Betty Thomas, Billy Crystal & The Curious Case Of The Emmy-Thieving Imposter

On Sept. 22, 1985, the Pasadena Civic Auditorium was filled with 2,700 members of the year’s television elite, gathered together for the 37^th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards. Hosted by Dynasty star John Forsythe, the ceremony was broadcast on ABC to 15.8 million homes – a staggering number today – and the stage was set to receive a glitterati of Emmy Award recipients: Robert Guillaume, Tyne Daly, Williams Daniels, Richard Crenna, John Larroquette, Rhea Perlman, Edward James Olmos, David Letterman and… a man called Barry Bremen.

At this moment, it’s fair to ask: Barry who?

Tall, handsome, tan and, most importantly, possessed of a palpable confidence, Bremen certainly looked the part in his chic tuxedo, trendy pink bowtie and matching cummerbund. But the truth was a lot less glitzy: he had next to zero Industry connections. And yet, he’d happily slid into his third-row aisle seat, and made small talk with his neighbor, The Man from U.N.C.L.E. star Robert Vaughn.

In fact, in 1985, 38-year-old Bremen – married with three children and a resident of the Detroit suburb West Bloomfield in Michigan – was actually a former insurance salesman turned co-proprietor of a marketing firm. They represented Famous Amos cookies, among other sundries, and it was Bremen’s job to place them in department stores.

But Bremen had actually become famous, in a strange sort of way. Known in sporting circles as ‘The Great Imposter’, Bremen had built a reputation for his unparalleled knack for sneaking onto the field – often with the help of those closest to the action, like Kansas City Royals all-star George Brett and the legendary ABC broadcaster Dick Schaap, the latter being Bremen’s longtime friend, neighbor and insurance client.

Beginning in 1979, on a dare and using a warm-up uniform he swiped at an NBA game in Detroit, Bremen brashly posed as a member of the Kansas City Kings and managed to join the pre-game shootaround with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Julius “Dr. J” Irving at the NBA All-Star Game, a feat he’d repeat two years later in 1981, outfitted as a Houston Rocket. He’d bluff his way into Major League Baseball’s 1979 All-Star Game, shagging flies in the outfield for a half-hour until he was ejected. He’d succeed again at MLB’s All-Star Game in 1986, where once exposed, he got a royal chewing-out by legendary Los Angeles Dodgers coach Tommy Lasorda.

Growing ever bolder, Bremen posed as a baseball umpire at home plate at Game Five of the 1980 World Series, and later a line judge for 1981’s Super Bowl XV. He’d even briefly danced alongside the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders in a blonde wig and short shorts. And just months before the Emmys, he’d bluffed his way into playing practice rounds with pro golfers Fred Couples, Curtis Strange and Bob Eastwood at that year’s U.S. Open.

Dick Schaap’s son Jeremy, the accomplished sportswriter, broadcaster and author, calls these stunts “harmless,” adding, “They were victimless. They were sort of charming, Walter Mitty moments.” Jeremy Schaap grew up with a family that were intertwined with Bremen’s, via his father’s friendship and boostering – so much so, that Schaap wrote and narrated ESPN’s E60 2022 documentary The Great Imposter and Me, which chronicled Bremen’s exploits.

“He had all this charm and charisma, so people wanted to embrace him,” Schaap says. “It was just a different world. The idea of eluding the security protocols, getting behind the velvet rope. This was before the [tennis champion] Monica Seles’ stabbing [in 1993], it was before 9/11. It was a different world, a world in which these kinds of stunts seemed harmless, and they didn’t make our antenna go up, in that way.”

Indeed, as a result of these hijinks, Bremen appeared alongside Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show, as well as Late Night with David Letterman, the Today Show, Larry King’s radio show, a Michelob Light commercial and my personal favorite: a guest stint on Bowling for Dollars.

Bremen was, simply put, the most accomplished charlatan in sports. But crashing the Emmys would be a whole different ball game.

In 1980, he’d expanded his repertoire by sneaking into the Academy Awards, hoping to swoop in and claim the award of a star who’d skipped the ceremony. But even when an ailing, absent Melvyn Douglas’ name was announced as Best Supporting Actor, Bremen lost his legendary nerve. “That would have been perfect—except I panicked,” he told a Washington Post reporter at the time. “I really did. I could not get out of my seat.” He’d also targeted the Emmys twice before: once, he made it inside, but balked at claiming a trophy; the second time he backed out before the ceremony.

