LS: What made you decide to give Murphy Brown another season?
CB: Late last year, I thought this should be the last season of the show. I was tired and I was very sure this was the year to stop. But I didn’t reckon on people not taking no for an answer. CBS was very smart. They said, “Take your three weeks off at Christmas, and see how you feel when you get back.” And of course, I rested, I felt better, and I thought: We have such a good time and we laugh so much on this show. How many jobs do you find like this? It was hard to make a decision that would affect 150 people. Before Christmas, everyone except me felt the show should go on, and when we finished filming on Friday nights, the crew would chant, “One more year!” They are great, they are adorable, and I really love working with them. Still, it’s risky doing a tenth year. It has to be good, because the press is going to be all over it. A lot to the think the show should be gone already.

Your own sense of self-protection, I imagine, is telling you to go out with a bang, not a whimper.
Now we really have to find a new direction for the show -- one that goes into more emotional areas and involves some new stories. I would like to explore women’s health issues, and do it in a way that introduces a sense of jeopardy as well as humor. Murphy going through a health crisis is different from the rest of us. It has room for both pathos and humor. I’d also like to explore Murphy’s alcoholism.

We talked once about the possibility of her falling off the wagon.
Yes, I think that should happen. If we get flak, we’ll just have a good time on Murphy Brown!

Let’s talk about Lily Tomlin. What has she done for the show?
She revitalized it. Lily’s presence is so strong, and I love the way she looks. I mean she’s so beautiful, and at the same time she has such a comedian’s face. It’s so mobile and animated, and moves in weird directions you don’t expect. It’s so fascinating to watch it run the gamut.
But what I really respect and love is the way she treats people on the set. Lily knows the names of guest actors that have two lines and are there for two or three days. She knows their work and she knows their problems. She’s so attentive and generous. I mentioned it to her, and she said, “Well, I’m working class.” I said, “Well, Lily, so are a lot of other people, and it certainly doesn’t hold them back from being jerks.”

Have you seen Grant Shaud [who played Miles Silverberg] since he left the series?
I see him from time to time. We had a carol evening during Christmas.... Grant was the only person on the show who ever made me laugh out loud. We’d get into laughing sprees that we really couldn’t stop, and they had to separate us as though we were in class. Once we couldn’t stop laughing during a shoot for 20 minutes. We had a lot of people coming over with solemn looks on their faces, so we sort of pulled it together.

What changes have you made in your own life?
Well, when I hit 50, I cut my hair. It was the perfect midlife cliché. You know, 50 years of long hair and then it was all gone. It was a great sense of freedom. I feared I would look like a pinhead. But, boy, it’s just so freeing in terms of time. Because you hit 50, and you’re looking at your watch all the time and thinking, it’s going fast. I don’t use blow dryers. I’m in the shower, I put some gel in, I’m out the door. It’s easy, and it’s nice to be another person, not a person with hair. For me, my hair was always my fallback position. If I looked like hell, at least I had my hair, to fluff up and fatten up. I just loved cutting it. And I saw Diane Sawyer after I had it done, and it was fun being with her because she has the same haircut. Oh, I’m so happy to be rid of it!

Murphy changed her look too.
Yes, well, the haircut. And the wardrobe is different. It’s cleaner, more pared down. Less jewelry. I changed my look, and as a consequence I changed Murphy’s. It’s just a little more modern. I’m a little simpler. I don’t wear heels as much because my feet hurt. Comfort is my focus.

Well, unlike Murphy Brown you always seem to put your family first.
That’s a big difference between us. The reason I chose to do this series was the schedule. I would never have done it if it were an hour show. I found out about the half-hour schedule and I thought: That sounds great for a life!

Last summer you shot a TV movie. Would you like to do more movies?
I can’t go away on location with Chloe still in school. I would never do that . I could do a movie for a week or two, but I wouldn’t go for longer. Chloe’s such a great girl. I love her so much. She’ll be a teenager soon, and she won’t want to have much to do with me. So I don’t want to squander the time now. While I’m doing Murphy, I can take her to school in the morning and see her in the afternoons.

