"Citizen Krane"

"Da Doo Ron Ron" came out in 1963 by the way.

"Citizen Krane"
April 5, 1977
B-

I was leaning towards a C+ for Raymond Siller's only L & S story, but I like the admittedly predictable "twist" that impresario Charles Pfister Krane (a parody of then modern-day Orson Welles more than '40s Welles) only wants to continue to mentor Laverne.  Miss DeFazio of course chooses loyalty and friendship over being "molded" into a star.  Note that this episode has a surprising amount of innuendo centered around Mrs. Babish, including a song that refers to her "birthday suit."  Also, this episode arguably gives Boo Boo Kitty her (?) biggest role yet, impacting the plot a little.

Ogden Talbot's second L & S role is as the Delivery Man, while Michael Mann's second is the lackey named Lackey.

Season Two of Laverne and Shirley moved up in the ratings from #3 to #2, just after Happy Days.  (Former king, All in the Family, dropped to #12, just behind newbie Three's Company, but Rob Reiner joked that he wanted his family to continue to rule the airwaves.)  As far as how much I enjoy this season nowadays, well, the grades range from C to B+, averaging out to a B- like Season One, although that didn't have any B+s.  Not every joke or situation works but the show is usually at least a little entertaining and sometimes they do hit those sweet spots.  And I don't think it's a coincidence that some of the best moments, and episodes, involve romance, especially the growing attraction (yes, on both sides) between Laverne and Lenny.  Even the better and funnier Happy Days crossover involves Shirley/Richie.

What doesn't work?  Sometimes the cast is thrown into a situation that is supposed to be automatically funny-- the hospital, the haunted house, etc.-- but no one has worked out what the actual jokes or even ramifications are.  In contrast, the honeymoon suite episode and the one where the gang tries to scare off Frank's girlfriend sound cliched but they work because everyone, including the writers, is giving their all.

I will say, it does feel more like an ensemble this year than last, with Rosie as an honorary regular at times.  Not every episode gets all seven (or eight) onstage at once, and there's not always magic when they do, but the potential is there and (whatever backstage tension was building) the actors and characters do support each well onscreen even in the weaker episodes.  The studio and home audiences knew the characters well enough to anticipate some of the interactions, but it was still fun to see them play out.

From what I recall, Season Three was more of the same, only with, if possible, more slapstick and ridiculous situations.  We'll see if my memories are correct, or if there will be more surprises like this season's "Wait, Laverne and Shirley owned a car?"

"Lonely at the Middle"

"Lonely at the Middle"
March 29, 1977
C+

Although this is another episode I for some reason vaguely remember watching at the time, especially Laverne using the "happy" suggestion box to sing "Rubber Tree Plant" to Shirley, it would probably be a C if not for the one-year-later frame device* of Laverne telling the story to Lenny.**  The "union" song that Lenny and Squiggy sing in the tag isn't bad but is too short and not one of their classics.  The main plot resembles "It's the Water," in that Shirley gets a promotion that doesn't go well.

Byron Webster is Warren Tompkins here and would later be Mr. Slotnik.


*And I think that's only there so that the girls won't have their own car to go to work in and have to use a car pool or the bus.

**After, at his request, putting a band-aid on his finger and kissing it, which is sweet and possibly shippy.  And he wants to know where the "secret place" is that a girl gets kissed in Laverne's smutty book.  He guesses the basement, which happens to be where he and Laverne are sitting.

"Haunted House"

"Haunted House"
March 22, 1977
C+

This is another cartoony episode (the only L & S story written by Andrew Johnson, although he was story editor on "Guinea Pigs"), but just not as funny as the previous one, despite the comic potential of Laverne, Shirley, Lenny, and Squiggy trapped in the title location.  In fact, the best part is Rosie and Laverne's dance-off.

Dan Barrows, Bill here, would show up as Carlisle four years later.

"Frank's Fling"

Maureen Arthur, who would later be the childhood
sweetheart of Mork & Mindy's son, don't ask.

"Frank's Fling"
March 8, 1977
B

This is another episode that's not particularly deep-- although we do get a little of Laverne's memories of her mother-- but it is very funny and really shows the ensemble coming together, as when six of them try to think hard but look like they're constipated. 

