The Classic/Retro Pop Culture Thread

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50th Anniversary Viewing (Part 1)

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M*A*S*H
"The Army-Navy Game"
Originally aired February 25, 1973

I was curious about the alternate theme, but MeTV seems to be using the normal one. A YouTube search wasn't turning it up either.

Radar's taking bets for a football pool, which involves handing out paper ballots from a bedpan. Some of the officers and nurses are listening to the game in Blake's office when the camp comes under bombardment. The surgeons and nurses go to the operating tent, and a shell is heard falling outside without detonating.

Burns: We've got to evacuate immediately!
Hawkeye: I think I did.​

Blake is acting a little more clueless than usual because of a head wound, so Hawkeye consults Colonel Hersh at HQ (Alan Manson), who's more interested in listening to the game. One of the surgeons has to use a stethoscope to determine if the bomb is live. Burns draws the short straw but faints, so Hawkeye and Trapper re-choose, and the job falls to Hawkeye, who despite Blake walking up and startling him, determines that the bomb is indeed active.

Blake calls in the markings on the bomb, which don't match anything used by the enemy or US Army, so he then calls a Commander Sturner (John A. Zee), who's also more interested in the game, to determine if it's a Navy bomb. Meanwhile, Klinger ditches his dresses for the snappy suit he was drafted in, because that's how he'd rather go out. An emboldened Radar propositions Nurse Hardy (Sheila Lauritsen), who accepts his offer to join him in the supply tent. Hawkeye, Trapper, and Ugly John play poker using chips that will only represent high stakes if the bomb goes off.

The commander calls back to report that it's a CIA bomb and gives Blake instructions for defusing it. Hawkeye and Trapper go out with mattresses to do the job, with Blake--by now more normally bumbling--calling out the instructions with a bullhorn from behind a sandbag barricade. The defusion is botched when Blake reads instructions in the wrong order ("do this..." [long pause while they do it] "...but only after you do this"). The surgeons try to take cover, but the bomb goes off--spreading propaganda fliers all over the camp.

With the crisis over, the final score is announced, with Mulcahy winning the pool; and Klinger is back to his usual attire, Radar mistaking him for Nurse Hardy from behind.

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Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In
Season 6, episode 22
Originally aired February 26, 1973

All are cameo guests. The only thing I could find from this installment was a Farkel family finale:


There was a brief, prescient stage gag in which Dennis Allen announced that he was a father, but couldn't say whether the baby was a boy or a girl, because he and his wife were waiting until the child was old enough to decide.

Johnny did a couple of gags about his apparently already legendary penchant for being absent from The Tonight Show, such as noting that he'd now appeared more times on Laugh-In.

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Hawaii Five-O
"Engaged to Be Buried"
Originally aired February 27, 1973

Rono Vidalgo (Ponch) and his brother Koa (Richard Yniguez) get rough with some pool hall equipment as a means of strongarming the proprietor, Mr. Hanolo (Yankee Chang, I believe, though his character is billed as Harold). After the Vidalgos leave, an associate named Bertie (Donald Roessler) drives up and leaves his exploding car in the parking lot--far enough away that it doesn't damage the building. Five-O is familiar with the Vidalgos and their M.O. of extorting businesses to rent their coin-operated machines. Steve and Danno raid the office of V for Vidalgo: The Patriarch, Shako (General Moore, dammit!), with a court order, taking his books. Meanwhile, Shako isn't pleased that Rono isn't around to see to family business because he's seeing a college girl named Alia (Tsu), whom we learn at the end of Act I is Chin's daughter. (The oldest of the kids we saw in a previous episode was a girl who looked well into her teens, so this could be the same character.)

Five-O get a lead in the form of a call from bowling alley owner Stan Carson (Charles Quinlivan), who was paid a visit by the Vidalgos and just happens to be a recently retired cop from Chicago. Meanwhile, Shako--who uses a wheelchair and cane because of a bullet he once took from a cop--learns from a spy that his favorite son has been seeing Chin Ho's daughter, and he's just as displeased as we'd expect Chin to be; though Rono genuinely cares for Alia and wants to keep that aspect of his life separate from the family business--Do I smell something Bardish? Rono flies Alia via private plane to the church of Father Jack (Bob Turnbull), a childhood mentor who's otherwise on friendly terms with Rono, but won't have anything to do with him while he's in the business. Meanwhile, Che has identified the dynamite used at the pool hall as coming from a manufacturer in Connecticut, which Five-O traces to a local construction site that had some of its supply stolen. It's when the foreman (Dick Fair) is brought in to look at slides of the Vidalgo enforcers that Chin sees pictures of Rono with Alia.

