The Delights
Continue in The Mary Tyler Moore Show Season Two
by
Kristin Battestella
WJM-TV
associate producer Mary Richards (Mary Tyler Moore) continues to
balance the single Minneapolis scene with best friend Rhoda
Morgenstern (Valerie Harper) as well as the bustling workplace with
anchorman Ted Baxter (Ted Knight), news writer Murray Slaughter
(Gavin MacLeod), and boss Lou Grant (Ed Asner) in the 1971-72
sophomore season of The Mary
Tyler Moore Show.
Once
again, the series hits the ground running with endearing character
breakouts joining several topical episodes pushing the envelope of
what television then dared to present. “He's No Heavy...He's My
Brother” is a shrewd two-hander addressing xenophobia and cultural
stereotypes with laughter as Mary and Rhoda grow suspicious of the
package a friendly Mexican waiter asks them to take home after he
gets them a vacation deal away from frigid Minnesota. Needing a birth
certificate to travel, long distance calls, decoy phone numbers, and
complaining memos make for great jokes thanks to shrewd comedic
timing and visual gags to match. Negotiations, scab talk, weather
jokes, and laugh out loud zingers earn The
Mary Tyler Moore Show an
Best Direction Emmy for “Thoroughly
Unmilitant Mary” when a writers union strike forces management to
cross the picket line. No pension or insurance and a pay cut is
indeed a stinky deal, and others walkout in solidarity. This could be
a long fight when there are bills to pay, but the workplace chaos,
laughter, clamminess, and tears tell a serious, still relatable
story. Reasonable adults also drive themselves crazy over bad luck
fears and hope for financial reward in “Don't Break the Chain” –
making copies, hording stamps, and fighting over address lists with
workplace peer pressure and guests from last season. Millennials may
not understand the premise here, but we tag fifty people on a cutesy
social media post and pass it on don't we? Can sentimental, homey,
lived in, messy, and gray become nouveau, light, and airy? Rhoda
stretches her far out design ideas when cheap, reluctant to change
Lou wants his living room painted as a surprise for empty nester Mrs.
Grant in “The Square-Shaped Room.” Exceptional performances and
décor revelations accent this multi-layered episode alongside work
conversations, home mishaps, and generational clashes. Mary would
also like to do more – civic duties instead of just socializing to
meet men – for “The Five-Minute Dress.” Unfortunately, the
Women for Better Government's meeting on recycling leads to a date
with a very busy city official who keeps canceling on her. All the
awkwardness happens via one-sided phone calls and angry messages from
our unseen, unnamed suitor, reiterating how on The
Mary Tyler Moore Show, an
all dressed up and nowhere to go career woman isn't going to waste
time waiting on a man who won't make her a priority. Of course, Ted
thinks it's going to be nothing but carpools and girls to iron his
shirts in “More Than Neighbors” when he considers moving into a
vacancy below Mary. In its debut, The
Mary Tyler Moore Show firmly
separated the familiar home and bungling workplace comedy, but here
they completely collide when Ted wants Mary to answer at home calls
with “Mr. Baxter's
residence.” Sophisticated
Mary Frann (Newhart)
befriends
Mary after rear ending her in “Some
of My Best Friends Are Rhoda,” and she promises Mary the $110 check
for damages amid fancy
activities and tennis at the social club. Rhoda, however, is excluded
until Mary realizes the antisemitic truth and sticks it to her new
friend in another progressive but tender and intelligent turn.
"Didn't
You Used to Be... Wait... Don't Tell Me” is one of the few less
than stellar episodes for Year Two of The
Mary Tyler Moore Show with
a 1959 Leif Erickson
High School reunion that revisits one of the weaker episodes from
Season One. The Viking Voice
Alumni magazine lists Mary
as a single career gal, and then Mr. Valerie Harper Richard Schaal is
ready and waiting as the obsessed Howard Arnell – rehashing the
same old questions on why Mary is cute but unmarried in unnecessary
going home plots. It's not a terrible episode thanks to some fun
winks including guest star Jack Riley (The Bob Newhart Show), however
the embarrassing proposals get old when The
Mary Tyler Moore Show never
needs to go back to the
“It's still Richards, isn't it?” snide. Likewise not the worst
but just annoying is “Feeb.” When Mary inadvertently gets an
incompetent waitress fired, she feels guilty and hires her at WJM.