Frank has a fling with a woman named Veronica, and we know she's no good as soon as she's catty with Edna, who gives as good as she gets.  (I'm going to assume that this episode is set before the previous one to air, but maybe Edna was interested in Frank already.)  Veronica is clearly after Frank's money, as it turns out he knew all along, although he forgives his "two daughters" and their friends for scaring Veronica off.

Some of the cartooniness of this story must be due to the script by William J. Keenan, his only for L & S, since he was more at home with, for instance, the animated Jackson 5ive and the Osmonds.  It works here but I don't know how it would've played out long-term.  Director Howard Morris didn't do any other L & S either, although he did his share of cartoons, too, mostly as an actor, e.g. the voice of Jughead Jones.

"Hi, Neighbor, Book 2"

"Hi, Neighbor, Book 2"
March 1, 1977
B+

"Davy" L. Lander and Michael McKean co-wrote this episode that is not only very Lenny-and-Squiggy-focused but is also very shippy.  And it has some class-clashing, in a French restaurant.

We begin in Lenny and Squiggy's apartment, which we and, it's implied, the girls have not seen since the boys moved in for the first "Hi, Neighbor" episode.  Squiggy is "in love" again, this time with Barbara Tedesco.  (This is the first of six L & S roles for Lynne Marie Stewart but the only one she'd repeat.  And it sounds from the dialogue like her last name is Hummel, but that's not what IMDB says.)  They want fashion advice from Laverne & Shirley, so Squiggy, while Lenny is in the bathroom, yells down the dumbwaiter that Lenny has swallowed his comb.  The girls race upstairs in record time (about fifteen seconds, or the time it takes for Squiggy to pour himself Listerine, despite what earlier was supposed to be three or four stories' difference between the apartments) and slapstick ensues.  The girls recommend that the boys go rent "evening wear" for the double date with Barbara and her (unseen) friend.

Laverne and Shirley are dateless on a Friday night, but it turns out that Mrs. Babish is going out with Laverne's father.  Shirley is instantly a Fredna shipper but Laverne feels uncomfortable about it, even though she likes Mrs. Babish.  (Although arguably, at this point, Shirley has bonded more with their landlady, as when she turned to her about Laverne being in jail and possibly pregnant.)  In any case, this ship is launched and would be somewhat successful, but more on that later of course.

The girls are dressed to clean the apartment, and Laverne ends up accidentally French-kissing a vacuum cleaner!  But she's about to get a better offer.

The guys show up to model their outfits, or as Lenny puts it, "Well, Girls, this is what we'd look like if we was handsome."  Laverne in particular is amused, to the point that Shirley has to quietly scold her for laughing.  While Squiggy calls Barbara to let her and her friend know that he and Lenny are going to go pick them up, Laverne goes over to "Len" and fixes his cummerbund, which he's wearing high enough to be a "brassiere."  He turns out to be ticklish but doesn't object to her touching him.  He and Laverne share amused looks when Squiggy tells Barbara it's "Squiggles."

But when Barbara breaks the date, L & L look concerned.  They also look like she was doing more than fixing his cummerbund.  Shirley is less physical with Squiggy here, but she does brush his suit off a little, like she doesn't want him to have lint on it, even if he probably won't be going out that night.

L & L encourage Squiggy to tell Barbara off, although Shirley doesn't.  And when Squiggy says that there are "plenty of women just dying to go out with us," check out the look L & L share as she strokes his arm, as if he's the one who needs comforting, and maybe as if she is on some level dying to go out with him.

Squiggy puts a very reluctant Shirley on the phone to speak with Barbara, but Shirley is in her too-nice mode and can't insult Barbara.  However, she delights as much as the guys do when Laverne grabs the phone and tells Barbara that she and Shirley are very much looking forward to going out with these two "hunks."  Lenny calls both girls terrific, but it's Laverne he keeps touching on the back.

Lenny assumes that Laverne meant it, while Squiggy wonders if he should call Barbara back.  The girls wonder what they've gotten themselves in for and "solemnly" thumb-swear that they will never tell anyone about this double date.

