#332 The Trailblazing Journey of Norma Safford Vela

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Jeff Dwoskin 0:28

all right, Bonnie, thank you so much for that amazing introduction. You get the show going each and every week, and this week was no exception. Welcome everybody to episode 332 of classic conversations as always, I am your host. Jeff Dwoskin, great to have you back for what's sure to be a story filled episode for the ages. My guest today is legendary television writer and show runner, Norma Safford Vela. Norma is here to share her inspiring stories of when she was breaking into the business as a woman, when it was mostly still a guys club. She's sharing stories from st elsewhere, Roseanne Davis, rule, slap Maxwell, George Designing Women, Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, and so much more. And that's coming up in just a few seconds, and in these few seconds, Barry Elise joined us last week, good friend of mine, amazing podcaster, great stories from the time. She was a page at SNL, and Letterman, so many great stories. Do not miss that episode. But if you're like ready for a story overload, you've come to the right place. Nora Safford Vela is here, and she is telling story after story. Get ready. It's coming up right now. All right, everyone. I'm excited to introduce you to my next guest, writer, director, producer, created. George Davis rules, good advice. A huge resume. Can't wait to dive into it. Welcome to the show. Norma Safford Vela, how are you?

Norma Safford Vela 2:05

I am well. Thank you. Thanks for inviting me.

Jeff Dwoskin 2:08

Oh, it's great to have you on the show. Your amazing background started as a writer, executive producer, show runner. How did you decide that this was your path in life. How did you break into the business? I

Norma Safford Vela 2:24

have a very unusual path, I think because I did not start out wanting to be a writer. I was going to be a set designer, and that's my degree is in scene design, technical production, lighting design and costume design. I came to Los Angeles with my husband, who was going to be a movie star, and I was going to be an art director, but they didn't let women in the Union. At that point, the art directors union, they were just starting to allow one or two women in me. So I gave up on that. I happened to type 95 words a minute, and at that point that was a big deal because we were still typing and using cut and paste and white out. They didn't have computers yet for shows, and so I got a lot of jobs just typing for writers.

Jeff Dwoskin 3:13

95 words a minute is a lot. Do you play piano? No,

Norma Safford Vela 3:17

I don't. I wish I could, darn it. But no, I started typing for court reporters and lawyers when I was 16, and that's how I paid my way through college.

Jeff Dwoskin 3:25

I think the greatest thing my dad ever did is in high school, he insisted that my brother and I take typing. Yes, the reason it's about the piano is I was pretty good at it, but my brother was a master at piano, and he could, like, he could type, like, 70 plus words a minute, just because he could move his hands like that, I bet you would have been amazing at piano. Norma,

Norma Safford Vela 3:46

well, I have, I have giant hands, I have man hands, and I can stretch an octave and a half on the piano, but I can't play. I have no understanding of music, although I finally am teaching myself to play the ukulele. You can see five of them behind me. Oh, so this,

Jeff Dwoskin 4:04

I figured I knew I knew it. I knew it was the music. And yeah,

Norma Safford Vela 4:08

yeah, I insisted my kids have musical training when they were growing up, and both my grandkids are playing piano now. So I wish I had learned to play, but I never got to. All

Jeff Dwoskin 4:18

right, so it sounds like when you came, when you were starting to break into the business, it wasn't as open and welcoming to women as men. Yes. How did you like, what were some of those early challenges, you know, as you kind of made your way onto the writing set of, you know, saying elsewhere and slap Maxwell and all those, what were some of the kind of stripes and things that you had to deal with as a woman, kind of making her way in this profession?

