The Daly Express
Author Douglas Wellman on Hollywood, Humor, Faith, Survival, and the Human Spirit
(upbeat rock music) - Hi everyone, this is John Daly. I'm here with another episode of The Daily Express. I recently talked to fellow author Douglas Wellman, who has a new book out. It's titled Teenage Girl in Auschwitz. And it's the true story of a 14 year old girl and her family during the Holocaust. Doug's a very interesting guy, as you'll hear in the interview. His roots are actually in comedy and television work, but he's written a number of books on very serious topics that entail faith, history and the human spirit. We'll get into all that. So without further delay, here's my interview with Douglas Wellman. And today we're talking to Douglas Wellman, author of the new Holocaust book, A Teenage Girl in Auschwitz. How's it going today, Doug? - Hiya, John. - I always love talking to you. It seems we only do it when I write a new book. So I guess I'm just gonna have to write faster. - That's great, great, great. Well, you put him out pretty fast. So that's great, that's great. So before we get into your new book, which is obviously on a very serious and sobering topic, I wanted to talk a bit about you and your background. I find your biography incredibly interesting. You were a Hollywood television producer and director for many years and much of that work was in comedy. Can you talk about that chapter of your career and what drew you to comedy? I must say that as someone who follows you on social media as well, you have a really good, fantastic sense of humor and I really appreciate it. So I'm interested to see how this part of your career started. - We know I was always interested in comedy as far back as I can remember as a child. And it just struck me that spending your time laughing was a whole lot more interesting than being unhappy. So I was always directed in that area. You know, there was a famous man named Napoleon Hill. He wrote a book about 100 years ago. He started about, it's called Think and Grow Rich. And the thesis of that book is that people tend to end up where they're doing things they think about. And I think that was quite true in my situation because I was this little kid who liked comedy. But I also liked television, broadcast games, very interested in that. And so I moved, merged the two at some point. I was a producer, director primarily in Minneapolis, St. Paul television director. Then I moved to Los Angeles. I got with the hope of getting into comedy television. And I was lucky. I got in, my first show was a situation comedy called Facts of Life, which I, it was a very nice show, very nice to be. Everything was, the show was niceness, you know. But I was a production manager. And I wanted to be a director again. And I was a short time thereafter, I was working for a studio as a production manager. And about once or twice a week, I would go up into the, you know, production executives office to talk. And I would say, you know, I'm also a director, I'm really a director. And he'd say something like, well, that's real nice, Doug, I'm happy for you. You know, and that was, that was it. So I sit in my office one day in the phone rang. Yeah, I get to say, you got to come here right away. Okay, fine. Went down to his office and he said, Joan Collins is on stage two right now to do a public service spot. And I forgot she was going to be here. And I got a stage and I got a crew, but I don't have a director. Didn't you tell me one time you knew something about a director? And I said, I might have mentioned that. Can you do this? Yes, so I can do it. Okay, you have the script. No, okay. Do you know what it's about? No, fine. When is she here? Now. Perfect, so I'm late and I don't know what I'm doing. And Joan Collins at the time was a huge television star with a show called Dynasty. And I thought, this is a great thing. I'm good, we're down there. It looked like a complete book. And I went down and Joan, why don't we, why don't we rehearse these cue cards before we go? That's how I learned what we were talking about. And then it happened to be about something I knew something about. So I think, well, you know, Joan, how important this is because you know that that organization does well. Oh, really? So anyway, now Joan and I are fast friends. We shoot the spot. Meanwhile, the headpuba of production is up in his office waiting for something to hit the fan and it didn't. And so after that, I became a director. Just because, and from there then I had the opportunity to move out into the world of comedy again, but at that time at a different level. And I had so much fun. The years when I spent doing stand-up comedy shows, for example, a lot of those were troubling. It was like you took your family with you because the comedy world was a family. And I really did enjoy that so much. I just had a great time. And I did a little writing, but mostly I was a producer and director and thoroughly enjoyed it. The business was quite different now. It's not the way it was when I was engaged in it, but. - You also part of your bio. You earned a theology degree and served for years as a pastor working with homeless people in Los Angeles. You were also a Bible teacher at a Utah prison and then served as a hospital chaplain. So you're not only filled with the comedic spirit, but also the Holy Spirit. I'm curious, has your faith always been, you know, a big part of your life or is that something that came later, perhaps after working with too many celebrities? (laughing) - Yes, you have. So I was raised at a church, very nice church, very nice people, but I was about 16 years old. It wasn't a teaching church. They did what I've now come to call the be good to your mother's sermon. You know, you should go out and go out and do nice things. And so I