At the fancy French restaurant, Lenny drags Laverne over to a free table but then pulls her chair out for her, impressing Shirley with his manners, although Squiggy mocks him.  However, both the maitre d' and the waiter are appalled by the foursome's lack of couth and elegance, as when they wear the napkins as hats and can't read the menu.  (The nameless waiter is Gino Conforti, a few years after playing a much nicer waiter, Nino, on That Girl a few times and still a few years from perhaps his best known role as Jack's frenemy assistant Felipe on Three's Company.)

When Laverne tries to teach Lenny not to grab food from across the table, she ends up falling over and the waiter helps to pick her up.  Lenny tells him to let go of his date, and Laverne says the waiter gave her an Indian burn.  Lenny, while still eating, manages to hold Laverne's arm and blow on it, which is sweet if not helpful.

Squiggy goes to borrow butter from another table, and he sees Barbara with a date.  He is distraught to the point of hiding under his own table, although his friends try to get him to come out.  When he finally does reemerge, after, as Lenny puts it, "paying under the table," Shirley puts her arm around his shoulder and says that he's been "a perfect gentleman" all evening.  When she says that they all had fun, Lenny says, "I did," so many times that Shirley tells Laverne to shut him up, which Laverne does.

Shirley convinces Squiggy to leave with dignity, so the four of them get up and stroll over to Barbara's table.  Shirley calls Squiggy "so witty," but the best Laverne can up with is that Lenny is "so...tall," which disappoints him.  Barbara pretends she doesn't know Squiggy, who manages to hold on to his dignity.  But the foursome stop in the doorway when Barbara calls Squiggy a creep and the girls "bottom of the barrel."  Squiggy goes over and yanks the tablecloth off Barbara's table and he and his friends run out, although he does come back to ask Barbara on another date, before Lenny pulls him away.

The tag, which remember, Boys and Girls, is the part of an episode that usually gets chopped for syndication so it isn't supposed to contain any vital information, is set back in the girls' apartment.  The tone is relaxed and surprisingly intimate, considering that one of the premises of this series is that the girls are physically repulsed by their two old friends.  Shirley (in what looks like Cindy flirting with her on-again-off-again boyfriend David L.) is playing with his spit-curl at one end of the couch, while Laverne is amused by Lenny's amusement at the other end.  We find out that Shirley set the lobsters free and the waiters chased the gang three blocks.  Squiggy puts his arm around Shirley as they talk about the lobsters, and she doesn't object.

It's not until Squiggy suggests another double date next weekend, and Lenny puts his arm around Laverne and suggests the Godzilla film festival,* that the girls pull away physically and emotionally.  They fake sleepiness and the guys catch on, leading to one of my favorite throwaway exchanges on this series.
LENNY: A truck doesn't have to hit me.
SQUIGGY: If it does, I'll be driving it.

The guys get to their feet and Squiggy "officially" ends the date.  Lenny adds that since the girls have been so nice, "we ain't gonna try to get anything off ya."  Yet, the guys are still hopeful and they draw out their goodbyes, one of them (I think Squiggy) saying that they'll see them around since they live in the same building.

The girls look at each other and know what they have to do.  It is like and unlike the end of their double date with Richie and Potsie.  Shirley's kiss seems to take Squiggy by surprise, but Lenny is clearly and happily anticipating his kiss from Laverne.  S & S's kiss lasts about four seconds and is enough to make his leg pop and his mouth stay puckered.  Then he slaps himself!

L & L's kiss lasts about six seconds (seven if you count the slow moving in for it), and it causes Lenny to bite his wrist, throw papers around, trip, and bite his wrist again, as Squiggy staggers out the door.

The studio audience oos and whistles, but also laughs and claps, because this is all so over the top.  The girls' reactions are calmer.  Shirley pats her lips, probably surprised at herself for kissing Squiggy for presumably the first time.  Laverne says Lenny "kissed better than the vacuum."  And so ends the girls' quiet Friday night.

Unlike with Frank DeFazio & Edna Babish, this does not lead to immediate romance and eventual marriage.  But the fact that Laverne and Shirley had fun on a double date with Lenny and Squiggy does mean that, despite all those hellos to come, the girls are not as repulsed by their two guy friends as the series will tell us on the surface that they are.  As for the guys, those kisses aren't going to scare them off like Potsie was scared off.  They will see the girls around and they all live in the same building.


