Best Classic Sitcoms of All Time (Before 2000), Ranked

Hey y'all, welcome to Past Times at eighties high. Got another great one for you today. We are going to do our top ten sitcoms. And this is not of all time, but we did go back to, you know, we're doing 1999 and prior, as 25 years old is considered vintage or nostalgic. So that's that's how we're going to do the ruling today. Um, and I did want to get something out there that I haven't talked about on past times yet, but we do have another sidecast called Preachers of the Night, which you will find under the Pastimes umbrella, which is a KISS-centric podcast, although we may get some other bands in there as well down the line. However, we're gonna get started right out of the gate today. But before we do, I wanted to give you guys our email address if anyone would like to reach out. Because on the latter-mentioned preachers of the night, we're going to start a little thing where you know we're gonna get some of the the audience involved. So our email is pastimes at 80shigh at gmail.com, and that is Pastimes at 80S. And hope you enjoy this one. It's gonna be a fun one, and today we are gonna get started right out of the gate with Dungo.

Hey everybody, it's good to be back. Yeah, uh, you know, starting it off. So I'm a little cold, so I kind of want to just chat a little bit about we're gonna be talking about sitcoms, and it was really hard to kind of narrow it down because there's so many good ones to choose from. And I went with, you know, which ones did I watch, which ones kind of were in, you know, that I was watching when I was younger. Um, and it may or may not have been in syndication, you know, or you know, the time frame was not kind of applicable to me, um, other than you know, because I lost the 90s. I was away in the military, and you know, the 90s is kind of a lost decade for me, but yet I did watch some of the shows from that from that decade after the fact. And syndication. Yeah, so it is it is hard to kind of narrow it down. Oh, this was so hard. Yeah. So I'm gonna start with one that I did watch a lot as a young adult, and that is Family Ties, which was 1982 to 1989. There was 172 episodes, seven seasons, and you know, that's how I remember Michael J. Fox as his probably defining role. Um, a lot of people go to the movies and you know back to the future. Back to the future is kind of like his movie defining role, but this was his television defining role, and it's kind of like a good, you know, family sitcom where the fan the mom and dad were hippies. Michael J. Fox was like a young conservative, and it was like the 60s, 70s transitioning into the 80s, and it was a good dynamic, and watching him kind of he was a great character to watch growing up. Awesome, man Keaton, yeah. Alex P. Keaton. And uh Justine Bateman, who's the sister of Jason Bateman. Um, she was kind of you know, kind of hot and smoking now, right?

So and the dadina's not so he was all right.

The dad was hilarious, I thought he had the best dry humor. Oh, great pick, Darnold. Yeah, awesome. So that's number 10 to you, Kev.

All right, so I have a 500-way tie for number one. Uh, there's just like Donald was saying, there's so much out there that you could choose from. I just really tried not to overthink about and think about the shows that really that I watched consistently. And one of the first ones that came to mind was obviously in syndication because uh it went off the air shortly after I was born, but it was on in the afternoons when I got home from school or or whatever else. Um, it was written by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry, and the idea came because James Bond and Inspector Cluso were huge at the time. So they were tasked with writing a spy comedy show, which of course was Get Smart with Don Adams. Yeah, and it was just such a great show. One of the one of the a lot of accolades for the opening bit where he was walking through all the doors, but all of all of that, you know, spy stuff and to goof on it was was just great. And then, of course, they had all of the great catchphrases that Don Adams has missed it by that much. Or would you believe a pack of Boy Scouts and a rabid Chihuahua? That I might believe.

An old lady in an angry poodle, right?

We've got we've got the we've got the National Guard, we've got you surrounded. No, you don't. Would you believe? Exactly. Just great stuff, and also also, I mean, futuristic, because he had the first cell phone, it was just in his shoe, right? Right exactly.

It's all right, yeah. Uh all right, great pick. Awesome show, too, man. Uh, number 10 to you, Mark.

Well, first of all, one thing I need to say is unlike Donnie, I these are a lot of the shows that I watched when I was older. Donnie, of course it's when you were younger. Yeah, this is the oldest you've ever been. Sorry. I just obviously, yeah. Anyway, I picked Nightcourt. Uh that was one of those musty shows. Good one. It was just an absolute riot. That that was the hint I was trying to give you when I was playing the song on your acoustic. The bass line's great. Yeah.

Boom, bam.

Bam. Great. So anyway, yeah, yeah. It, you know, it's based in the courtroom, obviously. You had Marky Post as the uh public defendant, kind of the public defendant, and then John Larriquette. Defender, right? Yeah. Yeah. And John Larriquette was the uh He was great. Prosecutor. The prosecutor, and I never could understand his sex appeal, but he got laid more than friggin'. It doesn't matter what you look at. Paul Stanley.

It matters how you conduct yourself. Yeah, and he's confidence.

And one one of the my favorite parts of the show was when this guy was a hundred years old being charged with something. I don't remember what it was, but he comes up with these three hardies, and he says, My secret is I swim 10 miles a day, uh, eat a hundred oysters, and uh well, then he drops dead right there. So that was pretty funny. I loved the killer intro. And I uh bull, I he was so funny. He was cool, yeah. He was cool, he was an absolute riot. And I remember there were rumors of spam balls down at the you know, at the cafeteria. All right. I'll bring it to AJ, but I loved that show. That was a great show.

That was definitely tossed around in my list.

Yeah. So my number 10, I wouldn't say is a comedy per se. Like, or at least this was not a laugh out, you know, out loud laughter show, but I had to put it on my my list because it's it was a staple in my life, and that's the Brady Bunch.

Oh, definitely a comedy. Yeah, I thought I was getting a little nervous. You're gonna pick Batman and I was gonna have to really fight up.

Anyway, you know, just coming home from school and watching that show, it was just was on TBS every afternoon, and just I mean, it was just relatable, you know. I mean, of course, that was not even close to my family or anyone else's family on the planet.

No, I would I I disagree. I the McDonald family, Steve and John. So that that that reminded me every time I went over to play with Steve and John of the Brady Bunch. Yeah, that was the Brady bunch. So yeah, they did exist.

But you know, I don't, I mean, what can I say about the Brady mud the Brady bunch? Everyone knows it, and I had to take it. So I will leave it at that and go to you, Dongo, for now.

You definitely have I was gonna say there's I mean so many phrases that came from that that are in everyday life. Oh, yeah, and like talking about the people that you know, like none of us had that lifestyle. It's kind of a burn today to be like, oh, he grew up in the Brady bunch. Like he has no idea what it's like to get slapped around or dad hammered or get the belt or whatever else. It was like, you know, his parents were it's all right, son. Alice was so hot too, wasn't she?

Alice, she really was when you took the makeup off her and saw her in real life.

Yeah, that's why Sam the Butcher was bringing Alice to meet.

And it's funny, you look at like in her late 20s or early 30s, they made her look like an older woman at the time. Um 30 something or 29 or whatever. Oh my god.

Then there's the rumors about Greg and Florence Henderson. They're not rumors. No, they're not rumors. Is that true? That is true. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I think they hooked up banging his mom. Yeah, hey, hey, that's that's a whole bunch of websites these days.

Oh my god. Oh my god. All right, Donald. So I'm on number nine, but I wanted to back up again to just talk about what makes a good sitcom. And I kind of looked at some things, and there's kind of like four things that you can say makes a good sitcom. It's either critically acclaimed, it it influences pop culture, um, has a cultural impact, or it kind of leaves a legacy of some type. This next pick is kind of not really any of the above, unfortunately.

But he said that. Good segue, Donnie.

Right, I know. This is like a negative segue, but I'm picking for number nine, WKRP Incident. I love that trade. Baby, if you've ever wondered. I mean, I love WK.

WKRP Incineti.

I always like the outro better. But I mean, it was like it was just cool, you know. It was kind of uh just a funny show with good characters. I mean, the characters were what made the show. Absolutely. Um, probably one of the funniest episodes I've ever seen on a sitcom was the turkey episode. Absolutely when they're dropping turkeys, they're all excited, they're like, Yes, this is gonna be great. And he's like, No, you're mad at it. Oh my god.

What was the hot blonde's name? What Lonnie Anderson? Lonnie Anderson. Oh my god, yeah.

Go for it.

No, I was just gonna say they did an episode of when the Who back during the general admission days. Good old days. Oh, yeah. I know, but they uh four people I think died in rush to the stage. Oh, yeah. They did actually did an episode of that on the radio.

Oh, oh wow, yeah, great. I a lot of them took the real life, you know, seriousness of that. And actually, Kevin brought that up that down the line we were talking about maybe doing an episode on the serious moments from a comedy sitcom. You know what I mean?

Right, and that's kind of what makes it you know, the critically critical impact of King's Yeah, when they tackled the tough issues of the day, exactly, and that's humor. That's what humor is supposed to be is kind of a satire of the you know toughness of life. Yeah, they just have to pussyfoot around, exactly.

But yeah, just solid characters. I mean, everything from from Les Nessman, he was great, Herb Tarlack, Venus Fly Trap, and and you know Dr.

Johnny Fever.

Yeah, who was the really cool guy?

The blonde balding dude with the mustache.

No, no, you're thinking I can't think of his name either, but he was like the station manager.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Um, God, I can't think of his name. Oh, well, I can see his face perfectly, but Kim Reed was Venus Flytrap.