thought, well, you know, this is a lot like Boy Scouts only without the fun. So I don't know that I necessarily be happy to be. So I left and about 20 years later, I was working as a director in Hollywood and I got very, very ill, very ill. And I couldn't quite shake the thing. And an actress that I was working with said, well, why don't you come to church with me? So I don't know. I certainly can't hurt, I don't have to think against it. And she took me to a church where they actually taught the Bible. And after about 45 minutes, I went, "Oh, so that's what this is all about. "Why?" I kind of, I'm gonna stick around. I'm interested in this. And so I did it and I just kept learning and learning and learning. And about a decade after that first experience, I had another life crisis and it was a whopper. I mean, it was, took me a long time to get out of it. And when I did, I thought, you know, I'm not the only one who's had the world fall in on them. Maybe I could be helpful to someone. And I was already interested in, you know, obviously in Bible study at that time. So I went, I got a theology degree initially just kind of for my own interest. And then I decided I think I wanna help people. I shouldn't do something. And then the homeless thing just kind of fell in my lap. I don't even remember exactly how it happened except that I suddenly found myself on Skid Row, which was a fairly horrible place back then, what it's like today, I can't even imagine. And I did that with homeless people for a while, but there was so much hardcore drug addiction. And mental illness, but it was really hard for me to do anything except try to be of some comfort. And, you know, that was about it. So I started looking around for someplace else and I found a ministry in the San Fernando Valley. And that was a different experience, not that similar level of drug addiction and mental illness. And through a very strange series of events, I suddenly found myself being the co-director of the ministry. And so every week I spoke to, I spoke and then we gave the homeless people a hot meal and closed. And then I stayed around and did individual counseling. And that was, I did that for six years until I retired and then we moved to Utah and I didn't have anything to do for a while and it was kind of bugging me. But the church I was attending had a ministry to prison inmates. So I thought, okay, fine, I'll try that. And I did that for a while and then I discovered that most about 70% of the inmates are there because of some involvement with drugs. So the state of Utah Department of Human Services provided classes for me to attend. And I got certified as a drug counselor and a disaster crisis counselor. And so, and by this time, of course, I was a licensed reverend. And so I went back, we worked at the prison and along about the time COVID hit, I heard that there was an opening in the local hospital here for a chaplain. And so I thought, oh, well, it's great. I'll go over there and go all the stuff I've done. They'll probably be happy to see me, which was incorrect. They had some pretty stiff scandars in what they wanted. And I did get the job, but it also came with a commitment to two more years of education, which was followed by becoming court certified, which was some more hoops. But I jumped through them and I'm very happy that I have a chance to be with people. I worked in intensive care and also in the palliative care departments. And there's generally you wouldn't think a lot of room for humor in those areas. But I found that a lot of times in those circumstances, people really need a relief from what's going on. Not all the time. I mean, they always need the relief, but you gotta be a little careful. But I found that the humor can be very valuable. I had a patient. I was in with her for about 40 minutes, I think. And her husband was sitting, you know, next to us. And he was just basically staring at the floor and she cried for the first two thirds of that visit. And then I was able to slowly turn things around. And by the time I left, they were laughing. As I walked out of the room, the husband said, "Hey, it wasn't that great." So I don't know how long that lasted. Was it an hour, was it a day? I don't know. But for a brief period of time, that little bit of humor gave her some relief. So you never know. You just never know. - That's a great story. And I mean, I'm sure they took that with them for a while after that. So let's talk about your new book, Teenage Girl in Auschwitz. It's a true story and emotionally gripping and very compelling one. Can you tell us a bit about it? - A teenage girl in Auschwitz, like all of my former books came to me. I didn't go looking for it. That's another kind of interesting thing that's happened in my life. I did a little consulting for the government, many, many, many years ago. And I met at the time he was a major general and we became friends. And he had a story that he talked to me about. That became Vox's Secret Life of Howard Hughes. I had, I got a call from our publisher, Terry, one afternoon. Terry never calls me on my cell phone. Which we talked by, all the time by email, she never calls me on the cell phone. She called me one afternoon and said, I just talked to a man whose mother survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. This looks like it has you written all over it. You want it? Oh yeah, so I called him. And then I had my friend John Binder, I worked with him on his autobiography and a missionary in Burma I worked on with her. And then a friend of mine read surviving Hiroshima, a young woman's story. And she said, well, wait a minute, I went to college with a young woman whose grandmother survived Auschwitz. Would you like to talk to her? Oh yeah, sure. So they made the connection and that's how that started. And