Norma Safford Vela 4:50

Well, sales were particularly was was like a college boys dorm, because it was all these smart guys that had been to university. And studied writing, knew everything, and they were all smarty pants, and it was fairly abusive and misogynistic for the women, but simultaneously, I was treated like a little sister. There I was protected. Bruce Paltrow kept me employed year round, which was unusual. Mark Tinker got health insurance when I was pregnant, while I was there, and I wasn't entitled to it as a secretary, Tom Fontana gave me the chance to write and taught me to write. And one of my best memories, I have a couple of memories from there and some many horrible memories, but one of my best was just realizing that I could write. I was sitting with Tom at the word processor, which was a brand new thing. I was the only one at MTM who had been trained to use a dedicated word processor, and it was a big deal. And so Tom would sit beside me and sort of dictate the script to me, and he set a line of dialog, and I didn't type it. I just kind of sat there for a minute to wait for him to reconsider maybe making that line better. And he looked at me, he said, what? I said, that's what you want me to type. Okay? He said, Oh, you think you can do better? And I said, Well, I would do this. He said, Yeah, that is better write that. And so I I started getting fancy ideas, and then I was allowed to be the person who communicated most with the medical advisor. So I got to write medical dialog. And then I was also the one who poured through the Landsat, the Harvard Medical Journal and The New York Times science section, medical section, looking for story ideas, medical story ideas, non emotional ones. That's how I learned, taught me so much, and gave me my chance.

Jeff Dwoskin 6:48

That's amazing. And all because you could type, yeah, but I mean, well, that was the bridge, right? That kind of opened up, yeah? The

Norma Safford Vela 6:56

Human Resources lady literally took my resume for off the bottom where it said, special skills, types, 95 words a minute. Took away all my education, all my experience, handed me that little piece and said, take that over to Bruce Paltrow and you'll get the job.

Jeff Dwoskin 7:10

Nice. So you went from kind of fixing his lines to actually writing full scripts for saying elsewhere.

Norma Safford Vela 7:18

Yeah, I only got read a couple of scripts for the show. They were not at that point, yet welcoming women on staff. Then

Jeff Dwoskin 7:26

how did you? What did you? Did you then use that experience to kind of pivot to the to the next opportunity is this where you start falling in love with the idea of writing like, oh, not only can, I can type it faster than everyone else. So I have that advantage.

Norma Safford Vela 7:42

That was real advantage. And there's a story about that later. Yeah, I, I worked on the show for, I think, four years. I got pregnant with my son at that point, and also was maybe going to be divorcing my husband. And so the idea of earning a decent living instead of, you know, $450 a week really appealed to me. And so Bruce expected, Bruce palpro expected everyone on the staff to want to progress, to want to be a writer or a director or a producer, and that was the only reason you were there working for him. And so he gave myself and Jorge zemacona the opportunity to write a script together. We could split a script, and it was horrible. It was an awful script, and yet he gave us both another chance. You know, it was, it was Bruce and Tom, and then after several years, I was just really unpleasant to have around at that point, because I wasn't getting hired as a story editor. I was teaching the new story editors how to write the show, and I got kind of resentful, and so Tom, he fired me so that I could go get other work. I could get unemployment, and he gave me $5,000 to start, and he called anyone he knew that could help me. And so I was able to get an agent, and I was able to get two staff job offers, and one was for Spencer for hire, which I loved that show, I loved the books, and I got hired on that show

Jeff Dwoskin 9:15

that it was your next kind of big one that you were at writing. Yeah, I

Norma Safford Vela 9:20

did get another freelance script between now and then for a show that never really made it to the air, but that was fun. So I did get other assignments before that, but that was my first staff job, and it was wonderful. Juanita Bartlett was the executive producer, and it was just terrific. We were based at the Warner Brothers lot and shot in

Jeff Dwoskin 9:40

Boston. Your writer, and you're writing and you're kind of entrenched. Do you get to know like Robert Eric or Avery Brooks? Like, do you get to kind of is part of how do you get to know the characters and the stories and the actors to then create the words and the scenarios that can best capitalize on, on their talents and the direction of the show, on that

Norma Safford Vela 9:59

particular show? We had the advantage of the book series by Robert Parker and but we had the disadvantage of the actors all being in another state across the country, and we didn't get to go there. So I did finally meet Robert and Avery, and that was when I did get go at the end. And I really focused on hawk. He was he was my guy, and I wanted to write his dialog, so I just studied all the other scripts that they had for the show and studied him in the books, and tried to make him sound as human and compassionate as possible. That's awesome.

