When people ask him the secret for getting a television show on the air, Bruce has an honest answer: "I don't know."

When 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter (Workman Publishing, May 2001) came out, Bruce was busy procrastinating on several projects at once, and was unprepared for what happened next: e-mails began showing up in his in-box, offering to sell him Viagra on line. Even more surprising—sprinkled in among those offers were queries from several television networks, asking him if he had ever considered turning his book into a series or if he knew of anywhere they could purchase Viagra.

ABC's offer was most attractive, especially when it became apparent that John Ritter might be attached to the project as the star. Always a fan of Ritter, Cameron jumped at the opportunity to have the Emmy award winning actor play him on the show. The casting of Katey Sagal, Golden Globe nominee, as the wife further convinced Cameron that of all the possible plans, ABC's had the greatest chance of turning out a series which would attract the same sort of family audiences which read Cameron's columns and books. The daughters are played by Kaley Cuoco (the "older daughter") and Amy Davidson (the "younger daughter"), both fine actresses who deliver perfectly the lines, sighs, and moods of teenage girls. Martin Spanjers plays the same role in the show as the son in the book—there for the perfect foil to his sisters, the father's only ally, and the person with the one line zingers that put the scene away.

The pilot script was a smooth and hilarious adaptation of 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter. "Fans of the book will not be disappointed," Cameron reports. "The writers were able to take large portions of the dialogue as written and put it right into the show."

8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter starring John Ritter and Katey Sagal airs Tuesday nights at 8:00 PM Eastern on ABC Television.