DAILY VARIETY - TALK BACK  10/2/96 FOREVER YOUNG by Karyl Miller      I just read in this very paper, Soleil Moon Frye, the little urchin from "Punky Brewster," is directing her first feature -which she also wrote. Don't worry, children haven't taken over Hollywood just yet, Punky's not 7 anymore - she's 19(!). Since careers blossom and wither quicker than ever, guys making less money than Devoid Schwimmer and facing "the big 3-0," are in Prozac resistant panic.      And I'm happy for Punky, really I am. But speaking of panic, TinselTown's got a new kind of blacklist : Are you now or have you ever been fortysomething? I think it's shocking, the generation that didn't trust anybody over 30, now can't get anybody under 30 to take their phone calls. Is it some sort of karmic pay-back?      Too young or too squeamish to relate to ageism? Okay. But who among us doesn't live in mortal fear of becoming show business' own worst-enemy, the has-been? Everyone in the industry is in on a pass, and most of the passes start expiring around age forty.      Those facing a twenty year gap between their piggy bank and their pension are going skitzo not knowing whether to fantasize about passing for younger to get the job, or passing for older to get the pension.       By now we've all heard the horror story about the has-been development deal millionaires who, after they squandered their FEMA earthquake chimney repair money at Von's, became the first Freeway Off Ramp People (FORPs) with snappy signs and no misspellings.      Everyone in show business is hooked on show business, except there's no longer enough show business to go around. There's too many Boomers and no boom in jobs. Some of my pals are actually on the verge of contemplating (gulp!) a real job!      Of course Showbiz is in our blood: We've been getting away with murder; with work that's like play, salaries higher than our dad's, having our name on  TV, access to easy sex, and fun gloating while relatives-with-boring-jobs  kowtow to us. I could give up everything but the gloating.       Since we have a problem with no solution, I suggest we do the next best thing: put out a PR campaign. Isn't that what Uncle Sam would do? Ageism victims need a really cool spokesperson like Tina Turner, T-shirts and a good slogan, such as "Don't Hate Me Because I'm Fifty." That way everyone's consciousness would be raised, and we'd have "fabulous fifties appreciation," if not jobs.       At "Jerry's Deli," I interviewed three men and one woman sitcom writer-producers. They call themselves "Three Bankruptcies and a Foreclosure Productions." "Our credits could devour the credits of today's teen-age exec producer who was a story editor last week," scoffs the woman. None of them looks a day over 35, but they are mostly 45. They're existing on residuals, a  pilot script here and a punch-up there, but they're pitching more now and selling less. They're scared. They don't want to become the next FORPs.      They thought my T-shirt slogan should be expanded to billboards saying "We're the old farts who made household names out of Timothy Leary and Lenny Bruce." Or "We were student activists! We rejected the conventional! We made the world safe from hypocrisy, and this is the thanks we get?" Or "If it wasn't for us and our generation, there would never have been a sexual revolution. We were in the infantry. We got crabs at Woodstock, so you could be gettin' it right now!" Their point was well taken, although the last one seemed out of sync with the current caution.      I was about to leave when the quiet writer with the crazy eyes seized my tape recorder and blasted this into it: LISTEN,THE ONLY REASON PEOPLE OVER FORTY ARE FIGHTING TO STAY IN SHOW BUSINESSIS TO MAKE ONE LAST KILLING SO THEY CAN GET OUT OF SHOW BUSINESS! YOU'REGOING TO GET YOUR PUNISHMENT! THAT'S RIGHT, YOU LITTLE GEN-X-HOLES WHODON'T BELIEVE THERE WAS A HOLOCAUST BECAUSE IF IT DIDN'T HAPPEN IN YOURLIFETIME, IT DIDN'T HAPPEN. HANG ON TO YOUR TONGUE STUDS, BECAUSE YOU'REABOUT TO BE SQUEEZED OUT BY THE NEXT GENERATION: "THE B-BABIES." THEY'REONLY THREE YEARS OLD NOW, AND LIKE YOU, THEY WERE RAISED IN FRONT OF THETV. BUT UNLIKE YOU, THEY WEREN'T EXPOSED TO THE GENIUS OF "SEINFELD." THEY'RETHE GENERATION THAT EMBRACES "BARNEY." AND THEY'RE THE TREND SETTERS ANDTHE TASTE MAKERS OF TOMORROW. THEY'RE GOING TO BE THE NEW HEADS OF TV DEVELOPMENT.YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO PITCH YOUR SERIES IDEA TO THEM. SORRY I WON'T BETHERE TO WATCH YOU SQUIRM, BUT I'LL BE LAUGHING ALL THE WAY TO MY GRAVE! (MANIACAL LAUGHING) End of tape.      It's obvious we need a Twelve Step Program for people who don't happen to be one of the five hyphenates the networks are doing business with right now. They're hanging on by the short hairs. They need a non-suicidal way to say good-bye to the old showbiz dream, and say hello to the new Bloomingdale's dream. * Ms. Miller is an Emmy award winning writer-producer. back to main page