September 8, 2025 • 14 mins
TV Inside-Out is the tell almost-all book that exposes outrageous celebrity misbehavior, toxic dysfunctional relationships, senseless executive blunders, million dollar production foul-ups and a myriad of stunning revelations garnered from candid conversations with some of your favorite TV performers, as well as members of their entourages, the production staffs, and the crew members who keep their jobs by keeping these secrets. This is the first book to reveal the real-life drama behind TV's popular dramatic series, the misery at the happiest sitcoms, the private whispers in talk show dressing rooms, and the games people play behind the scenes at your favorite game shows. Compiled by a 30-year veteran of the conflicts and camaraderie, these are true stories that many insiders would rather remain untold. So much has been obscured by the laughs at favorite late-night shows, disguised by celebrities' Botox-enhanced smiles, masked by the applause of adoring fans, and protected by professional ethics and discretion-until now.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning, Randy. How are you doing?
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Good morning, I row, I'm really well. Thanks buddy boy.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
How did you.
Speaker 3 (00:05):
Get the guts to put out this book? Because there
is so much information and so much shock and awe
in it that it's like, give me some more, give
me some more.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I've got friends who've been staying up all night finishing
the book. It's that compelling. How did I get to
the nerve to do it? Hey, it's all true. It's
a great defense about anybody who may be offended by
It's true. You can't sue me. And I think the
world well, obviously from the reaction. The world loves to
hear the truth behind the people they've watched on television
their whole lives.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
The book we're talking about is TV inside outs, flukes, flakes,
feuds and felonies, Celebrities being you know, misbehaving. That seems
to be the accepted But at the same time, things
are kind of changing a little.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Bit these days.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Well they sure are. That's just the me too movement
and you know, Harvey Weinstein and all that is put
an end to some of the stuff that is written
about in the book. You know, Bill Cosby's insanity, Johnny
Carson's womanizing, Bob Barker and the models. I mean that
stuff isn't tolerated as it once was, Thankfully, I'm happy
to hear it. But this is a study not so
(01:10):
much about you know, the gossip who who's sleeping with who,
and who did drugs and all that. It's really not
about that to me. I was a psych major in college,
and it's fascinating to me, fascinating how people. You know,
if you ask somebody what would make you happy, well,
most of us would answer the money. I want a
lot of money and fame. Give me let everybody know
that I can get a best seat in a restaurant. Well,
(01:32):
the problem is, you get yourself on television. You get
a lot of money and a lot of fame very quickly. Well, geez,
you should be happy, right, Well, in reality, you end
up complicating your life. It gets more and more complex.
And once you get money and fame and you're not happy, well, geez,
what do you do? Then? That's when people that's when
people jump the rails.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
Well, I've always been fascinated with the stories after they've
had their fame on TV, because all of a sudden
they now have to deal with being a used to
be didn't you?
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Used to be? Didn't you? And having to deal with
that blank space is a tough walk.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah. Yeah. If people you know snapped you attention and
got you, you know, your favorite glass of water, you know,
I'll give you a quickie. I worked on The Nanny
for years and years with Fran Dresser, you know, nann
The Nanny, Lovely Lady, lovely lady. But they had a
great parade of guest stars come through that show, which
was wonderful to work with them. But Elizabeth Taylor came
(02:25):
to town and she needed her dressing room painted a
certain color, not just pink, it had to be a
specific shade. She had to have a certain bottle of water,
and her dog needed a different brand of bottle of water.
I'm serious. And she's only going to be there for
three days, you know, and paint job and linen and
(02:46):
all sorts of stuff had to be done for accommodating her.
It must be tough though, when people don't want to
do that for you anymore, that's got to be crazy.