Just as things are starting to get tense between Alia and Rono because of what he does, she's picked up by a patrol car and brought in to talk to her father. Danno and Chin show her slides as graphic visual aids for a story about a laundromat owner who was killed for attempting to testify against the Vidalgos. (At this point Steve has left for Washington to testify before an anti-crime committee, as was set up in a previous scene.) Alia insists that Rono is different and proclaims her love for him. Chin and Ben raid Shako's office again looking for the dynamite. When Shako suggests that Chin's got an ulterior motive, Chin asserts that it's not personal, it's Five-O; and that Alia will be allowed to continue seeing Rono...on visiting days.

Rono pays a last-chance visit to Carson, who gets on the phone with Five-O as soon he leaves. Then Bertie does his car-abandoning bit again, but is hailed by an undercover cop on stakeout. This time the car is left without brakes on, so when it starts to roll down the hill, the cop jumps in and tries to gain control of it, only to unintentionally swerve into a parked car occupied by bowling alley employee Pamela Simpson (Cris Callow), established in previous scenes to be Alia's best friend. Both vehicles blow up real good upon impact.

Shako roughs up Bertie with his cane for leaving a potential witness--Pamela now being in a coma--and for not telling him about Alia. Steve gets back into town and Pamela dies in the hospital during a visit from Alia. Rono lies to Alia that he had nothing to do with the bowling alley job and declares that he's given up the family business. Five-O has Bertie brought in on a charge of second-degree murder, and when Steve gets a call that Rono's flown off with Alia, Chin blows up on Bertie, to be snapped back into place by Steve. Rono and Alia go back to Father Jack to join in holy matrimony. With ten minutes left, I predict a tragic ending.

Koa flies to Father Jack's island via chopper to visit the honeymoon cottage and inform Rono that their father has been picked up after Bertie spilled his guts. While Rono wants to flee with Alia, Koa insists that he has to turn himself in, and reveals that he brought Five-O with him, who have the place surrounded with conventional backup. Alia learns that Rono was involved in Pamela's death. Koa goes out to report that Rono intends to surrender, but Rono, who's armed, comes out using Alia as hostage. The officers all drop their weapons, except for Duke, who's in concealment trying to line up Rono in the sights of a sniper rifle. Father Jack angrily confronts Rono, and Rono shows what he's really made of when he unhesitantly shoots the priest. An unarmed Chin calmly approaches Rono to try to reason with him. When Rono puts his gun up to Chin's head, Steve dives for his dropped weapon as a distraction so Duke can take his shot. Rono's last words to a distraught Alia are that he finally got to meet her old man.

Alia: You don't know what he could have been...
McGarrett: No. No, all we know is what he was.​

Shako's office calendar featured what I assume were too-small-to-see presidential portraits, with Nixon's more prominently displayed in the center.

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Adam-12
"A Fool and His Money"
Originally aired February 28, 1973

Pete's embarassed that he won $10,000 in a contest to name a women's shampoo, which happened via an entry submitted by a dental receptionist he's been seeing. Now he's taking ribbings at the station and getting lots of mail--largely from salespeople--and phone calls. Pete wants to spend it on a boat, though Jim insists that he should put it away for when he settles down and marries.

The officers are assigned to a 507 stereo. At the apartment, they talk to an older gentleman named Billy Heckman (Regis Toomey), who called in the complaint about a neighbor, Mary O'Ryan (Lurene Tuttle), who plays her Shaughnessy records too loud. As Heckman describes the situation, it becomes clear that he's trying to build up the nerve to meet her, so the officers bring him up with them. She's happy to meet him, it becomes clear that she's only been playing the records so loud to get him to come up, and he contradicts what he told the officers by claiming to love Irish tenors.

Jim presses Pete to invest the money during a seven at a food stand. Back on patrol, the officers hear a shot and spot a sniper on the roof of a parking garage. Backup is called in and Mac sends Air-10. Malloy and Reed walk up through the garage while Officer Woods and his partner take the outside stairs. A car comes careening down toward Malloy and Reed while exchanging fire and ends up crashing...the driver possibly hit, though it isn't made clear.

