GUILT TRIPS WITH THE STARS : When a Writer Is Blocked on the Road to Publication

Just 14 years ago last week, my Big Break as a free-lance writer evaporated before my eyes, and I’m not sure I’ve gotten over it yet.

I’d landed an assignment with West, which The Times published on Sundays from Sept. 11, 1966, to Oct. 8, 1972. Until then, I’d been stuck pretty much in the nickel-a-word market. West was to be my entry into the Big Time.

My idea was to profile David Cassidy, then the most merchandised teeny-bop idol ever. The angle was to get behind the facade, to find out how a hip young ‘60s guy coped with having to present constantly a squeaky-clean public image, the puppet of his career.

Managing editor Jon Carroll gave me the go-ahead. I joined Cassidy’s tour to New York, taping hours of conversation. Carroll bought the piece for $500--good money in those days for a first sale--and scheduled it with a full-page watercolor illustration by caricaturist Peter Green. I alerted friends and family. Then, just before my article was to appear, West folded.

I didn’t write for another two years.

I survived the trauma of dashed dreams. But I’ve never quite gotten over the guilt of taking so much of Cassidy’s time and privacy--a tiny piece of his life, really--without reciprocation. “We use each other,” he had said to me on a plane from New York. “You get your story; I get some publicity. It’s a trade-off.” But with the article dead, I felt like I’d mugged him.

The feeling intensified with Ed Asner. The New York Times wanted a profile when “Lou Grant” was in its first weeks of production. When we met, Asner warned me amiably, “You’ll find I’m a tough interview. I just don’t have much to say.”

He was friendly, worked hard at conversation, was quite available--but really didn’t have much to say (that was before his Screen Actors Guild presidency days) . I never could bring my copy to life. The New York Times killed it.

Worse, Asner heard that an editor had termed him too “dull” for a Sunday profile. According to a publicist, Asner was “furious.” I couldn’t blame him. The next time I ran into him--almost a decade later--I shrivelled with shame. He probably didn’t remember me. No matter. I had failed, and he was a living, breathing reminder.

The problem with my Paul Michael Glaser piece was more complicated. An editor at Cosmopolitan had asked me to profile Glaser when he was something of a sex symbol with “Starsky and Hutch.” Glaser was remarkably gracious and generous, but my piece came back for a rewrite--not sexy enough. I tried, but my revision was also rejected.

“It takes a special person to write for us,” the editor told me sympathetically. “I just don’t think you’re a Cosmo boy.” I looked at the erasures of Helen Gurley Brown’s notes in the margins of my manuscript, and the only part she liked described Glaser in front of his Malibu beach house in a tight bikini swimsuit. She had written, “I like this!”

I took Cosmo’s kill fee and immediately sold the piece, unchanged, to TV Guide. I figured Glaser would be delighted that his time with me hadn’t been wasted. It turned out that he and TV Guide were having some kind of war; he tried to stop the article, but I’d already signed the contract, and the profile came out as a cover story. Later, a publicist told me Glaser had hated it, reportedly saying, “How could he do that to me?”

I felt lousy about it--I still do--although I’ve since cashed TV Guide’s check.

The last time I got killed, professionally speaking, it involved Al Molinaro, Scott Baio’s stepfather on “Joanie Loves Chachi.” TV Guide wanted 1,600 words. Molinaro was not only generous with his time, he invited me to have Sunday breakfast with his family and cooked me some great French toast. TV Guide bought the piece. But ABC canceled “Joanie Loves Chachi” before it appeared, so it got dropped. This was not your usual guilt. This was French toast guilt.

It almost happened with Dudley Moore after I did a phoner with the diminutive actor for a Calendar article on movie beefcake. His agent thought it would be cute to talk to at least one guy who was clearly not in the beefcake category. Moore had some funny things to say (“I pump iron psychologically”), but, try as I might, I couldn’t make his contribution work in the piece. My editor rightfully trimmed it out.

More guilt. I tried to think of ways to use the material in other articles. No luck. Then, almost a year later, I ran Moore’s best lines as a Quirky Quote in our Outtakes section. I was off the hook.

After so much time, Moore must have wondered where in the hell those quotes had come from.

Guilt, Dudley, guilt.