But on the other hand, where there are so many
stories of that, you know, filling the void once you're
no longer you're famous. There's the other side, which is
people like Dick Van Dyke, ninety seven years old, happy,
got all his marbles and I sign right now if
(03:08):
you told me, I'd be lucid at ninety seven. And
he's he still dances a little bit every day. But
talking about somebody who's totally grounded and happy to talk
about the past, but not living in it. And he
just lives day to day, a happy life, fulfilled. What
else could I possibly ask for? Mary Poppins, the Dick
Van Dykes. Everything I ever wanted to do, Everything I
ever wanted to do, I've done. How wonderful and lucky
(03:30):
I am. That's a whole different story from some other people.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
Well, thanks to Antenna TV and me TV and the
HD efforts. I mean, I've gotten the opportunity to see
a male blank in a situation that many of us
didn't know existed.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
Now you're talking about Jack Benny and Mel Blank. Yes, yes, yeah, yeah,
because that's a fascinating story. Mel Blank did all those
cartoon voices, well most of them. He didn't do all
all of them, but he was the only one that
got credit because he wanted to raise and warner brothers
just sheep now as they were then, and most of
the studios are always watching the bottom line. They said,
we won't give any more money, but we'll give you
(04:06):
credit voice characterizations by Mel. Blank and some of the
other people who do some voices were upset with that.
But the primary person I got the information from was
June Foray was Rocky from Billwinkle and Rocky and so
many other great characters that we know, and she was like, no,
I had no issue with that at all. Mel was
the master and that was his domain and they loved
(04:27):
working together and to hear the stories. But voicing those
cartoons live, you know nowadays not everybody's in the same
studio and they're all zooming in or whatever. Or you
come in and you lay down your stuff and then
someone else comes in later and lay that. They did
these things live. There was no There was no tape
in those earliest days. There was no audio tape, never
mind videotape. And they would you cut this stuff to
(04:49):
film soundtrack it WHI was an optical system as opposed
to the tape that we know, and they would perform
these shows, these cartoons live. So you had some stuff
with red pencil arks and others was blue because you
had to change your voice. So if you're mel blank
and you're doing you know, bugs and Daffy at the
same time, you're really doing bugs and Daffy at the
same time, jumping from one to the other. It's crazy.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Wow, that's you know that. Being a voiceover actor, it's
very tough to even to do that, to pull something
like that off because you're switching gears so quickly and
if you if you get vocal burn, that's it for
you for the day.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
And you know what, he used to save Yosemite Sam
for Fridays. Yeah, and Carter used to riff his voice out,
you know, And that was Fridays and he was dead
for the next you know, for the next day, there
was no working. So that was the one accommodation made
for him about when to do which characters.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Please do not move.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
There's more with Reddy West coming up next. The name
of his book is TV Inside Out. We're back with
Reddy West. Would you would you ever want to be
a part of of a of a pr team that
when when you know that your actor or your talent
is is doing something wrong and now you've got to
get in there and clean up the mess.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
It's just another acting job. Yeah, isn't it now, isn't it?
Isn't it the same things?
Speaker 3 (06:08):
So Desi Arnez and the Mafia? Why have I never
heard this story before? And why have I never made
such a connection.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
It's amazing you haven't heard it, but most people haven't.
It's part of the Congressional record because the guy who
sang and told the story, he told it to Congress.
It was one of the mafia members who you know,
turned States evidence and went into the witness relocation program.
The story is, you know, how could Desi Arnez be
in trouble with the mafia? Well, it's simple. Desi was
a producer and additionally to playing Ricky Ricardo and his
(06:40):
company Desilu produced the show called The Untouchables, which was
based on a best selling book at the time which
was all about the mob, the Mafia and prohibition and
al Capone. And the book was out and al Capone's
widow make Upon was very upset about it. But when
she heard that Desi is going to do what a
TV show based on the bo Well, Desi first did
(07:01):
a pilot. It was a one hour show and it
aired in a program called the Westinghouse Playhouse, and she
saw it and hit the roof, called Desi and said,
you will not do that show because my husband's name
has been dragged through the mud quite enough already. You
know what's good for you and Desi, you know with that,
you know a lot and hot head kind of temper.
If I can use that, you know, kind of a stereotype.
(07:24):
Said Hey, if I don't do it, someone else will.
It's the best selling book. I bought the rights I
doing the show. So she dragged him at the court
for a million dollar suit because she felt that she
was defamed. You can't suit anybody for telling the al
Capone story. You know, it's a story. It's true, it's
a public record. But she felt she was being unfairly portrayed,
and the court threw her out. It's a true story.
