Screens: NBC
Toward A Theory Of Joseph Bologna's Minute Of Shirtlessness On A Show For Teenaged Girls
There has to be a story behind it. There just has to.
Our Players
Hello, I'm Joseph Bologna.
Hello, I'm writer Robin Schiff.
Hey, I'm director Daniel Cahn.
The Scene
Hiya...it's Robin, right? You got a second?
Hi Joe, of course! You got my script for Episode 5, I take it?
I sure did -- great work, and welcome aboard, it's a real nice piece of work for you to make your Rags début with.
Thank you so much, that's really nice to hear coming from you.
I had a thought about it, I thought maybe I could run it by you with Daniel, here, who's going to be directing it.
Okay, sure -- oh, hi, Dan!
Hi Robin, sorry about...this.
..."Sorry"?
Nothing to be sorry for, we're just throwing ideas around. I think we all just want to make the best episode we can, right?
Yeah.
Uh, okay...?
So my first scene, it's me and Dicky Van Patten. We're at our country club, we're chatting about our kids, we're getting ready to get out of there.
Yes, right.
Here's what I'm thinking: I start the scene in just my slacks.
Slacks and your undershirt, right.
I know that's what you've got here on the page -- great pages! -- but I'm thinking: no undershirt.
...Oh! Hmmmm.
Yeah.
Uh, I mean-- I take it you've already been chatting about this, Dan?
Yeah.
Well...hmm. What do you think?
Yeah, well...yeah.
What I'm thinking is that so much of the show tends to be about the girls.
Well...right, they're kind of the focus of the show because girls around the characters' age are our target audience for the show.
Right, of course, and it's been a lot of fun for me supporting them in the role.
Great!
It's just-- The thing is--
[sigh]
You know, I think we've all seen the ratings, and it seems like this season might be it for the show. I know, I know -- we all hope not. But we're professionals; we can be realistic.
...okay?
I want to keep having a career after this, maybe as a leading man. And what I worry about is, what if I've pigeonholed myself in that "old dad" slot?
Well, I mean...Joe, you are in your fifties.
Barely! I'm only fifty-two!
Okay, sorry!
And I've just been thinking for a while, you know, what can I do within the show to kind of showcase my virility?
Uh...well, I mean, I thought that's why Deb and Andrew inserted the plotline in the episode before this about Nick going back to his playboy ways with a weekend in Mexico?
Yeah, but that's just talk, you know?
Okay.
But right here, you've served it up on a silver platter! I'm right there in a health club, I've just finished doing some kind of exercise: why shouldn't I have my shirt off?
Well, I mean...you know, like I said, it's a show for young girls.
Young girls don't like to see men with their shirts off?
I think young girls like to see boys with their shirts off.
Well, they just got that with the lifeguard episode, didn't they?
[muttering] So now they've got to take their medicine?
What's that?
Nothing.
It just seems like something that would be a bit jarring for our audience, under the circumstances -- Dan, don't you think?
Yes.
"Jarring"? To see an attractive man in the prime of his life who just happens to have hair on his chest?
I--
Okay, look, do I have to beg? I'll beg. This is important to me. I'm a grown man spending his days playing sixth banana to a bunch of girls who won't even agree to wear '60s period wigs. I put up with a lot. I don't complain. I need this town to know that when this nonsense is over, I'm ready for a love scene on a primetime soap!
I mean--
You really think this is going to get you there?
I think it can't hurt!
...Robin?
I don't know, I guess.
Gee, don't strain yourself.
I still think it'll be weird, but Dan, if you're okay with it: sure, fine.
Kids, it'll mean a lot to me, and you know what? It'll be so natural in the scene you wrote, Robin, that I bet no one outside the industry even notices.
Maybe you're right.