Assigned to a 459, the officers find J. T. McGrath (David White) sitting in an empty house that's for sale. McGrath has actually sold most of what was in the house, but two cameras and a TV set have been stolen. He'd rather get insurance money, but one of his three ex-wives--who are part of the reason he's been liquidating--had her social security number written all over their belongings, making them easily identifiable.

Back on patrol, the officers attempt to call in a seven and are assigned to investigate a downed man in an alley. They find a wino (Donald Barry) standing over a companion who's dead. The wino tells them that whoever did it stole a pair of new white tennis shoes stolen off the victim. The officers follow a short, bloody trail to find a third wino (Ken Renard) drinking in an abandoned car...wearing new, white sneakers.

At the station while off duty, Pete gives Jim a gift inspired by his financial advice--a single, $5 stock that he can enjoy watching grow.

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The Brady Bunch
"The Great Earring Caper"
Originally aired March 2, 1973

Carol's earrings, which were given to her by her mother, are on loan to Marcia. Cindy tries them on in the bathroom but hides them in a towel when Carol drops in, and subsequently finds that they're gone. Peter's latest thing is his detective kit, complete with deer-hunter hat and magnifying glass, so Cindy goes to him for help. After some Friday-style questioning, Peter questionably deduces that the earrings somehow sidled over into the sink, so he covertly takes apart the drain pipe, but doesn't turn them up. Peter then decides to get fingerprints from everyone in the house under false pretenses, but finds what I expected--the bathroom has everybody's prints in it.

Meanwhile, Mike and Carol are planning to attend a costume party as Antony and Cleopatra, and Cindy hears that Carol plans to wear the earrings that she loaned to Marcia. (Alice remarks that the costumes look like Sonny and Cher, who actually started out as Caesar and Cleo.) Peter and Cindy resort to directly questioning their siblings without revealing what it's about. On the night of the party, Marcia goes to get the earrings and Cindy confesses to what happened. The family reconstructs the events and it comes out that Alice was retrieving the laundry, put the towel in it, then put it back on the sink so the kids would clean up after themselves. The trail leads to the obvious place, the washer is searched, and the earrings are found, one of them badly damaged. Carol goes without them, and in the coda, we learn that she and Mike placed behind a couple dressed as Holmes and Watson.

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The Odd Couple
"The Odyssey Couple"
Originally aired March 2, 1973

Oscar's mother (Elvia Allman) is visiting, and doing the usual sitcom thing of pestering him about meeting a nice girl. When Felix helps back him into a corner, Oscar pretends to have met one and makes a fake call to her and sets a date for her to meet Mrs. Madison. (Felix claims that the nicest girl Oscar ever brought home stole his watch--I guess the lady doctor who was a recurring character in the previous two seasons has been sucked into a temporal anomaly.) Felix offers to patch things over by finding someone for Oscar.

Felix: I'm a natural-born matchmaker--all the great matches I predicted: John and Yoko, Liz and Richard, I knew it was going to happen! ​

Felix brings home Doris Atkins (Bobbi Jordan), a music teacher he met at the doctor's office...but it turns out that she has the same sinus problems as Felix (complete with the distinctive honking), for whom she proves to be a better match.

Felix: I bet you wouldn't be interested in seeing my vaporizer...?​

Felix later explains the situation to Murray:

Poor girl was clogged, I had to do something.​

When Oscar comes home, Felix tells him and Murray how he met a Greek family with a beautiful daughter named Helena at his studio (while a version of the Romeo and Juliet film theme plays softly). Felix takes Oscar to meet the Domoskopolous family, consisting of three generations living in the same apartment. The respectable-looking Helena (Lynne Miller) is brought out by her father, Aroestes (Titos Vandis), but Oscar only briefly sees her without exchanging conversation while sitting across the room and being shown photo albums.

Felix arranges for Oscar to bring his mother to the Domoskopolous's restaurant for the date. Felix and Oscar join Aroestes in a Greek dance, then he brings Helena out to perform...to everyone's surprise but ours, because we were spoiled by the Wiki description. Everyone rolls with the twist and has fun, and Mrs. Madison--who's been spending her time touring the world--hits it off with Aroestes.

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It's not an itchy trigger finger when you're a trained cop and a perp has a gun pointed at you.

 

50 Years Ago This Week

March 18

• The U.S. Supreme Court decided the case of Gaffney v. Cummings, setting the current standard in the U.S. for determining fairness in reapportionment and determination of election districts. In a 6 to 3 decision, written by Justice Byron R. White, the court determined that a mean deviation of less than two percent between the number of persons in the largest and smallest districts was acceptable, and that a ruling on the fairness of a majority political party's geographical construction of a district was a political question reserved to determination by the individual states rather than the federal judiciary.
• St John's High School, Dromore, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, was bombed by the Ulster Volunteer Force, causing extensive damage.
• During the day, Wings perform a live set before a specially invited audience at ATV's Boreham Wood studios, for the television special James Paul McCartney.

March 20

• The late Roberto Clemente was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame less than six months after his last game, as the 424 members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America voted to waive the customary five-year waiting period in consideration of Clemente's death in an airplane crash on December 31, 1972.

March 21

• Pieces of Moon rock samples from the Apollo 17 mission were sent by U.S. President Nixon to all 50 of the United States and to all the nations of the world, displayed on wooden plaques. In each case, a letter accompanied the presentation of samples from the last crewed mission to the Moon with a letter that said, in part, "In the deepest sense our exploration of the moon was truly an international effort. It is for this reason that, on behalf of the people of the United States I present this flag, which was carried to the moon, to the State, and its fragment of the moon obtained during the final lunar mission of the Apollo program. If people of many nations can act together to achieve the dreams of humanity in space, then surely we can act together to accomplish humanity's dream of peace here on earth."
• U.S. President Nixon and White House Counsel John Dean had a private conversation that was recorded, in which Dean warned of what he called "a cancer on the presidency" because the Watergate burglars had been paid money in return for their silence. Dean pointed out that he, Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman, domestic policy adviser John Ehrlichman and former Attorney General John N. Mitchell had all been "involved in that" and that burglar E. Howard Hunt was demanding more money. Nixon replied, "Don't you have to handle Hunt's financial situation damn soon? You've got to keep the cap on the bottle..." the first suggestion of an obstruction of justice ordered by the president.

March 23

• In a letter to Judge John Sirica, Watergate burglar James W. McCord Jr. admitted that he and other defendants had been pressured to remain silent about the case. McCord named former U.S. Attorney General John Mitchell as 'overall boss' of the operation.
• Yoko Ono is granted permission to remain in the USA as a permanent resident, but the US authorities order John Lennon to leave the country within 60 days.
• First UK release of Paul and Wings' "My Love" single.

March 24

• The 591st and final episode of the Lassie TV series was aired in syndication, after the beloved collie had gone through multiple owners in over 19 consecutive seasons in various scenarios. On September 12, 1954, the show had premiered on CBS with Tommy Rettig ("Jeff") as his first owner, followed by Jon Provost (Timmy) in 1957, a succession of U.S. Forestry Service rangers from 1964 to 1969, two seasons on her own until 1971, and two seasons at a ranch.

[I'd assume they went through more than one collie in that timeframe as well...]​

• At the age of 26, professional wrestling favorite André the Giant (André Roussimoff) of France made his debut in the United States after being signed by Vincent J. McMahon to the World Wide Wrestling Federation. Billed at 7'4" (224 cm) and 520 pounds (234 kg), André was introduced in Philadelphia against two challengers, Frank Valois & Bull Pometti, and then appeared at Madison Square Garden in New York City two days later.
• Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon was released in the UK.
• John Lennon lodges an apppeal against his deportation order.
• Spoiler

  Born: Jim Parsons, American TV comedian known for portraying Sheldon Cooper on The Big Bang Theory; in Houston

Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for the week:

Leaving the chart:

• "Bell Bottom Blues," Eric Clapton (5 weeks)
• "Jambalaya (On the Bayou)," The Blue Ridge Rangers (16 weeks)
• "Peaceful Easy Feeling," Eagles (12 weeks)

New on the chart:

"Pillow Talk," Sylvia

(#3 US; #27 AC; #1 R&B; #14 UK)

"Playground in My Mind," Clint Holmes

(#2 US; #7 AC)


And new on the boob tube:

• M*A*S*H, "Ceasefire"
• Adam-12, "Easy Rap" (season finale)
• Kung Fu, "The Praying Mantis Kills"
• The Odd Couple, "The Murray Who Came to Dinner" (season finale)
• All in the Family, "The Battle of the Month" (season finale)

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Timeline entries are quoted from the Wiki page for the month and Mark Lewisohn's The Beatles Day by Day, with minor editing as needed.

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I'm just listening now...delightfully demented.

His usual wardrobe is more Mrs. Howell than that...

