The Importance of Being Ernie: Read online

  In 1960, the concept for MTS was quite fresh and new: a widowed father struggling to raise his three boys in an all-male household. It was a radical departure from the other TV family shows that were popular at the time such as The Donna Reed Show, Ozzie and Harriet, and Father Knows Best. Those shows had two loving parents raising their children in spotless households in near perfect harmony. MTS was going to depict a new kind of American family: a single parent with kids. This prototype was to become a staple in films and on TV shows years later.

  Don Fedderson is cited as the “creator” of MTS, but Peter Tewksbury, the pilot’s director, was a major force in developing the show’s originality. He fleshed out the brotherly relationships and shaped the whimsical comedic tone that became a hallmark of the show.

  Tewksbury decided that the all-male household of MTS, lacking the feminine touch, would be in a constant state of disarray with the family dog asleep on the recliner, crumpled laundry piling up on the sofa, and stacks of mealtime dishes in the sink. Tewksbury also told the younger sons, Chip and Robbie, to take a shortcut midway down the staircase and leap over the banister. These were hardly revolutionary ideas, but they were true to the show’s premise and created a new, perhaps more honest, version of an American household.

  When the pilot aired in 1960, the viewing audience saw a lot of themselves in this new TV family and fell in love. Every girl wanted to coddle this motherless clan, and every boy wanted to join their chaotic ranks. The show was an instant smash hit.

  Thirty-nine episodes were filmed in the first season. Working in multiple episodes every day was key to making the MacMurray Method viable. Every day there was a frantic daily scramble to film the star’s scenes. Occasionally, only half a scene would be filmed, if MacMurray’s character exited in the middle of the action. In such cases, the actors would freeze in place the second he walked off camera and a still photographer would take a Polaroid picture catching the moment.

  Months later, when it was time to complete the scene, the actors would look at the Polaroid photo, assume the “frozen” positions, and then pick up the action from there. Once the editors assembled all the footage, the final cut would look seamless, like it was all shot on the same day.

  Maintaining continuity was the biggest challenge to success of the MacMurray Method. Hair would have to be kept at the same length and color all season long; an actor’s weight couldn’t fluctuate, either. Occasionally, Mother Nature had her say because the younger sons, Stan and Don, were still growing. A sudden growth spurt could easily occur in the intervening months between filming parts of the same scene. Wardrobe that fit in January might be too small in June. To deal with such problems, the costume designer bought doubles of everything: shirts, pants, dress suits. Sometimes he’d even buy larger sizes of the same outfits, trying to outwit Mother Nature’s whims.

  Credit should be given where credit is due. The production manager for MTS, John Stephens, was the scheduling wizard who made sure that no shot was forgotten. Without Stephens keeping track of every missing scene, half-scene, or matching close-up, the MacMurray Method would have collapsed into MacMurray Madness. The star realized his importance to the show, too.

  Stephens had a salary dispute with Don Fedderson one year, and the boss told him that he was fired. Before walking off the studio lot, Stephens stopped by MacMurray’s trailer to say good-bye. Once the star heard about Stephens’s leaving, he immediately got on the phone to Fedderson. Stephens was rehired that same day, with a substantial raise. Money was never better spent.

  CHAPTER 8

  Moving Up in the World

  Now that my brother was working full-time on MTS, Ozzie Nelson needed someone to fill Stan’s recurring role on his show. He didn’t have to look far. Since I’d already done a couple of episodes, Ozzie was familiar with my acting ability, and our mutual love of chocolate ice cream. I officially became Barry, the little neighbor boy, who would accompany Oz to the malt shop or play catch with him.

  My stature as a child actor took a big leap when the Nelsons gave me my first “guest star billing.” It was in an episode that Ozzie specifically wrote for me called “The Little House Guest.”

  The story called for my character to spend the night with the Nelsons. My parents were going to the hospital to have a baby, and I was dead set on having a little brother. Ozzie, Harriet, Rick, and Dave had to convince me that a baby sister would be just as good as a baby brother, but my preference in genders was unwavering. In the end, after a few trips to the malt shop and a couple of bowls of chocolate ice cream, Ozzie’s gentle counseling won me over.

  There was one other very cool perk that I got while working with the Nelsons: watching Rick Nelson, a major rock-and-roll star, premiere new songs like “Hello, Mary Lou” or “Travelin’ Man” on the show. Ozzie was no dummy. He understood the power of the TV medium in selling a product. Whenever Rick was about to release his next single, Ozzie wrote a high school sock-hop scene into an episode so his son could perform the song. A TV audience of thirty million people would hear it, and the record would zoom to number one across the country. It was MTV the Ozzie Nelson way.

  Suddenly, I was earning good money with the Nelsons and Stan was pulling down a big weekly paycheck as a series regular on MTS. By law, parents of working children are entitled to a portion of their kids’ earnings but only after a percentage of their salary is set aside and put into a trust account. The child actors can collect the trust money when they turn eighteen. This regulation is known as the Coogan Law, enacted after an early child star, Jackie Coogan, saw his entire fortune squandered by his reckless parents.

  My parents generously decided to exceed the minimum requirement of 10 percent set aside in a trust and raised it to 20 percent. The parents could use the remaining 80 percent in any way they deemed necessary. This was fine by my brother and me, especially since our standard of living was on the rise. Not long before the showbiz bucks starting rolling in, we were near the poverty level. Now we were on the fast track toward a respectable middle-class lifestyle.

  One of the family’s first luxury purchases was a two-door, canary yellow Cadillac, a beautiful tank. My most vivid memory of the Caddie is how heavy it seemed, particularly the doors after my mom accidentally slammed my hand in one. Fortunately, I was such a little guy that my mitt was only squished and not broken.

  My parents also bought a house in Laurel Canyon in the Hollywood Hills. The rough-and-tumble street scene on Wilcox Avenue was replaced by the serene beauty of the canyon.

  I enrolled in a new school, too, Wonderland Avenue Elementary. Making new friends was especially hard in the Canyon because everybody lived so far apart; houses were spread out all over the mountain. At my old apartment, I had a slew of pals living right next door. My new home was like an outpost on the moon.

  Needless to say, I wasn’t happy until I made a startling discovery. The sprawling property next door to us once belonged to the infamous magician Harry Houdini. His ghost supposedly haunted a burned-down mansion there. Laurel Canyon suddenly got a whole lot more interesting.

  Harry Houdini died years earlier, and his abandoned property had become a jungle of plants and shrubs. The ruins of his stately home had been swallowed up by the foliage like some buried Mayan temple. It was creepy as hell. According to legend, Houdini regularly held séances and was able to contact the dead. Some of my new classmates swore that a ghost walked the property every full moon ... armed with an axe. Some even said that Houdini actually died on the property after somebody lodged the same axe in his back. An axe is always a swell schoolyard embellishment. It didn’t take much to convince me that every gruesome tale was true; my imagination was scarred by too many gory Roger Corman monster movies.

  As the next full moon approached, a debate raged between my brother and me: should we face our fears and explore the foreboding grounds or was it just too dangerous to mess with Houdini’s ghost? I argued for the latter ... and lost. Younger brothers usually do in such matters. A
nighttime excursion was planned with a few old pals from Wilcox Street.

  The night of the full moon arrived. Stan, Ray Canada, Alan Nickolleti, and I hiked up into the hills and entered the estate from the rear by climbing a rotted wooden fence. My heart pounded so hard I could hear it. If the ghost wasn’t scary enough, we’d recently learned that a surly caretaker also lived somewhere on the property. He was supposedly meaner than hell, no doubt pissed off by the intrusions of kids like us. I knew from experience that angry security guards were just as scary as evil spirits. My eyes were open wide for either man or apparition.

  We crept deeper onto the property, picking our way through a dense jungle, and stumbled upon a stone path. We followed the man-made trail as it snaked through the canopy of towering date palms. It led us straight to the charred ruins of the main house.

  There was nothing left of the mansion except for a huge rectangular cement foundation and two stone fireplaces that loomed in the darkness like sentinels. Under the gray moonlight, we scoured the cracked concrete in search of underground secret passages, the main goal of our expedition that night. Had we found one, it would have been like discovering King Tut’s tomb; the bragging rights would have lasted a lifetime.

