ENCORE: Revisit Stephanie Zimbalist Talks Remington Steele, Part 2

Hello adies, tv ladies listeners, Our fun summer hiatus continues, but please enjoy this rerun of part two of our interview with the incredible Stephanie Zimbolist. We're so thrilled to be able to bring you this wonderful conversation with Remington Steele's one and only Laura Holt. Hello, this is Stephanie Zimbolist, and you're listening to eighties TV ladies. I don't even know their real names. So pretty into the city.

Hi everyone, I'm Sharon. It's time for part two of our interview with Stephanie Zimbolist, and we think you're going to enjoy it just as much as you did part one. Well, first, we're going to start with some fan feedback because there's some questions that might come up later. Thank you, guys so much for contacting us and sending us your emails and your comments and your ratings and reviews. It really means a lot to us and we love hearing from you.

I want to shout out Leah b and she says, just listen to the second and third Scarecromas's King episodes and you may have already figured this out, but Scarecromas Is King and Remington Steel both shot in Europe due to the nineteen eighty four Los Angeles Olympics being in town and they needed to shoot those early season episodes. That is true. We figure it out a few episodes after. It takes us a while, but thank you very much for your comment. Thank you, Leah.

Love hearing from you. Hope you are continuing to enjoy the podcast. Next up is Kristen, who says, thank you so much for the wonderful episodes on Remington Steel. I missed the show terribly, even after all these years. I remembered that Stephanie Zimbalist and Robyn Bernheim wrote Steele in the ch So when I came across your podcast, I was thrilled that you were going to interview Robyn Bernheim, and now to learn that you will chat with Stephanie Zimbalist as well, I can't wait.

I'd love to hear more about what Stephanie did to shape the character of Laura Holt, and especially her efforts to keep Laura Holt as a strong female lead character. I still remember where I was when I saw the first episode, a senior in high school and thinking Oh my god, finally a female character that I can relate to am inspired by. Thank you again. Thank you so much, Kristen. We both feel the same way about Remington Steele, and I think you'll enjoy what Stephanie Zimbolist has to say in this episode.

And on Apple Podcast from Worst app Ever zero out of ten, we got this review. Thank you so much for your podcast. I miss Remington Steele and it was so wonderful to hear such nice things said about the cast. We'll keep listening because we're going to keep talking about Remington Steel for a few more episodes. Thank you, Worst ap Ever zero out of ten.

So happy to hear that so many are enjoying our episodes. And oh my gosh. From Dakota, we got this question. I am wondering if Stephanie Zimbelist still keeps in touch with Pierce Brosnan. Thank you, Dakota.

Thank you for reaching out to us on eighties TV. Ladies, stay tuned and let's see if we can find out. Wait, we have so much to talk about, you. Know. Oh, I do want to go back to working with your dad.

Yeah, on Remington Steel and that had to be amazing and cool. But also weird. It's amazing and cool. But I do have to tell you about it just flopped into my head. I have to tell you about.

After Remington we were doing The Night of the Iguana. Alec Baldwin, who I had worked with, we did a movie of the week called nineteen eighty four Love on the Run. It was for NBC. We've been friends ever since. We don't necessarily agree on how the world should be run at this point.

But by the way, when we met back in nineteen eighty four, he was about to leave. He was a regular on k Notts Landing at the time, right, and he was about to leave the business because he was so passionate about politics that he was going to go and run for office back then he didn't, but he was going to. I mention it because we've always been you know, Oh, gee, you're working at Williamstown. Can you help me get in? Yeah, let me just make a call.

So I made a call and then he was in Williamstown. Blah blah blah. So he calls me and he says, I'm doing Knight of the Iguana. I'm doing a reading down at Nola down at the Tennessee Williams Literary Festival. I'm doing it with them, Elizabeth Ashley, will you do it with us?

I said sure. So a couple of friends from a theater I work out here saw the production and we said, oh my god, she was great as Hannah Jelks. So it ended up that we got this production of Night of the Iguana, and they asked my dad to play Nano, which is my father, in this lovely production of Night of the Iguana that we did in Ventura, and then we took it up to Winnipeg, Manitoba. Well, when we were first first, you know, working through the Kinks, shall we say, my pop was in an antique wheelchair and there was a ramp that had a high grade and the ramp goes off off stage down this high grade, down to stage audience right and disappears. Well, we're in tech.

I think there was an audience. It was actually we were in tech and I hadn't put the lock properly on on this wheelchair and it was facing backwards. I think, no it was. It wasn't backwards. No, it was facing frontwards, thank god.

So I go off, I go off stage right and I hear this and it's my father going down this ramp alone, unguided and crashing at the bottom, and the audience and my pop, being the professional that he was, he was in his late seventies then early eighties, popped up just like nothing had happened, popped up, dusted his pants off, said well that was fun. He walked back up the ramp. That's my father, that's my dad. Oh my god. But he was very as you can see, he was very athletic.

Also, it was it was such a delight to work with him on Remington. It was such a delight to work with him on Remington that when Daddy died and I did a lot of I did the service, my brother said, you do it all. Oh, thanks, skip, thanks, you do the whole thing. So I did the first memorial, I did the service, I did the second memorial, and they're big productions. They're huge productions with help from many wonderful people that helped me with this.

But anyway, when we did the one at the Sportsman's Lodge in la I invited Pierce because I thought that he would enjoy it. Well, not only did Pierce show up, he got the date wrong and he showed up a week before the event. He arrived looking apparently dazzling in his suit, and the people of the desk said, well, mister bros. And it's so nice to see you, but you're a week early. Well you'd think that that, and he was coming from a great distance.

He lives in a beautiful part of la and so you'd think that would put him off on showing up on the date. It didn't. He shows up on the date and he was such a delight and had so many lovely stories about Daddy and me. And I mentioned this because you know, Pierce didn't have the best relations with his own father, and those episodes of working with Daddy, he loved my dad. He loved my dad.

