"HELLO, DOLLY!" FOR TV- THE END
In TV Nothing Is Definite
When NBC research rejected Dolly Parton as too country, I got the network all excited about the idea of casting Bette Midler in the lead.
I met Bette in Paris and she agreed to do it. We were about to make her deal when those pesky research folks at the network decided that Bette’s audience skewed just a little too old. She was fabulous, of course, one of a kind, incomparable, but wasn’t she just a bit too “yesterday”. Didn’t she perhaps appeal too much to gays? A little too precious?
If Dolly was too country, wasn’t Bette too New York? Pass on Bette Midler! (Bette subsequently starred in 550 performances of the revival of “HELLO, DOLLY!” on Broadway and received every accolade known to mankind.)
Now I am going crazy. I can NOT lose this commitment. My boss, Merv Griffin, could almost taste his Emmy. I had to find a Dolly Levi the network would accept. Someone not too country; not too city, not too hip, not too gay, but just right-like Goldilocks and The Three Bears.
Ru Paul was not a candidate. NBC seriously considered Megan Mullally who was known to be a terrific musical performer. She co- starred on their hit series, “WILL AND GRACE”. And that was the problem. The TV public knew her as the character on the series. Nobody knew who Megan Mullally was.
Then I remembered what happened when Carol Channing, who created the role of Dolly Levi in the musical, left the Broadway production of “HELLO, DOLLY!” Producer David Merrick replaced her with several marquee names. Eventually, the show was running out of steam
Then he had the brilliant idea of bringing the show back to Broadway with an all-black cast, starring Pearl Bailey as Dolly Levi. The show, which was a hit with Carol, was a hit all over again starring Pearl.
About that time, the film of “CHICAGO”, “directed by Rob Marshall, was a huge hit. Queen Latifah, who until that time was known as a rapper, was fantastic belting Broadway songs in the role of the prison matron, Momma Morton.
How about an all-black “HELLO, DOLLY!” starring Queen Latifah in the lead role? How brilliant a piece of casting is that! NBC got ecstatic all over again.
They authorized me to offer her $1,000,000—at that time quite a sizable sum for a TV movie. She had a recording career. This was long before her police procedural. She had only made one movie. She had another one coming out. And that was the problem:
The day they authorized me to make the offer, Queen Latifah opened in a film called “BRINGING DOWN THE HOUSE”, starring Steve Martin. The box office went through the roof. It made Queen Latifah a star. It also made her unattainable for a measly million bucks to play a TV movie.
That’s when I threw in the towel. I could not come up with another casting idea to revive the moribund project. It was evaporating before my very eyes. After all that network enthusiasm and ecstasy, the TV version of “HELLO, DOLLY!” was never done.
NBC never paid a penny for an option on the rights, or for Dolly Parton’s expenses, or reimbursed Merv’s investment in time and money developing the project for all those months..
In the subtitle of this Substack series, I promised you “Cautionary True Tales From The Hollywood Killing Fields.” I offer this up as one of them. It should be shared with anyone who contemplates a career in television.
The Distributors control the game—the networks, streamers, syndicators. stations and advertisers. They are the gatekeepers. Without their approval, you can never get anything on the air.
From the moment I called NBC proposjng Dolly Parton, it appeared we had a deal. In Television, however, one can never take anything for granted. Until you see a signed document, until the money is in the bank, always remember the words of that venerable William Morris agent who once uttered these immortal words: