Will Bill Bring His Radio Days To Bookstores?

Dave: [0:17] This is the extra extra hot great podcast episode 350 our second installment of three of these for 2025. I am giant neon sombrero, David T. Cole, and I'm here with impending failure, Sarah D. Bunting. Sarah: [0:38] I'm still at the outline stage. Dave: [0:40] And title to come, Tara Ariano. Tara: [0:42] I am pleased as Christmas punch. Welcome to extra extra hot great this is of course a bonus bonus episode a bubba bonus that you helped unlock with your previous pledges this is the second of our 2025 three of these this year i am steering the miniseries and it is of course 90s sitcoms episodes about broadcasters writing books. Yes, that is hyper-specific. And yes, I still found three. This week, we are talking about Season 2, Episode 7 of News Radio. The episode is titled Bill's Autobiography. It originally aired November 21st, 1995. It was written by Joe Fury, who continued to work with his news radio creator almost to the present day. He was a consulting producer on What We Do in the Shadows, which Sims also created. Dave: [1:39] Plus, he assembled the Avengers. He's responsible for that team. Tara: [1:43] Yes, he does have an eye patch. He is. It's funny if you Google him because he is the most bland looking like a background actor in a writer's room on The Simpsons looking kind of a guy. He's like wrote on Letterman and it shows. Anyway, this is one of 13 episodes of Newsradio that he wrote, including the previous canon inductee, The Public Domain. He also wrote the series finale. It's directed by Michael Lembeck, now very prolific TV and movie director. I first knew him, of course, as Julie's adorable husband, Max, on the original One Day at a Time. But Sarah knows him as the guy who was first billed ahead of Dennis Quaid in Gorp. He's that guy. Sarah: [2:21] Oh, yes. Oh, Gorp. Tara: [2:24] So much like the Frasier episode we talked about a few months ago, this episode is about a lead character writing a book. That's truly all it is about. I will go through the plot and you can jump in where you have comments and then I have discussion questions at the end. So as a celebrity broadcaster, Bill, who is played by Phil Hartman, has been asked to write his memoirs and he needs Dave, Dave Foley, to sign a release permitting him to do it. Howard Stern's Private Parts gets name-checked in the episode almost immediately, even though it was a couple of years old at this point. It was the fastest-selling book of any genre in the history of Simon & Schuster five days after it was released. So it makes sense that Private Parts would still be considered a current reference that the audience would know. Dave: [3:05] Take that, Shakespeare. Sarah: [3:08] Well, and also, there was the movie that was not... The movie would have been out when? Around... Tara: [3:13] Two years after this. Sarah: [3:14] And I think we all knew that that was in process. Tara: [3:17] Oh, yeah. Maybe the year after this. Yeah, no, it was 96, I think. Lisa wanders in after Bill. Dave mentions a release that he's supposed to sign, not really thinking much about it, just before Bill ducks his head back in and asks Dave not to say anything about the book. But he was too late, and Lisa announces it to everyone at the conference table. And afterward, Bill complains to Lisa and Dave because in three months, all he's written is the words, the outline. And other broadcasters' memoirs are looming large for him, clip two. Did you know that when Dan Rather was 19, he was the youngest photographer. Tara: [4:03] Station. She hired me to try to get me to stop drinking. So everyone gets excited pitching bill titles and before long bill has just decided to fake it till he makes it in the most dickish possible way clip three he's strutting around out there like he's norman mailer he hasn't punched anyone out. Tara: [5:29] Obsession with that song? It wasn't me. It's just the tape that this thing came with. Horse with no name, of course, was a hit for the band America. And fun fact, Phil Hartman, before he got into comedy, was an album art designer, and he designed the album cover for America's Greatest Hits. That is a true fact. Sarah: [5:48] Wow. Tara: [5:50] So the news of the book filters up to Jimmy, played by Stephen Root. He has put his own publicist on it to make sure the book is a huge hit and has already had a standee of Bill Maid holding title to come. When Jimmy tries to help Bill by reminding him of the time they ran into Ross Perot and he told him he was getting back into the presidential race, it turns out Jimmy was actually with Dan Rather at the time. Still, that does spark something in Bill. Clip four. Chicago, 1968. Sarah: [6:28] Was, watching it on TV in my dorm and drinking. Tara: [6:33] Next day, Bill hasn't written anything or slept and is more despondent than ever. Lisa tells him she has a solution, clip five. Don't write it. hey hey bill that is. Sarah: [7:48] On the inside. Yes, you are. You are. No, you're doing it on the outside now. Tara: [7:53] So then Bill's in the booth reading the news. So Lisa and Dave gather everyone else to tell them that Bill is having trouble writing and everyone should just be cool about it. They do the opposite, including Matthew, who is usually