Is there anything you can’t do because of the show?
Well, I feel there are a lot of basic things that I’m neglecting in my life. I get up at 6:00 or 6:30 A.M. for car pool, and it’s a long day. I don’t have time during the season except for my weeks off to read anything more than the paper. I think I’d really like to just stop and have a chance to read, and have a chance to learn to use Chloe’s computer. I didn’t want to change in a dramatic way, because frankly, I love our life. But, of course, we miss Louis every day and probably more and more rather than less and less.

Probably always. How do you manage?
I think we both feel blessed to have had him in our lives. All I want now is for life to go on. Not be stricken the way we have been. Not to have anyone else stricken. You get to this age and you really appreciate what you’ve built. You so treasure your friendships, your child, your quiet moments of sitting in bed with your flannel pajamas, watching TV and reading when it’s raining outside. You know, my favorite thing to do at night is for Chloe and I to have a date. We turn off the lights in the bedroom, and we light the fire and candles. We put something like Bambi or Beauty and the Beast or Cinderella in the VCR and have dinner in bed on trays and have the dogs with us on the bed. It’s probably my favorite thing in life. It’s just heaven. I crave for it all to just continue. I feel like, now, I appreciate life more -- probably as a result of all that’s happened. I feel like I don’t want to squander a minute of this.

You don’t feel bitter about losing Louis?
No, I cannot feel bitter. There’s a lot of grief, though.

Did you ever have time to grieve?
No, not much. I think it hit me this past year that I just hadn’t had a chance because I was just going so hard and fast. This summer, I had to deal with so many things, and then I went right back to work. I kind of felt like I was having a meltdown.

You don’t seem that way now.
I feel better now.

How has Chloe persevered through all that’s happened?
She has great spirit and a positive attitude. She’s had some really difficult things in her life, and she has incredible courage. She’s very dignified, and also very funny. And she showed such generosity, because it was a very long and agonizing time. She finds ways to deal with things. She has incredible inner resources.

I gather she wants to be a journalist.
She wants to be a writer. She’s just finished reading Jane Eyre. Before that it was Of Mice and Men.

Getting back to being 50: Do you have trouble memorizing your lines now?
It is really getting to be desperate. I’m in every scene, and my brain is fried. I can’t learn lines anymore. I’m just not able to. Chloe’s terrified every time I go to any school function because I’m always getting people’s names wrong. I just humiliate her. She’s always watching me like a hawk so that I don’t put my foot in it. For the show, sometimes, I have cue cards. During the year that Louis was sick I started using them, for obvious reasons. I hate to use them with other actors, because it’s not fair to them when I’m looking at these cards. But, boy, if I get in trouble, I have to. The camera is not on me all the time. So I know when someone else is talking I can look to remind myself where I am. I’ve been in every scene for nine years. That’s 225 shows of five or six scenes each.

Nobody thinks of you as 50. Do you diet and exercise? I don’t have much time to exercise. And at 50 it turns tragic. This past summer, I thought I would try to get back in shape. So I swam a lot, and I lifted weights. I actually got pretty healthy. But I’m very undisciplined. As soon as I got back to work I started eating doughnuts. I average about two a day. Lily and I find ourselves at the doughnut box at the same time, looking really sheepish. Both of us slink off to our respective corners and sort of cram them in our mouths. So recently I eliminated the doughnuts, but we also have a candy drawer that’s filled with Hershey’s Krackel and stuff. It’s hard to keep your figure with that kind of diet! But I do find that every season I have to stop eating sweets, and stop doing the doughnuts, not only because get so fat, but because it really takes my energy away. It makes me feel like I’ve got hair on my teeth. And it makes my mood go up and down.

Well, you know how to eat right.
I know what to do, I just don’t usually do it. I do drink lots of water, I take vitamins and those packets of Emergency once or twice a day. I also know I feel better when I exercise.

What workout would you most enjoy -- if you decided to get disciplined?
On a good week, I would do a yoga session for an hour and a half. And then I would balance it by going to the gym three times a week and doing the treadmill for half an hour. I do a really intensive style of yoga, which is so demanding you can’t think of anything else while you do it, or you’ll fall over. But it really improves how I feel. I started lifting weights, but I always forget what I’m supposed to do.

