Former Chico State student’s prison stay inspires a television writing career
By Sam DeLong
In life, sometimes we follow the path we choose. Other times, it’s the path that chooses us. For former California State University, Chico student Rick Beren, it turned out to be both. Beren was studying English with an interest in writing when his life took an unexpected turn. This later inspired him to write the memoir Jailhouse Rick.
“It was around January of 1977 when my girlfriend at the time and I started selling cocaine to friends and other students,” the writer-director recalls. “I wanted to try it, and it was too expensive to buy—so I figured if I sold a little, I could have a little.” Beren says the person who first approached him did so casually at The Sports Page, a now-defunct Chico bar. “He just came up to me and said he was stressed out and overworked. He presented himself like he was just another student.”
At the time, Beren admits he felt like “a big shot just kind of screwing around in college.” But as he began selling around town, he started noticing a familiar face popping up—someone who always seemed to be nearby. That person turned out to be an informant, while under the guise of being just another patron of the Sports Page Bar.
Beren and his girlfriend were arrested at the Madison Bear Garden, where they worked as a bartender and hostess. Drug possession laws vary, but Beren says authorities were especially motivated at the time. “They were really trying to crack down on Chico’s party-school reputation,” he says. The judge, he recalls, wanted to send a message. “He really wanted to make an example of me—especially to other students. He was also trying to go after the owner [of the Sports Page Bar].”
Beren was sentenced to five months incarceration, starting with the Butte County Jail in Oroville, then transferred to the California State Prison in Vacaville. While serving his time, he never lost sight of writing. Through letters and notes, he began shaping what would become his future. As he waited out his sentence, he wrote back to many people in his life who had written to him: his parents, his friends, and his girlfriend at the time, who was serving a similar sentence in a women’s prison.
“People who I wrote to commented on how much they enjoyed my writing. And those that knew me encouraged me to keep writing. I knew what I wanted to do when I got out—I wanted to write for television.” Beren is candid about the fact that he was responsible for the arrest, but considers it just a small bump in the road to an otherwise straight and narrow life.
During a November 2025 interview on the Jay Kogen podcast called Don’t Be Alone, Beren relates that at age 22 he really didn’t have commitments at the time that a prison sentence could have screwed up, such as a wife and kids. He acknowledged that unlike several of the other inmates, he had a safety net when he got out—family, friends and support.
After his release, Beren began writing spec scripts for existing TV shows. Eventually, he walked into the offices of Paramount Pictures with a clear goal: to write for Cheers—the iconic 1980s Boston-bar sitcom where “everybody knows your name.” His scripts were initially rejected, but Beren stuck around, determined to get his foot in the door. His persistence paid off when legendary director James Burrows took notice and mentored him.
Beren notes that he was a huge fan of Cheers, due to its sharp characters and writing, going all the way back to its first episode. “In the pilot’s first scene, he recalls, we are introduced to Coach (the late actor Nicholas Colasanto), a sweet but absent-minded bartender in the bar. “Coach answers the phone with his character’s real name. So in the pilot’s first 30 seconds, we learn the name of the bar, Coach’s real name, and the fact that he has a nickname. That is good writing.”
Beren started as a technical producer before working his way up to writing and directing. He recalls a favorite behind-the-scenes moment from a season 11 Cheers episode “Bar Wars VI: This Time It’s for Real,” which featured one of the show’s rare special effects scenes, requiring the bar’s door be blown off by an explosion.
“Originally, the episode didn’t have an explosion,” Beren says. “But Jimmy [Burrows] kept saying, ‘the explosion needs to be bigger.’” And here is another piece of trivia, Beren also appears as a background extra in that episode.
After serving on Cheers in varying degrees for over 200 episodes, Beren went on to work on some of the most iconic sitcoms of the 1990s, including Frasier, NewsRadio, Will & Grace and Friends. As part of his 35-year career working in the television industry, Beren had stints as technical producer and as a liaison between different departments on TV shows. Beren’s focus had shifted entirely to directing after the long-running sitcom Cheers ended in 1993.
The writer-turned-director never had another brush with the law, eventually marrying his wife, who he met in 1984. He worked in the early days of the TV show Two and Half Men, including its controversy-laden actor, Charlie Sheen. “Charlie thought I was a cool guy; he wanted to be friends. But I knew his reputation and I was done with that lifestyle.”
Beren also produced many short-lived TV shows such as the 2011 comedy Whitney, which despite being a fan favorite, only ran for two seasons. He also directed about 75 TV pilots, many of which didn’t get picked up.
After a long career, Beren decided it was time to retire around 2018. It was then that one of his young daughters happened to find one of the letters from his prison days. This inspired him to write Jailhouse Rick, the memoir recounting his journey from prison to a writing career. While not actively working in television now, writing is always on his mind and he still tinkers with the idea of creating something new.
“I’ve got this idea based on a glamping trip I took with friends,” he says. “We hiked a trail in Yosemite and were totally unprepared. It got me thinking about a group of campers who get in over their heads. It was based on a real thing, and there is a new story there.” As Beren considers his next chapter, one thing is clear: the story is far from over.
Rick Beren will be in Chico on April 3 as a guest of the Digital Filmmakers Guild, meeting at 3pm in Tehama Hall, Room 346 on Chico State campus. He will also be at the Chico Barnes & Noble on April 4 from 11am to 1pm for a book-signing of Jailhouse Rick, and to answer any questions about writing and his work in television.
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