Daddy enjoyed him immensely, but Pierce really thought of Daddy as a real father figure. So it meant it was a lovely closing the door on that lovely connection that he had with Daddy. And I was very touched that he made the effort twice, not once, but twice. That's so awesome. How did it come about, though, that your dad came onto the show in the first place.

Well, Daddy was a big star. I don't know if you knew, but he was a very star. Yes, Daddy was the highest paid actor on television at one point. He did FBI was nine years and seventy seven was actually eight and in those days, you got in seventy seven you got fifty cents. You know, I'm not saying it all, but he was a very big deal.

He did about at least forty big feature films, mostly for Warner Brothers because you were under your contract then. Not all of them, but a lot of them were warners. And so Michael always had it in mind to find it to have. You know, I mean, I was Jimmy Stewart's last leading lady. We did a movie called The Magic of Lastly, and Jimmy loved me, and I loved him.

I'm not going to brag on myself on what he said about me. I'm not going to do that. I won't be tacky like that. But I did tell Michael how much Jimmy loved me. So Michael wrote a part for Jimmy, and Jimmy was all set to do it.

He said, absolutely, I'm gonna come and guest star on Reminden Steele and he had some kind of conflict at the very last minute, and Andy Duggan took the role and the irony was is that that episode and you'll you guys all remember it. We shot it out on Route one twenty six. We shot it at this little uh uh pilot what do you call it? This bit not a base, but where they have plane airport. It was a funny airplane.

It's a funny airport. And we were actually shooting it on the day of the Challenger disaster. Oh oh my god. Wow. And that was the show that Jimmy was gonna do.

Is that the one where there's a plane crash that you see probably lower seats, yeah, okay, probably yeah, the radio. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, so Michael always had it in mind to bring you know, you saw the show, I mean everybody, like everybody, I mean just Lloyd Nolan and all these fabulous actresses and oh it was just great. We were so lucky. So he brought Daniel Chalmers on, and of course Daniel Chalmers ends up being Remy Concial's father at the end.

Spoiler alert, that's all right, it is spoilert from forty years ago. Yeah. The funniest thing though, our favorite favorite time. So my mother on the show was Beverly Garland, Beverly Garland, who is delightful, Well, Pierre, Daddy and I had this ridiculous scene which was a dance scene. It was a waltzing scene, and we had this little martinette guy that was trying to get us to do the words on the turn on the shot, the same thing, just like the gal moment when I did Tea at five.

You know, you turn on this word and then you go over here, and then this camera picks you up and then you turn here. So Daddy and I, you know, Daddy was actually invited by his teacher at the Neighborhood Playhouse to join her company. He was that good a dancer. And that teacher was Martha Graham. Oh oh wow.

He didn't do it because his mother said, I didn't raise I don't want you know, she didn't want that. She didn't want her son to be She wanted her son to be a doctor or a lawyer or something, or an engineer. She wanted him to be an engineer anyway. But Daddy, you know, he could move. He was a very good dancer.

But I'm a really good dancer, but not when somebody is telling me you do this, do that, do this, do that, So Daddy, we start the You know, we've got the in our ears. We've got the earbuds, just like our resident in the White House. We've got these things in our ears telling us what to do. We've got the music in our ears. So when we would listen to the music, it would make Gus type like this because it was that.

And they said, stop, stops, stop, stop your sounding like a waltz. Forget. We said, well, it's hard to listen to the rhythm of the waltz and try to say the lines we'd started. When did you first meet mister Steele? Well, well, it got to the point that we couldn't keep a straight face, and because the little martinette it was telling us what to do, got madder and madder, and that made Deddy I laugh more.

Finally, we couldn't look at each other while we're trying to dance, and we're just biting our lip. This stupid thing took forever, but that was one of our favorite memories, was trying to do that waltzee. Oh my god, all right, now I gotta go back and watch and see if I can catch you guys. No, it was a fun show. It was such a silly show.

You know, it was fun. It was great fun, and it taught me a lot. I mean, I had a there was one episode where I had to be drunk. I was terrified of that. I just was terrified of that.

And I think it was my dad that said the easiest way to play a drunk it's it'll work every time. You have to try to be sober. I said, really, he said, piece of cake, that's all you have to do, just try to be sober. I said, okay, and he was right. And I was really good in that episode.

But you got to do fun things like that. You know, I was gon. I was gonna say. I also appreciated that, Like you got like kind of dirty and beat up a lot, your hair got blown out, you like like it was it felt so game. Lawer Holt was so game.

Yeah, and I and you got to get angry like yeah, and that again, something you didn't see a lot of is is a woman advocating for themselves and getting angry when people weren't doing what they were supposed to do. That didn't happen on network television. People got angry in soaproper way, but getting angry because you're not doing what you your job, or you're not doing what you need to do in our relationship. That was so unusual. It was powerful.

Yeah. We also, you know, I don't think Pierce and I ever pad it well. At one point we sort of patted ourselves on the back. It was, you know, we're in the fourth season or something, and there was really you know, if it was just the two of us, there was absolutely no need really to direct us. We knew where to go, we knew where where where the where the money shots were.

We knew, we knew where we needed to land. We knew the rhythm, we knew how to do everything. And the directors were always delighted because we didn't. It was a well oiled machine we gave them and we always had fun to have somebody new join us, you know, a guest person. I remember there was an actor named Paul Riser.

You remember Paul Riser, Yes, yes, right, Well, for some reason, I mean I thought he was a stitch. Pierce could not keep a straight face with him. He could not, he couldn't. The second Paul started to rehearse, Pierce was on the floor. He could not stop laughing.

He just simply was ridiculous. He could not stop and we really had to sort of wait for Peerce to go. He just could not stop laughing. We had a lot of fun with people like that that were just really pistols, you know, Louis Anders. God, see, I had a lot to I wrote to Pierce when Louis died, and because I had to do all those scenes where Louis was on the horse, and I don't think Peerce was there when Louis was on the horse.

Oh my god. It was just Louis was great to me. I went to his comedy act after that. He invited me many times. He was a doll.

