Dick Van Dyke

by My Lucky Life In;Out of Show Business

  But plenty of other people in town had seen her, including Danny Thomas, one of our executive producers and one of Hollywood’s biggest, smartest stars on his own. She had auditioned to play his daughter on Make Room for Daddy, better known as The Danny Thomas Show, but as Carl later quipped, “She missed it by a nose.” Indeed, as Danny added, “No daughter of mine could ever have a nose that small.”

  But he suggested “the girl with three names” to Carl, and she got the role. Her nose was perfect, as was she. Everyone loved Mary.

  What wasn’t to love? I adored her from the moment we were introduced. I think both of us had each other at hello. But I still had a couple of problems. For one, I thought she was too young to play my wife. She was twelve years younger than I was, though as time went by, no one ever noticed or mentioned that fact. Even I forgot about it. Then, during our initial read-throughs of the first episode, titled “The Sick Boy and the Sitter,” I was concerned that Mary wasn’t much of a comedienne.

  It is hard to imagine. But she was stiff and proper, polite. She didn’t seem to have much of a funny bone. I saw a little Katharine Hepburn in her, but not much Lucille Ball.

  Of course, I was wrong. And therein is yet another reason Carl was known as a genius and I was referred to as “the actor playing Rob Petrie.” Within a few days of reading and working together—really in no time at all—Mary got it. With Carl, Rosie, and Morey in the room, she had the best teachers. These people knew comedy like nobody else. They had funny in their bones, down into the marrow. On top of that, they had impeccable timing. Mine was pretty good, too. And Mary was the A-plus student. She absorbed everything—the chemistry, the rhythm—and emerged a comedienne herself.

  I had never seen a transformation like hers, and I still haven’t. She went from black to white. The first time I stood across from her in rehearsal and heard her say, “Oh, Rob!” I thought, That’s it, we’re home.

  All of a sudden, she was perfect.

  Little Cahuenga Studios, or Little Desilu, became our home away from home. We spent much of that first week as a cast preparing for the pilot by sitting around a table, reading the script, and throwing out suggestions as Carl listened and wrote. He was brought up on Your Show of Shows, where they sat around the table and threw out lines. We did the same. Everybody got to suggest dialogue and work out their parts, and Carl wrote and, more accurately, rewrote the scripts as he fine-tuned each role to our personalities, strengths, speech patterns, and inflections.

  Imagine humming a tune to Mozart. With perfect pitch, something I still marvel at, he captured every one of us. It made it so we didn’t have to act. All we had to do was read our parts. We were playing ourselves.

  We had to hold Morey down. He was an encyclopedia with a million jokes in his head. They popped out of him at a rapid-fire pace, and they were hiliarious, except most didn’t fit the story. He wasn’t always wrong, though. Sometimes he threw in a great one, and Carl kept it.

  Carl was like that with all of us. If someone offered a line and it was funny and fit the story, it stayed in. That was the ethos as we worked on the pilot, and it stayed that way for the entire run of the series.

  I liked everyone instantly and the feeling was mutual. We all liked one another and everyone had a handle on the idea. Throughout the week, we knew we were headed in the right direction. The show got better, funnier, and each of us grew more comfortable in our parts. That was when I was at my most creative, when I was on the set, doing the work. With the adrenaline flowing, you never knew what might happen.

  I was so nervous before taping the pilot that fever blisters broke out in my mouth. That morning we were to begin taping, I looked in the mirror and counted five of them. I thought, Poor Mary, I have to kiss her in the opening scene when I come home from work excited because my boss, Alan Brady, has invited us to a party at his penthouse home. We shot the pilot on January 21, 1961, the same day John F. Kennedy was sworn in as the thirty-fifth president of the United States, in front of three cameras and a live audience, just like present-day sitcoms do, and got laughs in all the right places, and even a few unexpected places. Toward the end, there was a big party scene at Alan’s house where everyone got to perform, and it went flawlessly, too.

