{"id":2193,"date":"2026-06-20T21:08:43","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T21:08:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=2193"},"modified":"2026-06-20T21:08:43","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T21:08:43","slug":"james-burrows-appreciation-warren-littlefield-says-there-would-have-been-no-must-see-tv-on-nbc-without-jimmy-exclusive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=2193","title":{"rendered":"James Burrows Appreciation: Warren Littlefield Says \u201cThere Would Have Been No \u2018Must See TV\u2019 on NBC Without Jimmy\u201d (Exclusive)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\nJames Burrows, the legendary TV director, died on Friday at the age of 85. Many from across the industry have issued statements paying tribute to him. Below, you can read a longer personal remembrance provided exclusively to <\/em>The Hollywood Reporter by Warren Littlefield, who became an executive at NBC in 1979 and served as president of NBC Entertainment from 1991 through 1998, encompassing its fabled Must See TV era.<\/em><\/p>\n

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\n\tAmerica\u2019s greatest and most prolific exporter of the world of laughter and joy was and is Jimmy Burrows.<\/p>\n

Read more Rebecca Hall on Finding a New Frequency with \u2018The Listeners\u2019 and Whether \u2018Onslaught\u2019 Is a Stealth \u2018The Guest\u2019 Sequel<\/a><\/p>\n

\n\tJimmy\u2019s brilliance revealed itself in a number of ways.\u00a0In casting sessions that included showrunners, writers, studio reps and network execs, the voice everyone listened to the most was Jimmy\u2019s. He directed actors by gaining their trust so that without fear, they would take risks beyond their comfort zone. He had a wickedly funny mind, but also a very kind soul. Uniquely, he also directed writers, telling them what he needed to take their material to another level. Marta Kauffman, after making the first episode of Friends<\/em> with Jimmy, said the eye-opener for her was his skill at dramaturgy.\u00a0No one was his equal in that regard.<\/p>\n

I met Jimmy shortly after I started working at NBC in Comedy Development in late 1979.\u00a0At the time, ABC and CBS each had at least a dozen award-winning and highly popular shows on their schedules. NBC had Diff\u2019rent Strokes<\/em> and Hello, Larry<\/em>. That\u2019s it.\u00a0NBC was desperate to be competitive in the genre, and overpaid the Charles brothers, Les and Glen, and Jimmy Burrows, who had good credentials working on other people\u2019s shows, but had never created a show on their own.\u00a0The deal was for two scripts against a 13-episode series commitment.\u00a0Their brilliant agent, Bob Broder, shopped our offer to other potential buyers, but no one was as desperate as NBC.<\/p>\n

At breakfast in Burbank, Jimmy, Les and Glen served us a few scraps of what they were thinking. They wanted to do an adult comedy, maybe set in a bar. Unlike the tone of ABC\u2019s popular Three\u2019s Company<\/em>,\u00a0they wanted to channel a little bit of the Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn dynamic, or Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell in His Girl Friday<\/em>, and perhaps throw in a little of George Cukor\u2019s The Philadelphia Story<\/em>. We said yes, and Cheers<\/em> was born.<\/p>\n

When casting the show, ex-LA Rams football player Fred Dryer gave a very entertaining read as \u2018Sam Malone,\u2019 and there was a good chance that we would have rolled the dice with him, but Jimmy insisted that Ted Danson was the guy that we could depend on scene for scene, day in and day out.\u00a0He told us to put Fred in a drama.\u00a0Jimmy spoke and we listened \u2014\u00a0for both actors \u2014 and thank God we did. History repeated itself when Kelsey Grammer read for the newly created role of \u2018Frasier Crane\u2019 in Cheers<\/em>.\u00a0Was Kelsey the best choice? Jimmy said he was, and Frasier<\/em> was the award-winning quality comedy that kept us going for another 11 seasons after Cheers<\/em> departed.<\/p>\n

Jimmy executive produced all 275 episodes of Cheers<\/em> and directed 236. It was everything they envisioned in their non-pitch breakfast pitch so many years before, but it represented so much more.\u00a0For me, it was a learning tree of what network television adult comedy could be. They never pitched individual episodes, but rather character arcs across a season. No one had done that before. I listened and learned, and Jimmy and Les and Glen forever changed the DNA of comedy at NBC.\u00a0Sophisticated, urban, young adult comedy was our beacon \u2014 we finally had one.<\/p>\n

There would have been no \u2018Must See TV\u2019 on NBC without Jimmy. He was our North Star.\u00a0He launched Night Court<\/em>, Wings<\/em>, Frasier<\/em>, Friends<\/em> and 3rd Rock from the Sun<\/em>.\u00a0Jimmy executive produced and directed every single episode of Will & Grace<\/em> for the Peacock.\u00a0Vice President Joe Biden gave a shout out to the series when he announced the Marriage Equality Act, and that made Jimmy smile \u2014 but he was particularly<\/em> thrilled by how relevant the show made him with his kids.<\/p>\n

Year after year, NBC\u2019s Advertiser Upfronts in New York were a celebration of the genius of Jimmy Burrows. Late night parties followed and alcohol flowed, and my memory is of talent of all ages lovingly looking up at the master with tremendous gratitude.\u00a0One only has to go to the Friends<\/em> reunion special to witness that love.<\/p>\n

Equally phenomenal to his influence and achievements at NBC was what Jimmy did with Chuck Lorre at CBS, but that\u2019s a story for someone else to tell.<\/p>\n

In the digital age we now live in, 500 episodes are considered the amount of content needed to launch a platform.\u00a0In 2016, in a star-studded spectacular, NBC honored Jimmy for producing and directing his 1000th episode of television. Imagine a world with not one but two<\/em> Jimmy Burrows channels \u2014\u00a0it would be a world of laughter and joy. Thank you, Jimmy, and Cheers to you!<\/p>\n

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James Burrows appreciation: Warren Littlefield says ‘there would have been no must see TV’ on NBC without Jimmy.’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2192,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1789,344,516],"class_list":["post-2193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting","tag-james-burrows","tag-nbc","tag-warren-littlefield"],"yoast_head":"\nJames Burrows Appreciation: Warren Littlefield Says \u201cThere Would Have Been No \u2018Must See TV\u2019 on NBC Without Jimmy\u201d (Exclusive) - US Property Moves<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=2193\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"James Burrows Appreciation: Warren Littlefield Says \u201cThere Would Have Been No \u2018Must See TV\u2019 on NBC Without Jimmy\u201d (Exclusive) - 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