  We probed the ground, prying up broken chunks of concrete, and found nothing but dirt. Then, we heard something: a far-off, blood-curdling howl. My body froze and my eyes darted back and forth, trying to penetrate the dark jungle surrounding us. The high-pitched howls grew angrier, more intense. Some kind of monster, alive or dead, was clawing its way through the bushes and closing in on us.

  “Let’s get out of here!” Stan screamed. I needed no more prompting.

  We dove into the thick shrubs. As I ran, tree branches lashed my face, unleashed by the fleeing kid in front of me. Nothing slowed me down, though. I was at the rear of the pack and knew I would be the first to be eaten. Looking over my shoulder, I finally saw a predator tearing through the bushes. It was a sinewy Doberman pinscher in full gallop, twenty yards behind and closing fast.

  Up ahead was a chain-link fence. Ray and Alan climbed it in two seconds flat. Just as Stan was about to climb, he looked at me and saw that I wasn’t going to escape the canine. Casting his own safety aside, Stan ran back for me like John Wayne returning for a fallen comrade. He grabbed my collar and dragged me to the fence as the Doberman arrived. The mad dog had his pick of legs hanging down and chose Stan’s. I only knew this after I heard my brother’s panicked cries; I continued to climb the chain link like a scared monkey. It was “fight or flight,” and I opted for the latter.

  I reached the top of the fence and looked down. It was a terrible sight. The beast’s head was flailing back and forth with Stan’s leg in its jaws. It looked like a velociraptor toying with a natural enemy before tearing it to pieces. Amid Stan’s screams and the dog’s guttural snarls, the bottom half of my brother’s jeans ripped right off. He was suddenly free of the dog’s bite and flew over the fence like a ninja.

  We dropped to the ground on the safe side of the fence and watched the insane Doberman gnaw on the fence, trying to chew through steel to get at us. A flashlight’s beam sliced through the jungle and was coming our way. I didn’t care if it was the caretaker or the ghost of Houdini; I’d had enough fun for one night. I ran home and never looked back.

  We lived next to Houdini’s mansion for more than three years, and I never ventured back onto the grounds again. In my mind, the Doberman might have been the spirit of the great Houdini himself, and I wasn’t taking any chances.

  CHAPTER 9

  My Six Loves

  I had done two movies for Paramount: The Errand Boy and Papa’s Delicate Condition. I must have impressed somebody at the studio because in late 1962 they offered me a great supporting role in My Six Loves, an upcoming film starring Debbie Reynolds and Cliff Robertson.

  There were a couple of odd coincidences regarding this project. First, the title of this movie, My Six Loves, was similar to my brother’s show, My Three Sons. Second, between shooting seasons on MTS, Stan got a job in an epic Western How the West Was Won, which also starred Debbie Reynolds. She was the biggest female star in Hollywood, very much in demand, and worked with me on the weekdays and then flew off to Arizona on the weekends to work with Stan on the Western. This is how Ms. Reynolds came by her reputation as a workaholic.

  My Six Loves had another unique distinction. The famed cult novelist, John Fante, author of Ask the Dust, wrote the screenplay. Fante was moonlighting to earn some studio bucks to fund his true passion, noir novels about the low life of Los Angeles.

  This is only one of two films helmed by the great stage director Gower Champion. He was the guiding force on Broadway behind Hello Dolly, Bye Bye Birdie, and Carnival. My Six Loves was going to be his big break into films.

  Champion liked me and kept adding little moments in scenes for my character. One unique bit of business was flushing toilets. I played Sherman, one of six hillbilly orphans given refuge by Reynolds at her lavish country home. Champion figured that my character would never have seen indoor plumbing, hence the flushing fixation. The sound of a flushing toilet preceded my entrance into almost every scene, and the gag got quite a laugh in the movie theaters.

  Another star in the movie, David Janssen, also took a shine to me. He played a slick showbiz manager and was forever offering me his cigar to smoke in our scenes.

  During filming, Debbie Reynolds took my mother aside and said, “Barry has natural comedic timing.” That was a great compliment from a hugely talented star, something I’ll always cherish.