True...the camp seems big enough, they have to drive the casualties down from the choppers in Jeeps. I think they may have handwaved that they were surrounded by the enemy...they had just been getting shelled.

I see what you did there...kinda wish I didn't.

I'm not sure why they squeezed an unseen trip to the mainland into the middle of the episode. Like we were going to wonder why he wasn't in a few scenes.

I was anticipating a revelation that she volunteered to be the human shield to get him out of there, but no such moment was forthcoming.

I think it was more like he blamed her.

"He had a gun on me, I had no choice."

(Like Jim could ever outdraw Pete...)

IRL, 15...I think maybe a bit younger on the show. But yeah, his voice has already changed...

To clarify, they didn't mention the Caesar and Cleo connection on the show.

Gotta have consequences.

It was payoff for earlier scenes in which Mike and Carol were trying to come up with an original idea for a famous couple they could dress as.

 

From the preview video they have posted on the Decades site, it looks like Decades is going to be rebranded as Catchy Comedy. From the schedule it looks like they'll still be doing weekend binges--they have a Night Court binge scheduled for Apr. 1-2--but the shows might be limited to comedies because of the new format.

ETA: Decades Network Becomes Catchy Comedy in March, Led by 'Night Court' - Variety

Another article I found specified that the Decades Binge will continue as the Catchy Binge:
Goodbye, DECADES. Hello, Catchy Comedy! (wbay.com)

 

The parent company, Weigel Broadcasting, has a very large and diverse number of shows under its umbrella, being shown on multiple networks, including MeTV, MeTV+, H&I, and Start TV. It appears that they're just changing the focus/format of Decades, while keeping many of the same programs that were already in the channel's daily lineup. But the binges will presumably no longer be drawing from the full range of programming that Weigel has available.

Hopefully all of the ones given to American states, at least.

I usually don't cover the births of people who aren't celebrities yet.

I already had it, but couldn't remember it. FWIW, the Sylvia here is Sylvia Robinson of Mickey & Sylvia fame.

I wasn't familiar with this at all, though given its high chart position, I likely deliberately passed on it when building my collection. I find it a bit cloying, but may go ahead and get it because it's on a compilation that I've already bought into for the Johnny Nash singles.

Maybe it was airline product placement when Danno had to pick up Steve from the airport.

It ties in with that as well, paying off both story threads.

If I manage to get back around to doing album spotlights...

 

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50th Anniversary Viewing (Part 2)

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Mission: Impossible
"The Western"
Originally aired March 2, 1973

The penultimate aired episode was actually produced third from last, so it's about where it should be.

In the aftermath of their theft, Matthew Royce (Barry Atwater) tells Van Cleve (Ed Nelson) that he wants out of their partnership; following which Van Cleve uses a preset bomb to blow up the cave where they'd apparently intended to hide the treasure, while Royce is in it.

The IMF's plan involves making Van Cleeve think he's got second sight. First they stage an accident in which he runs into the victim wearing a skull mask just before it happens (which is covertly removed before the body is turned over); then he sits next to Casey--posing as a psychology student specializing in probability theory--on a plane, where she practices her card trickery and lets him see a large bundle of $50 bills in her trick purse, then reopens it and they're gone. Jim and Barney, posing as geological surveyors for the Department of the Interior, are caught on Van Cleve's ranch by henchman Ed Stoner (Michael Ansara). Their arranged credentials seem legit, but Van Cleve calls a Washington contact, Ralph Driscoll (Frank Farmer), to find out why a hush-hush survey is being done on his land.

Stoner spies on Jim and Barney at a casino, where Jim loses a lot of money at a crap table manned by Willy. Van Cleve, who's found that Jim is deeply in debt from gambling and child support, offers him money in exchange for intel about the survey. Van Cleve runs into Casey, who's enjoying a lucky streak that causes her trick purse to be filled with the bundle of Grants that he foresaw. Jim and Barney sneak into Stately Van Cleve manor...and Willy into the Van Clevemobile...to plant devices to simulate an earthquake. Meanwhile, Van Cleve shares his visions with Casey, who rationalizes that these were manifestations of his subconscious ability to predict outcomes in a computer-like fashion. While they start to get romantic, Royce turns up alive to take a shot at them from outside with a silenced Mauser.