*At this point, timeline nitpickers note, there were exactly two Godzilla movies out.  (King Kong vs. Godzilla wouldn't be released until '62.)  So this is hardly "eighteen straight hours of monsters in Tohoscope."  Still, we'll learn in a later episode that Laverne shares Lenny's love of such movies.

"Honeymoon Hotel"

"Honeymoon Hotel"
February 22, 1977
B+

There's no depth to this Johnson & Cohen story, like there was in "Look Before You Leap," but it is an utter delight, from the opening scene rich with Lavenny fodder to the girls getting away with a scam, OK, thanks to Rosie.

Laverne is letting the guys watch From Here to Eternity with her, since their TV isn't working and hers is.  (Presumably the one she won dancing with Richie.)  She is sitting very close to Lenny on the couch and keeps reaching for the popcorn on his lap, and, yes, you could fit four people on that couch, as on "Playing Hooky."  Squiggy is in the room but upset about a relationship that soured.  Laverne complains that the popcorn is unbuttered, so Lenny mocks her but he nonetheless goes and gets a stick of butter and a knife.  And he proceeds to butter every single kernel that he hands her, while she's oblivious!  This is funny and in a weird way romantic.  (Well, Lavenny is by definition almost always weirdly romantic.)  Not only that, but when Laverne reacts to the famous lovemaking-on-the-beach scene, Lenny says, "He ain't such a much.  He didn't even remember to bring a blanket to the beach."  And yet when Squiggy says that the whole world is out on a date and Lenny gives her a look, she reminds him that he and Squiggy are only there because of the TV.

There's also a moment that is inadvertently Lenny/Squiggy, when they both try to put an arm around Laverne and instead touch each other.  Laverne notices, they don't.

The TV announcer draws a name to win a honeymoon weekend at the Hotel Pfister (a hotel mentioned in previous episodes) in beautiful downtown Milwaukee.  The winner is Miss Shirley Feeney, who is out on a date with someone we never see.  The announcer calls the apartment and Laverne answers and has to pretend to be Shirley, with the guys rooting her on.  Shirley comes home towards the end and Laverne and the guys race out of there without seeing her.

This is not an episode where there's a voice of reason saying, "You can't cheat the hotel out of a weekend's stay in the honeymoon suite."  Even the sensible Mrs. Babish rolls in (with Lenny's help) a garment rack with her five (!) wedding dresses.  Carmine agrees to put on a mustache and carry Shirley over the threshold for a publicity photo.

Unfortunately, as the girls discover after Carmine returns mustacheless to the dance studio, it isn't going to be just one photo op but a series of pictures taken throughout the weekend.  They are going to have to bluff their way through this "honeymoon," while still having a good time.  And they do, from setting off the musical bed to throwing a party with Big Rosie and a circus.  Just being in a fancy hotel is a thrill for these working-class women, and I love the line, "Laverne, this must be how Liberace lives!"  We're rooting for them and, yes, Rosie redeems herself by bribing the hotel manager.

In the tag, Laverne almost says what she often does, "Doesn't your balloon ever land?" but then she stops herself.  And she reveals that she's stealing the heart-shaped toilet seat!  The manager, after bribery, has a very '70s line about "who are we to say what's right and what's wrong?"  For once, the sentimental Garry Marshall touch is gone and we get something more anarchic, more Marx-Brothery, yet in its own way lovable.

On his way out, seeing Squiggy "in love again," this time with the bearded lady, Lenny kisses Laverne on the top of her head.  So, yeah, the episode has Lavenny, but it should be noted that there's some Shirverne, as when Shirley accuses Laverne of trying to abandon her on "their honeymoon" and Laverne dresses in drag (including the mustache) to try to pull off the ruse.  Heck, we even get Rosie/whatever the bodybuilder's name is, as she embraces her inner bimbo and forgets about her husband Ogden (who's at a proctologist convention elsewhere in the hotel).

Gary Shimokawa unfortunately wouldn't direct any other L & S episodes.