Jeff Dwoskin 10:30

At what point now is like, are you getting a reputation as like, a hot writer? Like, what? What kind of leads? Because as I look at your IMDB, it seems where your first producer, writer. Opportunity comes from Roseanne. Is that, yes, what kind of in these early ones led to, did you know Roseanne, or did she just kind of notice the work you've been doing and then, or did you start to create a reputation that kind of moved you in that direction? For that opportunity, I

Norma Safford Vela 10:59

went from Spencer for hire. I got I had my daughter. I was pregnant then, so I was on maternity leave. And while I was on maternity leave, the show got canceled, so there was no show to go back to. I had met Jay Tarsus at St elsewhere, because he was on the MTM lot at the time. He was friends with Bruce and mark, and he would come in all the time, and he was always nice, kind to me and funny. And Bethany Rooney was also she was a associate producer on st elsewhere. She was working on Days and nights of Molly. Dodd and my other friend, Elena Rada, who is another writer producer. She was also working with Jay on Days and nights of Molly. Dodd Beth showed me the tape for slap Maxwell story, and I liked that show better. I was crazy for that show, not for Molly, but I did write an episode of Molly Dodd, and I begged Jay to let me write for slap Maxwell story, and my sample script I gave him was three pages of a Spencer for hire, where I had written funny dialog for Hawk, and that's what he hired me based on that so I did with Russ Woody, he and I wrote the last nine episodes, and we were there on set day to day, because Dabney and Jay did not get along very well. And then that show got canceled. Then I went to work for Alan zwabell on a show called the boys, which had a bunch of, you know, major old time comedy guys on it, and he had hired the Bobs, Bob Weiskopf and Bob Shiller, and they were heroes of mine, so I got to work with them briefly, but it was a horrible experience. I was bad at the show. I was not funny. And at that point in time, Jeff Harris, who was executive producer of Roseanne, called Bob Weiskopf, and said, I need a chick. I need a girl writer over here. Do you know anybody and Bob Weiskopf said, Well, we have a girl over here. She's not very funny, but she's a good writer, because Bob and I had had fights over different jokes over the time I was there, and he would make me cry, and then he would send me flowers. We had a good relationship, ultimately. So I went over and met with Jeff Harris and Danny Jacobson, and I got hired there, and it wasn't based on anything but Bob, Bob Weiskopf saying, I could write,

Jeff Dwoskin 13:17

I have. I did find an article by vulture magazine that listed the greatest TV writer rooms ever. It lists your seasons as as one of the strongest staffs. That was pretty cool. I Oh, that's interesting. Yeah, yeah, season two and three staff. And then the other interesting thing I found about Roseanne was a book called stealing the show, which quoted you as talking about how when Tom Arnold came on board, they wanted you to teach him how to write. And there was perhaps some internal strife with him becoming part of the team a teeny bit,

Norma Safford Vela 13:58

just a teeny bit, Tom tried to take a swing at me one day because we were rewriting his scripts completely, and Danny wasn't there that day, so Tom felt safe trying to hit me, and I called security and had him removed from the building, and we had his offices moved to the soundstage, so he wasn't allowed around us anymore. So I did not get along well with Tom. I initially got along well, really well with Roseanne, but Tom came in, and he was an abusive control freak, and he convinced her to fire her sister, fire her manager, fire her publicist. It was horrible. I felt bad for her. Yeah, I

Jeff Dwoskin 14:37

remember. I remember just being, you know, just person watching Entertainment Weekly and all that kind of stuff during the whole when they got together, it was like a powder keg of it seemed like, like it was just crazy. All right, so you were at the front lines of that. It's funny, like someone can take a swing at you. That funny, but it's that and then just, and we'll just. Of his office. I mean, today, I mean, that would, yeah, I mean, that would, that would be a whole different ending, right? So you'd have been probably, oh, yeah, taken the jail and removed completely. And so how did you kind of work through that? I mean, this Roseanne was, like, one of your was your, I'm just going by your IMDB was your first, like, long term, like, right? I mean, like, well, you wrote 24 episodes. You're now you're a co producer. What is being co producer and writer? What is that? Was co producer? Exactly. How would you define that?

