Mr. Hesseman appeared in a 1984 movie called Dr. Detroit. I was undoubtedly the basis for title character of that particular movie; see "Doctor Detroit" in the media index near the bottom of Screen B of my home page. But among other things that can be noted while viewing Doctor Detroit is this: someone, perhaps an imaginary person, named “Hal Gausman,” was listed in the closing credits as “set director.”
Any reader interested in purchasing Doctor Detroit may click on the hyperlink at left. It wasn't really a very good movie. (Nevertheless I found 49,300,000 links to Doctor Detroit on Google.)
As for Richard Sanders: after WKRP had run its course, Mr. Sanders appeared in one episode of a later CBS series called Simon and Simon. The episode in question, which was first broadcast in 1984, helped keep my space colonization cause alive after NASA--and indeed the entire US government--had disowned it.
The plot featured the ideas of Dr. Peter Glaser. Glaser was a pioneering advocate of Solar Power Satellites (SPS). SPS is perhaps the only way to deal with global warming, while, at the same time, providing Earth with enough energy to sustain future human well-being.
Mr. Sanders played the part of an oil company executive opposed to SPS.
Some years later, after Simon & Simon had run its own course as a series, I encountered Mr. Gerald McRaney and his wife on the street in Indianapolis. Mr. McRaney had played one of the two lead roles on Simon & Simon. His wife had also been in a CBS series, Designing Women.
“He’s bad,” said Mrs. McRaney, of me. (She may have even said, "He's really bad." It has been some time since it happened.)
“Oh, he’s not bad the way we are,” replied Mr. McRaney.
I said nothing, altough I was grateful for Mr. McRaney's generous assesment of my character. Many such incidents helped me to better understand my role as a source of theatrical verisimilitude for Hollywood. Other CBS entertainers I encountered in public included: Bonnie Franklin, Mr. Telly Savalas, Linda Carter, Mr. Alan Alda, Mr. Pee Wee Herman, Loretta Swit, and Sharon Gless.
When one encounters well-known personalities in public, they sometimes seem different than the impression one gets from TV or the movies. Sometimes, it seems, they’d rather not be recognized, so they dress differently than they do when performing. I recall once encountering someone who looked a good deal like Susan Saint James. Indeed, I thought it was Susan St. James. But she was dressed in what at that time might have been referred to as “beatnik” attire.
Her TV character wouldn't have dressed like that.
On the other hand, turning a corner once, I once almost collided with Pee Wee Herman. He was dressed exactly the way he dressed on TV and was therefore quite unmistakable.
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