He was very very sweet. Yeah, yeah, that was That was again a standout episode because it was it was so silly, but it also was so charming that the the cast was always so charming. Yeah, thank you, Molly, Thank you Molly for those wonderful people. Yeah. Absolutely so.

I'm curious because you've been working for a while, and how how do you see things have changed or not for women in television, both on stage, both in you know, sort of in front of the camera and behind the scenes. Well, I could only go with what I have to go by now. The last time I was. First of all, I'll just I'll give Dan Roebuck a big, a big pat here. You know, if I don't think somebody can do something, I'm I say, they can't do it, they're not very good at it.

Dan Roebuck is a hugely gifted director. He's not only a hugely gifted director, but he's a really good writer. He's really really good. And he's also good in this light material. I don't know if you know, Susan.

He's got this company and his wife Tammy have this company called it a Channel of Peace, and it's basically it's faith based family movies. That sounds really boring, they're not. They're not at all boring because Danny has this great sense of humor. He's got a wonderful he's. Just delightful to work with, effortless, so effortless to work with.

So when I worked with him, I did. I did the one he didn't direct, the one that I did and with Sally Kellerman that was pretty great. That was I had a lovely scene with dear Sally. And that was twenty fourteen. That was the one that was called his Neighbor Phil And now it's called a timeless love.

But working with Danny, I mean, he's just he's a champ. And so the only experience that I have in front of the camera for quite a while is Danny and A I thought, God, he really knows what he's doing. And B and by the way, the crew said, you really know how to do this. I said, well, this is what I used to do, so I know this stuff a lot. And our DP would say, but you're really good at this.

I said, well, thanks, I mean this is this is my territory. It is what I know, and there's a lot that it takes to learn, and you either know it or you don't. Robin says to me, you know you should be directing. I don't want to direct, and I want to direct. I have no interest in going.

Uh, you know, when the guy gets up and gets his oscar for Shine, let's say, oh, it only took nine years preparation. That's fine. Yeah, it's one of my favorite films. By the way, I don't know if you've seen it Shine, Do you remember that film? I do?

Knowing amazing beautiful? Yeah, he said, I think it was nine years. Make it just what I want to do. And as far as the theater. Yeah, my theater stuff is out in the boonies a bit.

But new plays, I've done new plays, which is always exciting. Talk about taking nine years. Yeah, no, yeah, yeah, that's right. I don't know. I mean, who knows.

The only the only unfortunate part is that you can't act in a closet, so you can't even do a reading in a closet. So this actually what we're doing here. As you can imagine because I'm talking so much, it's a bit of a performance, right, Yes, So this is sort of what I do too, which is my thoughts about where to live. Do I want to live in the slow lane always? Do I want to really live on a hilltop?

You know? Dealing with farmers? Who am I going to talk to? Not that I don't love farmers, I love them, They're great. But I was sort of made to sort of babble, I guess and talk and get up and.

Do things, so perform. We'll see where it all ends up. Yeah. Well, and so let's I'm going to swing right back to Remington. Let's talk about the end of the show and then the re end of the show.

The show gets canceled at the end of season four. Did you know that was coming? And then it gets brought back? Yeah, let me think. No, I'm trying to think because it got canceled.

I was I was working at Williamstown and so I got robot Cop, I got RoboCop. Show is canceled. I get cast as the lead in RoboCop. And then while I'm there doing Barbarians by Gorky or Summer in Smoke with Chris Reed and Annie Renky, I find out I have to go back to Remington because we're picked up again because the all the all the audience complained and they said, we don't want this show to be canceled. And I think it was only the second show in the history of shows that they ever brought it back because the audience said, we insist on it coming back.

I was fine about it. I had to give up. Not only did I have to give up an a picture, but at my wardrobe. If you ask Erica Phillips, my wardrobe is a was sitting at Sony for a long time. It was already made, and Pierce never had bond.

When he made a big stink and said take this job and shove it. He didn't have the job. I did have a job, and I gave it up. I said, I got to give it up. We got to go back, because the only reason they want me for things is because I did this show.

And so I was forever grateful for Remington, because after Remington came a slew of very interesting parts, you know, very interesting things that I never would have gotten to do if I didn't have the platform. Isn't that a lovely word, but the platform of Remington, so nobody would have cared, if you know, I remember Tommy saying, you know, I've taken this show out three or four times on the road. We've never had numbers like this. It must have to do with you. What he said.

He didn't have to say that, but he did say it. He said, it's the magic of being on television. I said, yeah, yah, it is. We were talking about that network television meant something very different, like, there's so many platforms, there's so many streaming channels. There's a lot of content.

It's really all interesting content. It's very exciting to have this much opportunity to create interesting stories. But at the same time, you can't keep up with them. The butt, here's the butt, here's the butt. Related to what you were just going to say, how many avenues were there?

Then there were network television. There were a couple of PBS channels. People weren't making series on PBS channels, so there was ABC, NBC, and CBS, and so if you had a market share on one of your shows, do you know the numbers we had. I mean, it was ridiculous, the numbers we had. I would walk down the street after a movie of the week, if I were in New York, I'd get stopped about by ten people on the block.

Oh, I saw your show last night. Oh it was great. Oh. And it would happen everywhere I went. People would stop me because people watched television.

They don't watch it anymore. Well, they watched you too, I have to say, as a personal fan, Yeah, you really were outstanding and that's why people were drawn to you. And it was such an unusual role for the time, and thank you. And I didn't know it at the time. I didn't know it.

I mean I remember I was at my friend Judy and she said, you got to go sign some autographs because I wanted to make some money for Michael. He was in bad straits and I was doing tea at five and we thought it would bring in audience for TA at five and Burbank. So I went to one of these things where you sign it. You sit down there and you write and you sign autographs, and they're at the autograph signing besides Celeste Home, which was kind of a thrill. I have to say nice.

