Live From New York - James H. Miller [97]
ROBIN SHLIEN:
Woody Allen was best friends with Jean Doumanian, who was the associate producer when I was there, and he would call the control room constantly and talk to her. Woody Allen would always call as “Mo Golden.” And the second day I was there, I got this call for Jean Doumanian and had to say, “Jean, it’s Mo Golden calling.” We always had to answer the control room phone. I didn’t think anything of it, and then somebody said, “It’s Woody Allen.”
We never knew if she knew that we knew. We had to pretend that we all thought this guy calling her was Mo Golden and not Woody Allen. He called all the time. Sometimes it was like every five minutes. And we were just like, “What the fuck?”
JAMES DOWNEY:
Jean was like a fashion person. It was all about restaurants and clothes and stuff. She didn’t seem to me to have much of a sense of humor. The only time I’ve gone to a party where I was kind of awestruck was when she called me and said, “Woody Allen’s going to have a party,” and Woody apparently never had parties. And when she called me she said, “Don’t tell anybody else.” It was like 1980, ’81, and I went with my college girlfriend. It was in Woody’s house, I thought it was his house, because it was a townhouse. You went upstairs. You actually met him at the door and he like stayed there the whole evening with Jean, who would assure him that whoever came through the door was not a dangerous or menacing person.
Walt Frazier was the first person I saw, then John Lindsay. It was a very New York thing, and the best collection of camera-shy, publicity-shy, retiring type people I’d ever seen. Paul Newman was there, Truman Capote, even Jackie Kennedy.
In one of the last sketches of Saturday Night Live ’s fifth season, Laraine Newman played a noblewoman, Garrett Morris played a butler, writers Jim Downey and Tom Davis played Lords Worcestershire and Wilkinson — of sauce and razor-blade fame, respectively — Jane Curtin was Lady Wilkinson, Bill Murray played the Earl of Sandwich (“I’m afraid nothing has been named after a member of my family,” he lamented), his brother Brian Doyle-Murray was a servant, and host Buck Henry joined Gilda Radner to play the principal characters of the sketch, Lord and Lady Douchebag. The setting was the manor of Lord Salisbury, whose steaks were served to the guests, and the year 1730. “My dear Sandwich,” said Henry, in character, “Parliament has always had its share of Douchebags, and it always will.”
And on this mildly satirical and intentionally ridiculous note, what was left of the original cast and creators of Saturday Night Live would soon part, never to perform together again. The stakes were being pulled up and the circus was leaving town. It was May 24, 1980, the end of the fifth season but also of an era. Lorne ended the last show on a shot of theON AIRsign going off.
JEAN DOUMANIAN:
I think Lorne would’ve stayed on, but NBC wouldn’t give him the deal he wanted. So he went away. Lorne wasn’t very happy about me getting the job. Because after all, it was Lorne’s baby, and he wanted Franken and Davis to get it. But Silverman didn’t want them, and Brandon didn’t want them either. They thought that I could do it.
I had been in every writers meeting when Lorne was producing. I had seen how the writing was done. Besides, Lorne really wasn’t writing, he was editing and selecting. I took the job because I thought it would be a challenge. There was no other woman doing a live ninety-minute television show, and I wanted to see if I could do it. I did want to keep several writers, but I think everybody was advised not to stay on. I don’t know who advised them, but four writers said they