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told me I was making him feel like this one mistake had erased everything good he’d ever done, and that’s when I realized I’d gone too far.
    So I started backpedaling: “I didn’t mean to do that. I’m very happy with the work you do. . . . I guess I’m just upset.” I hugged him and retreated back to the writers.
    The incident was so out of character for me that I discussed it with my therapist. I mean, I wasn’t crazy or pathological; I knew I was acting strange. We concluded that the plant was me as a child. It was as if Ramon had hurt me and not the plant. For this I’m paying $150 an hour? But in fairness to my therapist, I did har-bor a lot of sorrow for those times as a child when I was made to 9377 Cancer Schmancer 2/28/02 4:18 PM Page 32
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    sit by myself on the milk can outside our apartment door for mis-behaving. Those times I felt scared, misunderstood, and unloved.
    I guess when the plant was set aside in the alley my subconscious reared its ugly head.
    This satisfied me and seemed to explain why I’d overreacted, but in retrospect I think it was much more than that. Perhaps on some level I felt bad for the plant because I felt bad for me as a child, but my reactions were definitely fueled by some kind of chemical imbalance. No matter how deeply I dug into myself in therapy to understand and unravel my past, I’d always end by saying the same thing. “This normally doesn’t bother me, it’s just when I’m PMS-ing that I become so consumed by irrational anger and insecurity.”
    And life wasn’t getting any easier. A week later Peter and I were called into the studio president’s office. Something was up. We walked together as we crossed the lot. For that moment we put our personal differences aside. As we entered the inner chambers of the top Columbia TriStar TV executives, they all seemed very solemn. I noticed a framed Nanny poster hanging on the wall.
    That was a good sign. I thought perhaps we were going to get the usual ratings pep talk. I wondered if they knew Peter and I were having problems. But the situation was much graver than that.
    They began by saying that they’d gotten a call from the president of CBS. The network wasn’t planning on renewing our option for a seventh season. Our hearts sank. The show was the only thread holding us together. It was our baby and now that, too, was coming to an end.
    After much persuasion by the studio and network, I agreed to go public, announcing that it was my decision to end the show.
    Better our audience think we were going out on top, by my choice, than that we’d been canceled. There was some hope that if the news came out midseason, it would somehow boost ratings and 9377 Cancer Schmancer 2/28/02 4:18 PM Page 33
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    prompt a miracle pickup. I hated the idea of pretending it was my decision because I didn’t want everyone I worked with to think it was my fault they were losing their jobs. Nor did I want to be responsible for disappointing the millions of people who’d watched and supported the show all those years.
    But pressure from the inside to do whatever it took to try to rescue our ill-fated show made me the fall guy. One of the hardest things I’ve ever done was to stand before my entire cast and crew, as well as Peter and the writer-producers, and make that speech telling them I was ending the show. “In my life I’ve always stayed too long at the fair, but not this time, not with The Nanny,” I said, as my voice quivered.
    Like real troupers, we were all inspired to wrap up the final episodes with style and panache. Some of our greatest shows emerged out of our despair, but for some reason unknown to me, the network that we helped keep afloat for so many years chose to abruptly pull us off the air. Brand-new episodes of The Nanny were shelved. Once the press release was out that I was the one quitting, the network quit us and I was left holding the bag. Elaine, as always, said it best: