speaker 5: you did you want me to put a little like
Speaker 5: something on this, and we'd like, you know, really try
Speaker 5: to try to bring it. You have good performances, yeah,
Speaker 5: because you're because you're trying to help each other out,
Speaker 5: trainers to be like, I don't want your script to
Speaker 5: go down because we you know, it didn't sell.
Speaker 7: It didn't sell it.
Speaker 5: So when we're really trying to trying to do it,
Speaker 5: and yeah, and we would come.
Speaker 7: We would always come out of those tables. Read those
Speaker 7: kids are geniuses. I can barely speak. You know, nobody can.
Speaker 5: Nobody can pick up their your kids and stuff.
Speaker 7: It's like, it's amazing.
Speaker 3: Well, I do want you to know that Heartbreak Cory
Speaker 3: is on our short list for potential best episode of
Speaker 3: the series. Thus far we we are, you know, a
Speaker 3: few episodes into season six. We've watched everything up to
Speaker 3: this point, and we've got a short list of like
Speaker 3: perfect episodes, and Heartbreak Corey is one of them. We
Speaker 3: also ended up loving Corey and Lauren as a couple
Speaker 3: and the fact that she wasn't this outright villain that
Speaker 3: she was. She was just cool and fun and they
Speaker 3: had a good thing going. So, I mean, was that
Speaker 3: something when you guys were casting, Is that something that
Speaker 3: you were also really looking for, Like threading that line
Speaker 3: between someone who very much was into Corey but not
Speaker 3: wanting to be outright like, I know you've got a girl,
Speaker 3: but give it to me. You know, what were you
Speaker 3: looking for in those in those scenes?
Speaker 7: No, I mean I think she surpassed what we were
Speaker 7: looking for. We were looking for a believable flirtation. Yeah,
Speaker 7: that could.
Speaker 5: Actually be like, you know, yeah, I believe he even
Speaker 5: to just lie to Taipanga.
Speaker 7: I don't even know that we thought that it was
Speaker 7: going to go past one episode.
Speaker 5: You know that it was that she was going to
Speaker 5: go past one episode or it was just basically like, oh,
Speaker 5: did he get caught up in something? I think had
Speaker 5: we not found Linda Cardellini for that role, the role
Speaker 5: would have become something where Corey didn't realize what he
Speaker 5: got into. And then and then his mistake was covering
Speaker 5: up that another girl liked me, And that would have
Speaker 5: been because because the audience wouldn't have believed that he
Speaker 5: liked her as anything other than like my ankle was
Speaker 5: twisted and what else. I thought we were just doing
Speaker 5: puzzles together or whatever. So so yeah, she she made
Speaker 5: it believable and yeah, and watching the episode too, you
Speaker 5: can see like how difficult it is to thread the
Speaker 5: needle of the things that she's saying to him without
Speaker 5: it being like you're crazy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, exactly, yes, exactly.
Speaker 6: It was so good though, And when we had Laura on,
Speaker 6: she claimed that she really wanted in the episode because
Speaker 6: she's a huge fan, but that you hated me and
Speaker 6: that's why you removed Eric from this script entirely, and
Speaker 6: I was wondering if you could just address that a
Speaker 6: little bit.
Speaker 7: You know, that's so funny.
Speaker 5: I can't address that because I have no memory.
Speaker 7: And when you said that, it was like, Eric's not
Speaker 7: in the.
Speaker 2: Exactly, No he's not. And it worked perfectly.
Speaker 6: It was such a good episode, and the two of
Speaker 6: them together, we you know it's written well, cast well,
Speaker 6: acted well. When you're watching this couple for years together
Speaker 6: and this new person comes on as a guest star
Speaker 6: and you're like.
Speaker 2: I actually think they'd be a great couple other world.
Speaker 6: But yes, yeah, yeah, it seemed like there were a
Speaker 6: lot of less red flags with those two than there
Speaker 6: were with with Corey and Topango.
Speaker 3: Frank, do you do you remember anyone else who auditioned?
