Act like a writer

by Nora Drake

CHERI STEINKELLNER teaches her students to behave as if they are writers, even if they don’t quite believe it yet. It’s an insight she gained over decades working in the entertainment industry. Now she shares that lesson — and many others — with students at UC Santa Barbara. 

An Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning writer and producer, Steinkellner teaches classes in TV, screenwriting and creative collaboration. She instructs her students to write 1,000 words a day throughout her courses, in order to “be the writer you wish to read in the world, engaging in daily dialogue with your inner monologue.” 

As a child growing up in Fullerton, California, Steinkellner was “an avid audience,” she says. “I didn’t know performing or writing were options for someone like me. I thought, ‘Why would anyone ever want to look at me? Or to listen to me?’ I’m pretty sure I didn’t realize writing words for other people to say was a thing people did.” 

She began as an actor — onstage, on TV and as a charter member of L.A.-based comedy troupe the Groundlings. Though Steinkellner was being paid to perform, something felt off. “I didn’t enjoy rehearsing. I didn’t want to take bows,” she says. “After the show, other actors ran out to greet the audience. I just wanted to slip out the back.” 

A lightbulb went off when she met her lifelong collaborator and future husband, Bill Steinkellner. “I fell in love with a guy who wanted to be a writer,” she says. “I didn’t realize until a few parties in that I liked talking about what he did better than what I did.” 

One day Bill had an idea for a story. Cheri suggested he write it as a stage play. He didn’t know where to begin. She said, “I’ll help.” A creative partnership was born. 

That play, which she describes as “a contemporary take on ‘Our Town’ set in L.A. in the 1980s,” got great reviews, won awards and convinced Steinkellner, who was also playing the lead, to give up acting for good. She describes her aha moment onstage, saying: “My leading man got a big laugh with a line I thought of. It sent a sparkle down my spine in a way that performing someone else’s words never did.” 

The play’s success — as well as her early association with the Groundlings — led to professional opportunities to pitch and write comedy. “We were like microwave popcorn,” she says. “The first kernel takes a while to pop, then a few more go off, then it’s pop-pop-pop.” 

One of their fellow Groundlings eventually popped, becoming a writer for the TV comedy “The Jeffersons.” He invited Steinkellner and Bill to come in and pitch stories. Overprepared they brought in 100 story ideas on 100 index cards. They sold nothing. The following season, they were invited back, bringing in six stories and selling them all. When the show ended, they were invited to join the writing staff at “Cheers,” the iconic 1980s and ’90s sitcom based in a Boston bar “where everybody knows your name.” 

Cheri Steinkellner - Photo by Matt Perko

Steinkellner recalls their first story pitch at “Cheers.” “We didn’t sell any of the stories we prepared. We never even got to pitch them. We were sitting around with the producers, schmoozing before the pitch, and something that had happened to us that week ended up inspiring a story and becoming our first assignment.” That story became “Cheers” episode 4, season 6, “I’ll Gladly Pay You Tuesday.” 

The Steinkellners went on to become “Cheers” story editors, then producers and eventually showrunners, enjoying rare creative freedom. “The network and studio execs trusted us,” Steinkellner says. “If a story didn’t work at the table reading, they’d say, ‘We know you’ll fix it.’ Then they’d go off to the next table reading and we’d go back to the writers room, to fix it our way. That doesn’t happen often, but it’s great when it does.” 

Along with creative freedom came the burden of having to deliver 26 top-notch episodes a season on a tight deadline. Over the years, Steinkellner was often the only female writer on a raucous male staff. “It was like ‘Peter Pan,’ and I was Wendy, playing mother,” she recalls. “She would tell the Lost Boys stories so they could go to sleep. I would say, ‘We’ve gotta write this story, so we can all go home and get some sleep.’” 

The Steinkellners left “Cheers” when they ran out of stories to tell. They worked on a couple of other shows, which have been lost to time, including a Bob Newhart-led sitcom that Cheri describes as “pure comedy joy six days a week. Then on the seventh day, the ratings came in and nobody was laughing.” 

The next TV show they created brought more challenges. Conflicting story notes from network, studio and actors felt never-ending and nearly impossible to address. “It was like juggling Rubik’s Cubes while you’re trying to solve them,” Steinkellner says. The creative freedom was gone. 

At the same time, Cheri realized her personal goals had shifted — from leading a writers’ room to volunteering in her kids’ classrooms. Cheri and Bill sold their home in the San Fernando Valley and moved to Santa Barbara to raise their family. 

Colleagues warned that leaving Los Angeles would end their careers: “Nobody dials 805.” But a year later, a Disney visionary called with an invitation to create an animated series for ABC’s “One Saturday Morning” lineup. That series, “Teacher’s Pet,” went on to earn the Steinkellners a couple more Emmys, plus one for Broadway star Nathan Lane, who voiced the title character. A theatrical feature version came next. With stars including Lane, Kelsey Grammer, Jerry Stiller and Megan Mullalley, it blossomed into a full musical, with songs featuring Cheri’s lyrics. “It was a financial matter of the studio not wanting to pay for extra elements, so we snuck the lyrics into the dialogue, then set them to music, et voila: It’s a musical!” 

It worked, and Disney Theatricals invited Cheri and Bill to look through their film catalog for a property to adapt as a stage musical. “Sister Act” was the result, and following successful Broadway and West End runs, the nuns are now singing on tours, in regional theaters and in community and school productions around the world. 

Cheri’s new musical, “Get Happy,” is a stage adaptation of the Judy Garland-Gene Kelly MGM B-movie classic “Summer Stock.” She describes it as “everything I ever loved about musical-comedy, all in one show.” The show broke box office records and was named a New York Times Critics’ Pick when it debuted at the Goodspeed Opera House in Connecticut. It now awaits its Broadway debut. 

In the meantime, Steinkellner continues to inspire and embolden her students in the classroom. “Be fearless,” she says. “In the writers room, you have to be brave enough to say the dumbest, most obvious thing out loud, because your dumbest thing may lead the room to the smartest thing. You have to start the ball, listen, read the room, check your expectations at the door, and accept brilliance when it finds you.” 

Cheri practices what she preaches, listening closely and learning from her Gen Z undergraduates. What she learns informs her own writing. “Comedy is a moving target, and what makes us laugh changes constantly,” Steinkellner says. “My students open a window into what makes them laugh, what is meaningful to them. This is incredibly helpful in my own work.”