'Life' Is Good for Bonnie Hunt

[TJ]

http://tv.zap2it.com/news/tvnewsdaily.html?29291

LOS ANGELES (Zap2it.com) - There's a holiday-identity
crisis developing on the set of "Life with Bonnie."

In the real world, it's two days before Thanksgiving. On
the show's crowded soundstage, it's Christmas Eve, and
the Molloy living room comes complete with a tree,
holiday cards hanging from the banister and stockings
above the fireplace.

The sound, though, is more like Hanukkah. During a
break in shooting, Anthony Russell, the piano-playing
sidekick on "Bonnie's" talk-show-within-the-show, is
playing "Havah Nagilah," and Charlie Stewart, one of the
show's kid actors, is racing around the set at an
ever-increasing pace.

His TV sister, Samantha Browne-Walters, joins him, and
soon they're kicking off the fuzzy slippers they're
wearing for a bedtime scene. The assembled cast and
crew breaks down in laughter, and it takes several
minutes for everyone to calm down again so they can
film the next take.

"Honest to God, most of our days are like this," says
Don Lake, who writes and executive produces "Life
with Bonnie" with star Bonnie Hunt. "There's always a
time when we work hard, then most of the time it's 'Let's
go up and laugh and have fun.' "

Such an
atmosphere is
made possible at
least partly by the
fact that most of
the cast and crew
already knew
each other. Hunt
seems to inspire
loyalty in her
co-stars -- all the regulars on "Life with
Bonnie" (ABC, 9 p.m. ET Tuesdays), save the two kids, had worked with her in the
past.

"[Hunt] made good on a comment she made to me 10 years ago," says Marianne
Muellerleile, who plays Bonnie's housekeeper, Gloria. They worked on the NBC show
"Grand" in the early 1990s, and Muellerleile says Hunt told her "I don't know where I'm
going or what I'm going to do, but whatever it is I'm going to take you with me."

"I thought it was the cutest thing," Muellerleile says now. "To me she was a kid, you
know? I thought, Oh, I love that sentiment. So about 10 years later she called me at
home and said another thing an actor loves to hear: 'How much money do you need to
do the show?' "

There's also a little more freedom here than on the average network sitcom, for both
the actors and the producers.

"We're kind of doing television the way it used to be done," Hunt says, referring to the
fact that she and Lake have written all the episodes thus far. (There was, in fact, a
mini-dustup earlier in the year when they let go of the show's writing staff, hired in the
first place at the network's and producer Touchstone's behest.)

"It's a very creative atmosphere. Don Lake and I run the show, but the actors have their
input, and the camera people have their input, and it really stirs the creativity in
everyone," she says. "The format is shout it out if you've got an idea."

The do-it-yourself ethos extends to filming, too. A
significant portion of the dialogue on the show --
particularly in segments involving "Morning Chicago,"
Hunt's character Bonnie Molloy's talk show -- are
improvised. The actors, from Hunt on down to Stewart
and Browne-Walters, are encouraged to ad-lib.

"The characters are very well-defined, and we're very
proud of the dialogue we write," Hunt says. But rather
than being a set-in-stone guide to each episode, the
scripts act as "a strong net. The actors can have the
freedom to improvise, but they can always fall back on
the safety of the script."

ABC has been kind to the show as well. Lake says the common horror story of
network executives tinkering with a show until it falls apart hasn't happened to "Life
with Bonnie."

"So many times you have a lot of cooks in the kitchen, and everyone has their two
cents of how they'd like to do it," Lake says. "But I think they have a great respect for
Bonnie and the vision she has for the show. ... Which makes sense. If you hire
someone to do a job, let them do it to the best of their abilities."

Hunt says there was some initial concern about her taking on multiple duties -- she's
directed several episodes in addition to writing, producing and starring -- but the solid
performance of the show has put them to rest. ABC picked the series up for a full
season early on in the fall, and it's averaging just under 10 million viewers a week in a
tough timeslot.

"I really think of it as one job. I'm a storyteller putting on a show," she says. "When
you've been a nurse in an emergency room" -- as she was for several years in her
native Chicago -- "this is an easy day."

"Easy" and "fun" are words that come up a lot talking to the cast. "What's more fun
than working with your friends?" asks Mark Derwin, whose "One Life to Live"
character is conveniently in a coma while he works on "Bonnie."

"It's really been great to see how well the cast performs now" as opposed to when they
started, Derwin says. "It's pretty well-oiled. I can only imagine if we do it for three or
four years, how much better we can be."
---
The Christmas episode of "Life with Bonnie" airs at 9 p.m. ET Tuesday, Dec. 10 on
ABC.