Rose Marie Waited For Her Laugh

Throughout her record-breaking, nine-decade career in show business, Rose Marie was an expert in getting -- and yes, waiting for -- her laugh.  She began performing at age three, after winning a contest, and by age 4 was a bona fide child star.  At age 5, she had her own national radio show on NBC; she soon starred in the first all-talking short film, Baby Rose Marie: The Child Wonder, to open in theaters nationwide.

Later in life, Rose Marie would land the role we remember and love her for the most, playing comedy writer Sally Rogers on The Dick Van Dyke Show.  But as the lady herself told me when we spoke just this past September, her other appearances on landmark TV shows over six decades are too numerous to recount.

For what turned out to be her last three years, Rose Marie worked with filmmaker Jason Wise on a documentary about her life and career, Wait For Your Laugh.

It truly is amazing that the actress, who died on December 28 at age 94, lived just long enough not just to see the release of the film, but to bask in the audience's reaction and their shows of affection for her long career.

Below, a snippet from my talk with Rose Marie from September 27:

Rose Marie: .From my whole career, everyone was wonderful -- I can't give you any bad talk.  I’ve been very lucky.  I’ve worked with wonderful people.  They’ve always been very nice to me and always respected me for who I am and what I am.  We were all professionals, and it was wonderful.  

Must-Hear TV:  And I know that's all captured in your film, Wait For Your Laugh.

RM:  The film is wonderful.  Even I was impressed.  I didn't do it -- it was all Jason, the director.  It took him about three years, and he did it all.  I just sat around and emptied out my house.  All the stuff I ever collected, or kept, he used in the film.

Appearing in Wait For Your Laugh, l-r:  Peter Marshall, Carl Reiner,
Rose Marie, Dick Van Dyke, Tim Conway

Must-Hear TV:  How does it feel at this point in career and life to have attention again?

RM:  It’s amazing to me.  As I always say, if I'd known how good it was at the time, I’d have paid more attention to it!  I want you to see the film.  I wish there was some way you could let me know if you liked it.

I wish there were, too.  Just this past year, Rose Marie joined twitter, and so I ended our conversation by promising I'd send a tweet after seeing the film.  And so now, I'm hoping that if Twitter can be used for evil -- such as our supposed leader trying to provoke nuclear war -- then perhaps it can be used to send love and thanks for the years and years of laughs, even to the great beyond.

Meet Ms. Wilson

Betty White and Emily Osment
in Freeform's Young & Hungry

Tonight's episode of Freeform's sitcom Young & Hungry marks the introduction of a new character, Ms. Wilson -- played by a venerable lady who is anything but young.

The show's writers had laid out this Valentine's Day-themed episode, where after a misunderstanding Gabi has to return a ring she has just learned was not intended for her.  But as originally scripted, before Gabi can get to the ring, a mouse would nab it first.

But, as the show's creator David Holden notes, the network's executives found the mouse bit a bit forced, "and for lack of a better word, cheesy."  And so David and another of the show's writer/producers, Caryn Lucas, took a walk around the CBS Radford studio lot to brainstorm.

With Young & Hungry being directed by Andy Cadiff, who had worked with Betty White all through Hot in Cleveland, the Young writers already knew they wanted to find a way to lure Betty onto their set.  So when David and Caryn decided the plot would instead involve a neighbor in her apartment, "Caryn turned to me and said, 'What if the neighbor is Betty?'," David remembers.

The two rushed back to their offices and pitched the idea to the rest of the staff; ultimately, writer Rachel Sweet, who had spent years on Hot in Cleveland, was elected to write dialogue for Betty's new character:  the five-times-married widow, Bernice Wilson.

Betty filmed her scenes for tonight's episode in December -- not in front of the live audience, but pre-taped, mostly because her scenes would be shot on "swing sets" which are located off to the side of the soundstage, out of the audience's view.  Her scenes completed, Betty had had such a great time  that she indicated that day that she'd like to return.

And so, later this season, look for a romantic episode where Mrs. Wilson and Gabi take a danger-fraught road trip to Vegas.  As Gabi (Emily Osment) suffers through, at 25, her "quarter-life crisis," Bernice, turning 95 on the same day, has a preoccupation of her own:  to meet up with a man she kissed 20 years ago, and with whom she made a pact to meet as they turned 95.  Ultimately, Betty was thrilled not only to come back to Young & Hungry in a bigger plotline revolving around her character, but also to be playing opposite her real-life close friend Carl Reiner, aka Bernice's long-lost beau, Bernie.

As David explains, the writers came up with the idea of the age-based pact when they realized that the episode would be taping on the day of Betty's actual 95th birthday:  January 17, 2017.  After the scenes were shot, the Young & Hungry stages turned into a birthday party for Betty, with a select number of humans, including Carl and also her former Mary Tyler Moore Show and Hot in Cleveland co-star Georgia Engel, and a preponderance of animals.  Throughout the evening, Betty talked with her guests while nonchalantly cradling a porcupine, or armadillo, or a lynx which, David admits, "I was afraid was going to claw her face off."

Betty's second episode, opposite Carl, will air in May -- and it will probably not be her last; Young & Hungry's writers intend to bring back Bernice, whose relationship at ninetysomething is a nice counterpoint to Gabi and Josh's. Now that the show has gotten the "back order" of episodes to comprise the remainder of its fifth season, David explains that while the first ten episodes will be about Gabi and Josh (Jonathan Sadowski) realizing they were meant to be together, "the back ten will be about exploring what that entails."  And as Bernie and Bernice explore their own burgeoning love, the two women will be able to compare notes about what it means to move in with a guy.  "The younger with the older," David says, "is such a great dynamic."