NONFICTION - Oct. 27, 1996

CONVERSATIONS WITH MY AGENT by Rob Long (Dutton: $15.95, 192 pp.). Make no mistake: Rob Long intends to do lunch in this town again. This very funny memoir makes us howl at the absurdities of how TV programs are manufactured in Hollywood, but Long burns no bridges and names few names. Like an old Marine reminiscing about boot camp, he’s proud of having survived the “development hell” into which he was cast at age 27 after two years as a staff writer and co-executive producer of “Cheers.” Actor Ted Danson’s departure in 1993 brought that long-running hit to an end, and Long and his writing partner, Dan Staley, had to create a new sitcom from scratch. They received studio seed money under a deal “that, when described, sounds suspiciously like goofing off,” Long says, but, given that they had no idea what to write about, it wasn’t easy.

The funniest parts of the book are Long’s chats, usually by cellular phone, with his agent, whose self-absorption and bewildering non sequiturs mask some shrewd insights into the world of “buck slips” and leased BMWs, where nothing succeeds, it seems, like the right kind of failure. These dialogues are rendered in screenplay form.

In fact, Long’s book is itself a sitcom--like “Cheers,” a well-written one.