  Everything worked, including ideas we had discussed earlier and little impromptu bits that came to us in the moment. We came off as a married couple. It was thrilling. I could tell it was working, and so could Mary. From the start, we had a special timing and chemistry that you can’t manufacture. It’s either there or it isn’t. With us, it was there—and it only got better over time.

  All of us were learning. I spoke to Carl between takes about the shadings of my character. We had been discussing Rob throughout the week and continued the conversation every chance we had. Carl had a picture in his head, and I was just getting acquainted with him. The two would quickly merge, his vision and my portrayal, and then the fun really started.

  He knew that I loved physical comedy, so we made Rob a tad klutzy. If he could trip or bump into something at an inopportune or unlikely moment, he did. It was during one of the early rehearsals that I came up with the idea to stumble over the living room ottoman, which became a signature of the show’s opening. I tried it and Carl laughed—especially at my expression. It was golden.

  Everything about Rob was like that. He was relatable. A comedy writer may not be familiar to everyone, but he was a husband and father, a good guy who tried hard to make sure things went right, that he did a good job, and that he not get flustered when things went awry. I was able to pour so much of myself into him before I even knew I was doing that. Like me, he hated confrontation. Carl had a deft eye for piling up intricate little problems that turned into challenges that thwarted Rob, including his job, his coworkers, his roles as a husband and a responsible provider, and his own charming, well-intentioned self. Every time he came up with a new situation that caused Laura to wince, “Oh, Rob!” I thought, Oh, good, this is going to be fun.

  It was also no accident that we had numerous episodes with parties where we broke into song or dance. All of us looked for any excuse to perform, and Carl relished any and every opportunity to write in a number, since they shortened the script by ten pages or so.

  As we shot the pilot, I mispronounced Rob and Laura’s last name, saying Pet-re rather than Pee-tree, as Carl had done in the original when he based the name on some actual neighbors of his in New Rochelle. Nobody corrected me, and so it stuck.

  Another name stuck, too—the show’s title.

  That was the problem the whole time we began working on the remake. There wasn’t a title. No one wanted to use the old name, Head of the Family. Carl came up with numerous suggestions, one more clever than the next, but none of them hit the magic note that made Carl and Sheldon go, “Aha, that’s it!”

  Ideas were pitched all week and just as quickly dismissed, including Double Trouble, which Sheldon championed, as it was his idea.

  But Carl shook his head. Our conductor heard it as a sour note.

  “The problem is we have a show with a star that no one has heard of,” Carl said. “We need something that will make both Dick and the show a household name.”

  One afternoon, with time running out before we had to deliver a title to CBS, Sheldon, an imposing, opinionated man who was always perfectly dressed, fit, and tan, as well as a man who possessed an impressive vocabulary and used it to his advantage, got into a discussion with Carl, who had his own arsenal of opinions and arguments. As they went back and forth, Carl suggested calling it The Dick Van Dyke Show. I saw his face brighten.

  “Look, Make Room for Daddy, a big hit, became better known as The Danny Thomas Show,” Carl said. “We should do the same. It solves our problems.”

  Sheldon, who looked as if someone had just put a pinch of bitters on his tongue, didn’t think so.

  “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” he said slowly, as if placing it on a shelf and standing back to assess how it looked.

  All
of a sudden everyone looked. All eyes swung to me. I wanted to hide. Rosie, appearing more perplexed than anyone, shook her head and said, “What’s a Dick Van Dyke?”

  I agreed. It sounded like a mistake.

  “Nobody’s ever heard of me,” I said. “Who’s going to tune in?”

  “I disagree,” Carl said. “I think it’s perfect.”

  10

  SHOWTIME

  Less than a month after shooting the pilot, Carl called me at home in New York. I was reading the paper before going to the theater, but I immediately put it down when I heard the excitement in his voice. CBS had loved the pilot, he said, adding, they were picking it up for an entire season and we were going to get started as soon as I got to Los Angeles.

