My favorite Peri Gilpin story

Last week there was some grumbling that I didn't answer enough Friday questions. So this week I'm devoting two days to your questions. More answered manana.

Jeff gets it started.

We are big Frasier fans, but we just watch whatever show comes on cable. I never read about Roz - although we like her character a lot. Any stories there?

First off, Peri Gilpin is the sweetest human being on the planet. That has nothing to do with the story but I wanted to say it anyway. One day during the first season after a runthrough I said she looked very comfortable behind that control board. She said, “Well, my dad was in radio.” Being an old radio guy myself I asked who he was. She was sure I had never heard of him. He died quite a few years ago. Still, I wanted to know.

Jim O’Brien.

I was floored. I did know Jim O’Brien. He was program director of KHJ in 1969 and I did an audio documentary for college on the station and spent a day interviewing him. He was a great guy. After KHJ he moved to Philadelphia where in addition to radio he started doing TV weather. He died tragically young in a sky diving accident saving a fellow diver whose chute didn’t open.

One day on KHJ he filled in on the air and I happened to tape the show. I dug up the tape – it was an old musty reel-to-reel, and gave it to Peri the next day. I knew the sound department could figure a way for her to hear it. She was very touched. A couple of days later at runthrough she thanked me again and said it was the first time she had ever actually heard her father on the radio. She was very little when he died.

I have other Peri stories but that’s my favorite.

Dan Brown asks:

What kind of priority was reality in your scripts? How much emphasis was there in keeping things plausible? My biggest pet peeve now with sitcoms is that even some good shows, such as The Office, defy believability. The other night, Dwight punched out Pam's window and tore up the house with a sledgehammer when asked to retrieve an iPod. Uh, sure.) Even in comedy, shouldn't writers ask themselves: Would this really happen?

I can’t speak for that OFFICE episode but personally I think it’s crucial to keep it real (Jesus, I sound like Randy Jackson). On MASH we had medical advisers, on-set nurses, and military advisers just to make sure everything was plausible. And on CHEERS we drank.

But the best comedy comes from reality. If you can believe or better yet, identify with behavior the better your chances of laughing. Characters can act irrational, crazy, weird – anything you want, as long as it’s justified. We joke about actors always needing to know their “motivation” but they do. Rachel Roberts, a wonderful actress on the old TONY RANDALL SHOW once said to us after a scene in rehearsal: “So what’s my motivation? I’m an out patient?” Yo, dawg, keep it real. Know what I'm sayin'?

What’s your question? I try to get to as many as I can. Honest. Really. No, I mean it.