Film Courage: Once you knew you were going to be the showrunner for Home Improvement,
you did a lot of research, you’re prepared, you show up, you are now facing this room
of writers most of whom you know...how are you dealing with this and was it as you imagined?
Bruce Logan, Author/Former Showrunner/Screenwriter: Well first of all, I gave them all homework.
It’s like kids in school today they have to do reading over the summer, they had assignments.
Their assignments were they had to come in with maybe 4 to 6 stories a piece or 3 stories
a piece.
I don’t remember what.
But everybody had to come in with and deliver something.
And so already you have just a bunch of stuff to work with.
I had stories that brought in and all of my writers had stories, so we had a lot to talk
about and so they had stories and the other thing that you talk about on day one really
before you even get into the stories is the arc of the season.
What’s going to happen in the beginning of Episode One of the season and what is going
to happen in episode 22 or 24 however many we were doing.
And once you kind of set up the general arc then you get to the stories because the arc
tells you where you want the characters to go.
So the stories that these writers come in with they are not that worked out because
first you have to decide on your arc and where you want your characters to go but I’m pretty
confident that all of us came in with stories that then actually did fit in with the arc
or we cold tweak to the arc and that’s how we got started so ideally you get started
with just a burst of energy and everybody is really excited to be there, it’s the
first day of work, people are getting paid to be writers in television in Hollywood and
it’s a privilege.
Film Courage: How do you know you are keeping the story moving forward?
Were there times when you thought you were doing things that were great, jokes were funny
but then you stood back and said “This story isn’t moving forward?”
Bruce: In traditional, multi-camera sitcom, there is always the tendency to make too many
jokes and slow down the scene because you think you are being so funny with all of the
jokes people are telling but it becomes pretty evident along the way if people are just standing
around telling jokes and the story isn’t being served.
Then if you have a staff of good people somebody is going to say “Hey, don’t we need to
get to this story point sooner and could we cut this?”
So that’s very common.
Film Courage: Speaking of cutting I’m thinking of let’s say Three’s Company [80’s sitcom]
and sometimes the character Mr. Roper would come in with just a look.
He didn’t have to say a word.
And the viewer already knew he was either judging or Jack Tripper or somebody.
How did you and the writers know let’s just do this as a look.
Was this when the actors suggested it?
Bruce: Well Tim Allen...when you work with somebody the audience loves you get so many
extra laughs with looks like that.
As the show grows you realize a look on a certain line you know is going to get a laugh.
With Home Improvement the thing that made that show a success Tim Allen was a very successful
comedian but the thing that made the show a success was coming up with a worthy adversary
to play his wife (who was Patricia Richardson) and we knew that if we wrote a scene and he
did something stupid and she gave him a look the audience (especially the women) were going
to love it.
So you learn about those looks and what they are going to give you comedically.
In fact we did a whole show of Home Improvement called ‘The Look.’
What that was...one of the writers came in with this idea and it was based on just the
look that your wife gives you when you act like an idiot.
So this whole thing (the episode) was called The Look and it featured a very funny comic
named Blake Clark and he played the owner of a hardware store on Home Improvement.
His wife played by a very funny ex-Groundling named Shirley Prestia and he would talk about
the look that he would get and I guess we did stuff with Tim and his wife at home.
But with Blake and Shirley she would give him one of those looks, she’d give him the
look and the audience would go crazy and he’d give the look back and Tim was in the scene
too and he’d be looking at them giving each other the look and the laughs they just spread.
I mean no dialogue at all.
Every time the director knew to cut from look to look to look to look and the laughter just
built like crazy.
It was a really funny episode.
Film Courage: Do you think this is what distinguishes a lot of new writers versus more seasoned
is knowing when to cut out some of the jokes and to go to the looks?
Bruce: You know it was what distinguishes watching a show grow because you don’t know
when you start a show what is going to hit from which actors so it’s learning the whole
thing.
It’s not just what’s on the page, it’s what is on the stage.
So if the actors are really gifted physically and you start to see audiences reacting or
even in a single camera show you can tell if somebody’s reaction is just hysterical
and you make a mental note of that and then you start to use that but it usually grows
from seeing the actors work with the material.
Film Courage: Forgive me but didn’t this happen with a show you did called Duet where
where two stars started out as main characters and then it was flipped around?
Bruce: That was a whole other bit of business.
I mean that was...Duet was on when The Fox Network just started and we followed Married
With Children which was a huge hit and we did okay.
Duet was a pretty funny show.
The audience...the studio and network liked the show but they felt that the two leads
weren’t as funny as these two side characters.
So it was one of these really weird situations where the two side characters became the lead
characters of the show and then one of the main characters stayed in the show but one
didn’t.
It was bizarre, it was really bizarre.
That was the first sitcom, the first acting job for Ellen DeGeneres.
She was in the spin-off of Duet called Open House playing a secretary in a real estate
office.
Film Courage: I bet that was funny.
Bruce: And the other person, it was between Ellen DeGeneres and Paula Poundstone and they
were both hilarious.