Howard Hessman was Dr. Johnny Fever, uh, Gordon Jump with Arthur Carlson, who was like the owner, and he was a great character. Is that the one you're talking about? And then Gary Sandy was Andy Trask. Andy Traps. And he was the young man who was like meant to turn the radio station around. Right, right. Like it was a dying AM radio station playing like crappy music, and he wanted to go FM and improve the rock and roll and bring it to the public kind of awesome pick.

Number number nine to you.

Number nine, number nine. Well, again, going back to the early days uh of my youth and a show that was off the air about a year before I was born, um, just iconic, and there's been so many other versions of this, but honestly, none of them hold a candle for me to the 1966 Batman. It was just the greatest show ever. It was so friggin' campy and Mark's marked in a blowing gasket right now. I'm sorry, brother. It's I'll let you talk for a minute. Okay, all right, all right. I'm with Kevin. So just just a little bit of the, I mean, it was it was hilarious. It was it was absolutely so Adam West goofy in its and it was the only one, it was the only sitcom on the air at the time that didn't have a laugh track, which was brave and and and amazing for them. Uh and the other thing I could say about it before I turn it over to Mark and he beats me to death with his microphone, uh, it was the longest running superhero show all the way up until Smallville in 07. And that is episode-wise because it was literally only on the air from 66 to 68, but they they was it was on twice a week. Interesting. Can you imagine something of of that fun and quality? Because now we get things on, we get series on Netflix, and it's like like Shorty just came out, right? It was you waited a year for six episodes. The whole thing's over in two minutes. That is the thing.

Yeah, you look at the episodes and the seasons, but yeah, it's like some are like nowadays are 10 10 episodes, is like a normal.

These shows were on the air for two years and they had 257 episodes.

Right, because that's the mark of a good show, is if you hit that hundred episode mark or whatever, you know.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Oh, what a great pick, man.

All right, so anyway, um, I'm glad you think that crime is a is a joke. Mark's not talking to me anymore.

You know, I I'm glad you think that crime is a joke, Kevin. The Riddler was out there, we might have to joke in havoc.

Mark, there's neighbors. That was probably the best.

We might have to change seating.

Oh joking aside, seriously, that this is the kid in me talking. I know. Because when I was a little boy, I was everything. I took the show so seriously, and my dad kept trying to say it was a comedy. And I was so mad at him, you know. And one of my favorite parts was uh actually in the Batman movie. Batman Adam West, my favorite Batman movie. Absolutely. He's running around with a bomb, and he finally finally looks over the into the bay, and there's a couple making out on a little uh rowboat or whatever.

And some days you can't get rid of a bomb.

Was that before or after he used the shark repellent from that utility belt was incredible? It always seemed to know what was gonna happen that day. There was always just the right thing that he needed.

It was just a tiny little belt, but everything was in that damn thing.

He had the greatest demeanor too. He was always so calm, like Robin, we're gonna we're gonna fight this evil right now. I know, but he just calming out.

I know he just did it. He played it so like straight but over the top at the same side at the same time. And the other thing, and I'm sorry if I'm walking on somebody else has it, but the guests, the the the villains were just I mean, what a that's what I met.

I mean that's what I set up for all the movies. It's like I compare them to that right show from Cesar Romero to uh uh Unbelievable but just Meredith Penguin, Frank Gorshen is the Riddler.

I mean, these guys are and then you and then Vincent Price Vincent Price Mr. Freeze, you were perfect, yeah. Wait, was he Mr. Freeze or was head? Egghead. He was egghead, egghead.

I forgot to play Mr. Freeze.

Wasn't Schwarzenegger, and then Catwoman.

Oh, there was two of them.

Newman, Julie Newman, and Julie Newmar was I mean, oh my god, Newmar. Newmar. Love those. That'll never come up in this epilogue. No, no, not at all. But yeah, Earth of Kit was also, and then and then Batgirl was she was mysterious.

You just never knew she was gonna pop up. I think she was it the Chief Daughter?

I believe Chief O'Hara Chief O'Hara's daughter, yeah. So no, not Chief O'Hara, no, wasn't she uh what was the other commission? Barbara Barbara Gordon, yep, Barbara Gordon. He was I mean, talk talk about like stereotypes that Chief O'Hara had the thickest Irish bro that you can have. Right. No stereotype there at all. That would that would play just fine today, right?

Right, right. Oh man, awesome. So that's number nine to you, Mark.

Okay, um, this is already picked. Get smart. So incredibly funny. The show basically is uh it's uh about chaos spelled K-A-O-S and control, which is the good guys, and um, you know, Kevin talked about some of the uh catchphrases. Um, you know, you had Jaime on there. Jaime, kill the light. I mean, he was a he was a robot. Um you know, must it by that much. Oh, yeah. And uh that there was a great band on that show. I I forgot the name of the band, but they had this great song. It went thrill, thrill, thrill. Ban it now, bang it, kill, kill, kill, bang out now.

Was it like a soundtrack or was it a band? It was a band dressed.

Oh, they were they were dressed as cows. What the f yes, what the f oh god, really? It doesn't matter.

I do that.

But anyway, um, there's another part. Well, actually, during that song, friggin' 99 is dancing around like they did in the 60s. So friggin' sexy. Oh my god. And then there's one part of the show when there's um one of the guys in control, 86, who is Maxwell Smart, goes up to uh the man and says, We need to use that device that you have right there.

You know, it was a was it the cone of silence?

Oh no, actually, it wasn't the cone of silence, but it was just some I don't remember what it was.

Here like is that how I think that was uh 86 as a restaurant term goes back to I mean the 20s, I think. Oh, yeah. So I think calling him 86 was actually a goof on right, right, right. Like 007, yeah, recall him 86.

But getting back to what I was trying to say is that um, you know, he's like, no, no, this is top secret stuff, blah, blah, blah. And then 99 goes up all cutesy and hot. And you know, do you think we could use that? We really could, it's important to us.

Oh, whatever you mind, here you go, you know.

Here's the the secret stuff for you. Yeah. The hot chick always gets on you.

And there was there was one other thing in that show that I have to bring up. We were sitting when we lived in Guildford on Farmer Drive watching the show. We absolutely loved it.

He was saying something like, Well, everything I put in here, it it uh it says that this thing is in Littleton, New Hampshire.

And we just looked at each other, broke down laughing. That they just randomly picked Littleton, New Hampshire. I tried to look up the exact quote.

All right, so I am going to um change my list a bit here, and I am going to 86. Get smart. So I am going to uh thank God I had some honorables here just because you know we've talked together back so much.

Um I got a ton of them, but I didn't write them down.

But this here, um once again, not I I don't know how popular this was, but my list is stuff that has meaning to me, you know, and takes me back to a special place here and there. I mean, and ironically, this part of my life, it was not a great part, but this was one great part of it, and it was 1986, and the show is elf. Really? Yeah, exactly. And just and the reason why is I was living in Hinsdale, New Hampshire, and I just loved this show. I and you know what? I actually watched it quite a bit in last in the last year, and it's still fucking funny to me. Gordon Shumway. Gordon Shumway is a riot, you know, you got the off monics next door, and she's always thinking she's crazy, or they all think she's crazy because she's seeing this alien life form. Of course, his favorite meal is cats, but um, it just you know, it w was really special to me. I had a good friend Chris, one of the few people that um I got along with down there, and you know, I think it was Tuesday nights, it was on. So every Wednesday at school we would chat about it. And I don't know if anyone out there hasn't seen it. I mean, is it stupid? Hell yeah. But it's pretty fucking funny.

The character of Alf was spot on awesome. Just a funny, like if you were gonna have an alien land on Earth from another country, it's some like eccentric kind of creature that looks cute. And yeah.

Well, I think he could also, it was a good device because as a puppet alien, he could say things and get away with things that that a human wouldn't get to. But it's funny because I haven't thought really about that show in years. Right. And to think that in the 80s we sat around watching a cartoon puppet that was an alien. But it was a well-done show. It was super well done. It was hilarious.

And Willie Tanner was also funny as hell. Super dry, but funny. The dad. Oh, the dad. And he was just a riot. So where are we here? That is uh that brings us to number eight to you, right, Donald?

Yes, number eight. And again, I you know, I'm sorry, people, I don't want to sing, but I have to sing. You do it because a lot of the stuff is, you know, music and it's what you know, good times every time. Good times every time you make a payment, chucking and a jiving, hanging, yeah, easy credit rip up head up of water.

Ain't we lucky we got him? Good times, such an awesome show.

So uh John Amos, James that Mr. James Evans. Oh, yeah, just such a good actor. I mean, that dude could his facial expressions, the way he portrayed himself as a dad, you know, it was just amazing. And you know, not to get too crazy into the but I watched that show because it was a good show. You know, it was a great race. No, it was a good show, good characters, loved it, you know, it was awesome. Um Penny with Janet Jackson, like that was oh yeah, I forgot about that part. Penny, oh yeah, yeah.

So I mean, but but JJ. But doesn't that illustrate how far backwards we've gone? Oh, backwards because that show was like, and I've talked about this, and they show interviews like Man on the Street VHS, where they're talking to people about racism, and they're all everybody, black and white, everybody in between was like, nah, we're cool, man. Everybody's good, right? Everybody, you know what was it, and now we've they've we're in this place where everybody's like, oh my god, right. If you if you I mean I comb my hair a certain way, so I'm culturally appropriate. I'm like, what the right you know, and back then it didn't make any difference to me.