Unfortunately, the eponymous lady really isn't qualified in typing or
shorthand – adding to Mary's clerical duties rather than
alleviating them. Perhaps this is just too realistic a situation to
be funny, as Mary thinks it is her obligation to be nice to someone
who doesn't deserve it and gets walked all over as a result. It's odd
to see our strong, independent woman guilt tripped into more
mistakes, and all the men in the newsroom think the negativity
between the women is just catty jealousy. Besides, this exact plot
was done much better in the First Season with Phyllis' office
incompetence. Although we won't be seeing The
Happy Homemaker just
yet, a different chef at WJM is mentioned in between the once again
under utilized appearances of John Amos as weatherman Gordy. He
answers the phone for
Mary when she's getting obscene phone calls after a sex documentary,
stands up for her during the union strike, and does the program logs
when she's late even though he can't type and doesn't know how to do
them. Gordy contests Ted with a quip or two, but he deserved much
more than another meager four episodes to predict fair weather when
it ends up snowing. Although backdoor pilots such as the “His Two
Right Arms” finale were not unheard of then, it's incredibly weird
to tune in for The Mary
Tyler Moore Show and
meet bungling councilman
Bob Daily and his eponymous campaign gals. His Pete Peterson can't
handle the tough questions when Mary needs a guest for WJM's
political talk show, but can his hip crew prepare him in time?
Viewers are supposed to love these girls instantly, but seeding them
into the season earlier – even starting the year with this episode
– would have helped tremendously. If Gordy's potential was not
going to be used, then let's see the progressive African American
family herein led by Mrs.
Jefferson herself Isabel Sanford addressing
the seventies civics. Who's the more incompetent scenes between Daily
and Ted Knight could have been fun, too, for Peterson doesn't want
to be briefed on air – he wants people to know he doesn't have any
answers. Ted also runs for office in Season Four of The
Mary Tyler Moore Show, making
this idea somewhat unnecessary now. Of course, having Daily here
means we wouldn't have had him on The
Bob Newhart Show. So
really it all works out in the end, especially since The
Mary Tyler Moore Show would
ultimately have count 'em three spin-off successes.
Mary
Richards may wear flannel pajamas, embroider, call her parents on the
phone, and not love Paul Newman o_O, but she goes ice skating to do
all that “Peggy Fleming” stuff and gains not one, but two suitors
when sending out a chain letter. Her unwilling to commit doctor
fiance premise seems forgotten now, but Mary left the University of
Minnesota after two years and stinks at tennis thanks to her out of
date wooden racket. Rather than television perfection – save for
her saucy exercise tights and seventies size seven – Moore keeps
Mary endearing because she is a good person trying to do right in her
little world. She doesn't think it's ethical to call in sick on a
Friday when you aren't and remains too polite to get rid of someone.
Mary thinks her apartment is a mess when it is completely neat, and
her biggest fear in living alone is that one day there will be no one
to help her when her back zipper gets stuck. Of course, Mary knows
Mr. Grant doesn't like people in his office, yet she's always
inviting people in there to confab. After she blunders a late
breaking bulletin in “Room 223,” Mary is unhappy at being an
average professional and wonders what she really does as an associate
producer, so she takes a night school writing class to become better
at her job. Naturally the professor is smitten, making Mary question
whether she gets by on ability or personality as business mixes with
pleasure and she gets a C. This charming relationship will be
revisited in Seasons Three and Six, and although it's too soon to
give her a regular beau, The
Mary Tyler Moore Show keeps
trying with a slightly older divorced architect in
“You Certainly Are a Big Boy.” Mary is surprised he has a younger
son that's closer to her in age – his twenty-five to her “over
thirty” – and she dislikes the fast pace with no real time to
talk, not to mention the idea of being a step-mother with a son old
enough to make her a grandmother.
Likewise,
Ed Asner's western watching and
grumpy as ever news
director Lou Grant is told to smile and be natural but he says you
can't have him both ways. He enjoys taking his sarcastic frustrations
out on Ted, lulling his staff into a sense of understanding before
turning deliciously viscous. Lou would love to have a news helicopter
but when he's forced to go on the air, he's terrible unless he's
drunk. He acquiesces to baking cookies if he can have them with
scotch and has been working on a novel for five years – on and off
between steaks and martinis. He's proud to be a newsman because real
newsmen don't need coffee breaks, but he places himself in the middle
when setting up Mary with his poker friend in “I Am Curious
Cooper.” He knows his two favorite, attractive, successful friends
will hit it off, however the only thing they have in common is Mr.