I was fortunate to not only have the family's interest in support in this, but Basha Freilich, who was the subject of the book, after the war left two recorded testimonies of her experiences. One was with Graz college that was done in the 80s. And then the other one was done in the 90s with the Showa Foundation. And so I had the opportunity to hear Basha's own words and to use them. And then of course there was the usual ton of research that goes with these kind of things. One of the sad things is when I talk to people, particularly younger people, they have no idea of what that was all about. And so I had to put in some historical context around this, 'cause nobody would know why that had happened. So I've, almost all of the chapters use Basha's words as well as my research. And then at the end, there's a section called historical context or historical perspective. And so then the reader, if they're not familiar with the war and all of this, then can read that and say, oh, I see how that happened. So that's kind of the way the book is constructed. And I wrote the book initially because as a amateur historian for the last 40 years, I wanted to contribute to that part of the historical record because this is a very, Basha was 14 years old when she was taken to Auschwitz. And while there's a lot of material on the concentration camps, and there are some stories from concentration camp survivors, not much from the perspective of a 14 year old girl. And so I thought that was critical that that be published, that that become part of the record. The second reason for the book was that, I believe each and every one of us has, we're a storehouse of determination and abilities that we don't really necessarily recognize because so few of us are pushed to the point where we have to dig that deeply in ourselves. Basha did that. She promised her mother, really minutes before her mother was executed, she promised her that Basha would live to tell the story to the world. And that's the will to live. She dug down and she found that and she did live. And now I'm telling the story. And I want people to understand that that determination, that will power, that courage. There's some of that in all of us. We just need to think about that every once in a while, realize it's there before we really need it. And then the last thing that I wanted to get out was that we have been blessed to live in a nice, safe little country. Most of us haven't had too many horrible things happen to us. We haven't been invaded. We haven't had atomic bombs dropped on us. We haven't been herded behind barbed wire for no reason. But that doesn't mean it can't happen. History does repeat itself. And it repeats itself to people who don't understand that it can repeat itself. So part of this is directed at everyone to understand that you need to pay a little attention. Yeah, you need to understand that evil does exist. A friend of mine called me a few hours ago about the book. Yeah, I'd send him a copy. And he said that people have to understand that evil does not have a limit. It's there, it seems like there's a limit on good things, but there is no limit on bad things. And you don't want to be caught in that. So that was another reason that I just want people to understand, however pleasant their life may be. It doesn't mean that there aren't people out there who want to mess with us. So that was the third reason. And I think the approach you've taken with this book and other nonfiction books, you do take this approach from a personal perspective. People can read history books and get the facts and everything, but there is something to be said, I think for these personal stories that people can really relate to. And like you said, you've written a number now about these horrific situations and surviving them. And there's something very inspirational about it too, is dark as these people's experiences are the fact that they can survive and come back from them. It's really something. - Well, you know, first of all, yes, they are personal stories and that's one of the big things that I enjoy about them, that we're talking about real human beings, not some concept. And if you take a story like a teenage girl in Auschwitz, particularly working with the family, it's pretty darn hard to write that without getting emotionally involved, which I did in a pretty big way. But also my writing style is something that I learned back when I was a child, really the beginnings of that. And that was the first writer that I remember following was a guy by the name of Tom McAdill, who was a columnist for Mechanics Illustrated Magazine. And I was a 10 year old car nut. And McAdill had an interesting sense of humor, which is based on how he played with words. And that stuck in my mind. And that was the beginning of understanding the power of words if they're put together in the right order. And also, as my life went on, the realization that reading anything should be interesting. McAdill could get you very engaged in a sentence about a car transmission, you know, that he could, he just got that. And I realized that people want to know what they want to know, but they also, reading shouldn't be an endurance contest for them. If you look at, I mean, I hate to say this, but I will, academic writing can be brutal, you know. And that's not what I want to do. I want my readers, even if I'm writing about something horribly unpleasant, to be engaged in every single sentence so that not only do I tell a story, but reading it has some level of pleasure, I guess, for lack of a better word. Even, yeah, I guess I'll leave it at that, but yes. - Or, you know, emotional, best man, emotional interest. I think that's a part of it. - To be emotionally invested in it, but to, this is me talking, when I write these books, this is me