Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1475547
LITTLE RASCALS: Burrows (center, hands tucked under chin) in the Metropolitan Opera Children's Chorus production of "Carmen." Fred Dryer and Julia Duffy, were seriously considered, before the unfaked chemistry of Danson and Long won out — to the creation of the famous barroom set, the handiwork of legendary film production designer Rich- ard Sylbert. The look was not only warm and inviting but practical in the way sitcom sets must be. "Richard devised a walkway behind Norm's seat leading to the bathrooms and pool table with a front piece on wheels, a quadrangle," Burrows writes. "We would roll it out of the way to get to Sam's office, and the restrooms would disappear." In early seasons, Danson and Long's physical comedy necessitated staging that would keep the characters in front of the bar, "so the audiences, both in studio and at home, could see all the physical business." Four cameras rolled for five minutes at a time. "We had clean, high-quality close-ups," he writes. Burrows expresses appreciation to the higher-ups at NBC, including Tinker, Brandon Tartikoff, and Warren Littlefield, for sticking with a show that didn't take off into the stratosphere immediately. "With- out Grant, Brandon, and Warren, 'Cheers' might not have made it on the air past a couple of episodes," he writes. The series finale is discussed as the mega-event that it was in 1993. But without Burrows's devotion to his craft, "Cheers" would never have been as good as it was. His delight in his performers jumps off the page. About Long, he writes that she understood her character's mild pretentiousness — "a little strident but never over the line." He adds: "She could do a joke or comment or smirk on the boorish behavior of the guys," he writes. "Diane was always trying to educate them, including and especially Sam." In directing Bebe Neuwirth as Frasier's wife, Lilith, Burrows sought to minimize the performer's evident "beauty and talent." "Her Lilith had to be severe to be funny," he writes. (Neuwirth's training as a dancer also had to be toned down in an episode in which Lilith dances: "I P H O T O : B A L L A N T I N E B O O K S 'I can do a half hour on TV! And I know Mary!' 50 C I N E M O N T A G E B O O K R E V I E W