Norma Safford Vela 15:31

I would define it, in that case, as a way to not pay me as much, because they could give me a title in trade for income. And I was happy to take it because I was I was grateful to work. I was a woman trying to work in television. I was happy to get what I got. In the case of Roseanne, specifically, it was Danny Jacobson and myself in a room doing the final rewrite of every script. We did the final pass just with the two of us. We didn't have a writer's room. Danny didn't like it, you got frustrated with people really easily. And again, this was where my typing came in, because I had a computer at that point, and I said I could type as fast as you could talk. So if you just want to sit in a room and dictate the script to me, we'll get it done that way. That was a lot of it. And then we would fight over the stories a lot, and scream and yell at each other a lot. And that was what went into the script, was our our disagreement over every issue. Well,

Jeff Dwoskin 16:27

turned out the show was a huge success that that that original run. So the other interesting thing I kind of found while digging around you were also wrote on a a Dutch version of roseanne. I don't AM. I don't know if I'm going to pronounce this right, A, A, F, I don't know how to Oh,

Norma Safford Vela 16:47

I think that they're required to give you credit for that because they used the Roseanne scripts that I wrote, not that I worked with them. I did work with Russian writers, but I didn't work with Dutch writers. Oh,

Jeff Dwoskin 16:59

so you got, you got credit for because they used your scripts to adapt it. I didn't even know that any adaptions of this. So usually you always hear like, it's an American show, is a version of a British show. I know you don't hear a lot about like, Oh, this one was moved over into these other markets. I got you so, so you get credit and probably additional income when they expand these and use your words in other countries. That's interesting.

Norma Safford Vela 17:27

Okay, yeah, yeah,

Jeff Dwoskin 17:29

I take it all right. That's cool. That's cool. Was Roseanne, other than bringing Tom Arnold in and creating a very hostile environment, I got the impression that she would reach out to bring women in. Did she give opportunities to women? Did you feel it was still an opportunity, even though it was hostile? And then eventually, I assume, what was the straw that broke the camel's back and you had to leave like you couldn't take it anymore. I imagine at some point,

Norma Safford Vela 17:58

Roseanne liked to give the impression that she was supportive of women, but she was, she was, in fact, not. She would call producer meetings, and I would be the one producer not invited to the meeting. And I, I confronted her about it, and I said, if you want a woman's voice in the show, if you want a woman producer in the show, you need to invite me to the meetings. You need to include me. And so we had a little confrontation about that. And I just believed in standing up to her, for for her to live up to the values that she was saying she had. She did bring in other women, writers on staff, and, you know, brought in some interesting people, but she was not necessarily supportive of women at that point.

Jeff Dwoskin 18:37

Got it. What was the the end for you at Roseanne.

Norma Safford Vela 18:41

Well, the end for for me was that Danny and I both got fired. The show was number one, and it was number one in part because of our writing. And that's that was the decision that they made. They had already let Jeff Harris had decided to leave, and he was replaced with Jay Daniels. And I think Jay was part of the decision to move us along, but the reward was that we got to create another show together Danny and I did, and that that's how we got Davis rules.

Jeff Dwoskin 19:12

Okay, so All right, so then you create Davis rules. Davis rules is with Randy Quaid and Jonathan Winters, yes. And Bonnie Heinz, right. So that's an amazing cast. So the, I'd love to hear some stories about them, but how did you So, when somebody gives you the opportunity says, Alright, you guys can create Alright, you guys rocking, we understand number one show some stuff going on there. You know, oil and water. They wanted you to leave. You got fired, but we're gonna let you create a show. Is this an idea that you had had? Was it based on when you were working together with Danny Jacobson? Was it something that you guys had talked about, like, how did, how did? What's the germ of this idea? Like, how do you create a show? Or do they hand you a show and go, here's our idea. Make the. Show.

Norma Safford Vela 20:00

It was a little bit of both. Marcy Carsey brought us in for the pitch to the network, and she said, we want to create a show about education. What do you think? And he said, Great, I like it. Go do it. And that was how this show was sold. Literally, we didn't know what we were going to do. It just needed to be about education. That was a passion of mine, personally. So I was very excited. They had Randy Quaid and Jonathan. Randy came in second though. They had, they had Jonathan first, I believe, and we had another guy in Randy's role, Gaylord Sartain, and he had, I don't know whether was drinking issues or emotional issues, but he he was so frozen by Jonathan that we had to replace him. I mean, I was literally in the early shooting of the pilot. I was behind a screen whispering his lines to him so he could finish the scene. So that was horrible. He was a sweet man, but he couldn't do the part. And then we brought in Randy. And Randy was also challenging. He wanted to compete with Jonathan, which is impossible. It can't be done. I imagine

Jeff Dwoskin 21:14

you just need to kind of bask in that glow. And that Jonathan Winters is probably a giving person in terms of sharing that I think most people that could improv are, but that's interesting, yeah, yeah.

