"Into the Night
with Rick Dees" – March 7, 1991
Rick Dees:
"…And our first two guests. Let's get into it right
now. They had never met before they
were cast together as partners
on the NBC hit series `Quantum Leap'.
The chemistry definitely
worked both on and off the screen. And
two years later the two are
real life best friends. A big hand for
Scott Bakula and Dean
Stockwell."
(Both enter the set through a prop
front door, with Scott leading and
Dean acting like he's either pushing
Scott or hiding behind him.)
(As the trio sits down -)
Rick: "You are two busy guys!"
Scott: "Busy, busy, busy guys."
Dean: "Busy, busy."
Rick: "Yeah, but last time,
Dean (interrupts): "Dick Van Patten."
Rick: "They know Dick Van Patten?"
Dean (pointing to Scott): "And this is Jimmy Van Patten, my
son."
(Audience laughs)
Dean (continues): "I'm teaching him to act."
Rick: "Now you guys weren't like father
and son or brothers at all
when you first met. I mean, I hear
stories that… Well, Scott, you
said you didn't think it was going to
happen at all."
Scott: "I did?"
Rick: "That's what I hear."
Scott: "Oh. Well, he wasn't very good
when he started."
Dean (reaching over to shake Scott's
hand): "Thank you very
much."
Rick: "What were your first impressions
of each other?"
Dean: "Ahh, "
Rick: "Dean, what did you think of
Scott?"
Dean: "I thought he was a pretty neat
guy actually. He thought…We
did a reading together for the network,
and he said, `Boy, your
reading was great.' So, everything was
fine from then on." [Dean
does a phony laugh] "That's true,
right?" [Looks at Scott]
"Rick: "Scott?"
Scott: "Well, we walked out of the
reading, saying, both of us
saying, `I hope you get this, I hope
this works out because I'd like
to work with you.'"
Dean: "Everybody does on every
reading."
Rick: "Sure."
Scott: "No they don't."
Dean: "But once we started shooting, we
knew right away that we had
something going, like an interplay, or
as they call it [making
quotation marks gestures] `chemistry'
and it's true and it's worked
now for two and a half years and we
love entertaining people with it;
we never know what the other guy is
going to do, so we keep
surprising one another and just like
that."
Rick: "But if the chemistry doesn't
work though, can you fake it?
Can you tell?
Dean: "Oh, yes."
[Scott laughs]
Rick: "You've been in a lot…You've been
in a lot of them, were they
fake?"
Dean: "No, this one!"
[Laughter]
Scott: "I think you can, I think it
makes it a lot tougher to work
12, 14, 16 hours a day if you're
working with somebody that you don't
like really being around, and on the
show, he's my only constant,
he's the only guy I see on a continual
basis because the cast changes
every week except for this guy."
Dean: "And same here, he's the only one
I ever work with because
nobody else can see me or hear me. So,
I mean, thank God I got Scott
and we have a good time."
Rick: "Will you guys sit here when
we come back and find out what
time-travel feels like, OK? And what's
going on with both of you
guys personally. Be back with Scott
Bakula and Dean Stockwell right
after this."
[Commercial break]
[Show returns, showing the top of a
bald man's head with an "Into the
Night" decal]
Rick: "Billy Graham the famous
professional wrestler. That was Billy
Graham."
Dean: "That was the guy?"
Rick: "Here with Scott Bakula, Dean
Stockwell, stars of `Quantum
Leap', which is making a leap from
Fridays back to Wednesday, where
you first..."
Dean: "Wednesday at 10, well, no, our
fans and the audience prefers
us back at Wednesday at 10, they've
been writing in a big campaign
and finally NBC has said, `OK' and put
us back home at Wednesdays at
10.
[Begins speaking louder than the cheering
audience]
Starting this Wednesday when he [pointing to
Scott] is a pregnant woman."
Rick: "I wanted to get a chance to look
at that in just a second,
too. Let's talk about that for a second
because in `Quantum Leap',
Scott, you have to play a bunch of
different roles almost each week
it becomes a different television show.
That's a stretch, that's got
to be a wild acting gig."
Scott: "It is wild but it is also the
greatest acting gig you could
ever imagine because it is different
every week, it changes, the
range is limitless, we can do anything
and we keep doing the kind of
the impossible shows, so it's
great."
