Aug. 4--PASADENA, Calif.-- "Scrubs" star Donald Faison has a simple, economical mission as host of "Your Life, Your Money," the WNED-TV production aimed at young adults, which will be broadcast nationally.
I like to look at myself as the new LeVar Burton ('Reading Rainbow') of PBS," cracked Faison in an interview with The Buffalo News. "I'm not teaching you how to read. I'm teaching you how to save your money."
Channel 17 producers were thrilled to get Faison, a frequent nominee for a Teen Choice Award for his "Scrubs" role as Dr. Christopher Turk, to front the
The show, primarily aimed at teaching financial literacy to young adult viewers, airs at 9 p.m. Sept. 9.
They could have gotten Wilmer Valderrama ('That '70s Show')," a flattered Faison said with a smile. "He wins the Teen Choice Awards every year. I've lost to everyone."
Faison's name helped the Buffalo PBS station get a prized slot at the Television Critics Association press tour, right after a session in which documentary filmmaker Ken Burns pitched his latest project, "The National Parks." According to executive producer John Grant, it is the first time Channel 17 has presented a documentary program it produced at the press tour.
Unfortunately, Faison was called away for a family emergency shortly before the session. Still, about 50 critics interviewed Grant, program producer Tom Simon and financial expert Beth Kobliner. "It was disappointing to find out an hour before," said Grant. "No one plans for this. But I was pleased with the turnout without Donald."
Your Life, Your Money" is all about planning to avoid emergencies -- financial emergencies. Fortunately, Faison talked with The News about why he accepted Channel 17's offer to host the program before he was called away.
No one teaches you how to save your money, ever," said Faison. "This show does that -- or at least sets you down the right road. I wish I could say I'm able to tell the future and that I knew the country was about to go into recession. But that's not true. I said yes because I thought it would be cool to teach young people how to save their money because nobody taught me that. If somebody did, I might be better off than I am right now, and I'm pretty well off."
Some of his financial misadventures are in the fast-moving hourlong program, which focuses on young people from different cities who learned the hard way about money. Much of the material seems to be so elementary that you might assume young people should know the information. "That's until you talk to them," noted Grant.
One of the subjects is a Buffalo Web designer, who gets good financial advice and was later hired by Channel 17 to do Web design for one of its projects.
After 169 episodes of "Scrubs," Faison is quite comfortable now. He lives in a $1 million home, and he'll pick up more big paychecks next season when Turk is one of three characters from "Scrubs" who will appear in a new, revised version of the ABC comedy.
Faison said he and John C. McGinley (Dr. Perry Cox) will be in all the episodes and Zach Braff (J. D.) will be in six episodes.
It is pretty much 'Scrubs: The New Class,' " cracked Faison. "[Like] 'Saved by the Bell: The New Class.' Turk is teaching surgery to a bunch of students. I'm [Principal] Belding, and let Johnny C. be Screech."
I'm always happy to have a job," added Faison. "If 'Scrubs' was going to go on, I was going to try to hold on to it for as long as I possibly could. There's something about being on television 10 years that's a big deal. If I can go 20 years, if I can pull a Kelsey Grammer [Frasier on "Cheers" and "Frasier"] I'll do it. You know what Kelsey Grammer rides around the Pacific on? A yacht. A really big one."
Early in his career, Faison's financial knowledge could be summarized in the title of one of his early movie (and subsequent) TV roles -- "Clueless." He said hosting "Your Life, Your Money" taught him some lessons.
I learned a lot," said Faison. "That there are ways to save your money, and it means living below your means. Act like you don't have the money and it lasts a lot longer. And you've got to invest your money in certain things."
He wasn't thinking about investments after he got his first big acting payday as a teenager in the film, "New Jersey Drive." He bought a Jeep and quickly became unemployed.
I had to make my car payments, and luckily 'Clueless' came around," said Faison. "Because I was 18, nobody could tell me what to do with the money, and I went out and spent it. I've done that a couple of times in my life, actually. I didn't learn the first time. I remember my Mom asked, 'What lesson did you learn from this?' I said, 'I learned I need to make more money, Mom.' She said, 'I don't think you learned the lesson then.' "
Faison, who has four children, said he learned the lesson about the fourth time he got into money problems and had to borrow from his mother to pay the mortgage on his first house.
I spent all my money on my house, figuring that in a couple of years I'll have a really big job and I'll sell this thing and I'll make that money back. It didn't happen that way."
I really wish I had learned the lesson at 18. I really wish I had learned the lesson at 16. . . . It's a pain to get calls from creditors and not know what to say to them."
Channel 17 representatives hope the program will teach young adults to avoid credit card debt and to save money. Of course, PBS isn't exactly CW or MTV when it comes to attracting the young audience.
That's why the budget [$1.5 million] for the show has [more] money going to non-broadcast components," explained Grant. "We created a terrific Web site. We're doing paid advertising for the first time in our history on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube . . . We had to go where these kids live. They don't live on PBS."
PBS does have viewers who are parents and grandparents. Beth Kobliner said that was the key. Parents have so much input in whether their kids save and use credit cards appropriately."
As the "parent" of the national program, Channel 17 President Don Boswell couldn't be prouder about what it means to the station.
Though the program is one hour, I have to believe a lot more things can be covered about financial literacy beyond this," said Boswell. "We think long-term strategically we need to be in the content business, and this gives us another feather in our hat to show the diversity of things we can do . . . I think it is the beginning of a long-term opportunity for us."
And thinking long-term is what financial literacy is all about.
Editor's note: Alan Pergament is in Hollywood this week for a meeting of the nation's television critics. He will be filing stories from his interviews there with TV show creators and actors, and blogging regularly on the Talkin' TV blog.
0 comments:
Post a Comment