Still, he had his sights set on gracing a major Hollywood awards ceremony’s stage.

Born in 1947, Bremen met his wife Margo when they were both teenagers studying at MSU. Speaking via phone now from her home in Scottsdale, Arizona, Margo says, “A frustrated actor, a frustrated athlete – put them together in one and you get Barry. He loved movies and he loved his athletic stuff. Being out there, being known by people, he loved being recognized as somebody. That’s who he was.”

She also knew that at 6’4″, tall, dark and handsome, Bremen could get away with a lot. “When he put on a tuxedo, he could go any place and get in anywhere,” she says. “He could make himself be a part of any situation, for the most part. He loved people. So getting in and talking with people and being around people and just mostly being himself, he was able to do things.” As Bremen readied himself for another go at crashing the Emmys, Margo recalls discussing his mission. “I remember our conversation was, ‘This is your third try. About time you get it right.'”

He momentarily encountered what might have been a major monkey-wrench when he was recognized by actor, comedian and sports enthusiast Billy Crystal, but the recent Saturday Night Live breakout Crystal did not report him to security.

Bremen would later recount to his hometown newspaper the Detroit Free Press, among other media outlets, that he put four months of planning into crashing the Emmys, but finding himself short on inside connections to obtain a ticket, he was forced to get creative. Using his real name and claiming to work for a local network affiliate, he told the local paper, “Finally I called ABC and said I was in town from Michigan and I wanted to do a story on the Emmys.”

Allowed to pay $300 for a ticket – “No one ever asked for my credentials” – he flew to Los Angeles, tuxed up and “walked through the front entrance.” He momentarily encountered what might have been a major monkey-wrench when he was recognized by actor, comedian and sports enthusiast Billy Crystal, but the recent Saturday Night Live breakout Crystal did not report him to security.

“When I got in, I realized my ticket was for the third row. It was like they were saying ‘This is for you, Barry,’” Bremen told the press after that night. He had quickly calculated that as long as he looked like he knew what he was doing, he could be onstage in but a moment. Until his moment presented itself, he made idle chit-chat with another TV icon of his youth, The Untouchables star Robert Stack. “I told him I was here to accept an Emmy and I asked him what it was like to work with some of his friends. He didn’t say much. He acted like he knew who I was, but I knew he didn’t.”

As the ceremony progressed, the biggest controversies of the night remained somewhat tame. Moonlighting star Cybill Shepherd paired orange Day-Glo Reebok high-tops with her formal black velvet gown. Then there was the increasingly anemic showing of the critically ballyhooed, 15-times-nominated TV game changer Miami Vice, which was edged out by perennial Emmy darling Cagney & Lacey. However, thanks to Bremen, the drama dial was about to be turned way up.

For him, fate seemed to intervene in the form of Mission Impossible star Peter Graves, who took the stage to present Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. And what would follow would change the trajectory of Bremen’s life.

“Mission Impossible is how I always see myself,” Bremen later told the Washington Post. “We always start with a Mission: Impossible concept. It always starts out, ‘Good morning, Mr. Bremen. Your mission, should you choose to accept…’ So it was incredible. Graves is my hero.”

“I’ll tell you a very private moment,” says Margo. “He and I snuck away from school and went to his parents’ house. This was back when we were in college and being together or living together was not a thing. We were breaking the rules to go home for the weekend and just have a weekend to ourselves at his house. We were lying in bed and watching the Peter Graves show, Mission Impossible, and that’s when we decided to name our first child, our first son, Noah, because there was a character Noah on the program. He just always loved the Mission Impossible thing.”

That fateful Emmy night, Graves, with his rich, baritone voice, announced the winner: Hill Street Blues actress Betty Thomas. It was her first victory after four previous nominations in the category for her role as patrol officer Lucy Bates in Steven Bochco’s highly-acclaimed, grittily realistic police drama (she’d be nominated for two subsequent seasons as well). The orchestra struck up composer Mike Post’s instrumental theme song, which had become a hit on adult contemporary radio. Bremen, who’d never seen a single episode of the cop show, nevertheless recognized that his moment had arrived.

“When I called Betty’s name she was all the way on the other side of the auditorium, and I didn’t know if she was coming. All of sudden, there’s this guy sitting below me, and I said, ‘Isn’t Betty here?’ And he said, ‘No, I’ll take it,’ and he took off with it.”