Speaker 5: Oh my god, we must have seen every twenty something
Speaker 5: girl in town. It went on and on on. The
Speaker 5: auditions went on forever.
Speaker 2: What's a big role?
Speaker 6: I mean, you got to carry I mean that's just
Speaker 6: like you're saying, you gotta be a viable other option
Speaker 6: for Corey. I mean that's incredibly difficult to do in
Speaker 6: one episode, right.
Speaker 5: And yeah, and just just in meeting the character, you're
Speaker 5: supposed to believe that she likes she likes him, but
Speaker 5: she's not crazy.
Speaker 7: He likes her and he's not great.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, doesn't demean or diminish him for being
Speaker 5: into her.
Speaker 7: And you know, and so was.
Speaker 3: There ever conversation about whether or not Corey and Lauren
Speaker 3: could be together?
Speaker 5: Well, I think after we after we cast it, and
Speaker 5: after we shot it, I think there was.
Speaker 7: That's where I think it developed into. I think it
Speaker 7: wound up being.
Speaker 5: Like a little three dark at least because it also
Speaker 5: spurred the breakup and then Topanga's kiss with Guy and then.
Speaker 3: Will's favorite character Ricky.
Speaker 5: But you know, I think that I think as I
Speaker 5: recall that episode when Daniel, when you, as did Tipanga,
Speaker 5: had your realization that you wanted to be with Corey,
Speaker 5: I remember the live audience just going berserklled they were
Speaker 5: so thrilled and they and they were and I think
Speaker 5: they were also they were surprised, like I think they
Speaker 5: had kind of resigned themselves but being over and then
Speaker 5: they were so excited that you know that that Tipanga
Speaker 5: kind of came to this. This just affirms that I
Speaker 5: you know that I love you.
Speaker 3: It was a good pump bank, it was a good pump.
Speaker 6: Now, one of the things that we I think we
Speaker 6: need to start asking every writer has come on that.
Speaker 6: I'm not sure we've asked yet, So I'm going to
Speaker 6: ask first, was there ever a conversation in the room
Speaker 6: at any level about the power of kissing?
Speaker 7: That's the power of kissing.
Speaker 6: We keep talking about how on the show there seems
Speaker 6: to be this thing where the kiss, if the kiss
Speaker 6: is done the right way, then any problem is solved
Speaker 6: or someone or you.
Speaker 4: Will never happen.
Speaker 6: Once.
Speaker 3: And I know for sure.
Speaker 6: Corey, Yeah, was there a conversation about the power of kissing?
Speaker 3: I'm curious.
Speaker 7: I don't think so.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think part of it was that the
Speaker 5: you know, the kiss on boy Mean's world stood in
Speaker 5: for a lot of other possible, you know, relationship things,
Speaker 5: and so it really did get imbued with it's the
Speaker 5: it's the sort of manifestation of all physical and emotional connection.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 4: That's a really good point.
Speaker 1: Interesting, that's a really good point that I can't believe
Speaker 1: we haven't quite hit.
Speaker 2: It has to represent all of exactly.
Speaker 1: It's the stand in for yeah, any it's that intimate
Speaker 1: physical relationship can only be represented in a kid.
Speaker 4: It's a really good point.
Speaker 3: Okay, interesting, all right, but we also just watched your
Speaker 3: first script of season six, which is better than the
Speaker 3: average Corey, and we want to know something right away,
Speaker 3: have to have to get it out there. Who is
Speaker 3: responsible for the salary.
Speaker 5: Joke standards and practices I believe, or clearances. It was
Speaker 5: so the joke was supposed to be that we were
Speaker 5: going to see Corey is sort of in his room,
Speaker 5: and that it was a very average boys room.
Speaker 7: And we talked about there being like a.
Speaker 5: Car poster or something that and that it wasn't the
Speaker 5: flashiest car.
Speaker 3: It was a Taurus. Yeah.
Speaker 5: Well, we could not clear any cars because what we
Speaker 5: were saying about the car.
Speaker 7: Was that it was not.
