On this episode of Baring It All with Call Me Adam, I am chatting with television producer, director & screenwriter Stan Zimmerman. We will be talking about writing for TV hits like The Golden Girls, Gilmore Girls, & Roseanne as well as his forthcoming book The Girls: From Golden to Gilmore + all his theatrical endeavors!

****This interview was recorded prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some events mentioned may have been postponed.****

More on Stan:

After attending Cranbrook Summer Theatre School for five seasons and Hampton Playhouse for two, Stan headed to New York to get his BFA at NYU/Circle-in-the-Square drama program. He appeared on Broadway dancing behind Rudolph Nureyev and the Joffrey Ballet in Homage to Diaghilev at the Mark Hellinger Theatre. Stan worked in casting before moving to Los Angeles, where he's been part of one of the longest running comedy writing teams, Zimmerman & Berg.

Along with James Berg, Stan's worked on many television series, including season one of The Golden Girls, Brothers, Fame, Hooperman, Something Wilder, Roseanne, Wanda at Large and the highly successful fifth season of Gilmore Girls. They penned the "Norman Mailer, I'm Pregnant" episode. Z&B (as they're also known) have 2 WGA nominations to their credit -- "Rose's Mother" from The Golden Girls and the other for "Don't Ask, Don't Tell", the infamous lesbian kiss episode of Roseanne.

Besides writing & producing many television pilots, Z&B rewrote the Emmy and Peabody award winning Annie for ABC. They have also written for film, including both Brady Bunch movies. The Brady Bunch Movie was honored by American Cinematheque. The Q&A panel with Jim, Stan, Shelley Long, Gary Cole and director Betty Thomas can be seen on youtube.com. Z&B created and exec produced two seasons of Rita Rocks, a half hour comedy series on Lifetime starring Nicole Sullivan and Tisha Campbell-Martin. They're much talked about new pilot script -- Silver Foxes, a gay men's Golden Girls, had an epic reading with George Takei, Leslie Jordan, Bruce Vilanch, Todd Sherry, Cheri Oteri, Daniele Gaither & Melissa Peterman.

Stan conceived, adapted and directed, SUICIDE NOTES: In Their Own Words, which won a Hollywood Fringe Festival 2015 Encore Producers' Award. The show starred Oliva d'Abo, Allie Gonino, Peter Onorati, Brendan Robinson. It's a one hour theatre piece in the vein of The Vagina Monlogoues. There was a benefit/reading of the play, now entitled Right Before I Go, Monday Dec 4 2017 at NYC's Town Hall. The all-star cast included: Ellen Burstyn, Judith Light, Michael Cerveris, Hari Nef, Maulik Pancholy, Alice Ripley, Lois Smith, Amber Tamblyn, Raviv Ullman and Vanessa Williams. A one night benefit of the play was performed at The Ratner Museum in Bethseda, Maryland June 2018 and in Orlando at The Mezz in Sept on International Suicide Prevention Day. Stan performed in the piece as "The Narrator" in Orlando and for a two night engagement at Claremont High School in Oct. That show was performed by high school students, faculty and school board members. He returned to Bethesda July 2019 to perform again, but this time with a mostly teen cast from The Achieve Project.

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Special Thanks:

Theme Song by Bobby Cronin

Podcast Logo by Liam O'Donnell

Edited by Drew Kaufman

Outro Music Underscore by CueTique