  CHAPTER 10

  The Amazing TV

  Whenever I had free time while working on My Six Loves at Paramount, I’d explore the lot. You never knew what you’d encounter: Nazi tanks, alien spaceships, movie stars, you name it. One day I spotted a brand-new, gleaming white Cadillac limo that was as long as an oil tanker. It was idling outside a soundstage and the back doors were open. I couldn’t resist peeking inside.

  The limo’s interior was like a vision of heaven, all snowy white and pristine. The ivory-colored carpet was plush as polar bear fur, and the creamy leather seats looked edible, like tuck-and-roll white fudge. A highly polished wooden control board was imbedded in the compartment’s ceiling with gold-plated toggle switches. Then, I spotted the most amazing sight of all: a television set! I’d only heard rumors of such advanced technology, and now here it was, man’s next great step into the future: mobile entertainment! You could ride all over town, in the lap of limo luxury, and not miss a single second of the best shows: The Mickey Mouse Club, Bugs Bunny, and Rin-Tin-Tin. This idea boggled my eight-year-old mind, particularly since our boxy old Philco TV at home barely got reception unless you slapped the damn thing silly and tweaked its rabbit-ear antennae.

  I ogled the limo’s television and figured its picture clarity had to be top of the line, just like whoever owned this limo. He was probably a famous inventor like Thomas Edison, or maybe even an astronaut, John Glenn perhaps. Just then, a voice drawled in a deep Southern accent, “Ya like it?”

  I turned around to see who could ask such a silly and obvious question. Holy crap! It was Elvis Presley, The King of Rock and Roll. He was towering over me, dressed in a colorful, loose-fitting Hawaiian shirt. His famous upper lip was raised on the left side with a half smile, half sneer, like in pictures I’d seen of him.

  “They just finished the custom work and brought it over,” Elvis said, stroking the glossy white paint on the car’s roof. He leaned over and peered inside the rear compartment. The King’s nose was inches away from mine; a loose strand of his raven black hair, slick and shiny, dangled in front of his eyes. “What do ya think?”

  Up close, his skin looked smooth as butter because it was coated with a heavy bronze makeup. He almost looked fake, like a walking-talking wax replica of himself. “I like the TV ...uh ... Elvis.” I said his name tentatively, testing it out to see how he’d react.

  He laughed, climbed into the rear cabin, and
settled into the leather seat, pushing down on it with his hands, assessing the firmness. Elvis seemed impressed. “I like TV, too,” he said. “Let’s see what’s on.”

  He flipped one of the gold-plated toggle switches on the overhead console. The television came alive, making an odd sizzling noise, and then a scrambled black-and-white image on the screen became perfectly clear. I knew it! The picture was better than our crummy old Philco. Not only that, Popeye the Sailor, one of my favorite cartoons, was showing.

  “I’m gonna take her for a lil’ test drive ’round the lot. Wanna come along?” Elvis asked.

  Hell, yeah, I wanted to go! Just then, my mother’s stern voice popped into my head: Never ride with a stranger, Barry. Then, a different, sneakier voice whispered: Elvis is no stranger. Everybody knows Elvis! He’s probably the most famous guy in the world!

  “Ya comin’?” Elvis asked again, snapping me out of my reverie.

  I glanced up and down the studio’s bustling corridor. Mom was nowhere in sight. The temptation was immense. A ride with Elvis was definitely a draw, but the chance to watch Popeye from the back of a rolling limo was the clincher. I hopped in.

  Seconds later, Elvis and I were cruising the lot as the limo driver kept the car moving forward at a steady five miles per hour. We sat next to each other, transfixed by the action on TV: Brutus molested Popeye’s girlfriend, Olive Oil, until the scrappy sailor, pumped up on spinach, whomped the bad guy’s ass. Popeye’s spinning, muscle-swollen forearm socked Brutus so hard that the bearded villain flew into space, orbited the moon twice, and then returned to Earth, landing in a pile of cow crap in a pasture. Elvis chuckled.

  When Popeye began to warble, “I’m Popeye the sailor man,” the singer flicked off the set. I figured the sailor’s scratchy voice probably bugged Elvis, him being the King and all. Secretly, I was a bit irked. I wanted to watch the cartoon until the very last credit rolled. It was his limo, though, so I didn’t whine like I would have if my mom had done such a thing.