The Debut of Cheers!

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Coach (Nicholas Colasanto): I'm working on a novel. Going on six years now. I think I might finish it tonight.

Diane (Shelley Long): You're writing a novel?

Coach: No, reading it.

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The great thing about Cheers! was that, although it was ostensibly about a bar, it was really about the people in the bar. The place where everybody knows your name.

When it finished its 11–year run, viewers felt as if they knew the folks on the show — their strengths, their weaknesses, their personality quirks — so well that sometimes I think any one of them could have starred in a spinoff and been successful.

Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) was the character who was spun off and had an 11–year run of his own, which is kind of ironic since he wasn't in the Cheers! cast when the show premiered on this day in 1982. In the first episode, "Give Me a Ring Sometime," the emphasis was on the barmaid who would be viewers' introduction to Frasier's woeful love life — Diane Chambers (Shelley Long).

She wasn't a barmaid at the time. She came in to the bar with her fiancé. They planned to go to Barbados, where they would be married, but Diane's fiancé wanted to get the ring from his ex–wife, so he left Diane at Cheers! with a promise to return.

By the end of the episode, though, it was clear that he was not going to return, that he had probably reconciled with his ex–wife. Forlorn Diane was offered the job of a barmaid.

Her conversation with her first customers kind of set the tone for the series:

"Welcome to Cheers," she told the middle–aged couple. "My name is Diane. I will be serving you. Why don't you sit down right over here? You know, I should tell you, parenthetically, that you are the first people that I have ever served. In fact, if anyone had told me a week ago that I would be doing this, I would have thought them insane. When Sam over there offered me the job, I laughed in his face. But then it occurred to me, here I am, I'm a student — not just in an academic sense but a student of life. And where better than here to study life in all its many facets? People meet in bars, they part, they rejoice, they suffer, they come here to be with their own kind. What can I get you?"

To which the man replied, reading from a phrase book in broken English, "Where is police? We have lost our luggage."

The episode was also a setup for the other people in the bar, especially the proprietor, Sam (Ted Danson), who had been a major–league baseball player until his struggle with alcohol ended that chapter in his life.

Many of the characters who went on to be regulars on the show were there — waitress Carla (Rhea Perlman) and patrons Norm (George Wendt) and Cliff (John Ratzenberger).

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"Coach" (Nicholas Colasanto), the bartender, was there, too, but he died of a heart attack a few years later, and the character was written out of the series. Woody (Woody Harrelson) was brought on as Coach's replacement.

And that is probably what prevented the episode from being regarded as one of the best of the series. The first episode essentially introduced the viewers to the characters in the series, and that took most of the time.

So the first episode couldn't be too in depth. There simply wasn't enough time, you see.

It served its purpose, though. It got the audience hooked and set the stage for the show's 11–year run. And that provided plenty of time to explore various personalities and themes.

Good thing for all of us, too.

The Unanswered Questions From 'Gilligan's Island'

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Fifty years ago tonight, Gilligan's Island made its debut.

I first watched Gilligan's Island reruns when I was a child. I've seen that initial episode several times, and there really wasn't anything special about it.

It mainly served to introduce viewers to the seven–member cast: The "fearless crew" of the Minnow, the Skipper (Alan Hale Jr.) and Gilligan (Bob Denver); the millionaire (Jim Backus) and his wife (Natalie Schafer); the movie star (Tina Louise), and "the rest," the Professor (Russell Johnson) and the pretty girl–next–door, Mary Ann (Dawn Wells).

In that first episode, running jokes were established — the clumsiness of Gilligan, the nerdiness of the Professor, the elitism of the Howells, the self–absorption of the movie star. It was well established that, deep down, each was shallow in his/her quirky way.

The show opened with a song written by program creator Sherwood Schwartz. It was intended to bring every viewer up to speed on the castaways and their situation by the time the opening credits had run. So we knew how they came to be stranded on that island.

But we never found out why, for example, the Howells and the two girls brought so many clothes with them on a three–hour tour. There must have been some kind of explanation for that — and, for that matter, where all those clothes were kept. The Howells did have some closet space, but it wasn't nearly enough to accommodate all the clothes they had with them. And Ginger and Mary Ann had no closet space that I can recall yet they had clothes for all sorts of occasions.