Peter Graves, to the Emmy Awards press in 1985.

In interviews with the San Francisco Examiner and the Orlando Sentinel, Bremen later said, “Betty Thomas’ name was called. There was a hesitation. There were no screams for Thomas, not even a lot of clapping. I did not think she was there.”

“He couldn’t sit still,” says Margo. “He had to get up and do it. And he actually did not think she was there. He did look and she hadn’t stood up yet. And if nothing else, Barry did lots of things very fast: throw a bowling ball, swing a golf club. Fast was part of his mode.”

Bounding up to the stage at lightning speed, Bremen collected the Emmy from a puzzled Graves, who told the press backstage, “When I called Betty’s name she was all the way on the other side of the auditorium, and I didn’t know if she was coming. All of sudden, there’s this guy sitting below me, and I said, ‘Isn’t Betty here?’ And he said, ‘No, I’ll take it,’ and he took off with it.”

Bremen had stepped up to the mic with the bravado he usually reserved for sports. He’d prepared a speech, but as the magnitude of the audience, in front of him and at home, weighed on him, his nerves began to show as he spoke off the cuff. “Betty was not able to be here,” he announced, “and she asked for me to accept this award and thank everybody else who was here. And thank you and thank everybody.” The he offered a quick shout-out to an old pal: “And especially Dick Schaap.”

“I’m sure when my father heard his name come out of Barry’s mouth, it was not a great moment for him,” says Jeremy Schaap. “I’m sure that he was like, ‘Jesus, Barry, couldn’t you have said Otis Birdsong or George Brett? Why me?’”

Meanwhile, Betty Thomas was, in fact, very much present at the ceremony. Her ascent to the stage was delayed by both the typical surprise of winning, and then by a string of beads she was wearing breaking and spilling everywhere. As the 38-year-old actress at last stepped onto the stage, she felt a sinking feeling when she saw an unfamiliar man merrily collecting the award. “I thought I made a mistake,” she’d later tell reporters. “It was the nightmare you always hear about.”

As Bremen concluded his speech and turned away from the mic chuckling with glee, he suddenly found himself face to face with the confused but formidable Thomas – all six-feet-one-inches of her, including extra heel height. He immediately went straight-faced, pivoted away from her and began quickly offering explanations to Thomas and Graves. They moved off the stage into the wings and the show quickly shifted to a commercial. “She was a little startled,” Bremen reported. “I said to her ‘Betty, I’m sorry. I’m the imposter.’ And the guy from ABC went a little crazy.”

I keep hearing that somebody’s going to make a movie. There’s always somebody who’s like, ‘We’re going to do this!’ At one point I think Adam Sandler was interested, at one point Larry David. I hope somebody does it.

Jeremy Schaap

That “guy from ABC” was Emmys producer Alexander Cohen. He seized Bremen in a fit of rage as Pasadena police officers moved in. “I ran over and jumped on his back and was ready to kill him,” Cohen later told United Press International, “but he said ‘No, no, no’ and pulled out his press clippings. I was absolutely stunned and the cops pulled him away.”

“I wanted to make sure they understood that I didn’t have a gun or something,” Bremen told the Lansing State Journal. “That I’m fun-bizarre, not crazy-bizarre.”

Still, in Thomas’ retelling in the Emmy press room later that evening, Bremen made a break for it. “It turned out that he was running backstage, out the door, and the police were chasing him, tackled him,” she said. “And it’s grand theft to take that Emmy away,” she added with a chuckle, “so he’s in jail right now.”

For his part, Graves offered bemused consolation to the actress, saying “I’m sorry, darlin’. That was a ‘mission impossible’ and I think that guy’s on his way to the cooler.” After the commercial, Thomas was allowed to return to the stage with her trophy and deliver her acceptance speech, opening with “Well, it’s definitely hard to follow an act like that, but I will.”

Meanwhile, Bremen was led out of the Civic Auditorium in handcuffs by Pasadena police, then he spent several hours in jail before he was finally released about 45 minutes after midnight on $1,500 bond provided by his attorney, who’d been on standby for just such a result. (“He always had his attorney set up to get him out of jail after,” says Margo). “They brought me in for questioning, and they got a little pushy for a while,” Bremen recounted back then, adding that behind bars “I was the only guy dressed in a tuxedo. And then there was the fact that I was conscious. You know, not drunk.”

