Bette Midler is reflecting on things she wished she had done differently when it came to decisions made around her partially autobiographical 2000 sitcom "Bette."
Unpacking her regrets during an appearance on actor David Duchovny's podcast, "Fail Better," Midler admitted one of her errors was not suing Lindsay Lohan, who appeared as her daughter in the pilot episode but did not continue in the following 16 episodes. Midler suggested that Lohan's early exit may have contributed to her show flopping.
"After the pilot, Lindsay Lohan decided she didn't want to do it, or she had other fish to fry," Midler said, according to Deadline. "So Lindsay Lohan left the building and I said, 'Well, now what do you do?' And the studio didn't help me. It was extremely chaotic … and if I had been in my right mind, or if I had known that my part of my duties were to stand up and say, 'This absolutely will not do, I'm going to sue,' then I would have done that. But I seem to have been cosseted in some way that I couldn't get to the writer's room. I couldn't speak to the showrunner. I couldn't make myself clear."
Midler, who was executive producer on "Bette," also blamed herself for its failure.
"I didn't realize what the pace was, and I didn't understand what the hierarchy was, and no one bothered to tell me," she said, according to Variety. "Well, I was kicked to the curb immediately and I didn't know what to do about it … I didn't know that I could have taken charge, that I could have asserted, because I think because I was so terrified of being branded a grandstander."
She added: "It was a part of the media I simply did not understand. I watched it. I appreciated it. It. I enjoyed it, but I didn't know what it meant to make [a TV series.] I had made theatrical live events, I had made films, I had made variety television shows, I had been on talk shows, but I had never done a situation comedy."
Midler added that she was "thrilled" when the show was canceled after one season.
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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