Grant. Asner plays both sides wonderfully before earning his Emmy win
with “The Six-and-a-Half-Year Itch.” I'd like to think the John
Wayne flick he goes to see is Big Jake, but
he catches his son-in-law
at the movies with another woman, leading to awkwardness, hidden
rage, not so hidden rage, and acting like nothing happened on the
phone with Mrs. Grant. Lou says he hasn't been this mad since he let
it all out in 1944 and captured a town in Germany, and fear of his
wrath is enough to keep his son-in-law zipped. The
Mary Tyler Moore Show shrewdly
addresses infidelity
without ruining any of the main characters or even saying it in so
many words thanks to cleared throats and exclamations that somehow
remain so innocent compared to today's sex everywhere culture.
Fellow
Emmy winner Valerie Harper is as sarcastic as ever as Rhoda
Morgenstern – who came to cold Minnesota to keep better amid winter
vacations with less competition for her sweatsuit bathing suit.
Despite Harper's beauty and style, Rhoda says the bad side of her
face is the front, always joking about being fat or ugly and ending
her diet with cake. Watching a documentary on swinging singles alone
is depressing to her, but Nancy Walker's Ida Morgenstern flies in for
“A Girl's Best Mother Is Not Her Friend” just to hook up slim,
unmarried Mary with a perfect, not Jewish man. She's shocked to hear
Rhoda has dated gentiles, but Ida tries being hip in a pink pant
suit, no bra, and matching mother/daughter dresses. She drinks super
sweet Jewish wine, too, so she can be “with it” in this
delightful generational clash with uproarious results. Rhoda,
however, gets caught up on the soap operas after getting fired in
“...Is a Friend in Need.” Mary feels guilty about hiding an
opening at WJM from Rhoda, and the workplace and friendship collide
on The Mary Tyler Moore Show
with
a giant hair dryer finale. Our lovable ladies are at each other's
throats again after a small fire makes them roommates for “Where
There's Smoke, There's Rhoda.” None of Mary's clothes fit Rhoda,
she laughs under the covers watching W.C. Fields, and dirties the
kitchen but won't do the dishes. Rhoda just can't handle all Mary's
good morning sunshine, but she takes Phyllis up on her phony move in
offer just for the torment. Billed as a Special Guest Cloris
Leachman's Phyllis Lindstrom keeps a college catalog in her purse
because you never know when one might feel inadequate or need to
better herself. She goes to a PTA presentation of Hair
with
all the clothes on when not boasting about her unseen husband Lars or
listening in on the landline extension. Phyllis inadvertently reveals
she is the lax landlord and may be self-centered, but she wants
to be an open and honest parent to Lisa Gerritsen's Bess, letting her
watch WJM's controversial sexual I.Q. Documentary in the “The
Birds...and...um...Bees” premiere. Phyllis wants Mary to give her
daughter the titular talk, but all the adults are too uncomfortable
to say the word “sex” in a wonderfully tasteful reflection of
television itself maturing into adolescence. Twenty years prior, Lucy
had to be “expecting” but now our single unmarried
thirty-something can talk freely about sex versus love and Bess is
totally cool with it. When crusty backup babysitter Lou Grant is
called in for “Baby Sit-Com,” he says Bess can do whatever she
wants but play with matches. He's a father of three grown daughters,
but entertaining a hip eighth grader leads to zany kitchen antics and
poker for cookies. When Bess writes a report about her parents in
“The Care and Feeding of Parents,” Phyllis thinks it can be
expanded into a book and be published – ignored how the point of
the piece was how children have it tough with such groovy parents.
Disinterested Bess, however, wants to do what will make Phyllis
happy, because her mother is a resilient, intelligent, creative woman
that got stuck being a humdrum housewife.