There was Ryan O'Neill, and I go up to Ryan's table and I say hello. Mister O'Neill said, I don't think you know me, but my name is Stephanie. And he said I had such a crush on you. I said, you did. I can't tell you how many people I've met that have said that.

I didn't know it at the time. I didn't have time to breathe. I worked eighty hours a week. I would get home, I'd be the first in my chair with Dorothy Fox, who I still visit, who's my hairdresser from Remington. I still visit her once a week in the assisted living.

I go and see her once a week. She's a ninety two, coming up ninety two. And I'd get in her chair at five thirty in the morning and we wouldn't get out of the last shot until eleven thirty at night, and then I'd have to get up and be in the chair at five thirty in the morning. And I didn't get a day off until my fourth season of Remington. Wow, fourth season of Remington, I got my first day off.

So I didn't have time to notice my impact on the world. I didn't have time. I did. I didn't know. I had no idea.

I remember Pierce said, what did he say? He said, we were shooting in like Santa Monica or something. He said, he said, why didn't you Why didn't you have a fancy Why did you get one of these cars? Why did you have a you know, a Corvette or a Jaguar. Why were you driving around that city?

I said, because I don't care about cars. It's not my thing. I just don't care about cars. But I don't care about fancy houses. I don't care about any of that stuff.

And I also never ever believed that the income, which wasn't astonishing a way by today's standards. It was not. I mean, it really wasn't, but I never believed that it would last. So I wasn't going to spend it. I said, you don't spend this money just because you're getting it today.

You don't do that because when I was at Juilliard, they didn't teach us anything nothing like that. We're going nothing. We didn't know anything about that, and it's very important that we know that. But I do want to swing back, Susan and talk to you about about Remington and say, uh, try not to get emotional because it's stupid. But I would have had a good journeyman career without it, uh, because I was starting that down that road.

Uh. I was. I was, you know, moving very nicely along into interesting parts uh and features. I did. In fact that my two big features were before Remington.

The Awakening with Charlton Heston and The Magic of Lastie with Jimmy Stewart were before Remington. I would have had an interesting career. But but uh, Remington made me a household word, household name, and it was a good body of work. It was nothing that I was ever ashamed of. It was always Uh.

I did the best I could do, and it was enough. So I was. I was very grateful to have it. I'm very grateful for my solvency, incredibly grateful for how long that remains to have some kind of solvency. And I'm grateful for the opportunity it gave me to take the time to be better, because that's what I did with it.

I went to the theater and I took the time to get better. That is amazing, and thank you for sharing that with us. You've changed I mean, you've changed people's lives. You inspired so many women to recognize that they could be themselves and sort of pick their own journey. Yeah, and.

That show resonates, and it resonates for a reason. So we have a little segment on the show called Nineties TV Babies. That's a younger generation that looks at these shows, and it's pretty amazing when they look at these shows how much they get from them. Because I think they're going to look at them and start laughing, but they really appreciate them and appreciate I think it gives them an insight into what the eighties was. But also they sort of appreciate what these shows were trying to do, and they really get them a little bit more than I thought they wouldn't.

Sharon and I have both been surprised when they're like, oh my god, it's just like this and this here and then the hair. Well, also the fact that they can binge. You know, that adds a lot to it because then they get a real flap. I've never binged anything, but they get a real sense of what the show, what the statement of the show was, by binging it. Yeah.

Yeah. Streaming has revived some of these older shows that were really resonant at the time and now carry a new resonance that I think is reminding people. So it's so interesting because it feels like the way that Remington Steel is giving nods to older movies in the show, Yeah, which I love. Was another thing part of the show that I loved. I would I would literally try to kind of write those down and then go find those movies, which were hard to find.

But as a person that was starting to love movies and television, it was like, oh, I better go check out, you know, Casablanca, and I see a lot of references. I see a lot of references to the Remington Steels of the day and stuff in modern television in particular. I think I think there are and that's why you keep hearing like, oh, Remington's gonna be revised, Oh there's gonna be a you know, but I it's one of the reasons we keep looking back at our old shows and movies and stuff, and I think there is value in rebooting stuff. I think there is I like new stuff, I've developed new stuff, but I think there is something in reimagining sort of these stories that have resonance as well, because I like, I like all culture.

Right, Okay, we're gonna have to take a break here. I think that's a great idea. Stay tuned for more of our interview. We'll be right back. All right, and we're back.

Welcome back to part two of our interview. This is eighties TV ladies. You know, it's funny. I h when we did I guess what was it. I don't know what it's called where you go in a studio and you comment and they put that in the DVD DVD commentary.

Oh yeah, that's about the only time that I've seen Remington since we did it. And the main reason is simply, first of all, I remember exactly how I shot every scene. I don't need It's sort of like a golfer. You you asked Jack Nicholas about, you know, nineteen eighty four in the fifteenth hole at Pebble, and he'll know exactly the shots that he hit. It's that's just the way it is, and same.

Djokovic knows every single you know, it's just an actors are the same. Oh, I remember we put the camera there and and I haven't watched it for one simple reason, and it's simply vanity. I don't really want to go back and look at what I looked like when I was twenty five to thirty. It'll just depress me. As I'll get out and I look pretty good now.

I swim about six six miles a week, you know, I don't look like a child. I haven't had a lot of you know, scaffolding done on my face. Oh, I haven't done that. But I still am a qualified member of the human race. Yes, but it'll just depress me to go look and see what I So who cares what I looked like when I was twenty five to thirty?

You know? Fine, that's good. I hope you do get a chance to relook at because you and mister Brasin are so completely adorable together. Yes, and the commentary you did with Michael Gleeson for the episode you wrote was fantastic. Good.

It's so fantastic, Oh good. The specials on the like the behind the scenes on the DVDs has been really, really fun to dive into, so I really appreciate that. And I was just saying, that's one of the challenges of streaming is you don't have those special features, like I appreciate that. Again, as a person that is interested in how things get made and is interested in movies and television and theater, I really appreciate those. I missed the Criterion collection.

