People: Oct. 21, 1985

His books have been optioned over the years by moviemakers, but none of Saul Bellow’s works have ever made it to the screen. The first exception will be Seize the Day. Bellow’s tragicomic 1956 novella about the decline and foibles of a Manhattan salesman is now being made into a TV movie for PBS in New York City. The film, being produced by former Princeton students of Bellow’s, has delighted the author, and last week he visited the set to make a cameo appearance walking down a hotel corridor past his hapless protagonist, Tommy Wilhelm, played by Robin Williams. The Nobel laureate has no ambitions about an Emmy. “I don’t expect to add anything unless something of my absurdity comes through,” says Bellow the actor. Bellow the writer was not tempted by the medium either. “I was approached to write the script,” he says, “but it’s not my trade. I’d have to learn how to do it.” Besides, he thinks the scriptwriters have captured his original humorous intent. “There’s a lot of funny stuff,” agrees Williams. “But it’s painful funny.”