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network. My blacklisting at ABC extended years past Isenberg’s leaving the network—and his subsequent sojourn into indy-prod with his own multi pic-pac.
    In fairness to Mr. Isenberg, I was uncooperative. I thought (and still think) that being uncooperative was a big part of my job; that being the producer meant fighting for what I believed was correct … that defending the original vision was the way to demonstrate my passion for the material. Isenberg wanted someone who would follow his instructions … to go along with his notes.
    Into the 1970s and beyond, network executives more and more elected to deal with the writer directly, believing that they could always hire a production manager to care for whatever logistical functions might arise. The producer was, in their view, extraneous; besides, most writers in Hollywood, having been conditioned for years by producers and directors in this collaborative process, were accustomed to “taking notes”.
    For some writers this new era was a boon. Being good at a meeting was the criterion. One’s acumen at a typewriter became secondary. Some, it is true, excelled at both. But now, for the first time, the writer who stuttered, took time at his or her lonely desk to think out an idea or phrase, was too old to be considered hip by younger network types, or—just possibly—too temperamental or opinionated, that writer was at a distinct disadvantage.
    “Giving good meeting” was a must. The era of the hyphenate saw the network executives take over the role of the project initiator. They took control of what would be said and by whom.
    To be affable—agreeable to the “new” idea pitched by the network executive for the network executive—to be able to interpret and execute the story the MBA network executive wanted, that became primary. What would get on the nation’s television screens became the province of the very few. Broadcasting was to become narrow casting.
    The effects of the young MBAs and the newly anointed hyphenates in Hollywood cannot be overstated. Bright though many of these executives were, brilliant as some would prove to be, it was basically one person giving out ideas to writers instead of multiple producers pitching their diverse projects. The narrowness of vision, even from an ingenious source, was still only one view. The sameness of it would become all too abundantly clear, as television would—with the exception of a few bright, shining moments—become worse instead of better: less courageous, less innovative, less passionate.
    It was also inefficient, for in the wake of this creative rough-shodding by networks came an era of fiscal irresponsibility of writers-turned-producers. The literary bent of many of these talents ill-prepared them for the visual, fiscal, mechanical, and temperamental realities of day-to-day production. Arguments about what a line of dialogue might mean were colored by the ego of the writer-producer himself, or, conversely, by his too-easy willingness to take yet another note and make a change.
    Lacking someone with an overview with whom to communicate, the production manager would often find himself waiting outside the hyphenate’s office for the pages to come out of the typewriter while the whole production team expended precious (and costly) time awaiting word of what to do next.
    Because the hyphenate would now be on location scouts and occupied at preproduction or casting meetings rather than at the typewriter, there would no longer be ten scripts in hardcover to start a season. This created major economic and creative repercussions. It is not a coincidence that the most expensive Cagney & Lacey episodes ever made were the few I wrote.
    Behind all of this was the new pseudo producer, the network executive. The power and money of his organization solidly behind him, the anonymity of his desk squarely in front of him, this executive was closest to having it all. Their names did not go on the screen to risk the wrath