Felix and MacGyver Wouldn't Assume; Neither Should We

I LEARNED ABOUT ASSUMPTIONS FROM FELIX UNGER. Felix is, of course, one half of Neil Simon’s Odd Couple, portrayed by Tony Randall when the popular play-then-movie was translated to television. I recall watching an episode when I was about nine where Felix is defending Oscar (Jack Klugman), in court – the reason why escapes me – and chastises a woman on the witness stand because of an assumption she made. “Ah… you ‘assumed’!” Felix proclaims. He leaps to a nearby blackboard and scrawls the word in thick, self-righteous chalk capitals. “My dear, you should never ‘assume,” he says, then underlines three parts of the word. “You see, when you ‘assume’ you make an ASS of U and ME!” I thought it was pretty funny. (It was 1973. I liked wordplay even as a child, but I suspect the fact that he said “ass” tickled my funny bone as much as anything.)

Click to read more ...

The NINO Principle: Nothing In, Nothing Out

“We need you to write a brochure about Bimini” It was more than a decade ago and I was a copywriter at a small advertising/marketing firm specializing in hospitality — hotels, airlines, tourist destinations and such — and a young account executive who didn’t know any better had stopped by to give me one of my first assignments. “Great. What’s a Bimini?” (OK, I was a bit young myself …) Turns out it’s an island famous for being one of Ernest Hemingway’s get-aways. A client about to open a new resort there needed a marketing brochure — and soon. I asked when I could get briefed on the details of the resort, find out what would appeal to visitors, maybe even go see the place. The AE told me she didn’t have any information, had only enough budget to give me two-and-half billable hours to write the thing and was hoping to see a first draft that afternoon. I was puzzled and thought surely I was misunderstanding something. “How am I supposed to write a brochure about something I don’t know anything about?”

Click to read more ...