Tom as judge on Law and Order, SVU

 As the money ran out in Hollywood, suddenly and very unexpectedly, Tom got an offer to apprentice as a director on Guiding Light. Once again, I’d guess he prevailed on his soap lady friend to make a call for him.

It was not a sure thing. He had to apprentice for months, then direct a few shows, and everybody had to like him. Then he would have to join the union, before they could hire him. Still, it was the best offer he had. And his friends back on the show were enthusiastic to work with him again. They had wanted to bring back Justin Marler several years before, but, as is so often the case, that offer came at the one and only time in Tom's California career when he couldn't accept it, because he was shooting Working Girl and under contract.

Three years after arriving in New Jersey, we were still in the two-family house and nothing had gone as planned. When we had left LA, Scott Free productions had been seriously considering doing one of Tom’s scripts. But they decided not to option his World War Two murder mystery Hunter's Moon which they'd been looking at before we left Hollywood.

Tom spent a year learning how to direct a soap, doing a few shows, and getting his union card, and then the producer who promised to hire him got fired. I don’t believe it was ever a serious offer. It was one more career disaster.

However, within the first few months of our return to the east coast, Tom was lucky and talented enough to come to the attention of the Law and Order producers. Ed Sherin cast him in a terrific part for Law and Order, which was one of the few shows we had always watched and really enjoyed while living in Los Angeles. I’m sure he never would have gotten the audition and aced it so well, if he hadn’t had all his nighttime TV experience from our years in LA.

We both had the greatest respect for everything about the Law and Order shows. The scripts were terrific, the acting was top notch, and the production values were superb. Tom got a plum role as a defense lawyer and was thrilled. This was the best thing that had happened to us in years. The Law and Order people were also very happy with Tom's work and told him that he'd found a home there. They were as good as their word, and every year for the next decade, he did several shows each season.

Then, when Law and Order Special Victims' Unit started, he was cast as a judge and happily went on working for Dick Wolf Productions. Working for Dick Wolf Productions was far more professional and serious than most of the jobs in Hollywood. The work, the acting, and doing a great job were what mattered most. And it certainly showed on screen.

Tom was thrilled to be part of those shows, and he loved the people he worked with.  He ended up working in over thirty Law and Order, and Law and Order SUV shows. The only downside to this job was that he only got to do it, to bathe in the luxury of working with great people, for several weeks total each year. That's very thin gruel for an actor to survive on. But working with these very talented and wonderful people was something that Tom could always be proud of. We had a renewal of hope. Maybe, somehow things will work out for us. I now had a full-time job in a nearby small insurance office. We weren't getting rich, but we were getting by.

I was happy enough, but Tom’s “depression” episodes were more frequent, and he never seemed happy anymore. I had no idea what the problem could be other than he wanted to work more often and do more interesting jobs. That was the excuse he always gave.

Then that crazy script Tom had written based on his drive back from his first trip to Los Angeles got made into a movie. We briefly went back to California for the shooting and more rewrites. The movie was made. We managed a small nest egg from the proceeds. Our lives got a bit better from knowing we had a financial cushion to tide us over in case Tom or I couldn't work.

He did many small parts in the top motion pictures that shot in and around New York City, and that was great and perked his spirits up a bit. He taught acting at several places, which all eventually went out of business. He tried working with his old manager Lloyd Kolmer to coach actors in how to succeed. Their combined experience was amazing, but they ended up doing it mostly for free. Nobody had any money. All their prospective students had borrowed money for expensive college degrees in theater that weren’t much help in getting jobs.

Tom spent his lonely evenings smoking and drinking. He’d sit in front of the TV set till all hours of the morning. That, in addition to constant acid reflux was a lethal combination for him.

I fought like crazy every way I could think of to try to dissuade him from his bad habits which were killing him, but to no avail. He’d been miserable for years. Down at the bottom of a well, he said. We were managing, and retirement was right around the corner, so it was very hard for me to understand why Tom had just given up on life. I knew he felt like an abject failure, but in fact, he’d done pretty well as an actor. Maybe not a big star, but he’d had a good career and done lots of work he could be proud of. I was proud of him.

I really couldn't understand why he took it quite so hard. Sure, we never got the Mercedes Benz or were able to send the kid to Harvard, but so what? We had each other and so much to be proud of. But Tom was not proud of us. He took no pride or joy in his achievements in the industry, or all our hard work in keeping us going. He went back to the bottom of that well and stayed there. Nothing and no one could reach him. Whatever love he’d felt for me, had long since died. We spent a few hours each evening together, talking and laughing, then I’d go to bed, and he’d macerate in his unhappiness, smoking and drinking alone in front of the TV.