Hearing offscreen shots that weren't part of the plan, Jim and Barney see the sniper fleeing and pursue his vehicle to a ghost town hideout...where he takes shots at them and they take cover to exchange fire. The firefight runs through the town and Royce gets away, but prints on the Mauser that he dropped to switch to a rifle identify him. Jim decides to up the timetable of the plan before it gets ruined, so he goes to Van Cleve with the survey results, which indicate that a fault structure under the dam threatens to cause the entire valley to be flooded with the next quake. When Jim leaves, Barney triggers a fake vision of a dummy of Van Cleve's body rising from and then sinking back under his bubbling swimming pool.

At 3 a.m., the IMFers trigger their fake tremor, caused by lots of little hydraulic devices shaking his furniture (which look like they'd be easily spotted) and backed up by a taped news broadcast fed into his radio. Van Cleve heads for the cave set where he hid the treasure (which looks like the same one the Brady boys were recently tied up in)--his truck's radio also playing taped broadcasts--while Royce follows him and the IMFers track him via a homing device. Royce confronts Van Cleve in the cave, and the gun-toting IMFers come in behind him to get the drop on both of them.

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Love, American Style
"Love and the Mind Reader / Love and Mr. and Mrs. / Love and the Soap Opera"
Originally aired March 2, 1973

"Love and Mr. and Mrs." opens with Dennis Stephens (Peter Kastner) starting his job in the office of Sid Daniels (Arch Johnson), Public Defender, Misdemeanor Trials. Dennis runs into fellow PD Valerie Stephens (Victoria Principal), who turns out to be his wife, to Sid's surprise. Eddie Colfax (Frank Welker) questions why Dennis left a good firm for this gig, and Dennis agrees to take a case for him despite Valerie's warning that he typically tries to unload his work on others. Things get awkward at home when the Stephenses find that they can no longer talk about what happened at work. Neighbors Mary and Carol (Dick Yarmy and Pamela Rodgers) drop in to draw attention to how the Stephenses split the household work, Carol being a housewife. Back at work, Dennis meets his client, Bonnie Lee (Shelley Duvall), a poor young woman who was caught shoplifting lingerie. Her story is that she ran out of the store to put money in a parking meter without realizing she had the merchandise, but Val counters Dennis's idealistic gullibility with a cynical outlook informed by experience and Bonnie's previous record.

Val is later incredulous that Dennis has invited Bonnie Lee over for dinner, and they have a little argument about one of them needing to quit the practice to see to the home. Dinner is canceled when Bonnie laughs at Dennis wearing an apron while preparing the meal, causing him to walk out of the room in a huff. Dennis stops doing his part around the house the next day, and Carol tries to advise Val about how to be less liberated and more attentive to her husband's needs. The tension between the titular spouses follows them to work, but Dennis later comes home to reveal that he won his case, getting Bonnie off; and Val reveals that she isn't surprised because she knew he was a terrific lawyer. They come to an understanding about their work boundaries and she confesses that she can't be the type of wife that Carol is. Bonnie drops by to give the couple a gift--a lighter that she lifted off them during her previous visit. Afterward, as the Stephenses retire to their brass bed, Dennis considers himself to have lost his case, but Val disagrees.

In "Love and the Soap Opera," actor Roger Adams (Tom Lowell) pays a visit to Sally Holmwith (Sarah Kennedy), whom he met on a cruise that they've both just returned from. While Sally's mother (Kaye Ballard) tries to chat him up, Sally references a number of tragic family events in progress. When Sally fixates on the TV at the crack of noon, Mrs. Holmwith explains that her daughter is a soap opera addict, and the tragic events were happening to characters on her shows. Sally's mother has Roger over for a date with Sally, but Sally's dressed and has the place decorated for a wedding happening on a nighttime soap. Sally takes a greater interest in Roger when he starts playing the part of Bill on one of her soaps...but their dates are still stymied by Sally's inability to distinguish fiction from reality, as she only identifies him as Bill and is more invested in his onscreen romance with Mona. When a frustrated Roger storms out, Sally's philosophical about it: "Well...that's the way the world turns."