Yeah, so it's why I recommend you get the DVDs of Remington Steel instead of trying to stream it. Also, in streaming, they tend to cut off your head. I'll tell you what I have. I still have the Beta maxes, oh wow, that I originally recorded my show on. And I'll tell you why because I was prescient enough to record one commercial in between each of the breaks.

Not because I felt it needed it, but it did because the shows were written to have commercials, so it's helpful to have the break. But I put the commercial in because I always wanted to know what the flavor of the world was when we were doing so I would pick one commercial and put it in the brake. And I still have all of those Beta maxes that are rotting. I haven't had been transferred yet, but I have all of them. How many are there?

No? Ninety nine, ninety five something like that. You may have been very prescient, and it's still up in the air. What is the best archive? Phle and Beta max is a pretty good archival medium, Believe it or not.

They may not be rotting good let's hope. So let's hope not. And I haven't revisited them for a while, I'll admit, but the times that I have put in a. VHS tape of. Something that I had recorded and the commercials are like this time capsule.

Yeah they are. I mean it's really it's really kind of fun and astonishing and scary all at the same time to see what was in commercials at that time and how things were sold at that time as opposed to now. It's right, it's fascinating. So there's three other things why Remington is terribly important right now. One, it captures what Los Angeles looked like.

Oh my god, so beautiful. We guarded everywhere, We went everywhere, and you'll see mountains that you don't see anymore. You'll see houses you don't see those anymore. You'll see a whole lot, you'll see a whole lot. In fact, a lot of people that would watch Remington are probably looking at the background going, oh my god, look at that.

That's one reason another we were It was so smart of Gleason not to want us in contemporary clothes. We were picked to be in classic attire. Whether it was Ron Tolsky our designer, whoever it was. Paula Jacaris was our first lady, I think, and then Ron took over and he was great. It was a sad death there, It was very sad.

He was a fabulous man. He put what's her name in the T shirt? In Jean vill Boujeo was that who was in the What's the Big movie? And she was wearing a wet T shirt. Oh the Deep, the Deep.

You put Jackie Bassett in a T shirt, brilliant. You didn't put me in a T shirt in the Deep. We were dressed so classically so that it would never look dated. So we were dated right away. So that was very important.

And the third element that is terribly important, especially where our world is today. We don't have a funny bone anymore, we don't have a sense of lightness, We can't laugh at ourselves, at each other. We need that we need that button where we can laugh at ourselves. We need that button where we can laugh at each other. And that's what Remington did.

It raised us those three inches off the ground so that we could laugh. I that's where we got the comments like the blood isn't real on Remington's Steel. That was true. That's what we used to say. And you know, you didn't quake it a gun that was pointed at you the way that you do in a real drama.

You didn't. That's not how the gun was treated. It was just a different story because we weren't quite real. Well, all of those elements make it a show that is well worth revisiting today. Yeah, that the action comedy has kind of left television.

There's movies that do it. But and and I think you're right. I think too, it's it's lovely to have that. Yeah, it's lovely to be able to be like, oh, it's fun to be a spy and a mom like for Scarecrows is King and and and Remington Steel and Moonlighting. They had a lot of wink in them and and it was it was lovely to experience that lightness we.

Had, I mean with with with the way we are with divisiveness. You know, I would never be cast today as Remington. I wouldn't be. But I was thinking that. Somebody said in that we're talking some theater friends.

It was Lucy Arnez and another friend of mine that I did a tour with, and uh, I said, but you have to understand in the theater, especially the theater, we're a tribe, and also in the film and television business we're a tribe as well. And the tribe. What the tribe applauds is excellence the tribe. Whether the tribe is an actor, a director, a producer, a playwright, we applaud excellence. And it doesn't matter whether that person is gay, is straight, is you know what side of the fence man.

If they can deliver in any form, it doesn't We just we just leap to our feet and support. It's just the nature of what we do. And it's it's funny because that is the way the internal feeling of the business, whether it's the movie business or the theater business. That is definitely true. I examined through the eyes of excellence.

If it's excellent, it deserves to win period. Anyway. That's that's my that's my my boat. The excellence of theater. One of my favorite things is in the Santa Barbara.

We're walking by the theater. It's for the Santa Barbara Symphony, and it was closed and boarded up, but there's this poster that said the Pursuit of Excellence continues, and we're like really, like that's your poster, Like you haven't gotten there, but you're gonna keep going like really? Yeah, Well, I you know, if I like a movie, I will. I've there's so many movies that I've seen about seven times. I won't go see a whole swa off of movies just for fun.

If I find one that's just absolutely dead on superb well, guess what, it's better every time I see it. It's better. I saw Shiner many times I saw. You know, I'll probably see Denzel again in Macbeth. He was just knockout great in that film.

When Molina was doing The Father, not the movie that Tony Hopkins did. Sorry, I don't have many things to say about that, but I do have. When Molina did the play, I had to go back to the pasading in a playhouse. I had to go see it again. Yeah, I think I saw it three times.

I said, you're just good. I love watching him Red Red was that for me? For him, I just watched him the whole time. It was really yeah, really resonant. That's right.

Yeah, I love rewatching things. Just as an aside, I happened to come upon a movie on HBO sometime in the last couple of days called Return to Me. There's certin and directed by Bonnie Hunt and I love this movie wow. And it's it's a better woman who has a heart, has a heart transplant and then meets a guy, falls in love and realizes that she. Has the heart of his deceased wife.

Oh my gosh. Wow. Okay, that sounds like a TV movie for sure. But it also has She was raised by her two grandfathers, who were played by Carol O'Connor. Oh come on, and why can't I think of his name?

Italian actor, and they run a restaurant called O'Malley's Italian Cuisine. I'm not kidding. It's so good. It's so good anyway, that's my recommendation for the day. So I wrote that down.

Robert Loja, Yes, Robert Loja, than Oja, I remember, rob My gosh, I. Love how this cash is pretty amazing. David Duchovny, Julie Richardson Minnie Driver. Wow, that's okay, I gotta go check it out. I love it anyway, you guys were kind of you launching in nineteen eighty two.

