It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time: The Worst TV Shows in History and Other Things I Wrote
Bruce Vilanch’s new memoir It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time: The Worst TV Shows in History and Other Things I Wrote takes a humorous look at the infamous variety specials he worked on throughout his career. Although the topics are often borderline esoteric (The Brady Bunch Variety Hour, The Paul Lynde Halloween Special), Vilanch does a great job of providing context thanks to a plethora of footnotes.
A breezy read punctuated by more jokes than you can throw a Wookiee at, It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time on a journey throughout the tackier side (watch out for the cheese pull!) of Bruce Vilanch’s storied career as a comedy writer and (albeit more rarely) actor covering the gamut from The Ice Pirates to The Star Wars Holiday Special. Vilanch has recounted some of these anecdotes over the years before whether it be in the 1999 feature-length documentary on his life Get Bruce, his numerous print and radio interviews, or his podcast guest spots, but it’s nice to have some of his best collected in a single tome.
Most of the book centers on the 1970s and 1980s, and Vilanch’s dry humor vividly brings to life a bygone era full of creative (out of?) control, drugs, and seeing just what you could sneak past the censors on network television. Seeing just how little George Lucas was involved in the Star Wars Holiday Special is a far cry from the corporate interference you’d run into today from Disney. Thanks to the bootleg VHS and DVD circuit at comic book conventions, YouTube, and TikTok (some of his work got legitimate home video releases), the plethora of TV shows and specials that Bruce Vilanch worked on have been kept alive for generations to come.
One of the best chapters focuses on Bruce Vilanch’s work on the infamous 1989 Oscars with an opening number featuring Disney’s Snow White and Rob Lowe. His years of writing for Oscars really comes in handy here as he analyzes what went wrong during the infamous ceremony. His work on the Oscars could almost be a book of its own, but you can listen to his podcast that he co-hosts with Adam “Tex” Davis The OSCARS: What Were They Thinking? if you want to dive deeper into Oscar fandom and gossip.
An often uproarious read covering the highlights (or is it lowlights) of Bruce’s career, It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time is well worth a read.
It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time is now available from Amazon on Kindle and in hardcover; it’s also available on Audible and Audio CD read by the author. You can listen to Bruce’s podcast he co-hosts with Adam “Tex” Davis, The OSCARS: What Were They Thinking? here. A copy of the book was provided for this review by the publisher.