Speaker 6: So if you have a poster of a beij Volvo
Speaker 6: on your on your own wall.
Speaker 5: Even even beige Volvo doesn't want to be no. Yeah,
Speaker 5: that and that being the process of in order to
Speaker 5: get things cleared, you had to put them in the
Speaker 5: context of what why are we seeing this screen? And
Speaker 5: nobody wanted and then and it was sort of like
Speaker 5: no product, nothing, nobody wanted their image associated with.
Speaker 3: No one represents Celery, right, there's.
Speaker 7: No big salary.
Speaker 5: But that's the hilarious thing about that was that.
Speaker 7: We we actually did it.
Speaker 5: It was like, just move on and do a different joke,
Speaker 5: but like, yeah, we just did it.
Speaker 7: Let's just make he's got a giant. I mean, he
Speaker 7: has a giant.
Speaker 1: I'm so glad to know because it's one of my
Speaker 1: favorite jokes of the show too. And I love that
Speaker 1: you guys kind of landed on it in a really
Speaker 1: organic way.
Speaker 3: That's why it's as so funny that they were probably
Speaker 3: so frustrated. They were like, we have this great idea
Speaker 3: for a joke and we can't do it. Just put
Speaker 3: Celery up there like it's it's famous. There are people
Speaker 3: who have Celery tattoos. I don't know if you know this,
Speaker 3: but Will writer and I have traveled the country, we
Speaker 3: signed salary posters, We've met people with Celery tattoos. Is
Speaker 3: it is it?
Speaker 7: You were going to say you guys all had one?
Speaker 5: We do?
Speaker 3: I know, honestly, it's not a bad idea for a
Speaker 3: group tattoo. Just I wonder if you all do it.
Speaker 2: About this, you won't do it?
Speaker 6: I would get I will go right now to go
Speaker 6: get a group tattoo.
Speaker 2: You guys won't do I would.
Speaker 4: Go get salary right now. If that's like, if you
Speaker 4: guys were like, send me the image, I'll be home with.
Speaker 2: The thank you, I will do it too.
Speaker 3: I'll consider it. I'll consider it. I'll consider it.
Speaker 4: Let's talk about it.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about it off there, let's talk about it there.
Speaker 1: I wonder when their vegetables were pitched right, like potato, potato.
Speaker 4: Is not as funny, like how do you go through that?
Speaker 4: Onion says too much?
Speaker 5: It's gonna be It really might have been at that
Speaker 5: point there was such a level of frustration there that
Speaker 5: it was just like there, I don't know that we
Speaker 5: expected that to even make it to air, which is
Speaker 5: you know, another fun thing about about making the show
Speaker 5: and and something that impressed me like early that that
Speaker 5: age in my career was that there was nothing that
Speaker 5: we said, you know, whatever brain fart you had at
Speaker 5: you know, nine o'clock at night on a rewrite showed
Speaker 5: up on set the next day. No one ever said
Speaker 5: are you serious? Right, They just did it, you know,
Speaker 5: and it was so magical to imagine something and have
Speaker 5: it appear, you know, on stage, and so you know,
Speaker 5: I'm not sure that when we you know, in frustration,
Speaker 5: landed on Celery that we thought, ultimately this is going
Speaker 5: to make it to air.
Speaker 6: Or it's Do you have any chance to remember any
Speaker 6: joke that you're just gonna ask to say a thing?
Speaker 6: Do you remember a joke that you really fought for
Speaker 6: that didn't make it on the show that you got
Speaker 6: were like, oh god, I really want this to be
Speaker 6: in there.
Speaker 4: Or a storyline or a storyline.
Speaker 7: Yeah, oh gosh, well, I mean tons, there's tons of things.
Speaker 5: I don't know if I if I remember things that
Speaker 5: were were pitched. Oh, I do remember.
Speaker 7: I was like, really, I.
Speaker 5: Won't remember the details. I remember really passionately pitching a
Speaker 5: concept for an episode, and and you could tell that
Speaker 5: it was like it might I might get like I
Speaker 5: almost sold it.