The Skipper, the Professor and Gilligan always wore the same clothes (except for the episodes with dream sequences), but the other four brought enough different clothes to sustain them for weeks if not months without ever having to wear the same thing twice.

The Professor was a handy guy to have around. He was able to make all kinds of remarkable things from just the raw material that could be found on the island, but he never seemed to be able to transform the radio into a transmitter — or even patch up the boat.

It was also established that the castaways would do anything to be rescued — and that laid the foundation for perhaps the biggest running joke, Gilligan's tendency to foul up just about every promising rescue. He wasn't always to blame — just most of the time.

And he never meant to foul things up, either. It was just in his nature to do so. He was a well–meaning fellow. His heart was in the right place.

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In that first episode, the Skipper and Gilligan tried to set sail on a makeshift raft in search of help. But the raft came apart on them after they fought off ravenous sharks, and they swam to the nearest land, which turned out to be the island they had left earlier.

The fate of the castaways was emblematic, I suppose, of the cutthroat nature of the TV industry in the 1960s and 1970s. Gilligan's Island was canceled after three seasons — and the decision was made after the last episode of the third season had been shot. That was the way things were done in those days, I suppose. The same thing happened to Ed Sullivan — and his show was on the air for 24 years.

Today — I'm not sure why, maybe because of the proliferation of channels in the cable age — the cast and crew of a canceled TV series are far more likely to get enough advance notice to have the opportunity to wrap things up in the series' final episode — unless that cancellation comes only a few weeks into the new season.

It seemed to be much more competitive when there were only three networks. A show was on the air one week, then it disappeared forever the next. It was like a mafia hit job. Explanations were seldom given.

I suppose it has something to do with audience share. When there were only three networks dividing up the available viewership, the share of the audience for even an average program probably set a standard that modern programs can't hope to match, no matter how popular they are.

But when the audience is being divided up by hundreds of channels instead of three, well, that is bound to affect how things are done and how things are perceived in the television industry, don't you think?

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In that environment, I suppose, silly programs like Gilligan's Island were lucky to last more than a season — and it lasted three, even though it had no supernatural or extraterrestrial characters. Well, no regular ones, anyway.

Eventually, thanks to made–for–TV cast reunion movies, viewers found out what happened to the castaways. They eventually made it back to civilization — but they were so turned off by what they found that they returned to their island paradise. As the old song says, you don't know what you've got until it is gone.

Presumably, they lived out their lives in the peace and serenity of their south Pacific island. Guess we'll never know, though. All but Wells and Louise are deceased now.

'Bewitched' Embarked on a Wild Ride 50 Years Ago

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Darrin (Dick York): Al, my wife is witch.

Bartender: Cheer up. You should see my wife.

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Fifty years ago tonight, Bewitched came into America's homes for the first time — and took up residence for eight years.

When the 1964–65 season was over, the sitcom was #2 in the country. It remained in the Top 10 through its third season, then dropped out of the Top 10 but stayed in the Top 20 for the next two seasons. That five–season run was really pretty good, given the often–intense competition between the three networks. Most programs didn't last more than a season or two.

But Bewitched didn't stop there. It was on the air for three more seasons; it wasn't even in the Top 30 for the last two.

So many things from Bewitched worked their way into the culture's consciousness. Take Samantha's trademark nose twitch, for example. Before Bewitched, the predominant image of a witch casting a spell would have the witch waving her arms and spouting some sort of incantation.

Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) did that, too, at times, but mostly she just looked at the focus of her spell and twitched.

Viewers first learned about the twitch 50 years ago tonight. They would learn a lot about witches and witch culture in the next eight years — and the rules by which they lived. If a witch cast a spell, for instance, another witch could not cast a spell to override the first spell. (Strangely, no other witch — except for Samantha's children — twitched spells.)

In many ways, it represented the kind of existence most of us mortals would like to have, and viewers could sympathize with Samantha, a member of a persecuted and largely misunderstood minority group who wished only to marry and make a life with the person she loved.

I suspect the series was somewhat empowering for people who, like Samantha, had felt the sting of prejudice. After all, Samantha might have been persecuted, but she clearly was more powerful than her oppressors, and she often showed great restraint in not using her power. It isn't very gratifying to show restraint if no one knows or acknowledges it, though, and sometimes Samantha demonstrated her own inclination toward mortality and yielded to the temptation to use her power for her own benefit.