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All in the Family
"Everybody Tells the Truth"
Originally aired March 3, 1973

Mike and Gloria have taken Archie and Edith to an affordable French restaurant, but Archie is in a foul mood because of the refrigerator being broken. When Mike disagrees with Archie over whether somebody they met earlier had a knife, Mike goes into his account of the evening's events, which sets the highly exaggerated tone of the flashbacks. In Mike's story, Archie comes home acting like a monster, while Mike and Gloria act flawlessly polite and agreeable. Archie's contrasting account has Archie coming home in a good mood and approving of everything the family does, while painting Edith, Mike, and Gloria as the sources of all hostility in the house. Mike and Gloria take over to describe the refrigerator repairmen, Bob and Jack (Ken Lynch and Ron Glass), coming over, their account having Archie treating Edith like a dog and portraying Jack as an overly accommodating and stereotypically behaving "Uncle Tom" character (in Mike's words)--much like the act that Lionel routinely puts on for Archie's benefit. Archie's contrasting account portrays Bob as a gangster type and Jack as a hostile Black Power activist.

The next contrasting accounts involve Jack eating an apple while Bob works on the refrigerator. In Mike's account, Jack has no knife and happily lets Archie treat him like dirt. In Archie's account, the more aggressive version of Jack threatens Archie with a large switchblade. Edith provides a third account, with a more realistic version of Jack who falls somewhere between Mike and Archie's extreme stereotypes. Jack offers Archie some of his apple while holding up a small pen knife that Archie overreacts to. Archie ends up sending the repairmen out and unsuccessfully trying to fix the fridge himself after Jack expresses his objection to Archie calling him "boy". In the restaurant, Edith produces the knife from her purse, supporting her account and disproving both Mike's and Archie's.

While it makes sense that the guileless Edith would have the most objective account, I think they missed an opportunity to show us things from her own unique POV.

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Emergency!
"Boot"
Originally aired March 3, 1973

When the crew find that Boot hasn't eaten his food, they search the station for him to find him hiding under one of the beds. Chet, the last one to have seen him before this, is defensive when questioned and makes a show of being unconcerned.

The squad is called to an apartment where they have to crawl in a window to help a woman (Ann Prentiss, whose character is billed as Fran Lillington) who's gotten her hair caught in a meat grinder while preparing a meal for a date. She doesn't want to cut it, so Roy takes the grinder apart to free her bob, and she cheerfully sees them out the door.

At Rampart, Roy and Johnny ask Dix about Boot, and she, Brackett, Early, and Morton all have their own questions and opinions about the situation. The paramedics' ultimate takeaway is Joe's recommendation that they take Boot to a vet. Back at the station, Johnny feels Boot's nose, which is moist, but Boot won't even eat hamburger.

The station and other units, including a phone crew, are called to the site of a traffic accident involving a convertible that's crashed into and gotten stuck under a fuel truck. Remarkably, the young driver of the car (Susan Madigan, whose character is billed as Carol) is injured but alive and conscious. The car is pulled out via a tow line while the underside of the truck is sprayed with foam. The girl is freed from the vehicle and taken away via ambulance; and once the truck driver (Vic Tayback) has verified that she's going to be okay, he insists that the accident was her fault.

A young man named Don Herrold (Zack Taylor) brings his father, Hoyt (Jock Mahoney), into Rampart, saying that he keeled over at lunch and passed out during the ride. Don tells Brackett of how his otherwise very healthy father suffered a stomach bug a couple of years back. Morton finds mysterious bruises on Hoyt's leg, and Brackett calls Hoyt's personal physician and learns that he's been taking Warfarin for his heart. Having found that Hoyt was carrying aspirin, Morton questions the revived patient to determine that he suffers from pain caused by an old leg injury, and diagnoses that the combination of aspirin and Warfarin has been causing stomach bleeding.

At the station, the paramedics are still trying to diagnose Boot themselves--taking his temperature rectally but not knowing what it's supposed to be. While they're trying to contact a vet, Chet gets up to do some studying in another room, and Boot follows him.

The paramedics are called back to Fran Lillington's apartment, where they have to crawl in the window again to free her hand from her mixer. She admits that she doesn't normally cook.

At Rampart, Brackett enlists Early's aid in dealing with an occultist who can't move his right arm because he believes he's been cursed (uncredited Jamie Farr; apparently this segment was repurposed from the episode "Helpful," where he was credited as playing an Alan Austen, but didn't appear). Early, who seems to have some experience with this sort of thing, plays along with Austen's beliefs and makes a show of helping to lift the curse, which does the trick.

Another call comes in concerning Fran Lillington's apartment, this time for the station to deal with what turns out to be a small stove fire that's managed to smoke the place up. Fran decides to give up on her date and go to the movies.