Speaker 7: I remember almost getting there and then not getting the bread.
Speaker 7: I can't.
Speaker 3: I can't remember that.
Speaker 5: It's never it's never as good as you know, But
Speaker 5: whatever it was, it was something. It was something that
Speaker 5: I I just know that.
Speaker 7: I went I went all in.
Speaker 5: I went in like you know, yeah, I'm gonna like,
Speaker 5: I cheer up, I'm gonna go this is the most
Speaker 5: important thing we'll ever do in television, you know, almost
Speaker 5: made it.
Speaker 3: But do you remember how the idea came together to
Speaker 3: incorporate the art prodigy Alexandra Nikita into the show. She
Speaker 3: was a pretty good actress for a young art How
Speaker 3: did that come about?
Speaker 5: I think that that I think as I recall, I
Speaker 5: believe she might have been on like sixty minutes or something.
Speaker 5: She I think she was getting a little press at
Speaker 5: a time, and Michael was interested in buying art at
Speaker 5: the time, so I think he just came across her
Speaker 5: and just liked the idea that she was about the
Speaker 5: same age.
Speaker 7: As the characters.
Speaker 5: And you know, I mean, we didn't do a ton
Speaker 5: of sort of stunt casting or you know, anything like that,
Speaker 5: So that was that was pretty.
Speaker 7: Unusual for the show to.
Speaker 5: Bring me in, particularly somebody just playing their real life self.
Speaker 5: Trying to remember if we did that in any other show.
Speaker 2: Now, there was more, there was more stunt casting. Earlier
Speaker 2: in the show. We had, like the earlier seasons, we had.
Speaker 6: Some like the you know, the Happy Days Gang and
Speaker 6: all that kind of We did that more back in
Speaker 6: the day than we did I think later in the episodes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, so the.
Speaker 3: Gang is now out of high school, we're all off
Speaker 3: in college. Do you remember was the room excited about
Speaker 3: aging us up a bit?
Speaker 5: I mean, I guess there would be some excitement and
Speaker 5: some trepidation about how that was going to work, because
Speaker 5: there's such a.
Speaker 7: There's there's such a specific dynamic for.
Speaker 5: The sort of school age up through high school and
Speaker 5: high school in particular. I think high school. The difference
Speaker 5: between high school and college to me, as far as like,
Speaker 5: you know, being on the screen especially, is that in
Speaker 5: high school, every little thing is extremely important. In college,
Speaker 5: even big important things are not important.
Speaker 7: You blow off. You know, it's like a.
Speaker 5: Real reversal in your life where you're not hanging on
Speaker 5: every moment and interaction in the way that we're all
Speaker 5: familiar with in high school. And so high school really
Speaker 5: lends itself to particularly, you know, in sort of that
Speaker 5: half hour setting where you could telegraph really quickly that
Speaker 5: something important was happening in the characters' lives because like because.
Speaker 7: It's high school.
Speaker 5: And then you know, so then when they went beyond
Speaker 5: high school, you're like, oh, are we going to lose
Speaker 5: that sort of universal feeling of what they're going through
Speaker 5: and why it matters to them and why they're you know,
Speaker 5: still such a tight group and things like that.
Speaker 6: There was such a change in the Eric character, not
Speaker 6: just comedically, but I'm also curious because we kind of
Speaker 6: know that we've heard from some of the other writers
Speaker 6: where comedically went that way. But one of the things
Speaker 6: we noticed is that it doesn't seem like Eric ever
Speaker 6: has a love interest again. And I'm curious if there
Speaker 6: was ever a talk of giving him a date again,
Speaker 6: having giving him you know, letting him have a girlfriend
Speaker 6: of his own, a boyfriend of his own, whatever, just
Speaker 6: so sort of a love.
Speaker 2: Interest it seemed to just kind of disappear. Can you
Speaker 2: remember if there was a reason.
Speaker 5: For that or.
Speaker 7: I don't.
