What Did Norman Lear Tell Chuck Lorre About Running Two Shows?

Chuck Lorre said that when he started The Big Bang Theory he was barely keeping up with Two and a Half Men, at 60 hours a week, and he was about to have a second show. He cold-called Norman Lear's office. He said he was Chuck Lorre, he had a show on CBS, and he was about to have another. At one point Norman Lear had seven shows on television at the same time. He invited Chuck Lorre over. Chuck Lorre said he was about to start production on a second show, he was barely doing the one, and he asked what Norman Lear had to tell him.

Norman Lear said Chuck Lorre was not going to like the answer. It came down to going where the fire burns brightest and trying to put it out. The fires were the bad ones: a script that did not work, a miscast role, a director who was not working, a second act that failed, someone was ill, with the question of whether to shut down or wait a week and miss an air date. Some problems were small and some were huge. The method was to gauge the response, leave the small fires alone, and go to the crisis.