(My dear cousin Leslie died recently in Ohio at age 77. I wrote this in 2024 and am republishing to honor her memory.)
For many years Leslie Podkin and I lived parallel lives.
I worked in journalism in the 1980s and 1990s as a TV beat reporter, mostly for USA TODAY, covering NBC, CBS and ABC, and later Fox, based in Los Angeles. Also in La La Land at the time was my cousin Leslie, who was a production executive on NBCs hit Monday night comedy Alf.
I didn’t know she was here. And if she knew about me, she sure didn’t let me know.
Cut to a few years ago, and word of a new cousin on my fathers side begin appearing on Facebook. We made contact, initially by DM, and then last week we finally met in person, at a Cracker Barrel in Columbus, Ohio! The similarities and common experiences, even without knowing of the others existence, are uncanny.
“I’m shocked,” said my mother Judy when I told her all about meeting up with Leslie. “Why didn’t we ever know about her? We were in L.A. at the same time.”
As someone who used to collect TV Guides (the covers were amazing) was obsessed by TV (I bought one of the first VCRs) and hoped to work in TV one day, before getting sidetracked by print, I surely would have wanted to meet my show biz cousin!
But in one of those odd quirks of life, I never knew. I used to hear (great) Aunt Sophie talking about (cousins) Marvin and Albert all the time but I don’t remember any talk of Henry, Leslie’s dad.
It wasn’t until I took up interest in learning about the origins of my family later in life that I learned about the Podkins.
The mutual connection is great-grandfather Peter Granowsky, who fled Balta, Ukraine, back when it was considered Russia in 1906 to escape Jewish persecution and somehow made it to Lafayette, Indiana, home of Perdue University.
He was in his mid-40s at the time. In Lafayette he sold scraps on a horse-led truck, and eventually moved to Indianapolis, where he started the Granowsky and Sons junk shop.
Peter had five kids and Leslie’s grandmother was one of them, Dorothy. Her brother Dave was my grandfather, and he and brother Hymie worked with Peter at the junk shop. (Dave was a funny guy whose motto was “Smile while you’re sleeping, laugh while you’re awake.”
Leslie lived in Indianapolis, and shared the common relatives of my parents era, as well as that favorite great aunt Sophie, who lived in Los Angeles. She always thrilled me with her calls. The rotary phone would ring, and this big, cheery, ultra-enthusiastic raspy voice would almost sing “HOW are YOU?”
My favorite part of journalism is hearing people’s stories, and all about their lives. Obits—how we lived, are my favorite section of the newspaper, and in books, it’s all about biographies.
I was excited about meeting Leslie at the Cracker Barrel (her choice) in Columbus. I expected her to have great stories. What I didn’t foresee was the many parallels. How this happens in families is beyond me.
From Indianapolis Leslie eventually ended up in Columbus, and started working in local TV, where she was “Mrs. Rattlebee” on a kid’s TV show.
My father Jerry left Indianapolis to work in TV, first in Evansville, where he ran the camera for a local station and then Binghamton, New York, where he starred in a kids show for WNBF-TV.
Her interest was music. (I play the guitar respectably, and my brother Jez is an accomplished professional musician who’s been making a living at it for years. Cousins Peter and Stuart—sons of Jerry’s brother Hal, are professional musicians, as was Hal.) Jez’s kids Janna and Bill are both professional musicians and Arthur Caplan, another descendant, is studying music at NYU.
Leslie got signed by Atlantic Records to record music, and got sent to the legendary Muscle Shoals studio to record her first single, “He’s Only Happy When He’s Singin’ His Song.
To put into perspective, if you saw either of the recent films about Aretha Franklin, this is where Aretha recorded her first, landmark album for Atlantic, “I Never Loved a Man, the Way I love you.” This is the big time.
My cousin’s record was produced by Barry Beckett, who also worked with Bob Dylan, Dolly Parton, Paul Simon, Traffic and many other greats.
The tune was a minor country hit, but didn’t break out enough for Atlantic to have interest in further recordings.
She eventually got to Los Angeles, home of dreamers and schemers, to further the music career, and ended up with a job in television, working for Barry & Enright, as a question writer for the game shows “The Joker’s Wild” and “Tic-Tac-Dough.”
My first book was called “Come on Down: The TV Game Show Book,” and yes, I interviewed her boss Dan Enright.
From here, she met Paul Fusco, the brains behind the hit show about an alien from outer space named Alf, and with her TV background, was able to parlay a gig as a production exec for the comedy, which ran from 1986-1990. I was at USA TODAY covering TV during those years.
At Alf, where she wrote one of the scripts, she worked with several writers who I’ve spent time with. David Silverman, who is married to Rogena, a former Los Angeles Times staffer who befriended my wife Ruth back when they worked together there, and Mike Reiss, the longtime Simpsons jokeman who I’ve interviewed many times over the years.
After Alf ended, she continued her association with Fusco, and produced the short-lived cartoon, Space Cats, for which she wrote the theme song.
(You all know I play TV themes on guitar, right?)
Leslie eventually moved back to Columbus to take care of her mother in the last years, and somehow never left, even though she took steps to do so, but never got around to it.
She’s not singing anymore (“50 years of smoking took its toll”) but she’s as Aunt Sophie would say, “A real Granovsky,” with the same kind of wit, outlook and enthusiasm.
(Spelled Granowsky, but pronounced with a V in the old country.)
“Why is there so much music in your family?” is a question we’ve all gotten many times over the years. Between myself and Jez, Peter and Stuart, Hal and his brother Leonard, who studied at Julliard, there was so much of it. I don’t have an explanation.
Runs in the blood, I guess!
But only Leslie Ann Podkin recorded in Muscle Shoals!
P.S. Of Peter’s five kids, each one ended up with different last names. The girls became Singers, Podkins and Katz’s after marriage. The names Grande, Grant and Graham were chosen by the various men to sound less Jewish.
But in our hearts, we’re like Aunt Sophie said, real Granovskys.
Cousins are the best!
I love this! What a wonderful story. Thank you for sharing it. Also, how tall are you?