Speaker 5: I mean, I don't remember a specific decision to do that. Really,
Speaker 5: I think, you know, I think it was sort of
Speaker 5: like in retrospect, Eric was becoming he fell into the
Speaker 5: category of somebody who maybe was cool in high school
Speaker 5: and then pequed.
Speaker 7: And that again wasn't a choice. It wasn't like, let's have.
Speaker 5: Eric be the guy who peaked in high school. But
Speaker 5: I think that is interesting kind of you know, where
Speaker 5: where things went, And I don't know, I don't know
Speaker 5: if that's also because again, the qualities that you can
Speaker 5: ascribe to somebody as being like a fun, cool guy
Speaker 5: in high school, do not you know, necessarily translate into
Speaker 5: a college and beyond environment. And I think maybe if
Speaker 5: we had, if we had done something deliberate, we might
Speaker 5: have decided that we were going to take Eric and
Speaker 5: have him and maybe this would be like something you
Speaker 5: do today. It wouldn't have done it then, but make
Speaker 5: him fall more into success, you know, make him be
Speaker 5: the person who you know, gosh, Feeney was always telling
Speaker 5: him to sort of like get serious and things like that.
Speaker 7: And then wouldn't it be fun if Eric was just.
Speaker 5: The person who after high school is just like he's
Speaker 5: a billionaire by the twenty and everyone's going like yeah,
Speaker 5: like then, And it's like because because then it would
Speaker 5: be in contrast to what the what the show and
Speaker 5: the adults of the show had told us, which is
Speaker 5: that Eric needs to get serious and like, apparently.
Speaker 2: Not that's interesting.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I like that.
Speaker 2: Cool.
Speaker 3: So you would go on to write two more episodes
Speaker 3: in season six and too in season step seven, and
Speaker 3: you were with us right until the very end of
Speaker 3: the series. What do you remember, if anything about that
Speaker 3: series finale week?
Speaker 5: Oh my gosh, crying everybody's crying all the time, so
Speaker 5: much crying, A lot of crying. Yeah, I mean it
Speaker 5: was I think it was pretty emotional. We've spent a
Speaker 5: lot of years, you know, up until that point. I
Speaker 5: don't think I ever worked in the same job for
Speaker 5: three years, you know. I mean I'm like pretty young
Speaker 5: and early in a career where it's like maybe you
Speaker 5: worked someplace for a year and then you were looking
Speaker 5: for the next thing you could do because you weren't
Speaker 5: where you wanted to be. And so this was the
Speaker 5: first opportunity to be doing what I wanted to be doing.
Speaker 5: And it wound up, you know, continuing and and you know,
Speaker 5: by by that year, I was like, man, I this
Speaker 5: is the this is the tightest group of co workers
Speaker 5: I've ever had in my life.
Speaker 7: So that you know, that was that was really something.
Speaker 5: And we we had that sort of relationship with the
Speaker 5: crew and the cast and the and then the audience
Speaker 5: that came, you know, our live audience, which is not
Speaker 5: an experience most writers get, you know, to put their
Speaker 5: stuff up in front of a live audience. And in
Speaker 5: those fans who would come, you know, the people that
Speaker 5: came every week, you know, yeah, repeatedly and stuff like that.
Speaker 5: It was you know, you knew that this was not
Speaker 5: something that you could count on ever happening.
Speaker 3: Again, Well, since Boy Meets World ended, you have really
Speaker 3: gone from job to job every year. You have never
Speaker 3: been at a loss for work, either as a writer
Speaker 3: or an executive producer. You've been on Private Practice, Life Unexpected,
Speaker 3: nine oh two, one zero, The Good Doctor. That's just
Speaker 3: to name a few. Would you say there's anything you
Speaker 3: learned on Boy Meets World that you have been able
Speaker 3: to take with you to all of those jobs?
Speaker 7: Oh? Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 5: I mean I think that's one of the things, is
Speaker 5: like formative experiences, the things that you do and it's
Speaker 5: when you don't know how it's done, wind up being
Speaker 5: things that you really carry with you. The writer's table
Speaker 5: reads is one of those things, Like I said that
Speaker 5: I've done that.