(07:46):
If you come off in a poor light, that's an
issue of reality, you know, if that's how you see it.
So she sued Westinghouse and Desi and Desie aren't Az
and Desilu and got thrown out. Next step to her
was to call her son, whose listen to this? Who
knew it Desi's when he first came from Cuba, went
to school in Miami and was in the same school
with Al Capone's son. Oh wow, who would have thought? Yeah,
(08:08):
so you remember me. We went to school together. Please,
my mom is crazy about this. Don't do the show.
I'm doing the show. Next one, a call from Ma
Capone to sam g and Conna. Oh boy, watch out now,
now you're in the major league, right and sam Gie
and Kanna dispatches Frank Sinatra. Now, I'm not making all
any of this up. This is congressional record. Okay, this
(08:31):
is available for anybody. They kinda sends Frank Sinatra to
talk to Desi. They meet in Indian Springs, which is
near Palm Springs, California, and they have a few drinks
and good time and a good talk. And when Frank
turns through, hey, you really don't want to do this
show if you know what's good for you, he throws
him out of the house and throws them Frank. Frank
gets Amagi and Conna and said, he threw me out
(08:52):
of the house. I can't do anymore. Conna calls may
make a pone, and make a pone, pushes the button
as they say, and they put out a hit, and
when the when the mafia turns state evidence, his quote
to the government was he never knew how close he
got to being clipped one. That's true. So the guy
(09:15):
was Jimmy the Weasel Fratiano. I mean, this is a
well known mafia member. He named who they was going
to actually do the hit, and two weeks after the
hit being placed, thankfully to Dessi, it was called off.
Now why did they call it off? He did? The
TV show went off for seasons and seasons. They called
it off because the Mafia didn't want it was way
too high profile. They didn't want to be known as
(09:35):
the organization that killed Ricky Ricardo, never mind Desi. They
wanted to be thought of as killing Lucy's wife, Ricky Ricardo.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
So when you put a book together like this, I
believe that writers have their own voice and you have
your own speaking voice. Did the two collide in any
way when you were putting this book together?
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Well, as a voiceover actor performer, you know, as a
radio personality yourself, you used to telling stories in a
verbal way, and all I did was write down as
I was speaking. I mean I did reading to a
tape recorder. But the style of writing is me just
weaving a tale and telling a story, you know, racking tour,
you know's kind of telling the tale around the fireplace
(10:14):
and everybody going wow. Because I've told these stories at
cocktail parties and people just fascinated. I stopped telling them
because it just became me telling a story all night.
But I went back and vetted these stories with people
who were on the sets with these people, and nobody
has come forward and said there's any you know, disparagement
or it's all true. It's all true, And to me again,
(10:37):
it's fascinating again. Money and fame. You think life would
be free and easy, and that's when it first gets complicated.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Wow. So who's worse, the talent or the entourage.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
The entourage is easy to sign up, size up because
they're just looking for scraps. They're looking for whatever it
could be had. So their motivation is pure talent. You
never know what's going on. They want more control, they
want they want this, they want that Red Fox doing
Sanford and Son. He wanted more than anything else to
have more money and to have a dressing room with
a window. He had NBC going out of their minds
(11:11):
because they didn't have a room with a window. And
then they decided, even if we had one, we're not
giving it to them. Don't go through in Yeah, because
and why did they not like Red Fox. We's bringing
in ratings, that's for sure. But he was also doing
mountains of coke at the at the table read, he'd
be doing coke in front of the entire you know,
writers in the cast and everybody. And when they were
(11:32):
doing Sanford and Son, that was in Studio three at NBC,
and in Studio four was Flip Wilson and one of
the writers was Richie Pryor, and the coke went back
and forth and back and forth, and it went out
of control. The day they all coked up out of
his mind that Red Fox pulled a gun on an
NBC executive And the second call was to Norman Lear,
(11:53):
who'd been saying, you know, I've created a monster.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
With this show.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
I wish I didn't have to deal with Red Fox.