Norma Safford Vela 21:26

And then we needed to just the deal that Jonathan had was he he wasn't required to memorize lines, and so the way we wrote the script was we would give him a starting point and an ending point with ellipsis in between, and he could fill in the blank however he wanted, and he would fill in the blank differently with every take, but we still needed him to get back to that last point. And so that was really Bonnie Hunt's initial service for us. She had just come off of Grand was the show she had been working on, and we loved her and brought her on as Dwight's sister, she would feed Jonathan that last line that he needed to get back to. And he adored her. He absolutely adored her, and they were similar minds, so it worked out great.

Jeff Dwoskin 22:19

Oh, that's awesome, as you were basically Curb Your Enthusiasm before, pretty much, yeah, right. Isn't that how that show works? It's basically like, start here, get here, figure it out. So what was it like? Like? Were you on set when Jonathan Winters would be doing all this watching work, especially with every day different. I mean, how did you get anything done? I mean, I like you have 2029, episodes, it seems. How did you get through that? Even just the first one, it just seems like without just cracking up.

Norma Safford Vela 22:53

Well, we did. We had a dedicated camera on Jonathan for one thing, and that was really important. He was always performing. He was always looking somewhere or doing something or picking some shit up, you know, anything, and you wanted every second of that. And we also had, I think we did two separate shows. I'm trying to remember, it's been a while. I think we did a pre taped show and then a live show, and we were on set for all of it. And he loved Danny Jacobson, loved him. And Jonathan was a childhood hero of mine. I mean, I had his albums from when I was a little girl. He used to come to the tidelands hotel and perform, and that's where I went swimming as a little girl, and we got into water fights with his kids. So I go way back.

Jeff Dwoskin 23:38

This is an amazing castle. I mean, Giovanni rabisi, Patricia, Clarkston, Deborah, Joe Rupp, was in this also. So it's like a powerhouse cast you had, did Randy Quaid kind of mellow out into the role and kind of meld over time with Jonathan Winters? Or was it a kind of that spotlight issue the whole time?

Norma Safford Vela 23:59

I think there was always tension the whole time. I think Jonathan just saw him as not fun to play with, and John just liked to play. That's all he wanted to do was play. So it became difficult. Got it

Jeff Dwoskin 24:10

Sorry to interrupt. Have to take a quick break. I know some of the great stories we'll get back to one second, one second, but I do want to thank everyone for this. For the sponsors. When you support the sponsors, you're supporting us here at Classic conversations, and that's how we keep the lights on. And now back to my amazing conversation with Norma Safford, Vela, all right, so Davis rules. And then from there, Designing Women, no,

Norma Safford Vela 24:36

no, no. Danny and I co created good advice for Shelley Long and I did not want to work on that show. I didn't like the I just didn't want to do it anymore. I had had Danny, and I had sort of time issues. He was just married, and I had two kids, and I wanted to work during the day, and he wanted to work at night. And, you know, we just had. Different schedules, and it was sort of time for us to break off a little bit. And so he went and did good advice. Michael Leeson took over Davis rules, and I contend, killed it, just he didn't like the show to begin with, and so he changed it to try to make it what he wanted it to be. And it didn't work. The show that we created worked, not that I'm bitter so. And then I went to, I think I went to run the torkelsons, which was with Michael Jacobs, and that was not fun. And I quit that show. I loved the show. I loved the cast. I'm still friends with the cast, but I would never work with Michael Jacobs in my life again,

Jeff Dwoskin 25:42

what was the strife that drove you from that? Was there a specific incident? Did he? Did he try and hit you too, like Tom Arnold,

Norma Safford Vela 25:51

no, but I came to those. It was, you know, it was just, I don't, I don't really know what it was. It could have been, you know, incompetence on my part. It could have been arrogance on his part. I'm not sure he was. He was doing dinosaurs at the same time, and he just fell in love with this show, and so he would come and micromanage me and that that makes it really impossible to do your job. And so I said, you know, then here you you go, have the show, and you have fun with it. And he changed it again into a different show that ultimately failed.