Speaker 7: I think it's to me, it was like it.
Speaker 5: Was such a good practice and so good for the
Speaker 5: new writers coming in because a lot of times on shows,
Speaker 5: there's a tendency to rewrite the original writer several times
Speaker 5: before it even gets to the actor's table read, and
Speaker 5: so what happens as a as a young writer is
Speaker 5: that you never hear your words out loud. Really, you know,
Speaker 5: they've always been changed in a way that sometimes it's
Speaker 5: not recognizable to you by the time it's going to set.
Speaker 7: Or even to the first table read.
Speaker 5: And I think having an opportunity to hear even from
Speaker 5: some really bad writer performers, but having the opportunity to
Speaker 5: hear your script aloud is a real growth opportunity for writers.
Speaker 5: Having to try to perform a script, Yeah, is a
Speaker 5: growth opportunity for writers of like that wasn't easy to say, Yeah,
Speaker 5: that was awkward.
Speaker 3: How can I make this less awkward?
Speaker 7: Yeah? Right right?
Speaker 5: Knowing that it's like that, that matters, and so yeah,
Speaker 5: so I've you know, I've I've tried to continue doing
Speaker 5: that and you know, gotten a lot of benefit out
Speaker 5: of that. I would say also Will as as far
Speaker 5: as your your character and Eric, one of the things
Speaker 5: I remember so much and that I have have kind
Speaker 5: of carried into other shows is.
Speaker 7: You were never not in the scene you were in.
Speaker 5: You might have had no role in the scene that
Speaker 5: you were in, and you were never not in the scene.
Speaker 5: And I remember specifically one scene that was in It
Speaker 5: was in the kitchen, and I think it was you know,
Speaker 5: I know it was the other characters were talking, and
Speaker 5: you had been there for whatever reason, and they came
Speaker 5: in and they're having a pretty you know, a pretty
Speaker 5: intense scene and you just happened to be in the
Speaker 5: in the shot. But I don't think you were thinking
Speaker 5: about being in the shot. But you were in the shot,
Speaker 5: and you were in it, and you were like, you.
Speaker 2: Know, oh you know what.
Speaker 4: I bet it was.
Speaker 2: I bet it was.
Speaker 6: It was when to Panga and Corey decided to get married,
Speaker 6: and Alan and Amy are having the conversation with Corey
Speaker 6: and Topanga across the kitchen and I'm standing in that's
Speaker 6: the Rachel is fine. I got this new room in
Speaker 6: and she is a fine scene. I bet she's the
Speaker 6: one you're talking about. I think I know exactly the
Speaker 6: one you're talking about.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but I so I've used that as I've used
Speaker 5: that as example for you know, for for actors, but
Speaker 5: a lot of time to use it as an example
Speaker 5: for for writers about who you know, which you've brought
Speaker 5: these characters into this room.
Speaker 7: Right.
Speaker 3: You what you are doing?
Speaker 5: And I will that would be like sometimes you get
Speaker 5: lucky and the actor, yeah, you know, is in the
Speaker 5: scene as the character no matter what you've given them,
Speaker 5: but you can't count.
Speaker 3: On I count on that.
Speaker 7: I could count on that.
Speaker 5: With the with you guys and that, you know. But
Speaker 5: and I remember that as being something where that was
Speaker 5: the first time as a writer I paid attention and
Speaker 5: realized that that I've left people here. I put people
Speaker 5: in this room and they're here, and and it was
Speaker 5: you know, rather than it being an oops, it should
Speaker 5: be an opportunity because that's how life is.
Speaker 7: People are in rooms where they're like, I wish I
Speaker 7: were that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that's great, Oh that's funny.
Speaker 3: What would you say the biggest difference between twenty twenty
Speaker 3: five writer's room and a nineteen ninety eight writer's.
Speaker 5: Room well being in an actual room, Okay, not being
Speaker 5: on zoom.
Speaker 7: Right, yeah, I mean so yeah, Back then, I mean
Speaker 7: it was.