"Buddy Can You Spare a Father"

"Buddy Can You Spare a Father"
February 15, 1977
B-


This story, written by Monica Johnson (her first of four) and Eric Cohen (his first of two), is perhaps the saddest one so far.  Shirley's father, Jack, has traveled the world in the Merchant Marines, but he's in town and soon borrowing money and disappointing Shirley's hopes of spending time with her "daddy."  (As with Shirley's mother, we'd never see him again, although that makes more sense in his case, especially since her mom lives in California.)  Since Shirley sees the good in people, she continues to believe in him, even when he sells off her funeral plot, and she goes to a dive bar (on Squiggy's advice!) just to show him how fun she is.  The warped record of "Daddy's Little Girl" is a nice symbol of the dysfunctional relationship.  Meanwhile, Laverne, the comparative realist, hates seeing her friend go through all this and even has a censor-baiting line about Mr. Feeney being "full of it."

The shipping notes are again odd here.  Lenny goes grocery shopping with Laverne (offscreen), but she later says that he insisted on her pushing him in the cart.  Squiggy, while Shirley is removing nail polish that his manicurist date put on his hands (!), finds himself in the unaccustomed role of confidante, hence the suggestion that she go hang out with her father at the docks.  She listens to Squiggy because she's drinking cooking sherry, for at least the second time this season.  (It will later be revealed that her father has a drinking problem, adding another melancholy note even to the comic relief in this episode.)

Speaking of Squiggy, he says that his stepfather used to lock him in the closet, and his only friends were the moths.  That sort of explains his interest in moths in other episodes, although it figures that his backstory is going to be tragicomic in this episode.

Bartender Jack Perkins played a Patient the previous year.  Ray DeVally, Jr., would direct eight more episodes.

"Steppin' Out"

Rosie seems to have a
different hairstyle in every
 episode, but then she
 is comparatively rich.

"Steppin' Out"
February 8, 1977
C

This Deborah Leschin story feels like filler.  The girls try to get ready for a big date but things keep going wrong, including a fire breaking out in the neighborhood.  Not that they're terribly concerned about their neighbor, but the water being shut off in their building does affect their grooming.

Not shipping notes per se, but both Lenny and Squiggy leer at Laverne when they see her in her slip, and Squiggy asks if Shirley is "naked, too."  Oh, and Carmine is still seeing "that divorcy" Lucille.  (I'm assuming they never went to Europe, or that's just not going to be mentioned again.)

"Call Me a Taxi"

Supplemental income

"Call Me a Taxi"
February 1, 1977
B-

Deborah Leschin and Paula A. Roth wrote this episode that, while not feminist per se, does inadvertently address the pay gap and the double standard.  And it's another episode I sort of remember from the time, both the "taxi dancing" and Shirley's bosom-stuffing.

In 1960 (the year this episode might be set), women who worked full-time made 61 cents for every dollar men made, while in '77 it had dropped to 59 cents.  (It reached 78 cents in 2013, with no more recent stats at this website: https://www.infoplease.com/womens-earnings-percentage-mens-1951-2013).  Now admittedly, Laverne and Shirley aren't doing the same job as Lenny and Squiggy, but when the girls are laid off for three weeks and the guys start making overtime, there is a feeling that it's unfair, especially since the girls are good at their job and the guys possibly aren't.

And when the girls decide to make some money during the three weeks away from the brewery, they get the humiliating work of a-dime-a-dance.  Lenny and Squiggy (who must by the laws of sitcoms show up) think it's normal for guys to be there but shameful for women.  And yet, it's clear that most (maybe all) the customers are "vermin," while our girls are "nice."  Also, Laverne refuses Rosie's pity money but agrees to work minimum wage for her father.  So the gender dynamics here are not that simple.

I will say that I was leaning towards a C+ but Lenny and Squiggy are genuinely funny in their guises as respectively a big-game hunter and a novelist, and I like the irony that they feel they are supplying fantasy to the humdrum lives of the dancers, rather than the other way around.  We know that when they give their tickets to Laverne and Shirley, they will pair off L & L and S & S, but there's also a bit of them accidentally dancing together.  (Not the last time LenSquig will be teased for humorous purposes.)

