Sunday, January 08, 2006

Sopranos' low notes

In a follow up to my last post I thought for fun I’d check out some of the actual previous credits for the SOPRANOS writers. They include:

Kolchak: the Night Stalker
the Magician
2 Stupid Dogs
Batman (the animated series)
Cover Me
Swat Kats
Hack
the In-Laws
Baby Blues
American Gothic
DiResti
the New Flipper
the Naked Truth
Living in Captivity
Sister Sister
..... and of course – the Secret Squirrel Show.

So dive into that “Coconut Fred’s Fruit Salad Island” episode you’re writing with renewed gusto.

16 comments :

Anonymous said...

Thanks for compiling this list. I'm sure it gives hope to the writers for "Freddie."

Anonymous said...

You seriously underestimate the quality of Batman: The Animated Series by including it on this list.

Alex Epstein said...

So what happened right this time, Ken?

By Ken Levine said...

I too think the Batman show is well written. It's just that it's animated and thus hard to make the jump to the SOPRANOS.

Anonymous said...

Omigawd. Coconut Fred’s Fruit Salad Island.

I watched that for the first time during the week (completely as a result of accidental channel surfing), and thought I hallucinated that.

Are you and David working on a spec?

By Ken Levine said...

Yes, along with Peter Casey from Frasier.

Julie Goes to Hollywood said...

My sitcom teacher in film school, our old pal Fred Rubin, used to run Family Matters. He tells a story about turning down a pair of brothers for a spec assignment because he just wasn't sure they could deliver.

They were the Cohen brothers. And uh, yeah, they can.

J. Walker said...

The episodes of Kolchak: The Night Stalker that David Chase worked on were actually really good. So I it's little surprise he'd go on to make The Sopranos.

Robert Zemeckis, who directed Contact, Cast Away, and the Back to the Future movies, also has a writing credit on Kolchak, oddly enough.

Anonymous said...

to be directed by Steve Buscemi of course

Stefan said...

Wow. That's...quite the collective resume.

Anonymous said...

I love this blog, but this is my first post.

Anyway, I just had to call BS on Julie's teacher's story.

The Coen Bros. tried to get a spec assignment on "Family Matters"? Considering that show started in 1989, at the absolute earliest that would be after they made "Blood Simple" and "Raising Arizona" and were no doubt deep into 1990's "Miller's Crossing".

Anyway, great post. Very inspiring.

By Ken Levine said...

The Fred Rubin story is true. The show in question might not have been "Family Matters". Fred goes back to "Archie Bunker's Place" in the late 70's/early 80's.

Anonymous said...

^Okay. I believe the story, but it must have been long before "Family Matters".

Cunningham said...

"He tells a story about turning down a pair of brothers for a spec assignment because he just wasn't sure they could deliver."

I think a better way to phrase or view the situation (if true) is to say he wasn't sure they could deliver a good Family Matters...

Different strokes for different folks.

Julie Goes to Hollywood said...

Yeah, Fred looks damn good for his age, which is why they let him keep working in sitcom. But even if it were in fact Archie Bunker's Place it's just a better story if they weren't capable of delivering dialogue for Steve Urkel. Come on, people, this is Hollywood. We love to sacrifice truth for color.

Lee Goldberg said...

Are you kidding? Those are great credits compared to mine...which includes such classics as THE NEW ADVENTURES OF FLIPPER, THE HIGHWAYMAN, BAYWATCH and SHE-WOLF OF LONDON.