One of the most critical decisions in television history and for my personal entertainment was made over 60 years ago. A young television writer and sometime actor for a popular TV variety series in the 1950s decided to write a situation comedy in which he would star.
He had reason to think that he would do well. Writing and acting in this famous variety series earned him a strong reputation.
In the summer of 1959, he took his family to the beach. His wife and kids played in the water every morning while he wrote scripts. By the end of the summer, he had hammered out a pilot episode and 13 more. He named his show “Head of the Family.” It would follow in humorous ways the lives of a fictional TV writer, his wife, his son, and the funny people he worked with.
Following protocol for the time, he sought investors to fund the pilot. Then, he shopped it to potential sponsors and TV networks. Nobody wanted it.
Finally, a former character actor turned producer name, Sheldon Leonard, saw potential in the series. He consented to a meeting with the TV writer/leading man. Leonard told him, “You have a good show. There’s only one problem. You need to get someone else to play you.”
The writer was crestfallen. He had invested so…much…time.
Finally, he resolved to take the advice. As important as being a star of this program was, it was more important to him to have all that hard work writing the scripts pay off with a TV series.
A search to cast the lead character began. It was time-consuming, but one man finally surfaced as the choice. The actor was a young, unknown Dick Van Dyke. And that’s how Carl Reiner’s show, Head of the Family, morphed into The Dick Van Dyke Show. And as they say, the rest was history.
Had Carl Reiner not chosen to remove himself from the cast, the show would have never aired. Instead, it became a classic and has been watched by generations. One of the most critical decisions of Carl Reiner’s life was not to insist on doing something that he did not do well.
I want to emphasize that Reiner was not a bad actor (indeed, he appeared in multiple films and TV shows, including hilarious guest stints on the Dick Van Dyke Show). Still, his strength was supporting the lead actor and writing and producing a TV series.
For some people, persistence proves difficult. I wrote about this last week. But there is another side to the coin. On this side resides the wisdom of knowing when we are unsuitable for the job. Sometimes, this discernment can prove extremely difficult. Other times, the decision becomes readily apparent.
I grew up wanting to be the quarterback of the Winnsboro Red Raiders, a quarterback for a passing college football team, and then a professional quarterback. Fortunately, in high school, I became the starting quarterback of the Winnsboro Red Riders. Unfortunately, when I went to college, I joined 13 other quarterbacks fighting for the number one position. Over a two-year period, through trial and error, I realized that not only was I not going to be a professional quarterback, I was not even qualified to quarterback my college football team. I did not have the physical ability to stack up to the other quarterbacks who started. So I moved on.
Honestly, it was not traumatic. My comparative lack of skill made my college football decision relatively easy. Other choices in my life were more complex. If you find yourself wrestling over what not to do, let me encourage you to:
- Take stock of your life, especially your strengths and weaknesses.
- Ask others who love you and want the best for you to give you an honest critique.
- If you are a person of prayer, pray for wisdom and guidance.
- If you choose to let it go, decide without regrets and move on.
- Find the things you’re good at and continue to do them well.
My father was a very successful businessman. I can easily think of ten businesses that he started. Some bigger, some smaller. Only one was singularly successful, but that one was exponentially more profitable. Equally important, he knew how to let the other nine businesses go.
Find out what you’re good at and do it. Find out what you’re not so good at and eliminate it.
Johnny Cash and his brother Tommy sang the song, Do What You Do, Do Well. A good sequel would be this: Don’t Do What You Don’t Do Well.
Mark
Author of Holy Chaos How To Walk with God in a Frenzied World