Endora (Agnes Moorehead) played Samantha's mother, who did not approve of her daughter's choice in husbands. She was so dismissive of him that she could not — or would not — pronounce his name correctly.

Some of the other witches followed her lead, but a few seemed to side with Samantha and Darrin (Dick York).

When I got older and watched those episodes again, I realized the premise of the series was a great metaphor for mixed marriage or an unconventional marriage of some kind — which was a social issue at the time, but it did not always refer to sexual preference (as some modern viewers might assume) or race (as many viewers from the previous generation might have assumed).

It could refer to spouses who belong to different faiths — or it could refer to people who come from different countries. I've even heard the phrase used in reference to people who were separated in age by many years — and couples in which the wife was older than the husband. Or marriages in which the spouses came from different rungs on the social ladder.

In short, any marriage that is perceived to be different from others in some supposedly important way is a candidate for the mixed marriage designation.

It wasn't a new theme in 1964. The idea of a marriage between a mortal and a witch, though, was kind of a new thing, I suppose — mostly because just about everyone agrees that witches don't exist.

If they did exist, though, most folks probably also would agree that they look nothing like Samantha. She had no warts nor a crooked nose nor any of that stereotyped stuff. She was young and sexy.

She didn't even dress like a witch — most of the time.

Neither did her cousin, Serena, also played by Montgomery (under the stage name of Pandora Spocks). Serena looked exactly like Samantha, of course, but their personalities were entirely different. Viewers had to be prepared for Serena, I suppose. She didn't appear until midway through the second season.

Fifty years ago tonight, there wasn't time, of course, to get into all the aspects of this mixed marriage in which Samantha promised to give up her witchly ways. That was the kind of thing the sitcom could explore. It was in the debut episode that viewers learned Samantha was willing to live in the "mortal way," foregoing twitches and incantations, and her mother opposed the marriage. That was the primary conflict through the series.

The series may have been a product of its time, approaching current events topics in a uniquely allegorical way, but it was a lot of fun.

A wild ride.

A New Beginning for Frasier

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Frasier: Six months ago, I was living in Boston. My wife had left me, which was very painful. Then she came back to me, which was excruciating. On top of that, my practice had grown stagnant, and my social life consisted of hanging around a bar night after night. You see, I was clinging to a life that wasn't working, and I knew I had to do something, anything. So I ended the marriage once and for all, packed up my things and moved back here to my hometown of Seattle. Go Seahawks!

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I suppose it was inevitable, when Cheers! took its bow in the spring of 1993, that there would be at least one spinoff the following fall.

And there was — Frasier, which premiered 20 years ago tonight. That was fine with me. I always thought Frasier was the most amusing character on Cheers!, and I thought the spinoff would give us some more time to explore his personality.

It did.

In my book, it is the best TV comedy of the last two decades. And it set the bar quite high for itself in the pilot episode.

Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) had relocated from Boston (the site of Cheers!) to his hometown of Seattle all the way across the country after splitting up with Lilith. He had given up private psychiatric practice to be a radio psychiatrist for a steady stream of anonymous callers (usually played by unseen celebrities — the callers in that first episode were actress Linda Hamilton and actor–director Griffin Dunne).

On this night 20 years ago, TV viewers were introduced to Frasier's immediate family — his father Martin (John Mahoney), Martin's dog Eddie and Frasier's younger brother Niles (David Hyde Pierce) — and someone else who joined the family unit, his father's physical therapist, Daphne (Jane Leeves).

And viewers met Roz (Peri Gilpin), Frasier's somewhat reluctant producer who, as viewers learned in a later episode, was pressed into service when Frasier's initial producer (unseen) bailed on him.

That unseen angle was kind of a signature of the show's creators, David Angell, Peter Casey and David Lee. Frasier's original producer was a minor, one–time–only character. An ongoing unseen character was Niles' first wife, Maris.

Maris always reminded me of Norm's wife on Cheers! — never seen but so familiar to viewers that they could easily describe her from what they had been told.

Maris wasn't mentioned much in the first episode, but viewers were introduced to her, anyway.

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Niles: I thought you liked my Maris.

Frasier: I do. I like her from a distance. You know, the way you like the sun. Maris is like the sun. Except without the warmth.

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Most of the story lines that would serve as the foundation for the series' 11–year run were clearly established in that first episode — except for Niles' infatuation with Daphne. That story line was born in the coming weeks.

All the other recurring themes were there. Frasier's father moved in with him, bringing his dog, and the clash of the generations was established. So was Frasier's ongoing feud with Eddie — whose desire to engage Frasier in staring matches was an early and ongoing source of material.

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Frasier: No, not Eddie!

Martin: But he's my best friend.

Frasier: But he's weird. He gives me the creeps. All he does is stare at me.

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When Daphne came in for her job interview, her psychic abilities were revealed.

In her first psychic moment with the Cranes, she correctly pegged Martin as a former police officer.

But she missed the mark on Frasier. She thought he was a florist.

"Well, it comes and goes," Daphne observed. She then confided that her psychic tendencies were strongest "during my time of the month."

Then she said sheepishly, "I guess I let a little secret out there."

"Well, Miss Moon," Frasier said as the interview came to a close, "I think we've learned everything we need to about you — and a dash extra!"

I was thoroughly entertained by the series' pilot 20 years ago tonight, but I don't think I would have predicted that it would last more than a decade.

I guess what really hooked me was the ending. Frasier and his father had been at each other's throats, and Frasier had complained that, in spite of everything he tried to do, his father had never shown any gratitude or appreciation.

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Later, when he was telling the tale to Roz, she taught Frasier an important lesson. Roz told him the story of actress Lupe Velez, who committed suicide in 1944.

As I wrote a few years ago, Roz's version of events might not have been exactly what happened, but her point — that even if things don't go as one plans, they can work out, anyway — was well taken.

And, before the final credits rolled, Martin finally did say "Thank you" to Frasier.

It wasn't what Frasier had hoped for, but it was a successful hurdle in the obstacle course of his relationship with his father — and audiences were entertained (and often moved) by the evolution of that relationship in the years ahead.

A Classic ... 70 Years Later

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This is the trailer from the 1961 re–issue of "Gone With the Wind."

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Some folks will tell you that "Gone With the Wind" is the greatest American film ever made.

Whether it is or not, it is certainly highly regarded.

It didn't finish in the top slot in the American Film Institute's Top 100 movies of all time list — but it did end up in the Top 10.

And most movie buffs agree that "Citizen Kane," "Casablanca" and "The Godfather" were better.

But "GWTW" — as some movie fans like to call it — has been a classic virtually since it premièred at Loew's Grand Theatre in Atlanta 70 years ago today.

It set a record for Academy Awards — winning 10 — that stood for two decades until "Ben–Hur" came along. That was quite an achievement, considering that 1939 is still regarded as Hollywood's greatest year by many movie aficionados. It told a story about a critical period in American history that may well have been romanticized, but even today, the movie is recalled by students of film as one of the most enduring symbols of the golden age of Hollywood.

The film caused quite a commotion on Dec. 15, 1939, when it premiered in Atlanta. The actual premiere came at the end of three days of festivities that former President Jimmy Carter, who was a Georgia teenager at the time, called "the biggest event to happen in the South in my lifetime."

Ironically, the Jim Crow laws on the books at the time kept the black members of the cast from attending the premiere. Clark Gable was going to boycott the premiere in protest, but Hattie McDaniel, who won Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Mammy, persuaded him to attend.

To my knowledge, no festivities were planned in Atlanta today. Apparently, a 70th anniversary celebration was held last month in nearby Marietta.

Well, "Gone With the Wind" always did seem to write its own rules.

Can anyone deny its lasting influence on American culture, especially when one thinks of such lines as:

• "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn."


• "After all, tomorrow is another day!" and


• "As God is my witness, I'll never be hungry again."

So much of "Gone With the Wind" has become familiar over the years that it naturally lent itself to parody — the best of which, undeniably, was the one Carol Burnett and her colleagues did in the 1970s.

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Imitation, they say, is the most sincere form of flattery. And I'm sure the cast would have been flattered, but most were dead by the time that parody aired. The film's last survivng principal cast member was Olivia de Havilland — and I don't know if she ever saw it.