Ted
Knight's vain Ted Baxter carries glossy photos of himself and an
autograph stamp, but sending his perfect head shot to the five people
in his fan club might intimidate them. Cheap Ted buys “imported”
beer from Los Angeles and tries having all his purchases written off
on his expense report – stomach aides and shoe shines included. He
has vintage fake pictures of himself with famous people, and while
Ted may do a volunteer ventriloquist act to entertain local troops,
he
sings at the piano bar
like it's karaoke and takes change from his tip. Ted adds complex
numbers if it involves money but can't do basic math. He hires a
second year law student for two dollars an hour with two cents a
mile, and his accountant goes to “Wilson High.” When Ted's
similarly silver haired and sport coat wearing brother commercial
actor Hal Baxter visits in “Cover Boy” he thinks what Ted does in
this little studio is quaint for a man his age. Ted has Mary pretend
to be his girl as the topper, but the brothers' competition escalates
with arm wrestling, visual blunders, and heaps of luxury restaurant
faux pas. Ted's also deliberately not gone on vacation over fears a
competent substitute would replace him in “And Now, Sitting in for
Ted Baxter.” Why is Ted kept on when he is so bad? Because no one
wants to hurt his feelings – especially after his card saying
“terrifico in Acapulo” is postmarked Minneapolis. It's awkwardly
endearing, too, when Ted's romancing Betty Bowerchuck, the sweet
daughter of Chuckles the Clown in “Ted Over Heels.” He wears a
fake mustache until the real one grows in and steals the roses from
Mary's desk, but underneath his peacock fronting, Ted's really
fearful of any rejection or embarrassment – and nobody wants to
tell him they really don't like his mustache! Murray Slaughter admits
he feels bad when his anchorman foil might get fired, but Gavin
MacLeod's news writer keeps a fake bag lunch in his desk drawer for
when Ted asks him out to dinner. Murray feels more like a comedy
writer in writing the news for Ted, and although he enjoys getting
paid, he doesn't really enjoy writing it. Initially Murray doesn't
have much to do beyond his seated zingers – ad libbing as needed
great rifts though they are, but Murray's making writing mistakes and
yawning over his typewriter in the late season spotlight “The
Slaughter Affair.” It's his tenth wedding anniversary, and he wants
to get his wife Joyce Bulifant the car they couldn't afford in 1963.
Unfortunately, Murray lies that he's teaching news writing at night
school when he's really moonlighting as a cab driver. When he's
robbed and late at the police station, Marie thinks he's having an
affair with Mary. Though clumsy when there were better ways to
feature Murray, a writer needing a second job to make means remains a
realistic story. The balding Murray, however, would give up all his
activities if it took him an entire night to wash his hair.
Thanks
to directors Jay Sandrich and Peter Baldwin as well as regular
writers including Treva Silverman, Susan Silver, Martin Cohan, David
Davis, and Lorenzo Music; The
Mary Tyler Moore Show creators
Allan Burns and James L. Brooks
keep the twenty four episode season uniform. Of course, the Second
Season credits are updated with new at home and work scenes replacing
Mary's big city move, and the “Love is All Around” lyrics are
redone into the now more familiar anthem with a softer, mellow exit
instrumental for a comforting, simpler time. Did you ever think we'd
refer to 1972 coughwatergatecough as a simpler time? How much would a
then $8 bottle of wine, $42 gourmet meal, and $28.50 for the plumber
cost now? The door to door salesman doesn't know his product's price
outright in cash because they make their profit via interest and
penalties, and if you rush that typewriter bell, you must make your
corrections with a pencil and eraser. Of course, let's not forget
that tiny, primitive, portable television right next to the
primitive, unmovable, behemoth VCR. While there aren't too many dated
cultural references on Mary
Tyler Moore, the
younger generation won't understand the clip on the receiver to rest
the phone on your shoulder nor how Lou wishes he could put Ted on the
air after
the Star Spangled Banner. Us oldsters will recognize those vintage
cups and corning ware sets, but some of the seventies tall boots,
empire dresses, chokers, waist cinchers, ruffles, and scarves are
back in vogue. The skirts are still short to start the season but
give way to longer, colorful suit sets and wider, flared jeans with
groovy patches to match blazers with the suede elbows and wild ties.
Orange turtlenecks, crocheted pink ponchos, and plaid vests can be a
bit much, but The Mary Tyler
Moore Show looks
crisp and revitalized on the 4K television.
In addition to several commentaries, Disc Three on the Season Two DVD set is double sided with unexpected parodies, news report spoofs,
karaoke, and trivia as Cloris Leachman, Ed Asner, Betty White, the
late Georgia Engel, and more host fun interactive features alongside
1972 Emmy highlights, vintage on location Moore
on Sunday behind the
scenes, and an hour long “Eight Characters in Search of a Sitcom”
retrospective topping off the sentimental good time here.
Season
Two of The Mary Tyler Moore
Show is
easy to marathon thanks
to charming nostalgia and groundbreaking storytelling that remains
fresh and must see for the whole family.
No comments:
Post a Comment