Ernie Was Right!

Ernest Borgnine in a scene from "Marty."  What a good-a boy! Won and Oscar for it too!

Years ago, I was earnestly pursuing a career as a Hollywood writer which, I hoped, would lead to directing.  I had a few successes, but not enough to keep me going in the long run... especially after having a child, and later another, which meant I had more people to worry about, to be responsible for, to provide for than myself. So, I scrapped my Hollywood ambitions and got a normal job. I became a working-class hero. Leastwise, a working-class something. I'm not bitter. I don't blame that decision on anyone. That's life. La vita. Sometimes, it doesn't go as planned.

We sold a few scripts, that is my writing partner and I, which were either film screenplays or ideas for TV shows, but only one of them was produced.  My writing partner, who I met at film school and who is still one of my dearest friends (he eventually put a law degree to work and became an attorney) and I sold  a TV sit-com idea that was produced by NBC. Unfortunately, it never went to series and only made it as far as an aired pilot. It was called "Whacked Out." It starred Dana Carvey (before anyone knew who he was), Desi Arnaz Jr., and some other funny and talented actors.

The coolest thing (besides "Whacked Out" being produced by a major network) was when they taped the pilot in front of a live audience. Lucille Ball was there to support her son and my friend and writing partner and I were seated, by the producers, next to Lucy for the taping. That was so friggin' cool! Lucille Ball of I Love Lucy fame!  I was like a stuttering fan-boy.

Almost immediately, Lucy acted like she knew us from way back and when she was officially introduced to the audience -- not that she needed an introduction -- she made my partner and I stand up with her while she extolled the virtues of writers and how none of what people see on TV or at the movie theaters would be possible without the imagination, creativity, and hard work of writers; people who most audiences never get to see or meet. A truly a class act Lucille Ball was.

A typical old school Italian barber shop. (Just kidding.)

Not long after, one of our other sit-com ideas was optioned by another production company.  "Optioned" means a producer or a production company pays the writers to secure the exclusive rights to a script or a story idea for a specified period of time while they pursue making a deal with a network or a studio to produce it.

This newly optioned project was called, "A Little Off the Top." The "situation" in this situation comedy revolved around an Italian-American family whose patriarch owned and operated an old school Italian barber shop in an unnamed city and what takes place when the man's son returns home after graduating from hair styling school to join his Dad in the barber business.

The family patriarch -- a 1rst generation Italian-American who comes from a long line of proud Italian barbers -- is thrilled to have his son join him in the business. The comedic conflict begins almost immediately when the son shares his new ideas for the future of the barber shop: Ideas and plans that aren't in line with what his father wants for his son or the barber shop.

The son wants to turn the barber shop into a trendy hair styling salon. The father wants to keep it the way it has been. In order to maintain peace and stability in the family, the two decide -- with Solomon-like wisdom -- to split the barber shop in half with one-half remaining an old school Italian barber shop and the other half becoming a trendy hair styling salon. (With no walls separating the two enterprises.) The comedy is driven by the family dynamics of new generation versus old -- old school versus new school -- and, of course, the daily interactions of all the old timers who have frequented the barber shop for years and how they comically collide with the new generation of trendy hipsters who are the new customers of the "salon."

Borgnine having a non-Italian dinner with a friend.

The production company that optioned the show made a deal with Ernest Borgnine to play the lead. He would play the patriarch of the family, the old school Italian-American barber. Ernest Borgnine was himself a 1rst generation Italian-American. His real name was Ermes Effron Borgnino. He was born in Connecticut to parents who were both Italian immigrants..

We had a number of writer's meetings. One of the things Borgnine was insistent on was that the show begin each week during a traditional, Italian-American, Sunday family dinner with all the family characters in attendance. Dinner always had to feature spaghetti and meatballs served up with all the other traditional Sunday sauce/gravy dinner fare. Ernie was a man who loved his Italian food.

I can't adequately express how thrilled I was to be creatively involved with an actor of Borgnine's caliber.  But on the issue of starting the show each week during an Italian-American Sunday dinner, the sort of dinner both Mr.  Borgnine and myself had participated in many times during our lives, we disagreed. It wasn't a negative sort of disagreement but a creative disagreement. Hey! What can I say? I was young. I was stupid. I had new and different ideas. Better ideas, or so I thought. Our creative disagreement became almost like Mr. Borgnine and myself were playing the two main characters in the show-- the old Italian head of the family and the young upstart son with the new ideas.

Writers can be adamant about "the sanctity" of their work, which we often love and treat almost like spoiled  children.  Actors can be the same way about the characters they intend to create and play. In the end, the show didn't happen. It was never produced. Not because of creative differences but because it didn't. Getting anything produced in Hollywood has long odds. Always has, always will. And "A Little Off the Top" wasn't able to beat those odds. But that's another story.

Now that I'm older, a lot older, and hopefully wiser, I realize Ernie was right. He was 100% correct. The show should have begun each episode the way he envisioned it, taking place at the table during traditional Italian-American Sunday dinners. Famiglia: That's what the show was about at it's core, not barber shops or trendy hair salons or even Italian families for that matter. Ernie was right. It would have been a great way to serve up the show to audiences... if the the show had ever been produced. 

Rest in Peace, Ernest Borgnine. You were a true movie star, a great man, and an Italian-American artist of distinction!