Well, the now 93–year–old de Havilland was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar four times in her movie career, and she won the statuette twice.

But mark my words.

When she dies, the first line of her obituary will not say that she was a two–time Best Actress winner.

It will say she was "Melanie Hamilton" in "Gone With the Wind."

The Premiere of Ben-Hur

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On this day 50 years ago, the movie "Ben–Hur" premiered at Loew's State Theatre in New York.

A few months later, it won 11 Oscars, more than any film had ever won before. It is an achievement that has never been surpassed, and it has been matched only twice — by "Titanic" in 1998 and "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" in 2004.

Considering what the film accomplished, I figured that today would have been a good day for someone to show it. But I have checked my usual sources for classic movies, and no one seems to be showing it today. Perhaps they are waiting for a more significant anniversary — the 50th anniversary of the movie's release in England is next month, although why that would be considered more important than the New York premiere is beyond me.

Well, anyway, 2009 is clearly an appropriate time to watch the film. And it's important, I think, to view it in context. Bruce Eder observes, for AllMovie.com, that it was "the culmination of a cycle of religious epics that dated back slightly more than a decade and closed out the genre as a viable Hollywood phenomenon."

I find his reasoning for the popularity of religious films in the 1950s — "the advent of the Cold War and the threat of thermonuclear annihilation likely made filmgoers start thinking about God, heaven, and the hereafter more than usual" — difficult to dispute.

Whether one is motivated by religious beliefs or a genuine affection for movies, "Ben–Hur" is worth seeing at least once. Be forewarned, though — it is lengthy (more than 3½ hours), and, if one is a devotee to the writings of Lew Wallace (a former Civil War general), there are some differences between his novel and the film adaptation.

But, even after 50 years, the chariot race is enough reason to see it.

The Premiere of 'Gone With the Wind'

From what I've been told, the premiere of "Gone With the Wind" 69 years ago today in Atlanta was the event of the decade — if not the century.

It was certainly one of the most anticipated films of all time. The book was published in 1936, and speculation started almost immediately over who would be cast to play Rhett Butler and Scarlett O'Hara.

Nearly everyone who was anyone was mentioned, at one time or another, and almost any combination you can imagine, even if it seems bizarre in hindsight, was considered possible. At one point, Gary Cooper was a top contender to be cast as Rhett Butler — primarily because his contract involved a distribution company that had an eight-picture deal with producer David O. Selznick.

From the start, though, Clark Gable seems to have been the consensus choice of fans and critics alike. But I can't help wondering — if Cooper had been cast as Rhett Butler, would he ever have played Sgt. York? Or Lou Gehrig? Or Will Kane?

It was different with the role of Scarlett O'Hara. Nearly every actress in Hollywood — including Lucille Ball, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford and Katharine Hepburn — was mentioned for the role, but it came down to four in December of 1938 — Jean Arthur, Joan Bennett, Paulette Goddard and Vivien Leigh. Leigh and Goddard were the only two whose tests were done in Technicolor — and Leigh got the part.

The premiere came on the third day of a three-day festival in Atlanta. Georgia's governor declared a state holiday on the day of the premiere. Jimmy Carter, who was 15 at the time, said it was "the biggest event to happen in the South in my lifetime."

It was undeniably the biggest event in a year that is remembered by film lovers and movie historians as "the greatest year in film history," but for most moviegoers, it wasn't part of their experience in the 1930s. From the day of its 1939 premiere until June 1940, the film played to only advance-ticket road show audiences at a limited number of theaters. It went into general release in January 1941.

And there were parts of Margaret Mitchell's novel that weren't included (or were watered down) in the movie. You can argue that the movie was long enough already, and that's a valid point — it was nearly four hours long. But I think politics played a role as well.

For example, the book's description of the burning of Atlanta was even more vivid than the celebrated sequence in the film — and so was its depiction of the ravages of war. This part of the story was more subdued in the film.

And there was an episode involving the Ku Klux Klan that didn't end up in the movie. I won't discuss it any further, in case you haven't read the book.

Even so, "Gone With the Wind" clearly influenced — and continues to influence — the art of filmmaking.