I watched that show because it was funny, exactly. And it wasn't a hard-working blue-collar family trying to make their way in the world, right? It was funny, right? James Evans, man. I love James Evans, and he was straight on back, you know, coming to America and yeah, yeah, yeah.

Would you think it was McDowell's sweet daddy? Yep.

He's he's an awesome underrated actor. I mean, he's amazing.

Unfortunately, he died in the show. He must have wanted to go do something else. Yeah, I think he wasn't the Beastmaster.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I mean, an interesting thing was that show opened out with humongous ratings, like it was popular. Yeah. And then the network like moved its time slot plate, and that that decreased its ratings. And you know, it's like, come on, don't mess with a good thing. Um that might have been a reason why he left the show.

But um and there are a few things, you know. It was a few a spin-off of a spin-off that I'm not gonna get into because someone else might have it.

But anyway, see if I can't get all of you mad at man.

Well, anyway, all right. So awesome, great, great show there, man, for certain. Number eight to you, Mr. Well, Kevin.

Thank you. Um, so number eight, I and and I fear that I'm gonna break the ice of the the absolute must-haves here. The the the obvious can't be denied. Yeah, and and that would be it ran from 78 to 82 on ABC and then 82 to 83 on NBC, which is so weird. And looking into this stuff, there was a lot of shows that are like I don't remember that ever happening. But yeah, at that age, I wasn't really like, you know. Well, it's in my notes. But it it's just strange that you know, a hit show would change networks right in the middle of it. But you know, it's it's the way it's done. They kind of at the end production. Say it! Production companies would make the show and then sell it to the to the network. Uh, it was an amazing show. It was a great ensemble cast, and they had two of the most bizarre comedians of the time on one show. Yeah, to think of Andy Kaufman and Christopher Lloyd being in that same TV show with Lodka and Jim Ignatowski on taxi. And then, and then you had Danny DeVito, right? Oh my god. Then you had Alex Riga, Mary Lou Henner, Tony Danza. That was only on for five years, huh? Yeah. Wow. Uh and it was just, and and and it was one of those shows where they were a family. Oh, you know what I mean? There was they they because they dealt with issues together and and whatever, but but the greatest scene ever, and I know you're all gonna kill me for this, but when he had to get his license. Yes, and he's sitting there, and and the whole gang is across the aisle from him while he's taking the driver's test, and he looks over to the group and he goes, What does a yellow light mean? And I think Bobby was the first one. He goes, Slow down, and he's like, Uh, what does a yellow light mean? Oh, it just goes on.

Slow down. What and it's one of the oldest jokes in the book. Oh, it's like so funny, too.

Yeah, what's that? Like he does it like six or seven. Oh, I know, and it's you're almost getting annoyed watching the show.

I know, but you can't you can't not be in tears laughing at it because he's so hilarious, and that character he developed that character so much that you can too.

You absolutely just they're all just amazing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Incredible. And I'm not gonna say any more because someone else might have that. Sorry, yeah. All right, so that's number eight, I believe, to you, my brother. All right.

Well, this one it only actually aired from 55 to 5 1956. Obviously, I'm talking about a show that spawned the Flintstones, which is the honeymoon. Yeah, absolutely. Used to come home every night, me and David, from going out to the weirs or whatever, and we would watch this, and there was just so many great episodes, you know. Awesome. And yeah, you know, his buddy Norton.

Norton. I know.

We're not gonna go through that.

We're not going through that.

You weren't born like a boy. But uh, you know, I know that you know, that I know that you know that you go ahead.

I mean, he just had all these great episodes like the one when you know he's on a game show and he's so confident he's going all the way to the end. And he he couldn't come up with it was always Ed Norton's warm-up song on the piano. And he just plays it and he finally goes, Ed Norton, and you know, of course he didn't win. And there was a costume contest that he was sure he was gonna win. He's I mean, and all of a sudden, Ed Norton comes in, he's got his sewer headgear and all that stuff on, his his uh uniform and you know getting out of work, yeah, and he ends up winning the costume because I mean uh Cramden's pissed off at first, but then he gets over it. And one of the great things about the show, I mean, they were dysfunction, uh, very dysfunctional.

Oh god, and uh which bang, no, you're going to the moon, Alice! Right. Dysfunctional means normal, exactly.

Yes, yes, and uh they you know he he was always in the wrong, and Alice is always in the right. Naturally, I can't forget you, Trixie, you know. Oh and uh part of an angel bus driver he was.

Yes, equistential American blue collar worker.

I definitely the basis of everything that came after it, too. I mean, they they like they set the mold with that for for what a sitcom was, right?

Exactly.

And the Flintstones was a blatant obviously, it was definitely based on well, my brother except Fred was he worked in the in the quarry, in the quarry with a with a dinosaur as opposed to driving a bus around New York, but other than that, yeah.

But anyway, um I left that off my list for you, my brother.

Oh, thank you very much.

But I was so happy you had it because it was a tough cut for me. But one thing I do have to say about that show is chewy chews candy. It's goody, good, good.

Oh, remember that one where uh hey, get a load of fat so.

Oh yeah. Hey, I'm gonna go get my friend Javi. Javi? Javi, this he's even bigger than me. This is my friend Javi. That wasn't Joe Piscopo's song, actually.

Yes, it was. Nope. Okay, so number eight to me, correct?

That's yeah, yes.

All right, I actually had this high hair at first, but um, that is uh show that I watched every night. I'm pretty sure it was um um an eight o'clock sitcom, and you know, then it of course became syndicated, and that's called Three's Company. Um just something that was near and dear to me. I loved the show. Um John Ritter played Jack Tripper, uh just talented, talented physical comic man. Yeah, like just so funny to me. Then you had the Ropers at first, and then Mr. Furley. Um, you know, obviously he now nowadays you would, you know, never they they couldn't do it nowadays because he was I mean, they could do it, but not the way they did it. Right, exactly. It would be a sex triangle exactly, but just the fact back then pretending to be gay, you know, now I mean every show you watch out there, you know, it's all out in the wide open. But back then, you know, it wasn't, but it was frowned upon for a man to live with two women or another woman, you know, pre-marriage, and so they pulled the wool over the roper's eyes. But something I found really interesting about the show is that Don Knott's was in it, yeah. He was Christopher, yeah, but um is that uh John Ritter was getting 150 grand an episode and uh Suzanne Summers was getting 30 grand. Oh boy, and she found out oh dear, yeah, and it kind of the show actually continued for quite a while after that, but it was just never yeah, they had like Terry came in later, somebody else who was the numb one. Oh yeah, I know.

She was a bit annoying, she was right, but you know, Suzanne Summers made it up on the Thymaster a few years later, so she looked Thighmaster most of her life. Yeah, exactly.

What was the one she was in? Physical graffiti with Richard Dreyfus. She was in that which is why she thought she was gonna be the superstar.

Uh American Graffiti?

Yes, thank you. Sorry. Yeah, not Led Zeppelin. I don't remember her playing on that album.

What did you call it?

I called it Physical Graffiti, like the Zeppelin album.

I was surprised on you didn't sing the theme to Three's Company. Come and knock on our door. Come and knock on our door. Yeah, that was a little we've been waiting for you.

All right, awesome.

So we are to number seven. Number seven. All right, so this is one that probably I hope is not on people's list, but it might be. Um, just a doesn't matter, man. Americana. This is Americana and it's happy days. Yeah. Yeah, you're gonna be. I got a lot to say about this one. So just the this is a show that I watched. Like it was on TV and I watched it. Was it was it amazing? No, but it was like cool, you know. You kind of fun, right? It was fun. Um, I love the character of Fonzi. Like this guy is just this machismo, cool Italian type of dude. Um, my daughter has a stuffed animal that's called Pinky Tuscadero, yeah. Um forget about leather, right? Ron Howard. I thought Ron Howard was amazing in this. Oh, yeah, you know, Bucko. I used to love listen here, Bucko. Um, tone. There were a lot of spin-offs off of this, like Laverne and Shirley, yeah, uh Morgan Mindy. Um, there's just a lot of spin-offs that came off of it. Yep. Um, it was just a fun show. Happy, you know, happy days. Happy days, goodbye, Grace. Hello, blue. He's raising his hand here.

Could I say a few things about this show? Yeah, um, go in, dive into it. I I thought it was an incredible show for a long, long time. And I in fact, I think there's a saying now called Jumpin' the Shark. Yes, oh interesting. Yeah. And um that uh, you know, Fonzie actually jumped a shark. And they just they just went down a really strange road. As a matter of fact, they wanted to change the name of the show to Fonzie's Happy Days. Oh, interesting. Yeah, yeah.

And you know, this is Ron Howard left. So I missed this and did other things. Yeah, and because Fonsey got to be such a huge character that that he was a secondary character, but he should have been the main character. Well, he was. I mean, as a as a what six, seven-year-old kid at that time, he was the idol.

In real life, Harry Winkler is just a really unassuming.