Nineteen eighty three is Scarecrow, Missus King, and then what eighty five is Moonlighting? Did you were you aware of those shows? Did you know that? Oh? Yeah?

And the one that the one that was the predecessor. She you know, I won't say she's a legend in her own mind. I won't say that because I really like her a lot and she was my mother's best friend. But Stephanie Powers, Yes, Hard to Heart, Hard. To Heart, Heart to Heart was definitely there in the specter before we were It was definitely, you know, something that we followed, and we were fully aware.

I don't know why we didn't have Steph on the show. I don't know. I don't think she would have done it. And I knew him for oh for so many He's just such a gracious, lovely man. But that show was before that was one that was before.

Yeah, And they talked him the special features about how they pointedly did not let the chauffeur, your chauffeur speak because of heart to heart or the chaffeur was the third Yeah, Fred, Fred. That's right, that's right. I did most of the driving too, as I remember. I love that you did do a lot of the And I love the pilot where you literally like reach over. It's like the golf cart and you like reach he's in front and you're in back, and you reach over him to drive the golf cart.

And I was like, there it is. That's the metaphor for the show. It's like she's driving, get out. I don't care whether you're in the seat. I'm the only woman I know now that drives a stick shift.

I have a stick shift. I love a stick shift. I taught my husband to drive a stick shift. Well, you know, the good thing about it is you never get your car, will never get stolen because they can't drive it. I have to confess I've never driven a stick shift.

I've I've always had not mad. But I you know, I fancy myself a race car driver. So I'll tell you how. I learned to drive a stick shift. Well, of course, I learned from my dad, but daddy had he had a nineteen fifty nine Bentley named Daphne.

But that but that wasn't Daphne was not she was no, she was automatic. I learned on his packard and the packard was a nineteen forty four packard. Wow, Nope, a nineteen thirty four packard because he bought it in nineteen forty four. And that's where I learned how to drive a stick shift on a hill, trying to start that car on a hill, and you have to. And my brother would teach me too.

He'd have a stick shift and he'd'd be on the top of like Los Sienaga where it meets Santa Monica, and there's all this traffic behind you, and you hear all these horns and you're sliding backwards into the people and you're just screaming your head off. So you learn how to use a clutch. You have to. That's where I learned it. That's how I learned it.

That's going into the deep end. Yeah, yeah, tossed into the deep end of stick shift driving. The other stick shift story right behind me where I live. My first mother on television was Shirley Jones. She was my first mother, and I was an idiot.

Then I didn't know anything. I mean, I knew nothing on this first movie of the Week that I did, which, by the way, he told me many years later, because who cares. When you're coming out of school, drama school, you get this part, you know, and you're not paying attention to who wrote it. You know it's a television project. Well, guess who wrote it.

Michael Gleeson wrote it. It was called Yesterday's Child, and Geraldine Fitzgerald and Shirley Jones and Claude Akins and the guy was always wonderful. Actors were on that show. It's called Yesterday's Child. And of course they asked me at the audition.

I think, can you drive a six shift? Oh? Yeah, sure I can drive. I could no more drive a stick shift than the man in the I nearly ended up going over a cliff because I couldn't drive a stack shift. But she was a great mom.

She was just great to me. She was lovely. I worked with her son Patrick, and I worked with Piper Laurie on that we did We did a little night music. The second time I did it, I did Desiree. Isn't it rich?

Are we a pair? It's a wonderful role. It was great role. And I did that with Piper and Patrick. That was great fun.

Okay, nough, theater stop. Well again, clearly we have to start the theater podcast, all right, so we do have to do our three questions as a time. Okay, I think it's time. Okay, okay, what is and again you were busy on a TV show? But what is the eighties.

Ladies driven television show that resonated with you other than Remington Steele. You don't get to say Remington Steel. Robin tried that with a letter. Let me see. Let's see.

Well you said one heart to heart. Heart to heart. So you know my show is that I watched my big shows. I watched Dark Shadows when I was growing up, and I watched Gilligan's Island all the time. Those are the shows that I watched that I wouldn't miss.

That is so funny. And you guys shot yeah on the Gilligan's Island set. Oh that's right, yes, for one of the episodes. And I know I have stories Walter Mathouse told me that I can't even repeat here about I'm not even gonna repeat them. Come on, you should.

No, no no, no, no no no. But as far as women's show. Geez uh, I mean I was not a great I mean Michelle Lee is a darling friend and she's just great. But I never watched those shows about the where they they obviously were five hours in here and make up. Those shows like Dynasty and all those shows.

Yes, those those ones never interested me because I didn't believe them. I just didn't believe putting that much effort into hair and makeup and costumes, it just and then trying to be a normal person. It's like I never I never bought that. That didn't really. So I mean, I'll tell you what I can do for you, Susan.

Yeah, if you rattle off about ten or twelve. Okay, you got I will do that one. All right. Cagney and Lacy keep going Moonlighting, Golden Girls. Uh, a Different World two two seven?

Uh Kate Kate Kate nowly is late eighties, so is Murphy Brown. So is uh what else we got? I know what I loved. I loved the Mary Tyler Moore show. Oh yes, of course will allow it.

It is technically seventies, but we will allow it because we always allow the Mary Tyler Mark. Loved it. I you know, I worked with everyone. I didn't work with Mary. Mary lived just a couple of miles from me here, but uh Chloris, I worked with Betty.

I worked with Betty was great, Betty, you know, oh see now yet I knew another story, I forget it. But Betty was great, she was wonderful. I did like and Lacy I did. I just I didn't watch it regularly, but I liked it and I liked I liked tyme very much. We have the same agent, I think.

Uh oh. I loved not Designing Women. But The Golden Girls was very sweet. That was very sweet show, very dear show. I like that show.

Those are the. Ones that I'd say, Yeah, so anything with Betty White, we see a pattern. Yeah, Betty was great. Betty was delightful to watch. You know.