Larry Hankin is Tall Dancer here and would later play Biff.  Peter Elbling is Dancer (presumably the shorter one), doing a vaguely European accent again after being Eric the German before.  Frances Peach is Mary but would have two other roles.  Julie Payne is Charmayne here and would be Colonel Turner in a two-parter a couple years later. 

And Rose Michtom is uncredited as the elderly Ticket Lady, but she'd later appear a few times as Mrs. Kolcheck/Kolchek.  (I instantly recognized her today from a taping of Too Close for Comfort, where she kept screwing up the line "I'm a drowning victim" by emphasizing "victim" rather than "drowning."  She has no lines here but she was then pushing eighty, and I'm curious to see how she does with L & S dialogue.)

"Guinea Pigs"

"Guinea Pigs"
January 18, 1977
C+

It's weird that I recall from the time details about this Jack-Winter-written story, like Shirley's version of Grace that makes "food" rhyme with "good," because it's not that funny an episode.  The only time I laughed was when Shirley did the Bunny Hop with a sleepy Laverne on her back.  The girls become the title subjects when they want to earn fast money to attend a cocktail party that requires $20 admission.  (One episode this season suggested they make less than $60/week.)

Note that Mrs. Babish has a date, which is why she gives Shirley her party invitation.  The episode does have some S & S and L & L shipping, although some of it is admittedly odd, like the boys spying on the girls as they change into cocktail dresses in the back of the delivery truck.  Lenny helps Laverne carry in her laundry, and he seems a lot more responsive to her flirtation (to find out about where the guys go secretly to make extra cash) than Squiggy is to Shirley's, but then Shirley is just resting her head on Squiggy's shoulder (her signature move, as in the girls' first HD guest shot), while Laverne is nuzzling and possibly kissing Lenny's neck.

Volunteer Leoda Richards would have two other roles on the show, but not until the '80s.  Jack Lukes, who's Guy #1, would play three other characters.  Kenneth Gilman is Dr. Sandor here but would return as Chickie Gale.  And this time Harry Shearer doesn't just do a voiceover but appears onscreen, in a skullcap bald wig, as the Danzaly named Harold.

"Playing Hooky"

"Playing Hooky"

January 11, 1977

C+

The title turns out to be a pun in this Barry Rubinowitz story, as the girls call in sick to work but end up being mistaken for hookers by two vice cops.  Maybe Shirley would've been better off accepting Squiggy's offer to spend the day with him, watching TV and frying fish.  And it turns out that Laverne's father is using their apartment during the daytime as his love nest.  (I think it's safe to say that he and Edna are not an item yet.)

Archie Hahn, who was on what feels like half of the '70s sitcoms and would be one of the worst players on Whose Line Is It Anyway?, plays Bob here and would later be a nameless Worker.

"Anniversary Show"

Oh no, a clip show!

"Anniversary Show"
January 10, 1977
C+

Ah, yes, a dreaded clip show.  This isn't bad as such shows go, although obviously they're harder to sit through on DVD.  The screen during the opening credits says "Laverne & Shirley Birthday Show," but IMDB says "Anniversary Show,"* and the framing story is that the girls' friends, including Rosie, are throwing a party because they won a big bowling tournament.  The girls mistakenly take a train to Canada, so everyone sits around and reminisces about them, including moments that none of the people at the party were present for, like Shirley wooing Richie.  Still, it is nice to see scenes from that episode again, as well as Lenny's proposal, plus a thirty-second montage of some of Lenny & Squiggy's entrances.  And we hear that Mrs. Babish's second husband (of how many I don't know) was named Lloyd.

Paula A. Roth and Roger Garrett wrote the frame story, and he'd write ten more episodes.  I'm mostly just tagging the people listed on IMDB, which means leaving out the various writers and directors of the episodes we see clips from, but I'm also including Winkler and Howard of course.


*The actual anniversary would've been closer to January 27th, but I guess the middle episode of Season Two is close enough.