Which is really funny. Did he live with the Cunninghams? He lived over the garage. Yeah, oh, okay, yeah. So he was like a roommate, yeah. Yeah, high school dropout, yeah.

Um, but it was funny too because looking up to him as a kid and thinking, okay, here's this cool, uh tough Italian guy with a leather jacket, and in reality, Henry Winkler is an unassuming little Jewish fan. All of his all of his other roles, he's an avid avid fly fisherman, too.

Yeah, all of his other roles, he's played a meek kind of Jewish the coach and uh water boy.

Absolutely.

So what it you know, what I wanted to say was I just think they went down a really strange road with like Mork from Orc and Bielzebub. It's just yeah, it just they ran out of ideas and they went into cheesy supernatural stuff, if you will.

It's like you've got to know when to bow out, kind of all post-jumping the shark. Yeah, exactly.

Which is where that came from, exactly jumping the shark. They did, they just they solely ran out on ideas, which is amazing now because when you think about like The Simpsons has been on the air for nine billion dollars. And they just they don't age, right? That baby is still a baby, but right, right. I mean, I I I think it's probably been 20 years since I watched that show. Yeah, but yet they're still pushing out new stuff. So it's yeah, it's bizarre that that the great writers that they had for happy days just kind of like all right, well, what do we do with these characters now? Exactly.

So the happy days had 11 seasons, and doing this research, I noticed that a bunch of shows had 11 seasons was kind of the it's time to wrap it up. Like compete. Okay, yeah. Yeah, I mean, it might have been too long.

Seven to me was another one of those just fantastic shows that you just the characters were so hilarious and relatable. I mean, who didn't love Welcome Back Cotter? Well come back. I mean it was just I mean, yeah, from John Sebastian doing thank you, doing the intro to it, and and and Gabe Kaplan as his character as as a former sweat hog, yeah, done well, gone back, and and became the teacher. But I mean, you look at you had I mean, come on, Vinny Barberino. Trivolto was exploding at that time, exploded. But even with that, Ron Palillo, or whatever his name is, uh you know uh uh Jesus really Horschak. Horseshak was like, I mean, he still had an Epstein and Spanish Jew, boom. Freddie Boom, boom, Puerto Rican Jew. Yeah, he was a Puerto Rican Jew. Puerto Rican Jew. Signed Epstein's mom. Every every note was signed Epstein's mom. But just a great cast, and it was funny in Washington. And it was Freddie Boom Boom. Oh, you did, yeah. Yeah, Mr. Catea. But they were in this gloomy situation in Brooklyn, being like that was a bad time. Alleged soon-to-be high school dropouts, they were making us laugh, they were making humor in that. And the only other thing I want to say about that, I don't know if it's gonna come up again, but one of my favorite people, uh actors, stand-up comics, had a small role on that. He was the rival Carvelli, and that was that was uh Charles Fleischer. Yeah, and he did he did this great stand-up bit about Molides, which if you can find it, will blow your mind, but a lot of people don't know that he was also Carvelli was the voice of Roger Rabbit. Interesting.

Yeah, that's interesting.

Very interesting. That was a terrible Roger Rabbit, by the way. Yeah. You have to spit to get it right.

Yeah, right. Awesome pick, Kev. So that's number seven to you, brother.

All right, I have uh family ties. I absolutely adored that show. I loved Michael J. Fox and that. And I totally agree with you guys that uh Michael Gross, the dad, well, the guy who played the dad. Yep, he was friggin' hilarious.

Oh, so funny.

And um interestingly, you know the girl that dumped Alex on the uh show? Yeah, he yeah, before she went out with he went out with the brunette there. Well, anyway, they they got married in real life. I did not realize that. Yeah. But you know, she was like saying I I got to the point where he doesn't even laugh when I say the word feminist, and then of course Alex P. Keaton starts laughing, and it was just awesome because he was you know, he was very conservative living in a his parents were very liberal. I mean, I don't know about the sisters. Yep. Um but it was just a it really was just a warm show. Warm show is a great way to do that. Great way to put that. It just it made me feel good, and uh they you know they had their uh serious episodes, like when one of his buddies was killed in a car crash. Yep. And you know, it everyone was funny.

Here we go with all the repeats. But welcome back, Cotter. Also my number seven. Um, just such a great show. I mean, what more can I say about it? I just loved the fact that um something that was important to me with the show. I mean, the sweat hogs were just a friggin' riot, of course. And but just the fact that I had a teacher like Gabe Cotter, um, it was a woman, but just you know how back then you could confide in certain people. Like nowadays they just don't um you know, you can't do that. And I really did, and it was really important to me in my life. I was in fourth grade, her name uh well to me she was Mrs. Johnson, but it was just you know, it was awesome how that they couldn't confide in him and whatnot. Anyway, welcome back, Cotter. Just a really important show to me, and I wish I could come up with one. I should have uh written one down last night, but he always ended the episode with a joke about his Uncle Louie. Talking to his wife, yeah, exactly. Those are great, and anyway, great, great show, and I will go to you, Donald, for numbers.

No, I I mean I I appreciate what you said about a teacher making an impact in your life because teachers are amazing, absolutely, you know, all politics aside, like teachers do the hard work, and there are those individuals when you're at an impressionable age that make a difference in your life, and I think that's an amazing thing. When someone does that, it's it's cool.

I I think that she genuinely saved my life.

Yeah, and that and there's a I have a few of those in my history as well. Yeah, and it it's just you know, that should not ever be understated. Unfortunately, certain things get in the way of that, but anyways, okay, back to the fun of number six. Uh, this is the Spin-off that Mark's gonna get pissed off. How do you know? This was a show that I watched and it was funny. And it was Mork and Mindy. Oh 1978 to 1982. I didn't spin-off of Happy Days.

I didn't mind the show, but I didn't think it belonged to Happy Days.

Americana is like it didn't match up, but like on its own, Mork and Mindy was a great idea. Because of the late, great Robin Williams is an amazing comedic actor. Absolutely. The man probably liked cocaine a little bit too much. A little, yeah. But that's what generated his his funniness and man was here, right? Funny. And that show had a bunch of comedians that I liked too. Uh Robert Donner was another comedian on that show. He was the great Exodor or whatever. And Jonathan Winters was amazing in that show. Oh yeah. But I I just thought it was a fun show. It was, you know, again, this is like it didn't meet all those criteria of it wasn't pop culture, it wasn't da-da-da. But it was just funny. Um, and that's all it was meant to be is stupiless, stupid, mindless humor that escapes you from reality. Exactly. And and I thought, you know, Robin Williams did an amazing job at that.

So as a as a writer, how else could you have taken Robin Williams and showcased what he did? Yeah. I mean, it almost had to be as bizarre as being an alien. Right. Because he was how how would you explain that character as a human being?

Yeah, someone that out there. Right, exactly. And it was.

I mean, it was just one of those shows that was like, if you looked at it on paper, you're like, yeah, this doesn't or any other actor in the role of Mork, failure, huge failure, never would have worked, yeah, but it was, it was designed to showcase the insanity that was that was Robin Williams. Right. And he actually so he brought Jonathan Winters in because Winters was such an influence on him when he was younger. Um, and they did a lot together as well. And if you ever get the chance, I used to have some of Jonathan Winters' albums uh back when that's where you got comedy was off LPs, and the man was well beyond his years in in back in the 50s, 60s, 70s, just did some some crazy comedic stuff. Yeah, great stuff to listen to if you ever get the chance.

Yeah, unbelievable.

Yeah, one of a kind. He was great.

Born in Vietnam. I loved that movie. Yeah, that was great.

Yeah, Adrian Kronauer. Yeah, awesome. Goodwill hunting, what a great acting job he did.

I mean, his acting chops were awesome.

Yeah, to go from that off-the-hook, wild stream of consciousness to actually molding a character the way that he did was and sadly that was more closely to his actual life, right?

You know what I mean?

And that's like comedy is satire, it's satire for the pain of life, yeah, and he was fully engrossed in it. Invented. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Awesome. All right, so we are at number six to you, Kev.

Number six is in your AJ, you're gonna know exactly what I'm talking about as soon as I say maybe number six in sitcoms, number one in theme songs.

Oh, yeah.

Stanford and Sun. Oh absolutely the greatest. Quincy Jones just made the greatest intro song for any TV show. No, I love that you made that point. That's but other than that, it was just talk about. I mean, just like I mean, Robin Williams was different, he was of his own, but Red Fox was an accomplished stand-up comic and really like well beyond lewd for his time. He did a lot of stuff. If you ever saw the stand-up comedy that he did, was like did not fit in that era. No, it was it was like it was graphic, it was dirty, but just an amazing comedian and the supporting cast with Lamont, one of my favorites, and I'm gonna throw out a couple lines because they were just so great. Is just he was he was almost like a black Archie Bunker in some respects because he just like like Rollo would always say to him, Buenos Dias, Mr. Stanford, and he'd say, Well, beans and disease to you too. I mean, he just had the great lines, the all of the Elizabeth, I'm coming to join you.

I'm done. I'm coming to join you.

Maybe that's Elizabeth. Oh, I love that. I pull that one out of the bigger. Oh, absolutely.

And and probably one of the best lines ever was when Esther would come over and he'd say, You're so ugly, I'm gonna push your face in some cookie dough and make some gorilla cookies. Yes. All right, enough, enough.