Bill's biggest fan-slash-worshipper, Clip6. Oh, it's all so sad. No. Tara: [8:38] Behind. Okay. It is. And we'll all stand behind. We will. Thanks. Dale turned around and waved. Hey, how's it going, you big loser? Come on, now. One of my favorites is Candy Alexander as Catherine reacting. That laugh she does in that scene is great. Out for drinks that night, everyone is so nice to Bill that he figures out Dave and Lisa told them everything. Bill has had an epiphany about why he's having such a hard time starting, Clip 7. The problem, as I see it, is that I have absolutely no personality of my. Sarah: [9:43] I don't exactly know what you are, but there aren't many like you. Wow, thank you. Okay, well, what about me, Bill? Huh? What about me? Now, all I have is voice. Tara: [9:54] Just like you. Just like me? Yes. Except you're a woman and you're black. Oh, what I wouldn't do. It's not everything is made out to be, Bill. Sorry I had to play the race car. Okay. Where are you going, Bill? Wait a minute. I need a drink. Well, ...needs to be alone with his drink. So Bill comes in the next day just as a rueful Jimmy is breaking the standee in half to lower the pressure on Bill. But Bill is actually fine. In fact, now he's apparently writing the book mainly out of spite, clip eight. Last night I hit my emotional bottom, and I have you people to thank for. Sarah: [11:04] Started climbing toward the top. Slowly but surely. Climbing. Climbing. Can you hurry this up? Climbing, climbing, climbing, climbing. And when it was over, I had this. Tara: [12:09] To publish because I'm not signing the release. Remember this? Issue's closed. But when Bill storms into Dave's office to plead his case, clip nine. Do you think they bought it? Yeah, beer. So that second burst of laughter is Lisa opening the door and Bill and Dave immediately going back into character to glare at each other. Turns out Dave told Lisa about this whole ruse, and though they try to pretend to Bill that he didn't, Bill doesn't buy it. Should the episode have ended just on the stare down? Perhaps. But it didn't. That's the episode. So let's get into it. Between news radio rarely leaving its one set and Bill working alone, unlike Frasier and Niles, it's not that surprising. Bill's writer's block mostly happens off screen. But given what we do see, how effective did you think this episode was in conveying his agony, Sarah? Sarah: [13:17] I thought it was good. When it comes to writing books, I have you. So we have our ways of breaking through blocks. Some of that is not all that accessible to me. But I thought they did a pretty economical job of the next time you see him, his hair is gigantic. And he's just doing a shot of toothpaste from Gabe's desk. And that he does seem, I mean, the character sort of as written up to that point, Phil Hartman plays it as just very sort of like, not surface, but like, he's not introspective. He's not someone who would really want to write a book, except to sort of have it to show other people and make them feel bad. And when he's realizing that that's the rationale and that he's actually going to have to do a bunch of work that he doesn't want to do for a feeling that he can get from being a sitcom character who's a prick. That's sort of funny that he like has this momentary sort of like, oh, the reason I can't do this is because I actually have no personality except being a prick to people professionally. Yeah. But then that immediately is kind of like lost and reset by the end. Was it all that realistic or recognizable? No. Did it feel true to this character? Totally. Tara: [14:38] Yeah. Dave, what are your thoughts? Dave: [14:40] Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I feel like Bill McNeil, part of what we see here, I get. Like, he is supposed to be a character that is very confident on the outside, but then, of course, is given to bouts of doubt. And we've seen that in other episodes. But I also feel like he wouldn't have as much trouble as he's having here. He seems like he wouldn't actually. Sarah: [15:01] Yeah, maybe not. Dave: [15:01] Yeah, like, I was thinking of the episode, I forget what it's called, but basically the Mark Russell episode. Tara: [15:08] Yeah, the public domain. Dave: [15:08] Oh, is that the public domain? Okay. Where he basically becomes Mark Russell. And he's like not good at the songs, but he's incredibly confident in his ability not to be good in that. And I thought seeing him here seemed like it wasn't quite the same character. And I feel like they needed a little something at the start of the episode or something to maybe like signal like what was going on or why what was going on was going on to make it more to make it make more sense holistically with the rest of what we know about him. Yeah. Add on to that, there's like a moment where Matthew just like absolutely isn't into Bill worship in his dealings, talking about him with other people in the office. Like there's this whole thing where he's like, you know, well, Bill, he's like to see him like fail. It's really weird. Oh, yeah, it is really funny, actually, now that I think of it. And that relationship isn't always sycophantic. There are little moments like that. But they usually come at a cathartic moment and not just like at