Judge Judy Recalls How Her TV Show Came to Be After ‘Terrible’ Pilot

With Judy Sheindlin about to say goodbye to her onscreen television career after 30 years, she looked back at her time in the spotlight in a CBS primetime special Judge Judy: Unfiltered, Unforgettable on September 22. Sheindlin went all the way back to the beginning and reflected on how Judge Judy came to be after she initially shot a “terrible” pilot for a show called Hot Bench in 1993.

As she’s revealed before, her time in the spotlight began when 60 Minutes did a special on her family courtroom in 1993. “My husband Jerry and I watched that 60 Minutes piece in our bedroom alone because I wasn’t sure how it was going to turn out,” Sheindlin explained. “I certainly didn’t hold back on who I was.”

From there, Sheindlin said she went to California and met with Larry Lyttle, a producer. “I showed him the 60 Minutes tape and he said, ‘I will make a pilot with you.'” Her stepdaughter, Nicole Sheindlin, joined her and noted, “We had no experience with being in the entertainment industry. In our family, that just wasn’t a thing.”

Of filming the pilot, Sheindlin said, “I wasn’t afraid of the camera. I was doing what I did, what I was naturally adept at. I was totally comfortable in my space. I wasn’t learning a new language. I really heard it all before. They didn’t understand that I’m not an actress, that I don’t do phony. That’s not what this is. This is not a cross between court and Jerry Springer. They tried to do that and it didn’t work because I can only do real.”

She explained that the producers behind the pilot “brought me stuff that wasn’t real and I couldn’t do it.” She also called the episode “terrible.” However, she was able to use parts of it to her advantage. “Nobody knew who I was, but we used the 60 Minutes tape and little pieces from the pilot and the show sold,” Sheindlin revealed.

That show was Judge Judy, which premiered in 1996 and aired for 25 seasons until its conclusion in 2021. That same year, she began her new show, Judy Justice, which will conclude in October.

Sheindlin is now passing the television reigns over to her son, Adam Levy, who is starring in his own televised courtroom series, Adam’s Law. “When it was presented to me as a possibility, my mom came to me and said, ‘I think you’re ready. I think you’re ready for your own show,'” Levy revealed in the special. “‘Just don’t screw it up.’ That was her advice.”

He has his mother’s full support. “I had been trying to make Adam’s Law for probably a decade,” Sheindlin said.
“He’s getting more comfortable in his chair. He’s going to be terrific. And he likes it. I try to offer him advice and his response usually is, ‘Mother, you’ve taught me well, now let me do it.’ Because he’s his own man. He does have talent. I don’t tell him that too often because it’s hard enough to live with him.”

Meanwhile, Sheindlin herself isn’t going anywhere. She’s now working on an animated series called Baby Judy, inspired by AI social media videos of babies using her courtroom soundbites.

“They went viral. Now a lot of people are doing them. So I decided to continue my message in the Judyverse,” Sheindlin explained. “It’s a way of me continuing to work, but sort of behind the camera, instead of in front of it. This is definitely not for young children. It allows me to complain about everything that irritates me.”