No, I'm I'm glad you took that song. I mean, oh, it's such a theme song from Quincy Jones is amazing. That is incredible. I love that amazing song.

Definitely the numbers, it would definitely be number one on my list, too.

I think it's called the Street Beater, if anybody out there wants to look it up. It's called Street Beater.

The street beater, okay.

Well, definitely Jones. Talk about that as a uh as an episode, yeah. Yeah, for sure.

Um what theme songs to shows?

So if there's any listener or listeners out there that went to Berkeley College in the uh 1990 era, would know that that at 150 Mass Ave and Quincy Jones was from did go to Berkeley, and at 2 a.m. in the morning, there was this like center kind of quad area. At 2 30 in the morning, somebody would put big large speakers and jam that song at 2 30 in the morning. I would have stayed up for it every night. Absolutely. It was this, it was classic.

You can't you can't listen to that and not like move your head or something just exactly.

You gotta mouth it and everything. Right? Awesome. All right, dummy. Great dummy, Kev, which another one that I knew you were gonna have, so I I altered diverted. I have altered my list. I have alter it no further.

All right, brother. That is number six to you. Okay, this is a show with Kelsey Grammar called Fraser. It's a spin-off from Cheers. Yes, brilliant. He moves to Seattle, he does a radio show um for psychology or psychiatry. Well, I don't think it's really psychiatry, it's basically therapy. And uh great, great show. His brother Niles also was in the same type of business. And their father is absolutely the polar opposite to them.

A great character.

Yes, he's more of a blue-collar guy. He loves his chair, he loves his dog. The dog stares at Frazier, makes them all uncomfortable. You had the uh, you know, the relationship thing that was like building throughout the entire show with Daphne and Niles, and they actually finally get married. Um Roz was an extremely hot co-host of Fraser. Yeah. And it it was super funny. And uh his rivalry with his brother, and just such a hilarious show. His banner with the collars was incredible. And it's just, you know, there was you know, other call there was the the friggin' uh male chauvinistic character that in real life is actually gay, but he was always trying to hit on Raw's and everything else that moved and bulldog Briscoe, Briscoe, yeah.

So Lilith, if you you know, this is a podcast that we or not a podcast, a sitcom that is out of our range, so I'm not gonna be as tromping on anybody, but uh Marvelous Mrs. Mazel. She's on that and she's fantastic. It's the mom, yeah. Wow, I never picked up on that watching it.

Yeah, I've only seen a couple episodes, but yeah, wow.

But no, it was just so much fun and so funny.

Yeah, also not the caliber of Sanford and Son, but a great intro song as well. Something about scrambled eggs, salad and scrambled eggs.

Yeah, all right. So where are we here? This is number six to me. That's right, and that's right. I think that this is the one that no one else is probably gonna have, but I don't care. This show to me, I just loved. And it's from 1964 through 1966, and it is the monsters.

I like that one.

And this is just this is the one I had taught when I spoke with a couple of you guys yesterday. I said I was walking into the bathroom and it clicked in my head, and that didn't show up anywhere. Like when I was doing some research, and I'm like, how can I forget the the monsters? But just Fred Wynne and oh god, grandpa's name just left me. But um, you know, they did Car 54 together, right? Right, and they loved them together so much that this came about, and just and oh uh Herman's wife just Lily just is so hot in real life, you know. Of course, you know, she's all made up in that, but but the show just being a family like that that thinks they're normal, and of course, you know, Marilyn was ugly duckling she was.

What a hideous ugly. And that was such a great goof. I mean, she was gorgeous.

They all made fun of how big Marilyn Monroe take off with her little.

I you know, I I have to disagree with you. I thought she was very ugly. I thought very homely. I mean, Herman was a very handsome man. Yes, he was, you know, yep, tall, too.

Yeah, tall, tall, green, and handsome. Yeah. Boy, was it weird too when they later on did the uh the episodes in color, it just didn't fare right to me. You know, I mean, but just everything about it was just so funny. Um and I couldn't leave it off my list. One thing I did want to say is uh off subject, kind of, but she dusted the house. Dusted it instead of vacuuming.

It came out of the vacuum.

But um, Rob Zombie, his song Dragula. Yes, is about the dragula. Based on the exactly the Dracula that grandpa built. Beautiful sports car and from a coffin. Yes, yeah, but yeah, that's what Herman, his job was at the uh at the funeral home, and I think he modeled the caskets. But anyway, awesome, awesome.

Pop rocks, Jack, stretch Armstrong, Jack, the Bionic Man.

Jack. You've gone back in time. This is pastimes at any time.

Awesome. All right, so that's number five to you, Donald.

All right, number five is gonna be the Flintstones, which I know we talked about the honeymooners, and this is the spin-off of the honeymooners, and this is a show that is near and dear to my heart, and was watching it frequently as a child uh in syndication, but an amazing show. Um awesome. So I I want to bring up the the biggest thing of this is the man of a thousand voices, Mel Blaine, yes, who played Barney Rubble. Um, the guy I envy his career. I think I could want to be that type of voice actor would be amazing to be the voice of a thousand characters, and he nails it like he's amazing. The the amount of voices he did for all the cartoons that are near and dear to our heart. Yeah, um, but the Flintstones was the OG for the the cartoon sitcom, like that adults could watch, and it's just there's endless stuff that we could go over, and I'm sure that will come up again. Awesome. So I'll leave it at that. Such a honeymoon's thing.

I I like the the camera with the with the bird, the little dinosaur bird that chiseling it out, yeah.

Yeah, he chisels it out.

I like that Joe Rockhead, you know?

Joe Rockhead. Awesome. Yeah, such a great cartoon, too. Um, all right, number five to you, Kev.

All right, you know, we're in that stretch, and I'm just you're all gonna hate me. We even talked about some of the spin-offs, but 82 to 93 Cheers was just a great, great show. Had such an amazing run. They did well, I've given five 50-50 on replacing people. I think the when coach passed, who was just brilliant in that he was, he was just so great. Um, and then replacing him with Woody was was genius. However, I personally never felt that Kirsty Alley ever came close to the dynamic with Sam and Diane. Yeah, that was so legendary. And look at how many shows since then have just like let's keep dragging this relationship out and almost getting there and then pulling back, and then almost getting there and pulling back. Um just a fantastic show. And then just the idea that you could have the different characters come in that sat down at the bar, you know, maybe because most of my life has been spent in that situation. That you know, the characters like the the the Cliff Clavens and the norms, and I mean everybody knows buffalo theory from from Cliff about you know killing brain cells off, like it keeps it's it's just just like the buffalo, you know. They kill they kill off the weak ones, and that's why you feel smarter when you drink beer. Uh just great theories and all the the norm welcomes. Hey Norm, what's going down? My butt cheeks on this bar stool.

What's going on, Mr. Peterson? Let's talk about what's going in, Mr. Peterson.

Right, right. And then Carla and and Frazier, of course. I mean, just a great ensemble cast. And like as we get into these ones that are coming up, one of the things that really hit me about those, and I was trying to think about what to say about these shows. I think the overriding thing is you could wake up and be at Cheers, and you'd know where the bathroom was. You'd know where the pool table was, right? You'd know that you could go upstairs over there to the left and go upstairs to Melville's and get some nice seafood in Boston. You know where the front door is. You know what I mean? It it's like you those people became part of y'all good or bad as kids that they became part of our lives.

Damn, right. All right. Let's see.

Number five to you then, Mark. All right. This show runs from 1970 to 1975. It's based on a movie of the same name, and this show is called The Odd Couple. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely love it. Um Oscar Jack Klugman as Oscar Madison, Tony Randall as Felix Unger. Just so many great episodes, just rip-roaring laughter. Um, some of the episodes I remember one is uh Felix had a uh a pet bird, and they were at a funeral, and uh the bird came back to life. The bird was never dead, apparently. And Fred, I mean, uh Oscar Madison was not gonna waste this money, so he kills a fly, and he names the fly Fred.

So the guys up there, we come here today to mourn Fred the Fly, beloved pet of Oscar Madison.

Um one time um Felix says, Pizza and beer for breakfast, Oscar. Really? Are you kidding? Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. And uh, you know, they were on the uh let's make a deal with Monty Hall. That was funny. You know, they ended up having to donate the money to their favorite orphanage because uh Monty Hall was friends with them, but it's just it was great fun, you know. It was great fun. Oscar was my hero. Yes, I loved Oscar. He was a sports writer, a great one.

I love the intro, and I can't remember exactly, but it was like June 7th, 1964. Yeah, Oscar Madison's wife asked him to leave the house and never returned.

I like the Felix uh during the intro, he bends over and he and he can't get back up and he has problems with his back, right? Obviously, Oscar was the slob and Felix was a complete neat freak and just and amazing because I always thought that Tony Randall was gay, but he was like giving birth to children into his 90s almost.

Yeah, right. I mean, that's like you're going a long way to that's that's a big beard you're wearing, buddy. You're going a long way to prove that you're not gay. Yeah, right. Pumping out kids at 90 years old.

Yeah. All right. So number five to me, and boy, the rest of my list is gonna go pretty quick because my number five is Batman. I just I had to put it on there. It was just one of my favorite shows to watch as a kid, and like Mark, I didn't really pick up on the comedic part of it until a little later in life, and then it's just hilarious. I mean, Adam West and his dryness and all of the things that he would say, like, your mother wore army boots, yes, and she found them quite comfortable. Like she just dead pad.