You need little drawings to follow.
Actually I do have drawings.

I guess it would be stupid if I didn’t ask if you think you might ever marry again.
You know, being 50 is different from being 40.

Well, what do you mean by that? People don’t whistle anymore> They don’t come on to you?
Frankly, I haven’t thought about it.

It’s a little soon for me to ask you that question.
Oh, listen, people were asking me so soon it would make your head spin. What I know is that you never know what’s coming in life, and I wouldn’t rule anything out. But I’m certainly not someone who needs to be married or even to be in a relationship to feel complete now. I’m very grateful for the one I had.

It wasn’t like you didn’t have a life before you were married. But Louis was so good.
He was great....Unfortunately things sometimes do go wrong in life, but fortunately I had a child to focus on. My only focus now is to create things for her to do that will in some way compensate for the loss she has suffered. Chloe has a great brain, so I try to feed it, and feed her experiences. And fortunately I’m in a position where I can do that. WE went to the inauguration in January. She’s such a great adventurer -- I’m thinking of taking her to Morocco or to Israel for a dig. I want her to see other cultures, other people, and other parts of America, too.

You bought a new house, didn’t you?
Yes, that was part of my experience of starting over again. It was probably too soon to make a decision like that, but I did. I felt we needed a change. Now I feel I’m very happy in our old house where we still are! But I wanted a bigger house where Chloe, as she gets older, can have friends over and hang out and do whatever they want. Where at the same time I can be with her and see what’s going on. The new place also has a little guest house for my brother, because I thought it would be nice to have him live with us. We’re very close and he and Chloe are incredibly close. So he’s going to live there. The house will be finished soon.

Chloe must be a wonderful companion for you.
Oh, yes, she is. I never do anything on the weekends but spend time with her. And I don’t go out much during the week either. I just like to be home. I have always been very conscientious -- and she has always been my first priority, because I’m so crazy about her. And after something like the loss of a father, you are even more conscientious about being there, being present for a child.

And you know, as she gets older, you’ll have another kind of time with her, the same way your mother did with you.
Yes. When you have a child, you don’t make any great changes in your life. You want to give a sense of continuity as much as you can. And you want to give a child a sense of family. Chloe has her father’s French family and her American family. In fact, we’ll go to France this summer.

Do you spend a lot of time with your mother?
Yes. I always have. We live very near each other. Last winter, we all went to Sun Valley together. My mother looks terrific and is in such great shape. I’m very thankful for her good health.

Do you see yourself in her?
I think we resemble each other. We have very similar voices. And she passed down many of her values to me. We have the same sense of courtesy and manners. People notice that. But we are quite different. I think I’m probably more like my father [entertainer Edgar Bergen].

Do you talk about him?
Oh, sure. There are always events and moments that we wish he could share with us. There’s always something he would have really appreciated and enjoyed.

What does Chloe think of her famous grandfather? She likes seeing him on film. She has a fairly eccentric gene pool and a great sense of humor.

Last year you told the producers of Murphy Brown not to submit your name for an Emmy award. Would you do that again?
Yes. I think so many nominations can create hard feelings. The last couple of times I was up there I felt like I should just get off the stage! Five is already five more Emmys than I ever thought I’d win. Enough is enough.

Do you ever think about going back to school?
Yes, I think about doing something entirely different. Once Chloe’s in college, if someone said, “Do you want to come to Africa and study animal behavior?” I’d be open to that.

What will you do next year when Murphy finally ends?
Besides reading a lot, I’ll spend more time than I do now at Chloe’s school. I’ll be one of those mothers who’s there pitching in more than I’m able to right now. I’ll do carpooling every morning and every afternoon. I’ll be at soccer games...I want every moment to count. Whether it’s working or playing, I just want to be grateful for every moment.

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Any typos are mine. I have typed this very late at night and spent a long time typing it. I should check it soon, but if there are any typos you spot, please e-mail me to tell me, then changes will be made sooner.

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