At Rampart, after advising that Dix not get further involved in the Boot matter, Morton tells her what a dog's normal temperature is, which indicates that the station mascot isn't running one. Then they hear an explosion outside the hospital and see that an unattached immunology laboratory has burst into flames. Station 51 and several other units are called to the scene, and the hospital staff take supplies outside to get directly involved at the site of the emergency for a change. Brackett questions Dr. Frye (Jack Manning) about how many people were inside and whether they were keeping anything infectious or toxic. Frye is primarily concerned about his records, and while the firefighters are still battling the blaze, he runs in to grab them, badly burning himself. A man is rescued from inside, and afterword the fire is determined to have been an arson.

At the station, Boot finally eats when Chet brings him his dish, and it comes out that Chet yelled at Boot earlier when the dog jumped and slobbered on him. Chet is shamed into agreeing to be more tolerant of their canine companion.

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The Mary Tyler Moore Show
"Mary Richards and the Incredible Plant Lady"
Originally aired March 3, 1973
Season finale

Mary and Rhoda are at a dealership having their unseen cars worked on. In a beat reminiscent of a recent Odd Couple, the service manager, Harry (Henry Corden), brings out two of the mechanics, Bob and Charlie (Robert Karvelas and Craig Nelson), to meet Mary, who's a figure of awe to them for how well she keeps her vehicle maintained. Back at home, Mary learns that Rhoda, who now has a special touch with plants, has a greenhouse going in her apartment despite the lack of anything resembling natural light. Rhoda shares her idea for opening a plant boutique, and Mary agrees to loan her nearly $1,000 to get it started. Georgette drops in with some rehearsed reactions to the plants to try to help Rhoda make her pitch to Mary, and is informed that Mary has already agreed.

At work, Mary learns from Ted that Georgette has given up her job to work at Rhoda's store, and Rhoda calls Mary needing a few hundred more. Mary goes to her bank to try to remove money from an account type that only allows withdrawal under certain circumstances, so the bank officer (Louise Lasser, Louise Lasser) ends up steering her into taking out a loan. Over six weeks later, Rhoda's business is doing well but she hasn't paid Mary back yet. Rhoda makes an excuse for her and Mary to return to the dealership, where she reveals that she's taken the money she owed Mary to make downpayment on a car that Mary was interested in buying on their previous visit but talked herself out of.

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The Bob Newhart Show
"Bum Voyage"
Originally aired March 3, 1973

The episode opens with a group therapy session featuring several of the usual suspects--Mr. Gianelli, Michelle Nardo, Mrs. Bakerman, Mr. Carlin, and Mr. Peterson. A wonky-sounding exercise for the group to express their feelings while being totally silent proves surprisingly successful, and Bob's enthusiastic about it when he goes home. What he isn't enthusiastic about is the 63-day cruise that Emily already has booked and made a deposit on. (The length does seem a bit excessive--more of a sabbatical than a vacation. We're not all working a teacher's schedule...) Emily drops by the office on another therapy night and Bob invites her to sit in. (If she says that this is the first time she's seen Bob work...) When Bob reprises the silence exercise, everyone can tell that something's bothering Emily and she explains the situation...

Emily: Well, last night my husband and I...
Bob: Uh, Emily...I'm not your husband here, I'm the doctor.
Emily: Oh, right. Well, the doctor and I were in bed last night...​

The group is surprisingly supportive of Bob and Emily taking the trip, and when Bob shares his concern about the therapy sessions, they agree to continue meeting in his absence.

Emily: Oh, Bob, isn't that great? Look, they don't need you at all!​

Emily overpacks for the occasion, including bringing ten pairs of shoes (as a formerly married man, I can name that tune) and an old Nehru jacket of Bob's that Emily thinks might still be in style in Europe.

Bob: I don't think it's still in style in India.​

When Mrs. Bakerman calls the apartment, Emily assumes that Bob's agreeing to cancel the trip, but he's just taking a request to place a bet in Monte Carlo.

When the Hartleys board the ship, Bob's put off by the "coziness" of their stateroom. The place becomes more crowded when their roughly bed-sized trunk is wheeled in and Jerry, Carol, Howard, and the entire therapy group drop in for a bon voyage party, to be joined by the steward (Archie Hahn) and a random passenger (Pat McCormick). (This very much reminds me of that bathroom scene.) As I saw coming a mile away, the group lingers too long and the boat starts to ship out.

In the coda, the group has somehow gotten off, and the Hartleys are still trying to figure out where the bed is.

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You can always give Frndly a spin...