And he followed the law right to a T, didn't he?

He never sped, like he would not speed. So it's even in emergency to get to the crime. I'm for that.

Uh holy headache!

But just I I couldn't leave it off my list. So number number four to you, Don.

Great. Number four. This is going back to you had it, the Brady Bunch. Yes. So the Brady Bunch meant a lot to me. I watched it every single day in syndication. Um, watched every single episode. Uh, I love the pop culture from it recently is last week. The Marsha Marsha Marsha. Right. You hear the Russia, Russia, Russia stuff, you know. Exactly. Um, you know, I loved the the Hawaii episodes and uh when they went to the Grand Canyon when they when they did like the travel episodes. Yeah, like the Canyon.

Was it the Grand Canyon one where they got into the the ghost town? Yes, and they got locked up and they had to put all their belts together to get the keys. I mean, that was and they got lost 50 years ago, and and I remember that and I can close my eyes and see that.

Yeah, absolutely. Don't play ball in the house, you know. Or say break the football, break your nose.

Oh my nose! Yeah, the hey AJ, what do you want for dinner? Pork chops and apples. Oh, right, pork chops and apples.

When it's time to change, you got to rearrange the silver platters. That was the silver platters, wasn't it? So just a just a great uh series to my heart.

Oh, yeah, near and dear for certain. And uh it was Vincent Price in the whole. That's my tiki. No, that's my tiki. Pick any tiki! Oh, Oliver. That was the statue. Oh, great, McDonald. All right, number four to you, Kev.

Four. All right. I gotta go with because of man, again, stand-up genius that most people aren't familiar with in our age group. You gotta go back a ways, but he was a genius as a stand-up new heart. Just an incredible show. I mean, you had there there was that, you know, the the timely stuff, and then there was the quotable things. So my brother Larry and my brother Daryl, my other brother Daryl. Um, you know, the the maid being like not really into being a maid and and all of that, and just the fact that I think we all kind of feel a little bit like his character in life because he is he was the ultimate straight man, and he's just trying to get through the day. Yeah, and everybody around him was absolutely insane. Insane. From his wife to, like I said, the maid to Larry Darwin is miserable because everyone else is miserable.

Right, right. Like the world is miserable.

Yeah, and he's just like, but but he's he's just like it was that, and he didn't he he never did the look at the camera thing, but that character certainly could have been like, is this really happening? Is this these people really say like the the the handyman was not handy, yeah? Tom Poston was not, he couldn't fix anything. Oh man. So just just a great, great show from that era. Incredible, yeah, incredible, and probably one of the best endings. I don't know if you remember because. He had a sitcom in the sixties.

Right.

And so the way they ended this one in the eighties was he wakes up in bed with the wife from the sitcom in the sixties. Oh, and I just had the strangest drinking. It was just a fireman that did that. So it was the Bob Newhart show first and then New Hart. And then New Hart, yes. And Suzanne Plachette was his wife in Bob Newhart when he was a what a dentist or a therapist or something. And then so he wakes up in bed with her at the end of the second one. Just brilliant.

Great twist. Very brilliant. Awesome. And he's great in uh the Big Bang Theory. He is uh Professor Proton. I do remember that. Professor Proton. And he always visits he passed away in the show, and he now visits Sheldon in his dreams as Obi-Wan, like in the robe. He was great in the world. And he's always like so dry. I don't I don't know why I'm wearing this thing.

Can I go now, Sheldon? Right. Well, that was that was part of the funny stuff. Is he his stand-up? Like one of the famous ones was like a driving instructor. And he'd just sit down on stage in a chair. And so it would just him, but he'd be like, no, no, no, no, Mrs. Johnson. No, no, don't put it in reverse. No, okay. So you've backed over the fence. That's okay. Let's go ahead and put it in drive. Okay. Yeah. Typically, typically we break before we hit the cat. Right. You know what I mean?

I thought I assumed you were taking a left that because you were in the uh left hand lane and the with the left the left blinker on. No, yeah, you took a right.

Oh, yeah, very dry. Yeah. Yeah. Genius. He is genius. All right, Mark. Number four to you then.

All right. I'm a little nervous about a lot of repeats at this point in the show. But I got uh I have chairs as well. Just an iconic show, just so many great characters. You know, Norm, uh Cliff Claven. He was just a fountain of information. You know what I mean? Yeah, Cliffy. Yeah. I remember the episode he was on uh was it Jeopardy? And he was just kicking everyone's ass.

Oh, that was annoying, no.

And then they got to the very end to Final Jeopardy, and he he said, three people that have never been to my mother's kitchen or something like that. Woody, he was so funny that take all the money in the world and get rid of it. That's what I have. And he had that that new girlfriend that he had and Kelly. Was it Kelly and they wrote her song? Kelly Kelly. And they were voted couple most likely to explode because they they they uh took this sexual tension and they turned it into eating. Right, right. And uh, you know, Cliff Claven had I because I I can relate to this because I was a a casual mailman for the post office back in the 80s, and I hated um upbeat day. It was a day where um it you know, it was like a a weekly paper, free paper that everyone got mailed to them. Oh right. So you you know, I'd go into some of the you know, like Winter Street. I lived on Winter Street, so I'm not gonna but there was a lot of crappy neighborhoods that I had to deliver. And if you had an upbeat, that meant every single mailbox got a uh something.

Yeah, and your and your bag was three times heavy. Oh, it was heavy.

But Cliff Claven hated TV guy day.

Yes, yes, that's an underappreciated thing nowadays. The TV guy guy. Yeah, man, I just don't think.

Is there even a there's no such thing as there is no such thing?

It's called your phone or the the scrolling one on the phone. Like phone books, like that must have been a hard one. I think they still make those though. They do make phone books, they haven't gotten one in the mail for a long time.

More like Yellow Pages book, not phone books. Right, yeah.

I would I would spend zero dollars on that advertising now. Sorry.

I I absolutely adored the uh intro song, it was just really warm and fuzzy. You know, come here, let me just forget our worries, our troubles.

The only thing that I will say negative about Cheers is that if you've lived and been in Boston and gone into the Cheers, it's not the same. No, not even close. You would think you would walk into the set, right? You know right, right, but unfortunately it's not. Of course. That's the only downside. You think by now they would have built it. Right. Well, you can build a replica. Well, they did.

I don't know how replica they were, but they did license people to build. Well, there's one in Concord.

Right.

There's a chair in the city. There is a chair in Concord.

So they licensed the name, correct, but not the not the bar, which is a right, you know, what do you call it? Horseshoe bar or uh just icon. Yeah.

Although I did like the time that Sam for some reason went somewhere tropical. I think he left the bar. I can't, I think it was one of the later ones, and he's standing there and they go down to to retrieve him and bring him back to Boston or something. And so they they walk up to the to the tiki bar that he's working at, and they're like, hey, you know, Sam, we gotta talk to you. And he goes, I'll be right with you right after I make this margarita. So, margarita, what are you doing later?

Right. Interesting is that Sam and Woody have a podcast or fellow podcasters shout out. They just came out with a podcast.

I saw that, and it's funny because I started listening to it and it didn't sound like him.

Yeah, one more quote from that show. And one well, first of all, I want to say that I don't think uh he was a very good pitcher. He did, he was a relief pitcher for the Red Sox, but I think his ERA must have been in the fives. But uh I just remember when uh he says to uh Sam Malone says to Diane, change Diane.

Not for you or any other man.

No, change nickels, dimes, quarters. So oh right.

So that's it for me, man. Number four. Well, happy days. Goodbye, gray sky, hello blue. I mean, once again, I don't know what more I could say about it because we've touched on it quite a bit, and it was just so important to me, just the beginning, just them always coming in either Arnold's or then Big Al's. I get that vice versa.

We were in Littleton when it first started out.

Oh, yeah, just such a great show. Um, just Potse and Mount Ralph Mouth, and just you know, the just the the restaurant scenes were always my favorite. And Ponzi's office, be in the bathroom.

That's great. Cunningham, my office.

Now, but just another quick um quick side note is you know, of course, there was Pinky Tuscadero, but then there was Leather Tuscadero. Right, yes, and now her name has left me. Oh, it's killing me. But uh the actress, yes, that's wasn't it Susie Quattro? Thank you. You're welcome. And she was on Eddie Trunk not long ago, you know, because she's actually a real musician. And anyway, Leather Tuscadero. So Nether. But anyway, I will stop there and go to you, Donald, for number three.

Number three, and this is my curse of being the first, is that I'm gonna steal probably hopefully not that's quite all right, but uh Gilligan's Island because it's a classic, it's in the top three, could be top one, definitely. Um, certainly for me as a young child, watching this show every single day in syndication was amazing. Um, it was uh a show that's interesting that it only had three seasons. I know, I saw it. Yet it had 99 episodes, so like a season was 36 episodes, so that's pretty impressive. 33 Donald.

I mean, you have the age-old question, obviously. Mary Ann versus uh Ginger. Mary Ann.