Speaker 5: It. I think there was more, you know, it probably
Speaker 5: is just, you know, kind of boring to say, but
Speaker 5: there's more more community and people were we were all
Speaker 5: around each other all the time, much more. I mean,
Speaker 5: I remember first season of Boyming's World and being on
Speaker 5: the Radford and being surrounded by other shows, also life
Speaker 5: taping all the time, and so you know, and and
Speaker 5: the little basketball hoop that the Seinfeld people shot hoops
Speaker 5: that you know, right to our building, and you know,
Speaker 5: just that just walking around the lot, you know, seeing
Speaker 5: other writers on other shows, seeing other cast on other shows,
Speaker 5: just being around that all the time, you had more
Speaker 5: of more of a sense of sort of us all
Speaker 5: being in the circus together kind of thing.
Speaker 6: Yeah. I mean we were in between Seinfeld and Third
Speaker 6: Rock from the Sun, so it was.
Speaker 5: There was bibil and there was like there was so
Speaker 5: many shows like big you know, big stars and big shows,
Speaker 5: and it was every every stage was full of that.
Speaker 3: Has it ever come up on any of the other
Speaker 3: shows that you've worked on that you once worked on
Speaker 3: Boy Meets World? What are the reactions when people find
Speaker 3: out you worked on Boy Meets World.
Speaker 5: This is the best thing, uh, And I'm sure you
Speaker 5: guys experienced this of you know, there were cooler places
Speaker 5: to be at this at the time. I went on
Speaker 5: a panel. I was asked to do a panel about
Speaker 5: medical storylines, you know, having to then move you know,
Speaker 5: moved on and started doing hour long dramas and medical
Speaker 5: dramas and things like that. So I, you know, done
Speaker 5: some medical storylines and I was asked.
Speaker 7: To speak and.
Speaker 5: I was like I had the least interesting or impressive
Speaker 5: thing to talk about in terms of the show that
Speaker 5: they'd say, Oh, you're going to come and talk about this,
Speaker 5: you know, breast cancer, gene testing storyline that you did
Speaker 5: the show. And then we're going to have somebody who
Speaker 5: created the Big C which was a huge show at
Speaker 5: the moment, and somebody who created some other like e
Speaker 5: er whatever. You have all these big shows, and it's
Speaker 5: like my little storyline. And so everybody spoke about their
Speaker 5: you know, their their show. And then they said, Okay,
Speaker 5: we're going to open it up for questions and I thought, well,
Speaker 5: I can get my things ready to leave. You know,
Speaker 5: nobody can ask a question. The very first question was like,
Speaker 5: I have a I have a question for.
Speaker 7: For Patty Carr. And I was like, oh, oh, you know,
Speaker 7: what is your question?
Speaker 5: And they said, I have a box set of Boy
Speaker 5: Meets World evds and I wanted to know if you
Speaker 5: would autograph that. Could you tell me about Corey into
Speaker 5: Pega's wedding? And I know that's not this medical thing,
Speaker 5: but could you just do I like, yes, I could
Speaker 5: exe tens you.
Speaker 7: Yeah, nobody asked for their autograph.
Speaker 2: Oh that's cool.
Speaker 3: That's amazing. Take that good doctor.
Speaker 7: That's right, that's right.
Speaker 5: And I mean so that's when you know, it's it's
Speaker 5: as the audience for Boy Meets World as they kind
Speaker 5: of grew up and started you know, being out in
Speaker 5: public without without their parents or whatever, as they kind
Speaker 5: of came into the world and into the industry, it's.
Speaker 7: Always now something that you say and people are like, oh, oh,
Speaker 7: oh my god, I can't believe you look for the show.
Speaker 7: It's amazing.
Speaker 3: Well, finally, did you ever think that people would still
Speaker 3: be wanting to hear us talk about Boy Meets World
Speaker 3: thirty years later when you were writing it?
Speaker 5: No, well back then, I don't think you could imagine
Speaker 5: you know, sort of any of the or any of
Speaker 5: that kind of you know, interest in old stuff.