Jeff Dwoskin 26:31

I need to learn Norma sets the

Norma Safford Vela 26:37

such a snot. Let's see. I'm trying to remember. And I think from there, I had been trying to work on Designing Women for a long time. I loved the show, I loved the cast. I tried to get freelance scripts, all kinds of stuff. And I think I was brought on as a consulting producer first. And Pam Norris was the show runner, but she had stopped showing up for work, which was unusual, but I think it's because she was pregnant and didn't want people to know, because it was a difficult situation for her. But the producers came in to me one day and said, Okay, what are we doing next week? And I said, I don't know. Ask Pam and Linda. And they said, Well, you're kind of the person in charge now, so that's what I became, and it was just for part of that season, and then for the next season, they did make me an executive producer, and David Steinberg was not happy about that. He thought that he should have been made executive producer instead of me, which I can understand. He'd been directing for the show for a while, and felt that he deserved it, but I got it instead, so he got mad, and it became very difficult.

Jeff Dwoskin 27:45

Did he try and hit you?

Unknown Speaker 27:49

Everybody?

Norma Safford Vela 27:55

Nobody's connected yet, though. So because I'm from Texas, I I jumped

Jeff Dwoskin 28:00

too quick.

Norma Safford Vela 28:02

Yeah, exactly. I had two big brothers who used to beat me up, so I'm used to it, but yeah, that was a that was a very challenging show. It was it was not fun, and I was deeply sort of disappointed, because again, David Steinberg had been one of my heroes. He had a joke that used the word moribund, and I worshiped him for that, and and he sort of conspired to get me fired and replace me. Oh, it's a sad story. But

Jeff Dwoskin 28:32

besides the kind of internal drama and the shuffling of that was there, did you enjoy, like, the scripts and like, you know, get to engage with, you know, Gene smart, or Andy Potts, Dixie, Carter, Delta Burke, you know, like, it's such a an iconic cast that, you know, at this point, it's like, was there some high points of it? I mean, I know you had wanted to be there for so long as you mentioned, was there, was there some story lines you wrote? You're like, I'm so proud of this. This is awesome. Well, I

Norma Safford Vela 29:05

was proud of everything that we did. The gene smart was gone. Delta was gone by the time I got on there and we had shoot. I cannot remember Jan's last name now I'm so sad. Hooks, yes, yeah. She was incredibly funny, incredibly funny, and I think I enjoyed working with the writing staff more than anything else. We had a really small room. It was Mark Brown and de la Duke, and I'm still best friends with de la Duke and Catherine mishaan. And that was our staff. And we cranked scripts out just like crazy and enjoyed every second of it that was really fun,

Jeff Dwoskin 29:44

excellent. And then from there was George next, or I'm just Yeah, did everyone work on that show? Get a grill? Did you get a grill? No, for lunch. Did everyone have to make food? On the George Foreman grill. That's it. There's no time. I'm not sure he even that might have been before

Norma Safford Vela 30:05

the grill yet. Yeah, that was a funny I had a development deal with Columbia at the time, and I was trying to sell a one hour show that's sort of an autobiographical one hour show that I had sold to CBS. But then the guy I sold it to died, and that was, oh, no, yeah. It was horrible. But then, yeah, then they approached me with George. I'm from Houston, too, so, and I loved boxing, and I loved George, and, you know, I was like, immediately, yes. And he was absolutely lovely person. He was really funny and just a delight to work with.

Jeff Dwoskin 30:37

He looks like he'd be a character. I mean, just him as the boxing guy, you know, it's like, he's, he's humorous to watch, just in interviews and stuff like that. So that was a, yeah, that was a fun show. What did you so as as executive producer, that make that show runner, right? That's the same thing as Yes. So in this you get to, what was this based on some of George's life, or did you kind of, was there a path that you had set and then they clicked George into it, or where they had a deal with George? Or how did that come about?