That's the pop that's the pop culture thing. Everyone always picks Mary Ann, it seems it it's you know, Mary Ann is the sweet body girl next door that everybody's but all Americans. No, but Ginger, if you look at Tina Louise, so it's Don Wells versus Tina Louise, you look at some of Tina Louise's stuff from previous movies, and oh my goodness. Oh, yeah, she was I mean, she was a looker, but prior to breast implants, and she definitely filled the suit kind of thing.

But I but I think it goes to the the male psyche of we really want the the girl next door, the America's sweetheart more than we would pine for the sex symbol. Movie star movie star, the professor and here on Dilligan's Island. Yeah, the other one is if the professor could build a radio out of a coconut, why couldn't he build a fucking boat? Well, that's that's the plot hole things.

You know, there was a hole in the boat, but yet they can make cars that drive down the island and they had guest stars every other week.

People always came to the island and never got them out of there. They couldn't make it like the Harlem in the brothers.

But I mean, my I have a theory about why Gilligan had so much issues with you know making so many mistakes. He was actually a mighty sailing man. He was a mighty man was a mighty sailing man, and I think he must have hit his head on something when they came ashore or something.

If you want to dive deep into it, you got Gilligan and you got the professor. Those are the only two, and then you got Ginger and Marianne. Those are the only two, right? The other people are out of the picture, so there's two guys, two girls. What's wrong with the skipper? Skipper wasn't having any little.

I think Skipper was odd man out, but don't forget that Thurston Howell III and Lovey. Yeah, but he's a married man. He can't do anything, so he's out of the picture. He's got he's got Lovey. He doesn't need right.

He can live his life in retirement on the nice tropical island back and forth with the skipper. Yeah, for the skipper's a sad case. He's a kind of a heavier set man who's probably a little older. So it was really between Gilligan and the professor for the two.

He probably the lady probably I'm guessing, I'm guessing Skipper had a healthy wife at home.

Yeah.

I'm I'm guessing that he was he was holding out to get back to his missus. I just feel like that. Right. Oh, you keep it that way in my mind.

Just admit it. The professor was banging both of them.

Oh if he if he's as smart as we all thought he was, yeah, he was sneaking in that tiki every now.

Well, somehow he kept that white shirt clean on an island. He was always cleaned and pressed with his hands.

Yeah. All right. So where are we?

Number three. I mean, Mash was again, you could get dropped off at the 407th, and you could find your way to the office, you could find your way to the mess hall, you could you'd know where the storage shed was because you'd find Hawkeye in there with a nurse. Right. Uh I mean, all of those things. Those characters were so well developed and so uh hilarious. And that was one show that certainly, you know, we talked a little bit about doing serious. They did not shy away from doing topical, serious type thing. Because that's what it came from. Absolutely. It's I mean, if you you I can't think of another TV show based on a movie that well surpassed the popularity and I think the quality of the movie. Oh, hell yeah. Not to mention that the show ran from 72 to 83, which was 11 years, which was far longer than the actual Korean War. Right. That it was that it was based in. Right.

Did you uh do you guys have you ever heard the actual lyrics to the song? Do you know what the name of Suicide was? Yeah, Suicide's Painless.

Oh my god. Which is kind of the we we hummed that every whatever night it was of the week. Right.

I know, but I heard the yeah, it was like that is kind of depressing.

Yes, yes, yeah, yeah. So in the movie, they was I I'm trying to remember how it went. One of the characters didn't want to live anymore, so they did like a fake funeral for him, and he's lying in the casket, and that's the song that they're playing as destroyed.

It's Donald Sutherland, who just recently passed away. Yes, yes, yes.

I'm gonna lose it anyway. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'm not no advice to anyone out there. Yeah, no, no, no, no.

Life is good. Call your call your uh what a great show, though.

I mean, so and they did deep right and they did really well talking about replacing people. Oh to go from um to go from uh uh Frank Burns to Winchester, right? Uh maybe not the same kind of because the totally with heart lips, but but still did that straight man foil to the other guys, and then to go from um Henry Blake to to Colonel Potter was was another great transition. And I will always I mean I feel I've I I think I kind of feel the same about when Henry Blake's character left and died in the helicopter crash, is like somewhere emotionally like losing my grandfather, right? You know what I mean? It was like at that age, right? That was like big, it was huge damn.

So did he really die?

Yeah, really? Yeah, is he dead?

Was that just a story thing?

Or is he doing a movie?

Yeah, no, he actually did a TV show that failed almost McLean Stevenson, and it was Hello Larry was the show, and it was on for like I don't know, what was a minimum 13 weeks or something like that.

Well, that was the the show that introduced transgenderism, didn't it? Jamie Farr, was that the guy's name?

Oh, yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Uh um um Levin East guy, like me and AJ. Right, right, out of uh out of Ohio.

Trying to get a section eight, but they they were on his seconder. Yeah, yeah, clinger, exactly. He was a riot, yeah.

He was totally accepted.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. And the funny thing was you know that that later on he got way too into the part, you know what I mean? He was just trying to get a section eight, but he was really serious about like his chiffon things and whatever you know. He was like seriously, like matching his shoes, right? Yeah, he he went he went for it all the way, right?

Uh awesome. All right, so number three to you, Mark.

All right, this uh show uh had the women's champion on it. The show is called Taxi. Oh yeah, and uh Andy Kaufman, he uh he actually had a part in wrestling. Oh, the women's champion, that's right, yeah. Oh yeah, and he he had a dueled personality, he was mostly talking like this, you know. And you know, he married Simca. Um Carol Kane. Yeah, and uh Alex, Alex Rieger. He he was like, Yeah, this one wants to be an actor, this one wants to do plays, this one wants to uh be a boxer. Um I'm a cab driver, I remember that part, and so many different funny episodes.

Here I go again, number three to me. And it's good times. I just I actually thought, I mean, I thought we were gonna have a lot of different ones today, but I mean it just goes to show what a real classic is. And this show just touched on so many different things and you know the seriousness of it. It was actually uh the first episode, first and second episode of season four when James Earl Evans, you know, passed away in a car accident. And I mean for it to go that long without him, you know, they still managed, and it was still a great show actually.

Was it a car accident? Was it a work accident?

I thought it I I thought it was an automobile accident. I thought it was I spent a long time and um he was in Mississippi because they were all gonna move there. And they just funny to you know, not funny, but to think back, they got that news in the mail. Anyway, um but the spin-offs, yeah, the spin-offs I still won't say, just in case, but it was in fact a spin-off. So that goes to number two to you, Donnie. Number two to me.

This is a show that uh I didn't see live because again, it was in the military most of the 90s, but I did see we got the Armed Forces Network, and they would kind of show us like syndicated type of shows, and this is the show about nothing that I think is one of the greatest pot uh sitcoms of all time. Yeah, and uh just the characters to have a show about nothing that is just funny, like every episode was something different. Oh my god, there was always something pop culture funny in it, and I could go on for hopefully I didn't well do it.

No, I wouldn't have showed Seinfeld, of course. He said it, yeah, he did, yeah. But the beauty is is there's so much of this show to talk about. Oh yeah, like we were talking about earlier that you can't spoil it, right? Right.

Right, yeah, that's you can always pivot to one of nine million other episodes that were legendary. Right.

No, you can't watch the episode and not enjoy it, and just the characters are just and it was pretty much about nothing, too. Yeah, oh yeah. It's hateful, like such miserable.

They actually were. I remember the first the first watch through, and I don't think I was I was out, I wasn't in the military, I was doing other things, but I it wasn't like something that I was in front of the TV like right the earlier stuff when I was younger.

Thursday night.

Yeah, I was I was out boozing for the twenties. Yeah, um I was in my 30s. But it wasn't until after it went into syndication and I saw it again that I realized how hateful they were. Oh, what terrible human beings were they were just shallow as well? Shallower than a dry in the desert.

If you're being honest with yourself, that's most people. Oh, exactly.

Exactly. Like, isn't it isn't Louis Pennett, isn't Louis Pinett the guy in the last episode or the last two episodes that gets mugged and they're laughing at him and videotaping it? Yeah, yeah, that gets the good Samaritan law and they end up getting up getting thrown in jail. But I believe that was Louis Pennett, but I mean there's there's a degree of us that that's like that's that's all of us, right? And then of course, the ultimate the thing that I was gonna because I'm gonna be honest, that was my next pick as well. So we're just come on, we're like, oh I'm pretty sure it's like I thought I was gonna be the only person that fixed it. No, no, no, it's uh but but I figured we'll keep rolling with it. The thing that was brilliant about that was the tie-in. Everything always came around. That last scene always took all the elements from what was going on in the different subtext, substories of the show, and they all came in together. And that was what made me think of that is that was what was brilliant about the final episode, yeah, was he sitting there and they start talking about the placement of the button. They're in the jail cell, which was where the show started. It makes or break. It makes or breaks the shirt. So not only was every episode looped back around itself and tied up in a neat little bow, the whole series, they were you know, they were brilliant enough. And I I'm gonna say that was probably a little Larry David there. Oh, hell yeah. Just to bring that all and put a nice little bow on it, right?

And and uh, because I will say that curb your enthusiasm. Oh, fantastic. Same thing. Does the same thing with the tie-in of everything? It's great, yeah. Right, it's great. So, Kev, that was your number two, you said that was my number two, yes. So then to you, brother, for number two.