In fact, Norman Lear's stop dealing with it and handed
to his partner, Bud Tandem production partner, Bud York. And
that's the name. I'm sorry, handed the butt and Bud
is like I had the patience of a saint dealing
with But eventually, when NBC said, if you're done with him,
we are too, And that's when you started to see
(12:17):
episodes of Sandford the Sun without Red Fox, eventually the
show was canceled.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Wow, to hold this this wealth of knowledge, It's like,
now we want to see the pictures. We're all going
to jump back onto the flat screen to watch these
shows in a different way. But are you going to
create something for Netflix or Hulu or some streaming network
with all this information?
Speaker 2 (12:36):
No? No, I've not been approached, and I'm really not
interested in getting that deep into it. I have a career,
I have a life, and you know that would require
me to be, you know, a whole hog, twenty hour
days for months on end. I mean, it's a lot
of work doing. I've known all too well how much
it goes into producing a show and how many sleepless nights.
(12:56):
So I'm just happy to write a book. I mean,
I'm you know, I'm not looking for aim and money,
because I know what that brings. I'm just looking to
have a happy life and tell some stories. And you know,
it's all good, it's all good. I've had a great career,
you know, as you know, off camera and on camera
talent as an announcer in game shows and sitcoms and
stuff like that. And I'm very happy. I'm one of
(13:18):
the few people you'll meet, probably in Burbank or anywhere
near zip code that is fully satisfied with their lives.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
How did you deal with the executives?
Speaker 3 (13:26):
Because you know, as the talent and the ones that
are really taking a chance with our gift, the executives
tend to make decisions that interfere with where we want
to grow. How did you personally have to deal with that?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
You swallow? You swallow what you need to swallow to
get the job. You know, would I rather be somewhere
else doing something else? Know, what's it going to require
me to stay here? I'll do it. Yeah, you know,
it's just a very conscious, simple decision, you know. And if,
of course, if you're living out of your head some
wacky place with an ego that's out of control, I'm
not doing that. Well. I can't believe that people actually
(13:58):
say that you get in the play and the choice,
you know, in the joystore, what's the admission? All right?
I'll pay you?
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Yeah, Well, congratulations on the book. TV inside Out flukes, flakes,
feuds and felonies, and listeners need to understand this. This
is a book that is really not only entertaining but informative.
And I love books that get inside the imagination like that.
Thank you, Erro, Thank you so much. Please come back
to the show anytime in the future. The door is
always going to be open for you, Randy.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
I appreciate that I loved you. You'd loved you, you'd
be brilliant today. Okay, thank you you too, my friend,
Good morning, Randy. How are you doing?
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Good morning, I row, I'm really well. Thanks buddy boy.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
How did you.
Speaker 3 (00:05):
Get the guts to put out this book? Because there
is so much information and so much shock and awe
in it that it's like, give me some more, give
me some more.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I've got friends who've been staying up all night finishing
the book. It's that compelling. How did I get to
the nerve to do it? Hey, it's all true. It's
a great defense about anybody who may be offended by
It's true. You can't sue me. And I think the
world well, obviously from the reaction. The world loves to
hear the truth behind the people they've watched on television
their whole lives.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
The book we're talking about is TV inside outs, flukes, flakes,
feuds and felonies, Celebrities being you know, misbehaving. That seems
to be the accepted But at the same time, things
are kind of changing a little.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Bit these days.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Well they sure are. That's just the me too movement
and you know, Harvey Weinstein and all that is put
an end to some of the stuff that is written
about in the book. You know, Bill Cosby's insanity, Johnny
Carson's womanizing, Bob Barker and the models. I mean that
stuff isn't tolerated as it once was, Thankfully, I'm happy
to hear it. But this is a study not so
(01:10):
much about you know, the gossip who who's sleeping with who,
and who did drugs and all that. It's really not
about that to me. I was a psych major in college,
and it's fascinating to me, fascinating how people. You know,
if you ask somebody what would make you happy, well,
most of us would answer the money. I want a
lot of money and fame. Give me let everybody know
that I can get a best seat in a restaurant. Well,
(01:32):
the problem is, you get yourself on television. You get
a lot of money and a lot of fame very quickly. Well, geez,
you should be happy, right, Well, in reality, you end
up complicating your life. It gets more and more complex.