a moment casually talking to other people in the office. So I thought that was a little off model as well. Sarah: [16:12] Yeah. I wonder if they didn't try it in a different way. And this isn't just an inversion of if they tried it. He's actually already written four books because he thinks that well of himself. Or he writes mystery novels under an assumed name. Or once he got the book deal he wrote the whole thing and it's terrible and he like knows that but doesn't really give a shit or like whatever might be on model yeah or so for bill but that it worked better for the ensemble to have these runners about do you think he bought it yeah and like norman mailer and stuff like that and there were some references that i was like you know grandpa buncy is gonna get these, like, a Pentagon Papers runner? Who is that for, if not me, who didn't watch the show? But it was like, I do wonder, I think Dave is actually right, but I wonder if they didn't try it in a more on-brand way. And it was like, well, but that gives nobody else really anything to do, and it makes him maybe too much like Steven Ruse's character. Dave: [17:15] Right. He can't be too efficient within the confines of what we're trying to tell here. I get that. But I think Bill McNeil would have known what the Pentagon papers were. He would have been so befuddled. Sarah: [17:25] Yeah. Tara: [17:26] Right. I mean, I'll also say, like, when they, early on, Dave and Lisa ask him if he's just hinting around to try to get one of them to ghostwrite it for him. And I wondered if that was another stub of an idea of, like, him working with one or the other of them to do this. But today's point, like, you know, this is season two, episode seven. This is only the 14th episode of the show overall. all like the public domain doesn't come until season four episode three like at this point in the run of the show dave like we haven't even gotten to bill loves super old sandwiches right or bill loves rap music when he can't make out the words like at this point in the run when he's like i have no personality that's kind of true like they still haven't shaded in a lot of what we will come to know about him like it's it's super early like maybe too early for something like this. But it's a different experience watching this now, Dave, for me at least, having made our way through The Mary Tyler Moore Show, because I have to think Bill was pitched as like a Ted Baxter type. But Dave, like, what would you say are the differences between between these two similar but not identical characters. Dave: [18:32] The source of Ted Baxter's conversational stupidity is his stupidity. Tara: [18:38] Yes. Dave: [18:38] Whereas Bill McNeil is an overconfident personality. That's like the big difference between them. And that's where it comes from. Like Bill McNeil is self-assured. Ted Baxter is self-assured. But Bill McNeil can sometimes prove himself better than Ted Baxter. Ted Baxter just has one thing going for him, and that is his voice on air. He's not good at reading cue cards. You know, Bill McNeil seems to have some sort of skill set inside of that show. So, you know, I think it's just a matter of confidence and actually be able to execute more often. But yeah, I mean, you're, I guess I never really thought about it. But yeah, they are sort of filling the same function inside of their offices. Tara: [19:19] Yeah, Bill's not dumb. Like, Ted is dumb. Bill is at least clever. He's not like maybe very curious. Dave: [19:25] But he's like, he's emotionally stupid for sure. Yes. Tara: [19:30] But he, you're right. He, we do see him being good at his job. Like when, uh, Jimmy meets the futurist Tom and like Bill destroys him in an interview because he can tell he sizes him up and can tell he doesn't actually have anything to say. So yeah, that's true. I will say going back to the Pentagon papers joke, Dave and Lisa obviously went through their up and downs, but touches like them both separately making the same Pentagon papers joke is what makes them credible as a couple. You believe in them. Would it have been better if like most of this does happen off screen? Like I said, would it have been different or better if we'd seen him writing with someone? Because like it might have given the book writing a little bit more dynamism as it is we don't see any of it. Like not that there's much to see when someone's having writer's block. But this is also before Jimmy James Macho Business Donkey Wrestlers. So you can't ask for tips there either. Sarah: [20:18] I mean, I would say the same thing I said before, like that might have been tried. Tara: [20:23] Yeah. Sarah: [20:23] And they like shot it and were like, oh, this isn't this isn't dynamic. This doesn't really work. Tara: [20:28] Yeah. Sarah: [20:28] But yeah, I mean, I think they smartly left the like writing is boring. Mostly it's very hard to make it audio visual. So I think they were smart to leave that off screen. Dave, what do you think? Dave: [20:39] I mean, the storyline with the supposed all these other ghostwriters could have been to say he goes through ghostwriters like he goes through tissue paper. Because he's so difficult to work with. And that would have seemed a little more in keeping with what we kind of associate with Bill