Oh, well, you know, we got to just keep it going. I had Seinfeld as well. Yeah, for 89 to 98. Hello, Newman. I mean Newman Newman. This show had it wasn't just the the four main characters. You had side characters, you had Newman. Oh, yeah, you had Uncle Leo, Leo, Castan's parents. Yeah, Seinfeld's parents.

Yeah, oh, the castans.

And any of those, any of those secondary characters are still better than some of the primary characters on other shows, absolutely.

Yeah, and and uh, you know, you had your great episodes, obviously, the soup Nazi.

Like, I still pull that off today. Like, I'll be at a counter and I'll do the little sidestep. And I'm just hoping for someone to say, ah, he's doing the soup Nazi thing. Okay.

I want a da da da da da da da. He he picks the side of his nose when he's right. And he sees the girl he's dating, and she thought he was picking his nose.

It wasn't a pig, it wasn't a pig.

Right. I went through a phase where I I was recently divorced and I kind of went on a dating spree, and I was like, she's got man hands. Like I was like hyper focused on little things of I think we all do unfortunate. The good light, bad shallow like that, but it was like, oh my god, she's got man hands. Right.

No, the woman that was like beautiful in certain light and then hideous when the light was wrong.

And of course, I mean, we all at least I know it, I know what shrinkage is. And it happens, summary woman, it does. Don't judge a man just by one look.

I'm a grower, not a shower.

I don't want to be a pirate. Now, this is funny because I knew I had a feeling that some or most, if not all, of us, were gonna have this. But the irony is every one of us has it at number two. Oh god.

And I got a funny feeling we'll all have the same one. Actually, there's no way I don't no chance.

But I know what yours is. But anyway, no chance. Um that's why I didn't spoil the spin-offs. But anyway, um, one of my favorites, you were talking you were talking about the man hands, is yeah, when they're eating out in the restaurant and he's like reaching over, and you got something on your face, but then she's eating the lobster and it just cracking it open with her bare hands, ripping the whole thing apart. But there's just so many things on that show, so many. And just one thing that I was talking with Kevin about this morning, and maybe to you guys here earlier, but um just I mean, I forget how many episodes we're in now, you know, between this and preachers, but already in several episodes, we are referencing a Seinfeld episode. Oh, yeah, you know what I mean? Talk pop culture, arcade one. We're talking about uh Frogger. Yeah, and in one of our Kiss ones, we're talking about Jimmy's getting angry.

I forget, you know, but we talked about Spare Square when I said we're talking about um uh Jamie Gertz.

I mean, we could do a top 25 episodes of this oh yeah, which that'll definitely be down the line for sure. But all right, so Drake. Let's go the Drake, the maestro hate the Drake. All right and putty.

I'd forgotten if Putty was such a great character.

He was the greatest. What was the one? Uh gotta support the team, you gotta support the team. The devil. The devils of the devil when he's got the priest in the car. But all right, Darn, number one to you.

So you had your number two, was all has okay, all right. All had to be. All right, so my number one's bringing it back to MASH. I put Mash at number one. Nice. Um, I love the show. That was a show that I did watch live with my parents as a young child, and watched it into adulthood as well, because that's one that you know fits that bill of it's got pop culture, it's got you know social you know importance to it, the drama that was behind it with some of the sadder episodes, but yet they put humor to it. I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. Just as tragic. I mean, it was it was an anti-war. Right. Fantastic. And unfortunately, Korea is a war that gets kind of overlooked and we lost human beings in that war, like we have in other wars, and it wasn't a pretty thing, and you know, it was good to bring it back. And nurses and doctors and people that are on the front lines that are military, but they're helping, supporting, yeah.

What a great way to tell that story from the perspective of people that aren't necessarily on the front lines, just a little bit behind, and are able to talk about their distaste for the war and to highlight how senseless it is to just keep killing people. Yeah. Number one to you, number one, it's the granddaddy of them all. Yeah, it has to be. There's there's no way in my mind that it can't be all in the family. It was just so you talk about, or I have talked about, how these people felt like family, yeah, and again the bunkers were just so real. They they just did such a great job with the writing with those characters. Um, I always it it always bothered me even as a child, and this this ran from 71 to 79. So I was between two and nine years old when this show first ran. And it always bothered me that Meathead was always correcting Archie, who and I'm not defending Archie, I'm just saying here's a guy who's living for free in this man's house, and he's constantly antagonizing and attacking his beliefs. It wasn't acting. Again, yeah, exactly. Yeah, and again, we've talked about Meathead. He directed two of the greatest movies ever, but I just don't care for the rest of his. But the the the other part of that is that what they did with Archie's character and and the term is is malapropism or a malapropist. And Archie just continually used words in the wrong context. Oh, it was. What are you, one of those communist synthesizers?

Synthesizers?

Synthesizer, he was not he was not a bright man, but he had convictions, right? And it was a time when the world was changing greatly, and he was trying to hold on to it. But if you go back and you watch those episodes, you know, he said things that were small-minded and racist. And he would argue with Jefferson. Oh, yeah, but they hung out, right? They were still you know what I mean? I'm not excusing any of any of that at all. I'm just saying, there was no belittling. No, it just it went from being being aware of differences to being, oh my god, microaggressions. Right. They said something about my curly hair. Oh my god, did you live through the day? Because somebody said something about your curl, oh my word. Or if you look at a woman, what is the mother? They always say, Well, if you smile more, you'd look you know what I mean. That's that's like the most horrible thing you can say to somebody. I get it. I get I I I understand where that's coming from, but good lord, there's worse things that go on in the world. Absolutely, you know?

Yeah, because someone doesn't get the right word, sympathizer, yes, versus respect. No, it's just means they can't articulate something. Exactly.

But exactly. Oh, it was on their point. Just because somebody doesn't have a college degree and and and malproptizes and mispronounces and uses the wrong word doesn't mean that there isn't validity to their beliefs.

Right. Well, like Ricky from Trailer Park Boys, he does that all the time, and he's no idiot. So he drives a car that only goes in reverse, you know. You know, he does like, oh, this isn't rocket appliances.

And you know, and he was, and Archie was totally the opposite in real life. All right, Mark, so let's end it with number one to you.

Okay, I don't think anyone's gonna expect this one. I have Third Rock from the Sun. Ah, I had it on my list, actually. 1996 to 2001, it me it met the criteria. Slid in under special to me because it was on Wednesday nights. That was uh date night for me when I met my now we just had a 25th aner wedding anniversary this week. And um this was the night she came over. She came over Wednesdays and Saturdays, and we just spent the entire entirety of every episode laughing.

Oh, yeah.

I just laughed and laughed and laughed. Um, you know, uh the show was about uh aliens that come down in human form and they're trying to figure out our ways and everything. And they Jonathan Lithgrow. John Lithgow, he's great. Lithgow. All right, whatever. Incredible at all. Jane Curtin. Jane Curtin was her boyfriend. She never could figure it out. You know, what the hell is so wrong with him? And right, and the the sons and the daughter. Oh, yeah. Wayne Knight went, you know, of Newman fame. He went out with the uh with um the uh the daughter, and um I remember one time she sneezed and she and uh Lithgrove Lithgow? Lithgow says, What was that? I don't know, but I liked it. You know, and just they would end up every episode out on their roof and discussing, you know, like with the head is that their was that their leading giant head that's who they reported back to the big giant head.

Oh, yeah.

And it was just, I can't say enough. I just I laugh after laugh after laugh. Awesome.

So cool, awesome guys. Well, honestly, I thought we were gonna have fewer repeats, believe it or not. Like, I really did like fewer or more.

You thought there'd be more.

I thought we were gonna have fewer, believe it or not. Like, oh, really? But yeah, what I one thing I did want to say was um like I didn't think anyone else was gonna have Batman. Oh, really?

Yeah, you gotta remember we all come from kind of the same generation.

And you know what's funny is after all that I forgot that I haven't even gone yet. I was gonna say, what is your number one? Yeah, my number one is taxi, so I might as well not go anyway, because we've talked about it so much, but just that cast to me, and I everyone in that show I just loved. I mean, the obvious, of course, but God, Louie, Louie, I was one of the funniest great characters, such a great actor, just but anyway, uh, but and I had also in my notes the whole ABC to NBC thing, so I thought that was very interesting. But I just wanted to go back real quick to Good Times because that was a spin-off of Maud, which was a spin-off from All in the Family, right? Right, but I didn't dare say it because I knew you at least were gonna have Archie on there, which is why I removed it from mine or the Jefferson, yeah.

I I was heartbroken. That was the one I was specifically talking about. So leaving off my list was good times. Sanford's son was another one.

See, I've I felt like Jefferson's was was a hard one to not list. Well, they got it. That was so great. Sherman Hemsley was just fantastic, and if you don't believe me, watch any clip of him dancing as George Jefferson. It was freaking hilarious.

All right, boys. Well, that was great fun. Just I wanted to get this out there one more time, our email address, and that is pasttimes at 80shigh at gmail.com. That is pastimes at 80shiigh at gmail.com. Anyway, Kevin, thank you so much for hosting and my pleasure. Beautiful pulled port quesadillas.

Oh my god.

And Donald, thank you. Thanks, and Mark, thank you.

Well, that was a lot of fun, guys.

And all right, listeners, thank you for joining us, and we are out from Television City in Hollywood.