And once you get money and fame and you're not happy, well, geez,
what do you do? Then? That's when people that's when
people jump the rails.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
Well, I've always been fascinated with the stories after they've
had their fame on TV, because all of a sudden
they now have to deal with being a used to
be didn't you?
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Used to be? Didn't you? And having to deal with
that blank space is a tough walk.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah. Yeah. If people you know snapped you attention and
got you, you know, your favorite glass of water, you know,
I'll give you a quickie. I worked on The Nanny
for years and years with Fran Dresser, you know, nann
The Nanny, Lovely Lady, lovely lady. But they had a
great parade of guest stars come through that show, which
was wonderful to work with them. But Elizabeth Taylor came
(02:25):
to town and she needed her dressing room painted a
certain color, not just pink, it had to be a
specific shade. She had to have a certain bottle of water,
and her dog needed a different brand of bottle of water.
I'm serious. And she's only going to be there for
three days, you know, and paint job and linen and
(02:46):
all sorts of stuff had to be done for accommodating her.
It must be tough though, when people don't want to
do that for you anymore, that's got to be crazy.
But on the other hand, where there are so many
stories of that, you know, filling the void once you're
no longer you're famous. There's the other side, which is
people like Dick Van Dyke, ninety seven years old, happy,
got all his marbles and I sign right now if
(03:08):
you told me, I'd be lucid at ninety seven. And
he's he still dances a little bit every day. But
talking about somebody who's totally grounded and happy to talk
about the past, but not living in it. And he
just lives day to day, a happy life, fulfilled. What
else could I possibly ask for? Mary Poppins, the Dick
Van Dykes. Everything I ever wanted to do, Everything I
ever wanted to do, I've done. How wonderful and lucky
(03:30):
I am. That's a whole different story from some other people.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
Well, thanks to Antenna TV and me TV and the
HD efforts. I mean, I've gotten the opportunity to see
a male blank in a situation that many of us
didn't know existed.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
Now you're talking about Jack Benny and Mel Blank. Yes, yes, yeah, yeah,
because that's a fascinating story. Mel Blank did all those
cartoon voices, well most of them. He didn't do all
all of them, but he was the only one that
got credit because he wanted to raise and warner brothers
just sheep now as they were then, and most of
the studios are always watching the bottom line. They said,
we won't give any more money, but we'll give you
(04:06):
credit voice characterizations by Mel. Blank and some of the
other people who do some voices were upset with that.
But the primary person I got the information from was
June Foray was Rocky from Billwinkle and Rocky and so
many other great characters that we know, and she was like, no,
I had no issue with that at all. Mel was
the master and that was his domain and they loved
(04:27):
working together and to hear the stories. But voicing those
cartoons live, you know nowadays not everybody's in the same
studio and they're all zooming in or whatever. Or you
come in and you lay down your stuff and then
someone else comes in later and lay that. They did
these things live. There was no There was no tape
in those earliest days. There was no audio tape, never
mind videotape. And they would you cut this stuff to
(04:49):
film soundtrack it WHI was an optical system as opposed
to the tape that we know, and they would perform
these shows, these cartoons live. So you had some stuff
with red pencil arks and others was blue because you
had to change your voice. So if you're mel blank
and you're doing you know, bugs and Daffy at the
same time, you're really doing bugs and Daffy at the
same time, jumping from one to the other. It's crazy.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Wow, that's you know that. Being a voiceover actor, it's
very tough to even to do that, to pull something
like that off because you're switching gears so quickly and
if you if you get vocal burn, that's it for
you for the day.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
And you know what, he used to save Yosemite Sam
for Fridays. Yeah, and Carter used to riff his voice out,
you know, And that was Fridays and he was dead
for the next you know, for the next day, there
was no working. So that was the one accommodation made
for him about when to do which characters.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Please do not move.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
There's more with Reddy West coming up next. The name
of his book is TV Inside Out. We're back with
Reddy West. Would you would you ever want to be
a part of of a of a pr team that
when when you know that your actor or your talent
is is doing something wrong and now you've got to
get in there and clean up the mess.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
It's just another acting job. Yeah, isn't it now, isn't it?
