(5 of 10)
Sometimes, in fact, he will spend even more time on children's programming, which is where he started out 15 years ago at CBS and which remains a first love. Last January, recalls Squire Rushnell, ABC's vice president for children's programs, the children's staff sat down with Freddie to discuss new ideas. One suggestion was to have three girls discover a caveman frozen in a block of ice; they would defrost him, and the four of them would go off on adventures. As Rushnell recalls, the concept seemed so absurd that even as he outlined it, his eyes rolled in embarrassment. Freddie, however, was mesmerized. Pacing the room, gesturing excitedly with his hands, he conjured up the caveman with his fingertips.
"Yeah," he said. "He's about this high, and he has a big, furry coat. He's a little guy, but"—at this point Silverman began bellowing—"HE HAS A GREAT BIG VOICE! He eats everything, and everything is yum, yum, yum." Duly christened Captain Caveman, the little guy will be seen on Saturday mornings this fall in Captain Caveman & the Teenangels.
His keen eye for characters has made Silverman the master of the spinoff. Intrigued by Bea Arthur's portrayal of Maude on an episode of All in the Family, Silverman was soon on the phone to Producer Norman Lear with the suggestion that Maude be given her own program. Fish, similarly, was spun off Barney Miller, and Laverne and Shirley was spun off Happy Days.
Sometimes Silverman can effect a half spinoff. Happy Days, for example, was a fairly popular show that was beginning to run out of steam when Silverman decided to give greater prominence to Henry Winkler, "the Fonz." Last season Happy
Days was the most popular show in the country.
For a time Freddie thought of giving the Fonz his own show, but he discarded the notion. The success of Happy Days, Silverman decided, depends on the interplay between the superhip Fonz and the superstraight Cunningham family. The Fonz alone would be overpowering, while the Cunninghams, left to themselves, would be cloying and out of touch with the times.
Silverman's instincts can betray him.
Not all of his ideas and not all of his spin-offs have had happy results. The list of his failed shows is longer than he would like to remember: Mr. T and Tina, Me and the Chimp, The Captain and Tennille, The Nancy Walker Show, Blansky 's Beauties, The Bill Cosby Show, Planet of the Apes, Calucci's Department. "I'm sure that somewhere," he admits, "there is a cemetery for dead TV shows, with many tombstones bearing the name Silverman." One of the things that separates him from other programmers, however, is that when all attempts at resuscitation fail, he is willing to dispatch his failures to the bleak wastes of Silverman Hill.
At CBS, where he was chief programmer for five years, Silverman had to move more slowly, with the due deliberation that that august organization expects. At