talking, in our teenage girl in Auschwitz, I quote heavily from Bosch's testimonies, you know. And that's her words. That's really the core of the book. But when I'm writing the rest of it, this is what Doug thinks of the situation. I don't change, you know, they're all infactual. I don't do anything, you know, don't write about things that didn't happen, or I don't stick my opinions into everything. But this is the way I tell stories like I would tell you, John, if we were sitting down and I wanted to tell you Bosch's story, this is the way I would tell it to you. And I think the readers feel that, you know, they feel that they're being, they're having a conversation with somebody who could be their friend. That's what I hope. - And you're a very good storyteller, for sure. These are some, these are some great work you're doing here. What did you find most rewarding and also most difficult about writing a teenage girl in Auschwitz? - Well, I'll tell you the first tough thing. The testimony that Bosch did for the Showa Foundation was a video testimony, instead of the '90s. And I can't work from recordings when I'm doing this. I need a written transcript. Well, the interviews that they did, I mean, Bosch spoke like seven languages, so she's very good. But as we, as I went through this, she's there are words that are Polish, German, Hebrew, and Yiddish. None of those are languages that I speak or necessarily understand. That meant I couldn't send this off to a transcription service because I have no idea what I would get back. I mean, it would be much. People I'd send it to, it wouldn't know anymore. Which meant I had to transcribe it personally. And that involved in the Showa Foundation interview, watching Bosch tell the story. She would, that was her face talking to me through the screen and that was tough. That was right off the bat, tough. Yeah, I'm a pretty, you know, I'm not a shrinking pilot. I can take a lot of kicking around. I mean, I work in an intensive care unit. People come in with missing parts, you know, and I talk about it. But watching Bosch tell that story, I think I had to break it into three or four sessions because it would come to a point where I'd say, okay, I think that's enough of this for a while. I think that's enough of this. What message do you hope that readers take away from this book is probably more than one, but it's kind of curious what it is that you hope they should get the most out of from this book? I hope that they understand by looking at what that 14 year old girl went through. The fact that she not only survived that, but in the end, and I haven't really mentioned this too much, in the end, she met a man who had also been a concentration camp president, Sandra Freilich. They were married. They immigrated to the United States and they became very successful business people starting from a position where they didn't have any money to eat and you look at that, you go, okay, this is outstanding. That's an amazing story of human determination and we don't think about it too much. And I want people to understand that that's in there. My father was an attorney and he said a lot of things to me, but a couple of them work. Anything you want, you better be prepared to work for. And when you're working for something, don't quit, you know. And so, Basha, I think, is a great example of that. She was literally staying alive so she could tell her a story and she didn't quit. And she wanted to sometimes, it's in the book. She, there were times when she said, this is what I can't take anymore, but she kept going. And the same thing, when they came to the United States and went into business, things weren't always all that rosy. And she said, "No, I'm gonna keep going." And she did and they became very successful. I want people to know that that's in them. And then the other part that I mentioned is just because you think things are pleasant now, if you do, make that way, you need to keep an eye on the world and see what people are doing. And don't make the assumption that everything is doing things that are going to be in your favor because that is not at all true, not at all true. Be prepared, that's what I would say. - Excellent, excellent. Well, thank you for your time, Doug. Can you tell people how to find out more about you and your books? - Yes, I have a new website that's in development right now. Hopefully, maybe by the end of the week, it'll be up. Douglas Wellman, author.com. - I agree with you, previously on the old website, there was one of those contact things. And I didn't realize it, but people who were contacting me on that, I wasn't giving their emails. And I just discovered that recently, which is hugely embarrassing. So now I gotta go back and see if I can dig up all those, some of those have been up there for two years. I'm so sorry that I did not get your email. 'Cause that's embarrassing. I don't give back anything. - Oh, that's all right. I sometimes check the one on mine and I got people just calling me names, usually. Hopefully you get better ones than I do. - Well, you know, but your books are fascinating in their own way because they're thrillers. And I find it very interesting because all of that comes out of you. I can go to Wikipedia, you know, if I want and find out some things about what I work on. But everything that you do comes out of your head, which I find fascinating and I have a long graph. My head has very little in it, but yours seems to be brimming with stuff. - Well, thank you. I appreciate that, Doug. And it was great talking to you today. Well, everybody, please check out a teenage girl from Auschwitz. You can get it wherever books are sold. Thanks again, Douglas. I really, I always enjoy talking to you and I hope you have a great day. - Thank you, John. Best to you. [BLANK_AUDIO]