  I am not even sure how I got through that night’s performance of Birdie. I hung up with Carl and danced around the living room with Margie, who was pregnant with our fourth child. I don’t remember exactly where I was later, whether I was standing outside our house before getting into the car to drive into the city or had paused next to the artists’ entrance at the theater, staring up at the New York skyline, but I do remember feeling blessed, like something greater than me was happening, and yet, it was happening to me.

  I planned nothing.

  This was my lucky life.

  We put our house up for sale and I gave notice at the play. The timing was perfect. I was only signed to the play for a year and that contract was just about up. My final performance in Birdie came in April 1961. It was a bittersweet night, as expected. The little girls with whom I sang “Put On a Happy Face” had tears running down their rosy cheeks, and Chita, who had become a dear friend, and I cried onstage, not caring if anyone in the audience noticed.

  Two months later, I was buried in work on the TV series but still making news in the play. Apparently I won a Tony Award for Featured Actor. I say apparently because I had no idea that I was among the night’s winners, which included Richard Burton for Camelot, Joan Plowright for A Taste of Honey, Zero Mostel for Rhinoceros, and Gower Champion for Birdie. Charles Nelson Reilly accepted the award on my behalf.

  “Dick says thank you,” he quipped. “And since he can’t be here, I’d like to sing a few of my hits.”

  He had such a good time that night in my stead that he forgot to call and let me know the good news. No one else called, either. Notification did finally arrive via a congratulatory telegram, but somehow it ended up under the welcome mat outside our front door, and days passed before our housekeeper found it when she swept the front porch.

  Oh, well.

  As much as I loved New York, it was in the past. We had settled into a new house in Mandeville Canyon, a secluded Brentwood neighborhood close to the kids’ schools. Byron Paul, who was managing my career, had gone ahead of us, bought a home for his family and then found one for ours two doors down from his. Our move went smoothly, except for my poor Chrysler, which I had put on the train in perfect running condition. It was dead on arrival, though.

  I marveled at my kids, whose lives were unfolding in a very different manner than mine. Whereas I had been brought up in a small town surrounded by relatives, they had lived in Atlanta, New York, and now L.A. But they were great kids: smart, respectful, studious, adaptable, generous, and well-adjusted. I was more proud of them than anything else I had ever done.

  Plus, as the little bump in Margie’s belly attested, we had one more on the way that fall.

  All of us adored L.A. It was warm and beautiful. Life was lived outdoors. None of us had any problems adjusting, not that I remember, but when minor issues with the children did arise, I simply turned to Carl and his wife, Estelle, both of whom were attuned to the latest advice in child-rearing. Actually, I turned to Carl whenever I had a question on any topic.

  Over the years, I have accepted numerous awards and made sure to thank Carl. In fact, on more than one occasion, I can recall thanking Carl for my life. It always gets a laugh. But it’s never been a joke. It’s true. In addition to all his show-business smarts, he has always been someone with genuine wisdom about life. The two don’t necessarily go hand in hand. With Carl, they did. When he put me in his show, he literally changed my entire life.

  I only saw him lose his temper once and by then we were already a few years into the show. It was during rehearsal, early in the week, and we were playing around too much with a bad script, trying to fix it. Carl came to the set to watch a run-through and raised hell because we not only failed to fix the script, but we had, he said, made it worse as well.

  Aside from that, the man was a model of hard work and comedy genius who was determined to do things right from day one, and he did. He set the tone, wrote the scripts, and the rest of us enjoyed the ride of our lives.

  Our first season, like all the others, was both effortless and joyful. I didn’t have to be at the studio until ten A.M., so I was able to spend time with Margie and the kids before I made the thirty-minute drive to the Little Desilu studio in Hollywood. My workweek began on Wednesdays with a read-through of the new script. We all sat around a table, read lines, shared opinions, and tossed out new ideas. It was the beginning of a process that didn’t stop until we got in front of the audience and shot the episode the following Tuesday, and even then we still added lines.

  Carl was firmly in charge, but it was such a sharing environment, one where everyone knew the goal was to make the best and funniest episode possible, that we all felt comfortable voicing thoughts to that end. At the table, Carl took to calling me “Doc.” It was always good-natured and casual. I didn’t get it, though. We were halfway into the season when I finally told him that. He explained that everyone on Your Show of Shows had called Neil Simon by that name, Doc.