Norma Safford Vela 31:08

Tony Dan's company had to deal with George. And I knew quite a bit about George's life and and wanted to, you know, make it easy for him as an actor. So we surrounded him with a really great cast. Cheryl Lee, Ralph was his wife, which was wonderful. And Haney, I think that was her name. Was the housekeeper, and she was wonderful. Juanita, yeah, Juanita, that's named after my grandma. And really, yeah, I try to get my family's names into into shows whenever I can the mother in law in the Torkelson is named after my mother beeps. It's fun. Dwight is my brother from Davis rules. It's awesome. Yeah, you sneak them in just to honor your family. But we did. We I wanted to go back to education again, and so George's wife was a teacher, and she dealt with troubled kids, and George thought he had the easy answer, and he could fix everything himself. And we had a multiracial cast, and I was really specific on casting according to race, because we had one little boy, one character was half Mexican, and we made sure we got a half Mexican kid.

Jeff Dwoskin 32:19

That's good, that's important. So diversity and inclusion, inclusion, inclusion, that's got that to me, that's that's probably way, way ahead of its time in terms of thinking that way too, so, because we're going back many years right now. So yeah, right. So then Cheryl Lee Ralph used that education background and brought that to Abbott Elementary. She's there now. Yeah, cool, awesome. All right, so, all right, this is fun. All right, so we got, and then you had, you were on with Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, co executive producer. There was, it was that fun? Carolyn Ray, all that you know, is that good?

Norma Safford Vela 33:00

Oh, it was a very fun show this. The writing staff was fun. The actors were fabulous. That was an early, early guest role for Bryan Cranston that that was fun. We had Raquel Welch rest in peace. And, you know, just able to get some really fun guest stars, blondie pin and tell her, trying to remember who else, just a ton of people. And the onset magic was really fun because Nell wanted, Nell Scoble wanted to do as much in camera magic as she could.

Jeff Dwoskin 33:35

Very cool magical show, not, not to jump around, but I was working with Pamela Anderson, you did a lot with VIP.

Norma Safford Vela 33:43

I actually, I respect and admire Pam a lot. She did not like me. I don't know why. I don't know what I did wrong, but I I was not her fan, a fan of hers. Now the other way around, which way is it? She didn't like me. I just wrote a lot, and was on set when I had to be and did my job politely and quietly, but boy, was she smart. She we would write her huge chunks of dialog, and she never missed a beat with it. She was always professional and smart and knew her cameras and knew her moves and knew the other actors stuff, and I remember watching her in rehearsal one day, and she's, you know, saying her lines, and I think it was we had Tom Jones as a guest, and one of her children came up behind her on set, and she just reached back behind her and hugged the little boy closer to her and kept doing her performance like nothing had changed and was fully present as a as a mom and an actress, both. That was really impressive.

Jeff Dwoskin 34:46

Very cool. She didn't take a swing. No one's funny. I know no one actually just Tom Arnold, just Tom you don't get along with like, the star and like, it's her vehicle. And because you were there at least a couple years, right? I mean, you wrote a lot of episodes, yeah, yeah. Was it just, are you a tough cookie on the set? What is it? Norma, oh,

Norma Safford Vela 35:10

I actually, I had a reputation for being able to work well with very difficult people. And that was also, that was Jay Daniels reputation. Why he was brought on to Roseanne because he could work with difficult people. And at that point, Tony Danza was a difficult person, and I worked with him, the Designing Women was packed that was a cast full of difficult people, and you just, you know, you were polite and professional and did your job. You know, you just don't engage with them in an emotional way. I was sad that Pam didn't like me, because I really respected her and admired her, and I thought she was really funny. So, yeah, you just do your job.

Jeff Dwoskin 35:47

Got it cool, and then connected with Bonnie. Hunt again. On Life with Bonnie, was that coincidence, or is she did Bonnie kind of bring you back? Bonnie

Norma Safford Vela 35:58

brought me back. She is an extremely loyal person. She, like Sam Dino, was on the writing staff that year, and she did that out of, you know, respect for older writers. And that's kind of where I was at that point. I was an older, older writer, you know, I had passed 40, I think. And, yeah, she just, she brought me back for that, and she was really careful about who she trusted, and she did not trust a lot of people so, but that's funny. Oh, but I, I do have a good body hunt sort of story that relates to Roseanne, if I can tell it briefly. When we were on Roseanne, Joss Whedon was a baby rider, and he was also frustrated that Danny and I were rewriting his scripts, and I went and talked to him one day, and I said, you just need to accept that this is the reality. This is what happens. Your work will always be rewritten by someone who's above you, until you're the person above everybody else. Is there something else you could work on? That's your work? And he said, Well, I have this vampire idea. I said, Great, work on that. Go do that. So then years later, I'm on the Bonnie Hunt show, and Doug Ellen is one of the writers. And I told him the story because he was also frustrated that his scripts were not getting used and I said, Well, let me tell you the story about Joss Whedon. Is there something else that you have that you want to work on? They said, Well, I have this other script. Maybe you could take a look at it and tell me if you think it's good. And we know what that was? It's