"Guilty Until Proven Not Innocent"

"Guilty Until Proven Not Innocent"
January 4, 1977
B-

Sand and Kaprall co-wrote this story where Kaprall's Officer Norman turns out to be not much help when Laverne gets arrested for shoplifting.  I was leaning towards a C+, but the scene where a drunk Mrs. Babish plays the sax as a drunk Shirley sings the blues (rhyming "jail" with "money" rather than "bail"), and then Lenny and Squiggy enter as respectively the Lone Ranger and the Devil, is genuinely funny. 

Note that Carmine has arranged a double date for himself and Mr. DeFazio, which is a little weird, but we never see it or find out any details.  It's mainly just there to explain why the girls aren't going to Green Bay when Laverne's father drives their car.  Also, this is one of several Season Two episodes where Shirley writes in her diary during the tag.

"Oh Hear the Angels' Voices"

"Oh Hear the Angels' Voices"
December 21, 1976
C+

The gang puts on a Christmas show at a mental hospital, which is as odd as it sounds.  I might've gone with a B-, but I didn't feel like the acts were that memorable, even the McKean-and-Lander-penned "The Jolliest Fat Man" song.  Note that it's now a month until the Lucille & Carmine trip to Europe.

Garry Marshall makes another uncredited onscreen appearance as a Drummer, while David W. Duclon, who wrote this episode and others, plays Vincent Van Eagle.  And the one and only Howard Hesseman is Dr. Grayson, around the time he had a recurring role as Craig Plager on The Bob Newhart Show and almost two years before he became Johnny Fever on WKRP in Cincinnati.

"Two of Our Weirdos Are Missing"

"Two of Our Weirdos Are Missing"
December 7, 1976
B-

This episode is somewhat off but it is admittedly funnier than most of the other episodes so far this season, especially Squiggy's lines.  (My favorite is the one that goes something like, "Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls, Children of All Religions.")

Both Rosie Greenbaum and Officer Norman Hughes appear, she of course flaunting her wealth and insulting the girls, while Laverne uses kisses and a whispered promise to get Norman to stay behind and answer the phone in case Shirley's new boyfriend the golf pro calls.  (He presumably does, since we see her smooching him in the tag.)  In fact, Bo Kaprall, who plays Norman, co-wrote this episode, his first of two; Bob Sand is his co-writer both times.

When Lenny and Squiggy invite the girls to the circus, Shirley would rather ride in Rosie's Cadillac, but Laverne seems up for it.  And she's the one who wants to stay and listen to the guys' problems but Shirley insists on going.  Then the next morning, Shirley wakes up Laverne with the news that Lenny and Squiggy "have runned away."  (It sounds like a blooper that slipped through, with Marshall teasing Williams about it, so Williams corrects herself, but then she says "runned" away again when announcing it to the others.)  It turns out that they've runned away to the circus, which means funny costumes of course.  The girls go after them, offering their help if the guys return.  And then Laverne and Shirley get attacked offscreen by a half dozen midgets!  (Frank Delfino, who spent the earlier part of the decade at Paramount as a stand-in to the Brady kids, leading to an onscreen role as a Kaplutian, plays Charlie, the midget who invites them into his trailer.)

"Good Time Girls"

"Good Time Girls"
November 30, 1976
C+

Greg Antonacci returns as Hector, here unable to take a hint when the girls repeatedly reject him.  As revenge, he writes their names and number on the restroom wall of a pool hall.  This leads to them being attacked by two leering accountants.  Yet, they are unable to be honest with Hector and end up telling him that they don't want to lose him as a friend by going out with him.

The best part of this episode is of course when Laverne and Shirley dress in drag, in what turns out to be Lenny and Squiggy's clothes, to take their phone number off the wall.  I like the guys' guesses on who these two strangely familiar fellas are, and then Squiggy reacting as if he's been caught exposed by having women in a men's room.  Note that Lucille honks offscreen and we learn, one, she's divorced, and two, she's still planning to take Carmine to Europe.

Fred Willard this time plays the Man in Bathroom, with a fake mustache.  Bruce Kimmel, who's Scott, would have two later roles.  Stephen Nathan, who would write three later episodes, appears onscreen as Kevin.  Laura Levine would write one other episode.

"Dear Future Model"

"Dear Future Model"

Lucille/Carmine.  (Lucmine?  Carmille?)