McNeil. Tara: [20:54] Yeah. Dave: [20:54] And also his ego, not be able to actually share with other people or then, of course, not really having a lot to share that is worthy of the book he's trying to write. Tara: [21:06] I already sent this to Sarah, but there's a point where Lisa is reading a newspaper section and on the back is a full page ad for an OJ Simpson report. It says, can tonight's 90-second report do his case justice? This probably would have been taped pre-verdict, but like just. I tried to find the ad online. I couldn't, but I did find that New York Magazine's cover story on Black spectators celebrating the verdict was written by Norman Baylor. So it's all full circle. Sarah: [21:33] Oh my God. Tara: [21:34] It really is. The show notes it was crazy to learn that. Dave: [21:37] There was some other little things I noticed that were very of the time that you don't really think about until you, you know, you have, you have, you have a break from, from reality for a bit. Tara: [21:46] Yeah. Dave: [21:46] And that was. Like Dave's office is always a little bit messy. He's not like a clean freak, but he's, it's not like chaos. It's like office messy, right? There's so many binders with years on the spines that just like threw me back. Like when's the last time you've been in an office that like was like the so-and-so 1989 prospectus next to the blah, blah, blah. Like everything is digital now. You see so much less of this sort of thing. And just like seeing so many stack binders of different navy blues versus the black ones just kind of threw me back to a place where there's like this certain depression that comes from knowing you're in a particular room or building where 90% of the stuff is just like is dead to the universe. It will never be looked at again. It is there for tax purposes. There's a room that maybe used to be a second bathroom that would have been handy or somebody's office years ago, and now it's just stuck with banker boxes and binders on top of them. There's something about that weird liminal business space that these binders signify that I found very late 90s, early odds, and I just couldn't get that out of my head. I did enjoy the joke. It was a very Simpsons, Rory Calhoun-esque joke, but Jimmy James is trying to think of a big guy. He's like, who's that guy, that big guy? Tara: [23:04] Yeah. Dave: [23:05] Dave just first says Andre the Giant no not the dead one the one that's still alive Hulk Hogan it was a very Rory Calhoun joke from the Simpsons but I still enjoyed it it. Sarah: [23:16] Definitely had that like the credits are extremely 90s that's sort of like super saturated overexposed angled montage that the Twin Towers are in. Dave: [23:28] Yeah lines over under the font for no reason very 90s. Sarah: [23:32] Uh-huh. And then once you're out of the credits and into live action, everyone has a Rachel in a skirt suit even the dudes and you're like okay i and that um sort of dark red faux garnet choker necklace that they like they just passed the same one around they had one per network and so that was i mean that was kind of fun but it's also interesting now to look at old shows and be like would you know would they get that reference and then realize that whatever they're referring to like the person was still alive yeah shit that it's referring to was only 20 years ago versus is 50 years ago now. It's like, oh my God. Tara: [24:12] Yeah. Sarah: [24:12] Wow. So that was kind of fun. Although going back to Dave's comment, I also don't believe that Bill wouldn't know what the Pentagon Papers were. Because I think if he does have a personality, it's being smarter than most people and making sure they know that. Tara: [24:28] Yeah. Sarah: [24:29] So. Tara: [24:29] Well, yeah. And if he was in college and during the DNC in 1968, like he was certainly alive when all that happened and probably already working. So yeah, that's true. I was going to ask Dave if you remember the time that we ran into the place on Broadway that is the exterior of the bar they always go to, and then you referenced it in your intro, the big neon sombrero. Dave: [24:50] Yeah, do you know what it's called, what it actually was? Tara: [24:52] No, do you? Dave: [24:53] No. I mean, it did at some point, but. Tara: [24:55] Yeah, the first time that we went shopping in Soho, I was like, oh my God, News Radio Bar. It was so exciting to me. Sarah: [25:00] What a rube. I have gone drinking in that place with Jesse Bradford, of all fucking things. Tara: [25:05] Really? Sarah: [25:07] Yeah. Dave: [25:08] I want to say it's somebody's name, like it's a possessive. Tara: [25:10] Oh, probably. Dave: [25:11] It shouldn't be hard to look up. Tara: [25:12] Well, I don't know if it still exists. Sarah: [25:13] I mean, I think the sombrero is still there, and it might be free people, but they just couldn't. It was like, that's a landmark. Tara: [25:20] Yeah. Well, it's also nowhere near the exterior of the WNYX building, because every time they showed it, if you see it from ground level, it was by where the TGI Fridays used to be when we worked at NBC that closed 10 years ago. That's another reference. Dave: [25:34] Gonzalez E. Gonzalez. Tara: [25:35] Oh, thank you. That's it. Closing clip. Do you think they bought it?