Style and Substance (lost unaired Kathleen Turner pilot; 1996)

Status: Lost

Style and Substance is a 1996 workplace comedy pilot produced by Disney's Touchstone Television, created by Peter Tolan, directed by Robby Benson, and starring Kathleen Turner. The script was later reworked and it briefly became a series starring Jean Smart.

Origin

Martha Stewart was on top of the world in the mid-1990s and wouldn't get knocked down until after the turn of the century. During this time, Peter Tolan (The Larry Sanders Show, Rescue Me) was asked to create a sitcom about a Martha Stewart-type, an assignment that he struggled with. Eventually, he found the right tone and his script was sent to a variety of actresses - including Jean Smart, who liked it, but turned it down for personal reasons. Kathleen Turner ultimately accepted the part, and it was shot in early 1996.

ABC Pilot

Chelsea Stevens (Turner) is an abrasive homemaker who heads a media empire. The plot centers on the introduction of new office manager Jane Sokol (Melinda McGraw), who's uncertain how to contend with Chelsea's circus. Lisa Rieffel portrays Chelsea's daughter, Danny Zorn is her secretary, plus Anthony Mangano, Scott Stevens, and JoNell Kennedy costar.

Andrew Bilgore had originally been cast as the secretary, but despite the fact that he was beloved by Turner, network execs arbitrarily wanted someone chubbier in the role so they handed the part to Zorn on the day of the taping.

Disney head Michael Eisner loved the pilot and penciled the show in on the ABC fall schedule, but things fell apart in test screenings. This pilot was never broadcast.

CBS Series

The script was reworked and it was shopped around to other actresses like Julie Andrews, but Disney became so adamant that they wanted Jean Smart that they sent her flowers every day for a week before resorting to outright manipulation by addressing a box containing $12,000 worth of Disney merchandise directly to Smart's 7-year-old son, along with a letter that promised more goodies if his mother accepted the part. Amused by their tenacity, Smart finally relented.

The pilot was reshot in 1997 with Smart and Nancy McKeon as her office manager. That version managed to get on the air at CBS in January 1998, but they ran afoul of Martha Stewart, whose own show aired 5-days a week on CBS, so it was pulled off the schedule a month later and quietly canceled. Copies of that series' 13 episodes, including the unaired finale that took direct jabs at Stewart, are easily found online.

Over two decades later, Smart reprised the role of Chelsea for a 2019 episode of "Mad About You" that was penned by Tolan.

External Links

• Wikipedia