Isn't it the same things?
Speaker 3 (06:08):
So Desi Arnez and the Mafia? Why have I never
heard this story before? And why have I never made
such a connection.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
It's amazing you haven't heard it, but most people haven't.
It's part of the Congressional record because the guy who
sang and told the story, he told it to Congress.
It was one of the mafia members who you know,
turned States evidence and went into the witness relocation program.
The story is, you know, how could Desi Arnez be
in trouble with the mafia? Well, it's simple. Desi was
a producer and additionally to playing Ricky Ricardo and his
(06:40):
company Desilu produced the show called The Untouchables, which was
based on a best selling book at the time which
was all about the mob, the Mafia and prohibition and
al Capone. And the book was out and al Capone's
widow make Upon was very upset about it. But when
she heard that Desi is going to do what a
TV show based on the bo Well, Desi first did
(07:01):
a pilot. It was a one hour show and it
aired in a program called the Westinghouse Playhouse, and she
saw it and hit the roof, called Desi and said,
you will not do that show because my husband's name
has been dragged through the mud quite enough already. You
know what's good for you and Desi, you know with that,
you know a lot and hot head kind of temper.
If I can use that, you know, kind of a stereotype.
(07:24):
Said Hey, if I don't do it, someone else will.
It's the best selling book. I bought the rights I
doing the show. So she dragged him at the court
for a million dollar suit because she felt that she
was defamed. You can't suit anybody for telling the al
Capone story. You know, it's a story. It's true, it's
a public record. But she felt she was being unfairly portrayed,
and the court threw her out. It's a true story.
(07:46):
If you come off in a poor light, that's an
issue of reality, you know, if that's how you see it.
So she sued Westinghouse and Desi and Desie aren't Az
and Desilu and got thrown out. Next step to her
was to call her son, whose listen to this? Who
knew it Desi's when he first came from Cuba, went
to school in Miami and was in the same school
with Al Capone's son. Oh wow, who would have thought? Yeah,
(08:08):
so you remember me. We went to school together. Please,
my mom is crazy about this. Don't do the show.
I'm doing the show. Next one, a call from Ma
Capone to sam g and Conna. Oh boy, watch out now,
now you're in the major league, right and sam Gie
and Kanna dispatches Frank Sinatra. Now, I'm not making all
any of this up. This is congressional record. Okay, this
(08:31):
is available for anybody. They kinda sends Frank Sinatra to
talk to Desi. They meet in Indian Springs, which is
near Palm Springs, California, and they have a few drinks
and good time and a good talk. And when Frank
turns through, hey, you really don't want to do this
show if you know what's good for you, he throws
him out of the house and throws them Frank. Frank
gets Amagi and Conna and said, he threw me out
(08:52):
of the house. I can't do anymore. Conna calls may
make a pone, and make a pone, pushes the button
as they say, and they put out a hit, and
when the when the mafia turns state evidence, his quote
to the government was he never knew how close he
got to being clipped one. That's true. So the guy
(09:15):
was Jimmy the Weasel Fratiano. I mean, this is a
well known mafia member. He named who they was going
to actually do the hit, and two weeks after the
hit being placed, thankfully to Dessi, it was called off.
Now why did they call it off? He did? The
TV show went off for seasons and seasons. They called
it off because the Mafia didn't want it was way
too high profile. They didn't want to be known as
(09:35):
the organization that killed Ricky Ricardo, never mind Desi. They
wanted to be thought of as killing Lucy's wife, Ricky Ricardo.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
So when you put a book together like this, I
believe that writers have their own voice and you have
your own speaking voice. Did the two collide in any
way when you were putting this book together?
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Well, as a voiceover actor performer, you know, as a
radio personality yourself, you used to telling stories in a
verbal way, and all I did was write down as
I was speaking. I mean I did reading to a
tape recorder. But the style of writing is me just
weaving a tale and telling a story, you know, racking tour,
you know's kind of telling the tale around the fireplace
(10:14):
and everybody going wow. Because I've told these stories at
cocktail parties and people just fascinated. I stopped telling them
because it just became me telling a story all night.
