Ken Rotcop - As I Remember It

As I Remember It

My 50 Year Career
As An Award Winning Writer,
Producer, And Studio Executive

Ken Rotcop

As Best I Remember It

2016. Ken Rotcop. All rights reserved.

All illustrations are copyright of their respective owners, and are also reproduced here in the spirit of publicity. Whilst we have made every effort to acknowledge specific credits whenever possible, we apologize for any omissions, and will undertake every effort to make any appropriate changes in future editions of this book if necessary.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopying or recording, except for the inclusion in a review, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Published in the USA by:

BearManor Media

P O Box 71426

Albany, Georgia 31708

www.bearmanormedia.com

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN978-1-62933-095-2 (paperback)
978-1-62933-096-9 (hardcover)

Book & cover design and layout by Darlene Swanson www.van-garde.com

Dedication

T his book is dedicated to Tyler Bohle, my grandson who lives in Berlin and hardly knows me, our meetings are so few and so far apart. I hope these stories will allow him to know his grandpa a little better.

****

I also dedicate this book to my audiences who have heard me speak on cruise ships.

Im really not a lecturer. Lecturers teach. I think I entertain. I tell stories. Stories about Hollywood. As I remember it. Stories about celebs Ive worked with, rubbed elbows with, and those who became friends.

Stories that evidently audience members wanted to share with others.

Evidently, after speaking, audience members would come up to me and ask where they could purchase these stories.

Surely youve written them down in a book.

Well, uh, actually no.

That is until now.

Thanks for asking.

Here are those stories.

What a wonderful life Ive had!
I only wish Id realized it sooner.

- Colette

Contents

Acknowledgements

T o my lovely wife Connie, who kept the home fires burning, the soup hot in the kettle, the biscuits warm in the oven, and snuggled up with Kady our dog on our love seat in my office and watched and listened to me talking to myself, laughing, bickering, mumbling and crying while I burned the midnight oil.

To my wonderful assistant Brian Frederick, editor, and extension of my family, without whom I would be lost. He has made himself available to Connie and Kady and me 24/7. Without his help these words would still be in my head or written in pencil on yellow-lined paper sitting on my bookshelf. He keeps amazing me with his knowledge about EVERYTHING!

To my dear friend Dan Klein, who started an audio book publishing company and wanted this book for his first offering. Here it is, Dan. Go do your magic!

Introduction

M ost young people come to Hollywood to be either actors or directors or writers.

They fail as actors.

They fail as directors.

They fail as writers.

So they become studio executives.

I was one of them.

If you were pitching a script to Avco Embassy pictures, or Hanna-Barbera, or Cannon Films, or TransWorld Productions you could have been pitching to me.

And if I turned your story down, remember what you called me after you left my office?

Idiot! You called me an idiot.

And as youd walk down the hallways youd mumble, How did Rotcop get that job anyway? Hes stupid, insipid, no-talent idiot!

And, as your story got turned down all over town, it became obvious to you that all studio executives, not just Rotcop, all studio executives were idiots.

We just didnt get it! We didnt see the movie you saw. We only cared about the almighty dollar, not your great screenplay.

In short, we were all idiots!

****

But of the parade of writers who came to pitch their stories to me, and of the mounds of scripts Id read, I began to get the courage to think that maybe I could start writing again.

Maybe I should give up the good life of the studio executive and take the risk, the gamble of writing on speculation.

Maybe my wife and I wouldnt go to Europe on vacation, and maybe my kids wouldnt wear designer label clothing, and maybe wed have to pull back for a year or maybe two so I could try to write.

Maybe Id hit it big. Or maybe I wouldnt. I was scared. We had a home in Bel Air and a couple of fancy cars and two kids and two dogs. What if our savings ran out while I was waiting to hit it big?

So I wrote. And rewrote. And rewrote again. And my script For Us the Living: The Story Of Medgar Evers sold. And got made. And won awards.

Suddenly, this idiot was an award-winning writer. Winner of, among the honors, the prestigious Writers Guild Award, the Neil Simon Award, and the Image Award.

And, I was featured on Oprah, Starz Entertainment, and on NPRs All Things Considered. And I was written about in the Wall Street Journal, L.A. Times, and most of the writers magazines.

In the beginning I wrote a game show, a documentary series, and Saturday morning animation but not dramatic scripts. In the beginning, I had no confidence.

Who the hell cared what I wrote? Who cared what I had to say? I mean there was Paddy Chayefsky, Stirling Silliphant, Rod Serling, and Ray Bradbury. They had something to say.

They were writers.

Did I have talent?

Maybe.

But so did a zillion other unemployed writers in Hollywood.

Writers waiting for somebody to discover their screenplays, waiting for someone to say, Yes. Lets make this movie!

Theyd go to story meetings, agent meetings, manager meetings, producer meetings.

Please read my script.

Please listen to my pitch.

Please hear my logline.

Please look at me, hear me, read me.

And some broke through because of their talent. Some because of a connection. Some because they were persistent. And some made it because they got lucky.

I was one of the lucky ones.

****

All of the stories youre about to read are titled with the names of celebrities. A few of them I never met, yet all of them, one way or another, impacted on my life.

NEW YORK

Mitch Miller

I was working in advertising in New York but I really wanted to write screenplays. Problem was I didnt have a clue how to write them or what to do with them after I wrote them.

I bought a magazine on writing and the big advice they gave was, if you want to break into show business get to know other people in show business. Some advice! I didnt know anybody in show business so I threw the magazine into the trash.

Little did I know then that I was about to meet some of the biggest actors, directors, and writers!

****

I used to play softball in Central Park on Saturdays. On one Saturday two guys came over to me after the game and asked if I was available to play on their team on Thursday afternoons in an actors league. It turned out their third baseman had moved to California and they were short of a third baseman.

I played third base.

That Monday, at the agency, I told my partner, Jerry Mandel, Jerry, I got a chance to play softball in a league on Thursday afternoons. I have to meet these guys at two oclock on Thursday in the mens room in Central Park and theyll give me my uniform.