Preston Beckman:(NBC head of scheduling, 1991-2000) NBC wasnt all that strong at 10 p.m.L.A.
Lawwas starting to fade out.
It came out of his experience as a med student in Boston.
It was all over the place, more chaos than order.
So I tried sellingERto other networks.
Littlefield:That could not be further from the truth.
I told him, Where are you gonna get a six-episode commitment?
I told [Moonves] to go make the film you believe in but as a two-hour pilot.
And there were people at NBC who didnt want me to even put that offer on the table.
Don Ohlmeyer(NBC West Coast president, 1993-99.He died in 2017.
): I had some reservations about whether the audience was ready for something that powerful.
Sometimes you’re free to have a show that is past your audience.
Lori Openden(NBC head of casting, 1985-99): Everybody was apprehensive about it.
There were multiple stories.
It involved a handheld camera and a big ensemble cast.
He gets up and walks into the ER and all hell breaks loose.
And Carol Hathaway [Julianna Margulies] kills herself in the pilot.
Littlefield:It was gory.
There was too much blood.
And there was so much medical terminology flying around.
I remember Don saying, Lets be in business with people who want to make television!
And he stormed out of the room.
Once Don had declared that he was less than happy with it, that kind of set the tone.
Ohlmeyer:People like to rewrite history.
I loved the pilot.
I cried three times.
There was just an awful lot of medical mumbo jumbo.
But she said it really didnt go that well.
We started working the phones.
The idea was to say, Guys, this was our highest-testing pilot weve ever seen.
So we did a third test together.
Beckman:We put the pilot on cable systems and recruited people to view it.
We started getting calls from ravenous people, asking, What was that?'
Reilly:One thing that came out of the research was how sorry everybody was to see Julianna go.
Littlefield:There was lots of doubt, but we had a feeling there was something here.
How does a connection say I love you?
You say yes and pick up the show!
He literally said to me at one point, What the hell do I know?'
Beckman:CBS announcedChicago Hopeas their Thursday at 10 show before we announcedER.
Reilly:The conventional wisdom was thatERwas interesting, butChicago Hopewas the more commercial show.
Moonves:CBS played dirty with the advertising campaign over the summer.
Plus, we had an incredible cast.ERhad an incredible cast too, but nobody knew it then.
Beckman:We premieredERon a Monday night [Sept. 19, 1994, and got 23.8 million viewers].
Then we ran the next episode that Thursday and it exploded.
We beatChicago Hope[and the 18-49 numbers shot up by 2 million].
Littlefield:It didnt take that long for CBS to moveHope.
Sagansky:Chicago Hopewas a successful show, but it was in the shadow of a super show.
So it never got its due.
Beckman:I had a feeling CBS would moveHopeto Monday night at 10 the day after New Years.
So we announced wed repeat theERpilot on that day.
Ohlmeyer:I always had a great deal of respect for Mandy for doing that.
But my job was to kick the s out of CBS.
ERaired its final episode on April 2, 2009.