Rick: "Impossible because you talk to a
hologram of [laughing while
saying the name] Dean Stockwell every
week, I mean you've got to have
the chemistry we talked about that
before, you gotta have chemistry
to do that."
Scott: "Yeah, yeah."
Rick: "And Dean?"
Dean: "Well, he's a rubber actor he can
do these stretches. [Scott
reacts to the pun] I'm just happy to be there."
Rick: "To have a fr…well, let's just
look at you as a pregnant woman
sometime in the past."
[Clip from "Quantum Leap":
"8-1/2 Months"]
[Audience applause after end of clip]
Rick:
"How are you going to top that? What could be tougher than to
play a pregnant woman?"
Dean: "What else could be tougher is
something to help cure this
planet and I just want to tell you
because I talk about this, about
this trouble with the ozone hole the
last time I was on the show,
and `The Rick Dees Show' [Rick tries
to ask something] California
Costal Air Quality Management
Commission has passed a bill that all…
Riverside county, San Bernadino, Los
Angeles and Orange county, now,
and in January 1992, it's a law you
have to recycle Freon, folks, you
have to. So let's start! Alright.
Alright. Alright."
Rick: "This is a follow-up from when
you were here last time. We'll
wait and see."
Dean: "I am a rabid
environmentalist."
Rick: "You are a rabid saver of the
ozone layer."
Dean: "My wife, Joy, [can't understand
because Rick also talk] and so
are a lot of other people. That's
right.
[commenting on what Rick was saying]
Rick: "A rule was passed."
Dean: "This guy [puts a hand on Scott's
shoulder and then points with
other hand] with his new son, did you
know he has a new son?
[audience applause]
Cody Prowdfit (sp?) Bakula is here.
Alright."
[Scott bends back to look behind the
sofa, says something I can't
make out]
[Dean also does a look behind the sofa]
Rick: "How has that changed your
life?"
Scott: "Well, he's very, very new, so it
just…it brings back
wonderful memories from when my
daughter was that same age."
Rick: "And how old is she now?"
Scott: "Seven."
Dean: "That's great, that's
great."
Rick: "And you've done, you've gone
through this with a big space in
between, Dean."
Dean: "Well, no, I have a five and a
seven-year-old, that's only 20
months between…I never had a child
before them."
Rick: "I thought you did."
Dean: "No, no, no."
Rick: "You told me you did."
Dean: "No I did not.
[laughter]
I was talking about my golf game
or something then. But at least these
kids may have a better chance,
you know, they won't have to have so
much sunscreen slathered over
them now."
Rick: "This is really important to
you."
Dean: "Yes. [voice becomes
enthusiastic] Important to me?! It's
important to every…"
Rick: "More important than
acting?"
Dean: "More important than acting, more
important than anything.
Yes. Yes, that's right."
Rick: "What's your passion,
Scott?"
Scott [starts to get up from the sofa]: "My passion is singing. I've
got a song to do."
[Scott gets up off of the sofa and
heads over to the house band, with
Dean trying to grab him]
Dean:
"Get him back here."
Rick: "Sing. Sing."
Scott [to the band]: "'Happy Birthday', you got it?
Yeah? You've
got a mic or something?"
[Scott starts singing "Happy
Birthday" while walking back to Dean on
the sofa]
[audience joins in]
[applause at the end]
Rick: "Oh, Dean, you're wife is going
to be so mad."
Dean [to Scott, feigning anger]: "You dirty…oh."
Rick: "We knew it was your birthday. We
wanted you to get passionate
about whatever you want."
Dean: "Oh, great, alright. Alright,
let's…let's save this planet for
our kids. Come on, folks. Let's do it.
Let's recycle our Freon,
all the stuff, all the stuff. Recycle
everything."
Rick: "And let's recycle one last
thought, too. `Quantum Leap' has
moved from Friday…"
Dean: "Wednesday at 10, folks. By God,
we [not certain because Dean
is laughing] want them back for 2 more years"
Rick: "This delicious. [licking his
fingers] I'm telling ya. Scott
Bakula. Dean Stockwell. `Quantum Leap'.
And a birthday boy right
here `into the Night'."
[While getting up from the sofa to meet
the audience, Dean takes a
taste of frosting from the cake.]