Raymond Burr, in the title role in CBS-TV's Perry Mason, has scored the sudden success most actors dream about. Does Burr relax and enjoy it? He'd like to, but he can't. The reason: it isn't possible for any man who plays Erle Stanley Gardner's famed attorney-sleuth to find the time. To keep up with the shooting schedule for the series (six days of work, one day of leisure), burr must learn as many as 14 pages of dialogue each night. A hit as Perry Mason, Burr has found he's Perry Mason's prisoner.
When the Perry Mason unit is filming, Raymond Burr seldom sets foot on his 1 1/2-acre place near Malibu, Calif. To keep pace with the production schedule, bachelor burr lives in a two-room apartment at Fox-Western Studios. Even then, the necessities of life are given little attention. "I'm a pretty good cook, but I don't have time, " he says. "And, anyway, there's no sense cooking for one person. So it's mostly canned food." Burr averages a mere four and a half hours of sleep a night. When someone inquired whether he wasn't concerned about the effect of the schedule on his health, burr shook his head. " I don't have time for germs," he answered. END