Speaker 7: You know, you weren't thinking that there.
Speaker 3: Was going to be that kind of like longevity.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, for for shows and things like that, or
Speaker 5: a forum for people to even have those conversations with
Speaker 5: with their fans and stuff. So yeah, just definitely didn't
Speaker 5: didn't think about that, and it it is, you know,
Speaker 5: it is amazing that, yeah, people people are still interested
Speaker 5: in hearing about this stuff.
Speaker 7: So hopefully I had something interesting to say about it.
Speaker 5: I know you had, like plenty of other writers telling
Speaker 5: telling the truth in a few lies.
Speaker 7: I didn't how I didn't like Eric's character and wrote about.
Speaker 6: I know you're lying, Patty, It's fine.
Speaker 3: He totally made that up. She did not say that.
Speaker 7: I did not have the power to make that happen.
Speaker 7: Even even no, we're.
Speaker 3: Also saying Laura did not say that she just made
Speaker 3: that up. La did not even come close to alluding
Speaker 3: to that, so did she.
Speaker 7: If she did.
Speaker 5: If Laura did do that, I would have to like
Speaker 5: you her comedy props for coming.
Speaker 3: Yeah, No, she did not. Patty, thank you so much
Speaker 3: for taking time out of your very busy schedule to
Speaker 3: come and spend with us. Really nice to reconnect with you,
Speaker 3: to hear your perspective on things. Congratulations on an incredible career.
Speaker 3: You're still going at it. Where can we find you now?
Speaker 3: What are you working on now?
Speaker 5: I'm just working on staying sane, so because.
Speaker 8: We all are Yeah, yeah, nothing, I'm helping nobody and
Speaker 8: doing reaching no audience other than the people outside my
Speaker 8: window when I screamed.
Speaker 3: That's nice because it knows to you for that. Thank you,
Speaker 3: Patty for being with us always.
Speaker 7: Nice to see you, good to see you.
Speaker 3: Thank you bye. Oh my gosh, that's so will you
Speaker 3: totally threw Laura and she believed you. She was like
Speaker 3: and then I was like, do you want to touch
Speaker 3: on those? And then she was right back to it.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I still think Laura said that in my head.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, you're the worst. You're just the worst.
Speaker 2: I know my truth.
Speaker 3: I the knowing that backstory about Celery. Oh, it's so satisfying.
Speaker 6: It is the best because because it's right or you're right,
Speaker 6: that just the way that the joke is so organic,
Speaker 6: because that was what was left. Essentially, it's like, what's
Speaker 6: the most and it's why more original?
Speaker 4: You know, it's just been a volvo or whatever.
Speaker 1: It's fine, fun, but the fact that it's like, wait,
Speaker 1: is that a poster of Sealary and.
Speaker 3: You have to like, you know, it's just it's good
Speaker 3: to have happened on purpose. Yeah, it's like it's too good.
Speaker 3: It's just it's unbelievable. So thank you all for joining
Speaker 3: us for this episode of Podmeets World. As always, you
Speaker 3: can follow us on Instagram pod Meets World Show. You
Speaker 3: can send us your emails. Podmeets World Show at gmail
Speaker 3: dot com and we've got merch.
Speaker 2: We need to get matching salary tattoos.
Speaker 3: Merch Podmeetsworldshow dot com will send us out.
Speaker 2: We love you all, pod dismissed.
Speaker 6: Podmeets World is nheart podcast producer and hosted by Danielle Fischel,
Speaker 6: Wilfordell and Ryder Strong executive producers, Jensen Karp and Amy
Speaker 6: Sugarman Executive in charge of production, Danielle Romo, producer and editor,
Speaker 6: Tara sudbachsch producer, Maddie Moore, engineer and Boy Meets World
Speaker 6: super fan Easton Allen. Our theme song is by Kyle
Speaker 6: Morton of Typhoon and you can follow us on Instagram
Speaker 6: at podmeets World Show or email us at Podmeets Worldshow
Speaker 6: at gmail dot com