Cagny Uh time was great. Yeah. I used to like I used to like Moonlighting. I thought it was very good. It was uneven.

It seemed like the stories were kind of lopsy doodle. They were sometimes in the desire to be funny. They I mean, even more than Remington's team. They kind of went wait, I lost the thread there, Wait what what what is that? You know it's been a while since I've seen an episode of Moonlighting, but I my recollection is that a lot of times the story, the mystery, whatever you want to call it, suffered at the uh because they were trying to be funny or trying to be more comedic.

So, and I like mystery, so I prefer that my mysteries be well told. So, but that's just me. So I was doing a show called vip VIPs or something with Pamela Pamelas. Who Pamela, Oh, yeah, Anderson Oh right, on the show. Steve a big, big TV producer.

He was acting in it. He was a big, huge Steve, Steve Bodo, No, not Boko, another guy, Yeah, big big guy is a vipped Anyway, what was I playing? I was playing? Oh, that's right, I was playing on has been TV actress. How how do you like that?

It was great fun. Bobby Canary I think was my character's name. I patterned it after a lady who played my own She played my mother in an Elvis movie. I think I did a long time wrote this. Gal was just amazing actress, and so I patterned it after her.

Anyway, I'm doing these scenes and I found Pamela was absolutely fabulous. I have to say, what are you doing? She said, it's called texting. What is that? Well, you just take your thumbs and you push the buttons here, but what's what's happening there?

So she was explaining what texting was, and she was divine. She was so fun. So I we'd choot a master and then I'd wait and come and I come back for another angle on the same scene, and she'd be in a different outfit. And this happened a couple of times, and I went to the first and I said, I'm a little confused. I we're shooting the same scene.

I come back in the same wardrobe and she comes back and she's where a completely different costume. What's going on here? And he said, you have to call this NLR. What's inn LR? No logic required?

And that was the joke of the show. She never wore the same thing in any shot. It would just be completely different. I can't imagine. Oh, okay, hilarious.

You'd be in the back seat in the same thing she'd be driving. You'd be in the back seat and they'd show show her again, she's in a different app that. It's like the share of TV shows. It was funny and she was smart. She was really smart.

I liked her a lot. That is funny. That is funny, all right, And do you have any current TV shows or female different TV shows that you're watching. No, I'm not much of a TV. I watched movies, documentary, streaming.

I watch a lot of docks, lots of docks. I watch if something gets thrown my way. That's a Saturday Night Live skit that is just brilliant. I'll watch that and watch it again and again if it's good. But I'm not much of a TV.

There's a lot of there's two there's two reasons, Susan. One is several months, several years ago, I said, you know, I've seen I can't tell you how many operas because I had it. I used to go to La Opera all the time, and I had an opera in my background, and blah blah blah. And I've done a lot of the classical plays, and I've seen the great productions. I've seen amazing things, and i've seen things to ulle and i've seen revivals and I've seen this, and I've seen that.

So I don't have a bent to be entertained anymore. I don't need to be entertained. And I also think that the theater in our world is so unbelievably demand our attention that there's very little room to watch theater that isn't really happening. It takes a great deal of effort to keep up on what, excuse me, what the is happening in our world. You have to pay attention, you have to stay alert, and if you're watching, if you're if you're out for entertainment, you're going to be behind.

You're just going to be behind and not know what's going on. And you have to have to know what's going on to know to make the right decision on what you're going to do. So there we are. It's a different world. It's a very different world, and it's a sad world, and it's a serious world.

And that's where we are. So I've said a long time, you know, I don't know who I am. I don't I don't know what I'm supposed to do on this earth. But the last thing I'll close with is that people ask me, what what is your driving force? And I think my driving force has kept me going is curiosity, Because curiosity leads to love.

What you are curious about will lead you down the path to what, as Joseph Campbell says, of what is your bliss and what is your bliss will lead you to what you love? And that's the only path that we have. That's fantastic. That's pretty great. I love that that.

That's a that's a good wrap up. I feel like I can't ask my third question, which is what is the most television right, Like, what is your most like, Oh my god, I'm in a television show, which, again it's weird to ask because you're actually in a television show and you have been in many of them, but like your most real life like, is this scripted moment? Has this been scripted? Now? Are you saying because of the quality of the people I'm working with?

Or are you saying because it was so bizarre? No, I'm saying because you're in a real life situation and you feel like this could be I am a television show, this is a scripted moment because it's so weird, so bizarre, so action oriented, funny, so funny. What is definitely action oriented. I've got to say, I've never had anything like this happen. So my hobby for many, many decades because I had the extra funds to be able to do it.

My hobby was to either get in a car or get on a plane and go to New York and see nine or ten or eleven or twelve thirteen shows. I did it all the time, and I saw I mean, I had to finally throw them. I had so many stacks of playbills it was ridiculous. I mean, I saw everything, absolutely everything. So I'm in Connecticut and a friend of mine's staying with me and another friend of ours says, you got to see this play.

You got to see this plane. It's just opening it play rights. And again I don't want to. I should shut up. I don't want to give them bad thing.

Anyway, I was going to see a play in New York that was apparently hot. It was a hot play, and it was a timely play, and it was a political play because it dealt with the left and the right on pins and needles. It talked about the left and it talked about the right, and it talked about the left and talked about the right. So we thought, let's go see this. We go to see this play and the traffic is horrible.

It's just terrible. Don't know why. The traffic just stunk. And stupidly, I had noodles right before I went in, and if I have noodles or carbs, it's not good for me. I have managed to get two seats in the back row because I know me.

I know me, and I often will doze, so I decided, okay, I'll just get two seats in the back. My friend, who's very savvy, is sitting next to me on the right. We were sitting in the back row. And the new thing about New York Theater, at least then this was back in two and nineteen. They don't light it.

It's under lit. The play starts, and also in fashion of people that maybe don't know how to direct a play, they'll have they'll have stage left, somebody over there that's sort of lit by a little light. They finished talking. Oops, there's stage right. There's another person over there talking.