But I went back and vetted these stories with people
who were on the sets with these people, and nobody
has come forward and said there's any you know, disparagement
or it's all true. It's all true, And to me again,
(10:37):
it's fascinating again. Money and fame. You think life would
be free and easy, and that's when it first gets complicated.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Wow. So who's worse, the talent or the entourage.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
The entourage is easy to sign up, size up because
they're just looking for scraps. They're looking for whatever it
could be had. So their motivation is pure talent. You
never know what's going on. They want more control, they
want they want this, they want that Red Fox doing
Sanford and Son. He wanted more than anything else to
have more money and to have a dressing room with
a window. He had NBC going out of their minds
(11:11):
because they didn't have a room with a window. And
then they decided, even if we had one, we're not
giving it to them. Don't go through in Yeah, because
and why did they not like Red Fox. We's bringing
in ratings, that's for sure. But he was also doing
mountains of coke at the at the table read, he'd
be doing coke in front of the entire you know,
writers in the cast and everybody. And when they were
(11:32):
doing Sanford and Son, that was in Studio three at NBC,
and in Studio four was Flip Wilson and one of
the writers was Richie Pryor, and the coke went back
and forth and back and forth, and it went out
of control. The day they all coked up out of
his mind that Red Fox pulled a gun on an
NBC executive And the second call was to Norman Lear,
(11:53):
who'd been saying, you know, I've created a monster.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
With this show.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
I wish I didn't have to deal with Red Fox.
In fact, Norman Lear's stop dealing with it and handed
to his partner, Bud Tandem production partner, Bud York. And
that's the name. I'm sorry, handed the butt and Bud
is like I had the patience of a saint dealing
with But eventually, when NBC said, if you're done with him,
we are too, And that's when you started to see
(12:17):
episodes of Sandford the Sun without Red Fox, eventually the
show was canceled.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Wow, to hold this this wealth of knowledge, It's like,
now we want to see the pictures. We're all going
to jump back onto the flat screen to watch these
shows in a different way. But are you going to
create something for Netflix or Hulu or some streaming network
with all this information?
Speaker 2 (12:36):
No? No, I've not been approached, and I'm really not
interested in getting that deep into it. I have a career,
I have a life, and you know that would require
me to be, you know, a whole hog, twenty hour
days for months on end. I mean, it's a lot
of work doing. I've known all too well how much
it goes into producing a show and how many sleepless nights.
(12:56):
So I'm just happy to write a book. I mean,
I'm you know, I'm not looking for aim and money,
because I know what that brings. I'm just looking to
have a happy life and tell some stories. And you know,
it's all good, it's all good. I've had a great career,
you know, as you know, off camera and on camera
talent as an announcer in game shows and sitcoms and
stuff like that. And I'm very happy. I'm one of
(13:18):
the few people you'll meet, probably in Burbank or anywhere
near zip code that is fully satisfied with their lives.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
How did you deal with the executives?
Speaker 3 (13:26):
Because you know, as the talent and the ones that
are really taking a chance with our gift, the executives
tend to make decisions that interfere with where we want
to grow. How did you personally have to deal with that?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
You swallow? You swallow what you need to swallow to
get the job. You know, would I rather be somewhere
else doing something else? Know, what's it going to require
me to stay here? I'll do it. Yeah, you know,
it's just a very conscious, simple decision, you know. And if,
of course, if you're living out of your head some
wacky place with an ego that's out of control, I'm
not doing that. Well. I can't believe that people actually
(13:58):
say that you get in the play and the choice,
you know, in the joystore, what's the admission? All right?
I'll pay you?
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Yeah, Well, congratulations on the book. TV inside Out flukes, flakes,
feuds and felonies, and listeners need to understand this. This
is a book that is really not only entertaining but informative.
And I love books that get inside the imagination like that.
Thank you, Erro, Thank you so much. Please come back
to the show anytime in the future. The door is
always going to be open for you, Randy.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
I appreciate that I loved you. You'd loved you, you'd
be brilliant today. Okay, thank you you too, my friend,
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