storyline coming up for you, and he needs you in rehab.”
I took that in for a long time. Finally I managed to ask, “Is this mandatory?”
“Yes, it is,” he answered, quiet but firm.
My response was as big a surprise to me as it was to him—I blurted out a truly joyful, “Thank God!” and hurried to my room to pack.
I loved rehab. Even during its hardest moments, I was aware that a team of people who’d been trained to help was leading me along an escape route from the prison of alcohol addiction I’d wandered into. I couldn’t have become clean and sober without the entire staff and the ongoing support of Alcoholics Anonymous. (Yes, I’m proud to say I’m a “Friend of Bill.”) Parenthetically, it was an ongoing source of fascination to me that during my stay at St. John’s, I was constantly greeted, even by my therapist, with a cheerful, familiar “How’s it going, Mrs. Chancellor?”
I have no idea what the “big storyline” was that inspired Bill Bell to send me to rehab. I’m not even sure there was one; I think it was just his excuse to demand I get the help I needed. And believe me, I’m convinced that if I had refused, he would have fired me, and good for him. Good for him for caring enough about his show, and about me, to see to it that both of us had the best possible chance to succeed, no matter what it took. There are some network executives and producers today who could learn a valuable lesson from his example and probably save some lives in the process, just like, in so many ways, Bill Bell and The Young and the Restless saved mine.
I ’d been at Y&R for three or four months before I met Bill and Lee Phillip Bell. I knew the Bells lived in Chicago, where Lee Phillip was a star in her own right with her own daytime talk show. I knew they cocreated the show and that Bill was our head writer. I knew Bill was also a consultant on Days of Our Lives . And I knew he’d had another actress in mind for the role of Katherine Chancellor until John Conboy convinced him to give me a try. So it was a huge confidence boost when I glanced over one morning to see Bill and Lee standing discreetly offstage watching rehearsal, grinning from ear to ear. Bill’s blue eyes were literally twinkling, although his dubious pair of plaid pants caught my attention more. Lee exuded a warm, graceful charisma that made me look forward to getting to know her.
We quickly became good friends. We genuinely liked and respected each other, and we became almost quasi-godparents to each other’s children—like me, Bill and Lee had two boys and a girl: Bill Jr., Bradley, and Lauralee. I still remember dancing with eleven-year-old Bill Jr. one night at the Beverly Hills Hotel and how fiercely protective I was of Lauralee when she joined the Y&R cast as Christine “Cricket” Blair and had to deal with the double-edged sword of being the boss’s daughter. And when my daughter, Caren, headed to Chicago for college, Bill and Lee made a heartfelt offer of “anything she needs, no matter what it is, all she has to do is pick up the phone.” She never took advantage of their generosity, but it meant the world to her, and to me, that she had someone close by who’d be there for her in a heartbeat.
The Bell family eventually moved to Los Angeles, into a beautiful estate in Beverly Hills. They were staying at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel while their home was being renovated when I took the family to dinner one night and then ordered them to follow me to a kind of surprise party I’d arranged. Halfway there, they waved me over to the side of the road, and Bradley came running over to my car to explain that it was already past his father’s bedtime (at nine P.M .) and to ask if it would be all right if they just headed home and called it a night instead.
“No, that would not be all right,” I told him. “A dear friend of mine is expecting us. If your father wants to leave and go home to bed after we get there, that’s
I took that in for a long time. Finally I managed to ask, “Is this mandatory?”
“Yes, it is,” he answered, quiet but firm.
My response was as big a surprise to me as it was to him—I blurted out a truly joyful, “Thank God!” and hurried to my room to pack.
I loved rehab. Even during its hardest moments, I was aware that a team of people who’d been trained to help was leading me along an escape route from the prison of alcohol addiction I’d wandered into. I couldn’t have become clean and sober without the entire staff and the ongoing support of Alcoholics Anonymous. (Yes, I’m proud to say I’m a “Friend of Bill.”) Parenthetically, it was an ongoing source of fascination to me that during my stay at St. John’s, I was constantly greeted, even by my therapist, with a cheerful, familiar “How’s it going, Mrs. Chancellor?”
I have no idea what the “big storyline” was that inspired Bill Bell to send me to rehab. I’m not even sure there was one; I think it was just his excuse to demand I get the help I needed. And believe me, I’m convinced that if I had refused, he would have fired me, and good for him. Good for him for caring enough about his show, and about me, to see to it that both of us had the best possible chance to succeed, no matter what it took. There are some network executives and producers today who could learn a valuable lesson from his example and probably save some lives in the process, just like, in so many ways, Bill Bell and The Young and the Restless saved mine.
I ’d been at Y&R for three or four months before I met Bill and Lee Phillip Bell. I knew the Bells lived in Chicago, where Lee Phillip was a star in her own right with her own daytime talk show. I knew they cocreated the show and that Bill was our head writer. I knew Bill was also a consultant on Days of Our Lives . And I knew he’d had another actress in mind for the role of Katherine Chancellor until John Conboy convinced him to give me a try. So it was a huge confidence boost when I glanced over one morning to see Bill and Lee standing discreetly offstage watching rehearsal, grinning from ear to ear. Bill’s blue eyes were literally twinkling, although his dubious pair of plaid pants caught my attention more. Lee exuded a warm, graceful charisma that made me look forward to getting to know her.
We quickly became good friends. We genuinely liked and respected each other, and we became almost quasi-godparents to each other’s children—like me, Bill and Lee had two boys and a girl: Bill Jr., Bradley, and Lauralee. I still remember dancing with eleven-year-old Bill Jr. one night at the Beverly Hills Hotel and how fiercely protective I was of Lauralee when she joined the Y&R cast as Christine “Cricket” Blair and had to deal with the double-edged sword of being the boss’s daughter. And when my daughter, Caren, headed to Chicago for college, Bill and Lee made a heartfelt offer of “anything she needs, no matter what it is, all she has to do is pick up the phone.” She never took advantage of their generosity, but it meant the world to her, and to me, that she had someone close by who’d be there for her in a heartbeat.
The Bell family eventually moved to Los Angeles, into a beautiful estate in Beverly Hills. They were staying at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel while their home was being renovated when I took the family to dinner one night and then ordered them to follow me to a kind of surprise party I’d arranged. Halfway there, they waved me over to the side of the road, and Bradley came running over to my car to explain that it was already past his father’s bedtime (at nine P.M .) and to ask if it would be all right if they just headed home and called it a night instead.
“No, that would not be all right,” I told him. “A dear friend of mine is expecting us. If your father wants to leave and go home to bed after we get there, that’s
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