Jeff Dwoskin 37:21

funny. Look at you in entourage, right? Entourage. I look at you inspiring all this

Norma Safford Vela 37:28

the vampire. I just told him to get over their cheap selves and get to work. You know, go do the stuff they want to do, right?

Jeff Dwoskin 37:35

So you said Joss Whedon was a baby writer. Is that the phrase you what does that? What does that term mean? Exactly, and the hierarchy of the writing room.

Norma Safford Vela 37:43

He was a story editor, and it was his first professional job, and he was young. I mean, he had waist length hair, and he was just a little boy trying to write about this woman's family. So it was kind of like, what, what do you know?

Jeff Dwoskin 37:58

Who knew one day, Buffy and The Avengers, you know, right? Oh yeah, I used to rewrite that Avenger guy. Scripts really

Norma Safford Vela 38:08

good, you know, they were well written scripts, slick and stuff, but they were just, they just didn't have what we needed. Maturity wise.

Jeff Dwoskin 38:15

Got it. You needed to tweak it. And so besides inspiring Buffy, the Vampire Slayer and entourage. Any other, any other hidden gems in there that exist now because of you, Norma,

Norma Safford Vela 38:30

I can't think of anything off top my head. Those are my favorite

Jeff Dwoskin 38:34

stories, right? I don't mean to put pressure. I mean, those two alone are incredible.

Norma Safford Vela 38:41

Yeah, those are like, my Forrest Gump moments. You know, I just happened to be there saying, yeah, go do that. That's all I did.

Jeff Dwoskin 38:48

I don't know shit happens, yeah? What? That's right,

Norma Safford Vela 38:55

that's the story of my career, man. Shit happens.

Jeff Dwoskin 38:59

Talk to me about what you're up to these days.

Norma Safford Vela 39:01

I am a retired old lady. I have circled back around to what I really wanted to do, which is to be an artist. And I have a little art business, and I have I am opening my a little store on my property in Maine. I live in rural Maine. My son and daughter in law have a farm, and I take care of their two kids, and I do as little as humanly possible. As I am I am old and lazy.

Jeff Dwoskin 39:27

Well, you've earned it. You've earned it in your living, your dream. And that's amazing. I love that. That's great. Yeah, any advice for any aspiring women out there breaking into the world of entertainment.

Norma Safford Vela 39:40

Oh, just, just do it. Just, Please, God, we need more women writing. And right from from being a woman like that was one of the things I learned back on st elsewhere from Alfre Woodard, was her character as a doctor came in and she was so different and couldn't figure it out. And the difference was she wasn't trying to be a man. And. That was how I wrote as well. I didn't write trying to be a man or write like a man, and I wrote action stuff. I wrote fights and kids shows and all kinds of weird stuff, but I always wrote from the point of view of being female.

Jeff Dwoskin 40:14

Norma, thank you so much for sharing all these amazing stories. Oh, wait, Does your company have a website?

Norma Safford Vela 40:20

Yeah. Kettermain.com is my, is one of my little businesses, Yes,

Jeff Dwoskin 40:24

awesome. So everyone can check you out there. Yeah, come see me in Maine, yeah, for sure, thanks. I need to get out that way so well. Thank you so much for spending this time with me. I really appreciate it. Great stories. It was, it was great going through your career with you.

Norma Safford Vela 40:39

Thank you. Thanks for having me. Was fun. All

Jeff Dwoskin 40:41

right, how amazing was Norma Safford Vela, I know so many great stories, such a rich resume of writing and creating shows, amazing shows, loved every second. But with the interview over, it can only mean one thing. I know another episode has come and gone. I can't believe it either. Huge. Thank you to Norma once again for hanging with me, and, of course, a huge thank you to all of you for coming back week after week. It means the world to me, and I'll see you next time.

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