  “He was a great writer, but quiet,” said Carl. “All of us in the writers’ room would be yelling and Neil would mention an idea, but no one could hear him. I’d say, ‘Wait a minute, Doc’s got something.’ I made it a point to sit next to him so I could hear him.”

  The same thing happened on our show. I would throw out a line, but not loud enough to be heard over Sheldon, Morey, Rosie, Jerry Paris, or the others. But Carl would raise his hand to quiet the table and say, “Hey, Doc has got something.”

  Jerry Paris had ideas, too. A student of comedy, he possessed all the talents that can’t be taught—timing, a sharp eye, and an intuitive sense for what worked. He was also one of those people who did not have an edit button. He said whatever he thought. Usually it was funny, but he pissed off his share of people. Jerry had acted for years, but he was more interested in directing. In preparation, he observed everything. Nothing happened on the set that Jerry did not know about or have an opinion on.

  Before the end of the second season, he would get his chance, and then in the 1970s go on to even greater heights directing Happy Days. But during the first season of The Dick Van Dyke Show we all were obedient soldiers. Sheldon directed the pilot and then John Rich took over the rest of the season and much of the following one. John epitomized the value and purpose of a director, especially on a sitcom. Blessed with a marvelous sense of the ridiculous, he was brilliant at seeing all the possibilities in a scene. I did whatever hit me instinctively as I read the script. I never thought about another way to play a scene. John only thought about other ways.

  He worked from a rolling lectern that he leaned on or gripped with his hands as we worked. His script was poised on top. A cigar was usually in his mouth. When he got upset—and he has a ferocious temper—John hit the lectern and chomped on his cigar. I braced myself for a thunderclap whenever I saw his cigar bouncing up and down. But when something worked, John laughed his head off.

  Even with personalities as strong and persuasive as Sheldon and John, it was still always Carl’s show. If it was funny, Carl’s ear, as well as his office door, were always open. He was a first-rate collaborator. But he was the maestro and we were his orchestra. He had the final word.

  On Mondays, we came in and spent all day blocking for the camer
a. It was the most boring day of the week, but it added to the anticipation of Tuesday, the day we performed the show. We arrived at one P.M. and did a run-through of the show, which I felt was when I did my best thinking. For me, that’s when the magic happened, when the funny bones took over.

  After rehearsal, we broke for dinner. While we ate, the audience came in. Then we did the show. By that point, I knew it was good and couldn’t wait to get out there and show them what we had. Mary took a few weeks to get used to performing in front of an audience. She hadn’t done that before. But soon she was like everyone else—chomping at the bit, excited.

  On taping nights, Carl always greeted the audience with some lighthearted banter and got them laughing. Then he brought out Morey to further warm them up. That was always dicey. Morey knew as many jokes as anyone I ever met, but if he saw someone in the audience of a distinct ethnicity, his brain turned to that page of jokes in his head and he rattled off one after the other without thinking that he might be offending someone.

  Those were delicate times compared to today, so I would often be backstage with the others, wincing at some of his jokes and praying we didn’t have a problem. We never did. But we had other problems. Though it might seem quaint now, the network’s censors had a problem with Mary’s Capri pants. They thought they were too tight, and that turned into a bit of a battle, which Carl eventually won. Following the show’s October 3, 1961, debut, I am sure Mary helped to sell Capri pants across the country.

  The attention that Mary got didn’t sit well with Rosie. She had come on board thinking the focus was going to be on the comedy writers and the TV show Rob worked on. She felt Mary’s part should be a more minor one, at least as the role of wife was thought of in those prefeminist days, meaning she should serve more as window dressing to Rob’s glitzier life in show business. However, Carl made it clear that the show was about both of Rob’s lives, work and home, and that the marriage was the foundation for everything else. Indeed, Rosie came to understand that the show worked just fine as it was.