You go over there and you look stage right. Oops, person over there, and stage left. It's talking again over there, stage right. Oop. And by the time about eight of these, you're getting exhausted because you're bouncing and what you're bouncing through is absolute black.

There's nothing lit on the stage except this little this little porch over here, and this little picnic table over there, and after a while I go to sleep. Well, I have many techniques when I go to sleep. I'm usually I prop my elbows up and I put my my my, my fists under my chin so it won't bother anybody. Well, I am awakened, not by a person behind me who takes my shoulder and sayst. Way, wake up.

Oh no, no, no, I'm awakened by being slapped on the side of the head as hard as this person could have done, whacked me with their hand so that I landed into the shoulder of my friend who I was with, and I was so shocked. I just sat there, stunned. I couldn't I just didn't know what to do. I couldn't even turn around because I knew it would start World War two or three or whatever. So I just sat there with my hands, you know, buried under my chin.

And when the play finished, I still couldn't turn around because the audience had been totally captivated by this piece, and I was not going to wreck their moment, as this person clearly wrecked my moment. I did not turn around and look and see who it was. I am convinced to this day because it was just opening that it was either the writer or the director. Oh, and they were so annoyed because clearly my head was bobbing or something was happening. But that was the worst thing.

And I thought, I mean, can you imagine. I thought, I'm on, I'm in a film. This is this is totally bizarre. That is insane. And I have never been to the theater since.

Oh that makes me sad. That was it. That was it. I wrote to the theater. I told him the story.

They never wrote back. They never apologized, they never offered me a couple of seats, they never said thanks for telling us. All they did was right back about three more times, asking for money because I gave it my credit card. And I wrote them again and they didn't say anything. And so I'm done.

I'm finished. But that's it's a sad. It's a sad tale to tell. That was That was a. Sad And did your friend go like what, like that's so shy?

Yeah, I know, I know she knew it was happening. At any rate. It's my loss, and it's probably the noodles more than anything else. It's those it's those noodles. That did it?

You know, But there you go, that's what happened. But that's it. That's not well. I hope that that someday you get to go back and watch a play and not feel like you're going to be assaulted. Yeah, well, it's too bad, because it really it was one of my favorite, favorite favorite hobbies.

I loved it. I call it a hobby because it's you know, there was an actor that I knew that, Matthew Coles. Matthew was married to Christine Baranski, and Matthew didn't like to go to the theater. And I said, but Matthew, that's where you learn. Oh no, I don't.

I just don't like to watch actors. It makes me very nervous. I don't like it. He said, Really, I love to watch actors. And sometimes the worst the material, the more you learn time you gotta watch it.

Well, maybe you feel comfortable going back if you knew that the writer and or director of that piece was not the same writer director that was at the one that you went to and got wapped upside the head. So but you just got to surround yourself with all the people you know, you go into big group. I mean, I've had you know, I've had the fire department coming the play is stopped, and I've had chandeliers fall down, and I've had I've forgotten half the play and I had to come back and do it for the audience in the tea at five once and I said, I left out a whole conversation. And I said to the audience, and they were doing the act afterwards, I said, would you like to see the part you missed? And they all said yes.

So I said, okay, you remember the part where I said that, And I was on the phone, Okay, We're going to be kicked out there. And they loved it. Thought it was the greatest thing. One. Well, there are so many wonderful theater moments.

It is one of the things I truly appreciate now, particularly after COVID, particularly in this time. I'm of incredible and there's incredible stuff streaming, and there's incredible stuff happening. I love so many shows and so many movies now, and yet I also find I more appreciate live theater because of that community, because of that sense of you can't fake this, you know, you can be really brilliant on stage with all your bells and whistles, but at the end of the day, you can't fake live theater, and that is really special to me. Now. It was just really fun to laugh with other people and to engage with other people and hear everybody sort of gasp in the same places.

And it's one of my favorite places to perform. That theater, Passing Playhouse, because. That theater is so unusual. When you're in an audience there, it seems huge. When you're on stage, it's the tiniest thing in the world.

Wow, it is so easy to get the audience in the palm of your hand. On that main stage at the Pasadena Playhouse, it's phenomenal effect. You're sitting there and you look around and you look at the mezzanine and you look at the thing, and you look at the ceiling and you're going whaw. But when you're on stage. It's like a little tiny playhouse, like a little jewel.

It's a jewel. Yeah, it's great. I'm living Pasadena, so a passing Playhouse in Boston Court and yeah, noise within are my favorite. Yeah, I love that director Jessica who worked the. Boston Love Jessica.

She's very talented I've always wanted to work with her. She's very good, she's very talented. It's a lovely place, Pasadena. It is all right, look at this, we're over. We're over.

Thank you for going over with us, and thank you for thank you so much. Yeah for joining us. This has been so special and really exciting. Oh yeah, thank you, ladies. Enjoy the rest of your Sunday.

Thank you, good bye bye. So in today's audiography. Stephanie Zimbalists fan page is Stephanie Zimbalists fan page on Facebook. Go check it out. And in honor of Laura Holt, I have a book for you today, Renegade Women in Film and TV by Elizabeth Weitzman with illustrations by Austin Claire Clements.

Really cool and we're always interested in finding out from you. What's the eighties ladies driven TV show that you remember or heard of and want us to cover. You can contact us through the website and through social media. The website is Eightiestvladies dot com and of course our social medias are at Eighties TV Ladies. And if you're liking this podcast, please rate and review us.

It helps out a lot. We hope you'll join us for our next episode where we will continue our dive into Remington Steel And let us know, because we're about to pick our next show. Should we do a comedy, a drama, another detective mystery, dynamic duo show, don't know what that could be, moonlighting? Tell us what show we should explore next. At eightiestv ladies dot com, we.

Hope Eighties TV Ladies brings you joy and laughter and lots of fabulous new and old shows to watch, all of which will lead us forward toward being amazing ladies of the twenty first century. Hand so pretty. Through the city, the World,