WRITER FIGHTS SEXISM TO BECOME A PRODUCER

Carmen Culver has a little-girl voice, a Porsche and a soundproof office where she occasionally screams about sexism in Hollywood. These days she’s screaming less. After writing the scripts for one of the most memorable miniseries ever aired, “The Thorn Birds,” and one of the least memorable, “The Last Days of Pompeii,” she has turned herself into a producer.

Her first production, a seven-hour miniseries which she adapted from Sidney Sheldon’s best-selling novel “If Tomorrow Comes,” airs on CBS Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. Culver describes it as “a romantic comedy, very fast-paced and glamorous.” It stars Madolyn Smith as a con artist, Tom Berenger as the love interest/burglar and David Keith as an insurance investigator.

“If Tomorrow Comes” is the start of a four-project deal Carmen Culver Productions has with CBS. “Producing was part of the deal,” Culver says frankly about how she made the transition from writer to producer-writer. “Like any negotiations, the other side will give what it must to get what it wants.” CBS wanted Culver’s track record as a writer. Culver sought more control.

She admits that her experience with ABC’s “Last Days of Pompeii” helped propel her toward producing: “I would say there were some very unfortunate aspects of ‘Pompeii.’ I wish a more even tone had been found for it. It didn’t seem to have been controlled by a central point of view. And there was a tremendous mixture of accents and acting styles.

“Who was going to pay for the writer to be on the set? I’m sad about that. Maybe I couldn’t have made a difference. With ‘The Thorn Birds,’ I was there for much of the filming. But often writers aren’t there, by choice or because they’re not welcome. That’s another reason why it’s nice to have the title of producer.”

Culver produced “If Tomorrow Comes” in conjunction with her co-producers, Jerry London (who’s also directing), Bob Markell and author Sidney Sheldon. “We all did a little of everything,” she says. “I spent a lot of time on the set, feeling that no matter what happened anywhere else, the success of the project depended on the images on film. I felt as a writer I could be effective that way.”

Oklahoma-born but Los Angeles-raised, Culver was appalled to find “a shocking degree of sexism” when she attempted to move into producing. “I’ve taken my lumps trying to produce,” she says over coffee in her Encino home. “If I were a man, I might have just seen it as political.

“I guess the idea was to totally frustrate me out. Newsflash! I don’t frustrate easily. I just hang in there. If people behave in an infantile and paranoid fashion, I ignore it.”

For example? She hesitates, then explains: “Strategizing to leave me out of meetings--to make it clear my opinions don’t count. It’s very hard when your intelligence, your integrity, your professionalism and your gifts are being insulted by such a tactic.

“But you can’t let them know they’re getting to you. That’s where your strength is. I just keep pushing. And then I run up to my soundproof office and scream.”

Culver has been involved with television since 1978, when CBS produced two of her screenplays--”Willa” with Deborah Raffin, from her original screenplay, and “First, You Cry” with Mary Tyler Moore based on Betty Rollins’ book. In 1979, she won a Directors Guild award for her script “To Race the Wind.”

Before that she was an English professor at UCLA and a consultant for the U.S. Office of Education. Her area of expertise: “trying to teach college students a method of writing so they could actually pass as educated people. I didn’t realize I was digging at a mountain with a toothpick--until my daughters were born.”

The twin girls are now 11. “I was not a young mother,” Culver chuckles. She appears to be in her late 30s, but would rather not talk about her age. “I didn’t know how I’d feel. The birth of those twins was so fantastic. It doesn’t sound smart, modern and liberated to say children can be fulfilling,” she adds after a long pause. “Having children is supposed to tie you down and not let you have a career. For me it was a very liberating experience.

“As a young girl, I harbored dreams of being a writer, but decided against it because I was self-conscious. I was afraid people would laugh. Writing was an act of courage I didn’t have the guts for. It’s almost as risky as acting. You set down what’s inside you and say, ‘OK, this is me.’ You feel vulnerable. So I just buried my dreams and said, ‘I’ll get good grades instead.’

“The children’s birth freed me psychologically. For some reason, I was no longer self-conscious. The idea of going back to teaching even part time depressed me. I said, ‘I want to write.’ I saw myself as a novelist, so I thought I’d take a course in novel-writing.” Because none was conveniently scheduled, she wound up in a screen-writing class.

Almost immediately, she heard about a screen-writing contest. “My husband (a microelectronics expert) advised, ‘You can’t win unless you enter.’

“In class we were supposed to talk about what kind of screenplay we wanted to write. I got up and told this story about a woman who wanted to be a truck driver. The teacher then asked the class how many would go see this story on the screen, and no one raised his hand.

“After a lifetime of being afraid people would laugh, I said, ‘The hell with you guys. I like it.’ I wrote the screenplay (‘Willa’) in longhand on a park bench, coming home in between scenes to nurse the children. I won the contest.”

Culver’s writing career has been on an upward spiral ever since. At the moment she is awaiting word from CBS about a project “that involves a star and a politically hot figure.” A miniseries she has put together about ancient Egypt, once planned for ABC, is in limbo. However, a recent trip to China has given her some ideas. And in her spare time, she’s working on a story about art forgery.

Writing is still her first love. “There is a lot of drudgery involved in producing,” she admits. “I think I will be much happier producing my own picture. It will be smaller and easier to have the impact I really want. But what spurs me on is the desire to tell good stories on film.”