Even then, Bremen’s charm became an important part of his toolkit. “He met some guy that was in jail, and gave him the number of his mother to call and tell her where he was when he got out,” says Margo. “So yeah, even being in jail was a story for Barry.”

The tense mood lifted upon his release. “I even autographed something for some of the police officers,” Bremen said. Ultimately, he was sanguine about the arrest. “I guess I deserved it, right? I mean, you take an award from somebody on Hill Street Blues, I guess you should be thrown in jail.”

Some relief came when he discovered the grand theft charge wouldn’t stick. The Emmy statuette, originally estimated to be worth $400, was actually valued at $135, and the charge was downgraded to interfering with an event. Within a month, from Detroit, Bremen pleaded no contest and a Pasadena municipal court judge fined him $175 and sentenced him to six months’ probation.

Along with the consequences came an important takeaway: “I learned that in Hollywood awards are taken very seriously,” Bremen said.

He was genuinely penitent that he’d marred a moment of career victory for Thomas. “When I saw her come up I was very surprised and disappointed that I took something away from her.” Although he couldn’t help admitting “it was a great feeling holding that Emmy and looking out on that crowd.” And he couldn’t help but make light of the brouhaha he caused. “I guess I missed my mark. I should have accepted for Jane Curtin,” he offered, as the Kate & Allie star was a no-show at the ceremony but won the Best Actress in a Comedy Series trophy.

“Whatever you write, could you please start out with an apology to Betty Thomas?” he asked the press. In fact, he vowed to offer her a personal apology, via his attorney, who was friends with Thomas’ agent.

Thomas had been pretty good-humored about the incident at the time. “I would now like to thank him,” she deadpanned in the press room. “That was a great way to be remembered for the award.” Days later, however, the network publicist for Hill Street Blues told Newsday that Thomas wanted to put the incident behind her and curtail any further notoriety for Bremen. She reportedly had accepted his public apology but not forgiven him.

Fortunately, the night would not be Thomas’ last in the Emmy spotlight. In 1993, after a career pivot behind the camera, she became the first woman to receive a Directing Emmy for the HBO comedy Dream On, followed by additional directing nominations in 1994 and 1996. She’d later go on to helm a string of successful big-screen comedies including Private Parts, The Brady Bunch Movie and 28 Days (Deadline attempted to contact Thomas for comment but was not able to connect with her by press time).

“He was so regretful over the fact that it was her moment and he messed it up for her,” remembers Margo. “He always felt terrible and tried, I cannot tell you the number of times, to be able to apologize to her, and she would not accept his apology. And that was his one regret in his life, that he hadn’t been able to apologize to Betty Thomas.”

Dick Schaap wrote an article decrying the fallout from his friend’s Emmy debacle. Although both Jeremy Schaap and Margo strongly suspect that Dick, having been name checked during Bremen’s fake acceptance speech, was pushed to pen the condemnation by his employer, ABC. “Their friendship remained very strong up until my father’s death,” says Jeremy. “So I don’t know if it was performative or real.”

The Emmy affair would signal a turning point in Bremen’s ‘career’ as a professional imposter. Says Margo, “After that, pretty much, I said ‘enough’ and that our kids were becoming teenagers and I didn’t want him to keep ending up in jail.”

Bremen died of esophageal cancer on 64^th birthday in 2011, leaving behind a loving family and a colorful legacy, one that continues to captivate 15 years later. “People like people who have balls. And Barry was so positive about life,” says Margo. “What Barry’s influence did is that he showed people – first and foremost, our three children – you don’t say no to things. When opportunity presents itself, you take advantage.”

“I keep hearing that somebody’s going to make a movie,” says Jeremy Schaap. “There’s always somebody who’s like, ‘We’re going to do this!’ At one point I think Adam Sandler was interested, at one point Larry David. I hope somebody does it, because nobody would love to see themselves on the silver screen more than Barry.”

And if that happens, maybe Barry Bremen’s name will finally, legitimately, be engraved on one of those prized Hollywood trophies.

Deadline contributor Scott Huver is the author of the forthcoming true crime collection Beverly Hills Noir Volume Two: Money, Murder and Mayhem in 90210 (March 2027). His book Beverly Hills Noir: Crime, Sin, & Scandal in 90210, was published in 2024.