may have Berenbaum to thank. "Pace is one of the most important points in comedy," he says. "The faster that [a segment] goes, the funnier it may seem."

Funny thing about "Housewives": It became big in a hurry.

"On the Street Where You Live" soon became the song sung by millions of fans who can't get their share of the women husbanding their energies and daffiness in pursuit of having it all. "It got huge - and huge fast!" says Berenbaum.

If the series fired up ABC's schedule, it was a fire that best displayed Berenbaum's talents in the pilot.The scene in which Susan (Teri Hatcher) accidentally set Edie's (Nicollete Sheridan) house on fire could have meant curtains for the comedy's impact if not done properly. "When it happened, the flamesshot up the curtains too quickly for it to be comedically appropriate," says the editor, who "technically delayed the scene when the flames were revealed."

When you're hot, you're hot. And what could be hotter than working on the sexed-up "Sex and the City" before Berenbaum encountered the horny "Housewives"? The women were wonderful on the HBO series - as are the "Housewives" he worked with on the pilot - he says, but felt that "New York itself had a large part to do with the pace of that show," on which Berenbaum was the editing-room's Mr. Big, working from the first show to the last.

It looks like "Desperate Housewives" will last for a while; of course, Berenbaum has long moved on to other productions. But, since he lived