November 23, 1976
C+

In this story by Barbara Robles (her only credit at IMDB) and Judy Skelton, Shirley's latest scheme to make her dreams come true is mail-order modeling lessons.  Lucille (Sandy Wirth) now runs some sort of Tupperware-like lingerie company and agrees to have the girls model for Rosie Greenbaum and Rosie's friends, oddly enough in Laverne & Shirley's apartment.  This allows Shirley to be annoyed with Lucille, while Laverne is annoyed by Rosie, although there's not much of a pay-off to either.  Then the girls go to a real modeling agency but get overlooked.

It's kind of weird to have the girls so insecure about their looks and weight, although I guess they're Hollywood-average.  Lenny scoffs at the idea that a book can teach them how to be sexy.  And I couldn't help wondering how exactly the Tarzan rope that Laverne uses would work in a basement apartment.

Photographer Michael Mann would play a Lackey the next year.  Receptionist Deborah Harmon would star as a mother of eight a dozen years later on ABC's Just the Ten of Us.  Billy Sands, who's Holms here and would be Waldo later, would probably at that time have been most recognizable as either Private Dino Papparelli on Sgt. Bilko or "Tinker" Bell on McHale's Navy.

"Look Before You Leap"

"Look Before You Leap"
November 16, 1976
B+

This is mostly set at the girls' apartment and doesn't have guest stars (not counting extras at the Pizza Bowl).  As such, it is a very interesting look at the interactions of what is now the core cast of seven.  But of course the episode is just as notable for its script, by David W. Duclon (his first of four) and Deborah Leschin (her second of six, after the quite good "Fakeout at the Stakeout"), being both daring and Family-Hour-friendly.*

We start with slapstick, as the dumbwaiter that we saw in a recent episode as being a sort of pipeline to Lenny & Squiggy's apartment (up on the fourth floor? maybe the intervening neighbors ignore it) is now being used by the guys to play Mine Shaft.  In fact, Mrs. Babish and Lenny have to rescue Squiggy from the shaft.  Then Carmine shows up and yells at Shirley because Rosie Greenbaum (not shown) told him that Shirley has an appointment with a "baby doctor."  She says it's on behalf of a friend of a friend of friend.  Carmine apologizes, but I think it's interesting that his first reaction is anger, rather than sympathy.  If she were in what we discover is Laverne's situation, he presumably would not try to help her, at least not initially.  Well, he might threaten to beat up someone but that's about it.

The audience has seen that Laverne isn't feeling well and it soon becomes clear who the appointment is really for.  Carmine apologizes to Shirley, but the other guys mostly find it amusing that Laverne might be pregnant.  However, this is their initial reaction and it will change.

Shirley confides in Mrs. Babish, partly through a flashback to a month ago, when Laverne was out all night and passed out in a vat, where she had a dream about a honeymoon with a cute guy she'd met that night.  Then it turns out she's wearing boxer shorts under her dress and over her full-slip.  It's not quite The Miracle of Morgan's Creek, but there are parallels, although there Trudy Kockenlocker is definitely knocked up by a passing stranger and writer-director Preston Sturges is doing everything he can to subvert World-War-II era censorship.  L & S leaves things more ambiguous.  We don't know even know if Laverne had sex, although maybe the doctor can tell her that.

Mrs. Babish is motherly here and in fact mentions that she has five kids.  Garrett plays the scene well, warm but sensible, sympathetic to Laverne's plight but also believing that it's best that Laverne tell her father before he "hears it on the streets."  Laverne understandably fears doing this, because her pop is an old-fashioned Italian.  Also, she's ashamed that this has happened (or might've happened), especially how.  But when they have their talk, he's also warm and supportive, while still taking a few moments to rant and rave.  (And he asks if the potential father is Italian.)  It's a sweet scene that gives Foster more to play than the easy comedy he's been given so far.

But it is of course McKean and his Lenny that show previously hidden depths in this episode.  After Squiggy literally drags Shirley out of the apartment— "Don't worry, he won't hurt her," Lenny tells Laverne— L & L have a talk.  Lenny is nervous at first and Laverne is already on edge because she has an appointment with the obstetrician in an hour and a half.  But Lenny eventually admits that he and Squiggy flipped a coin to see who is "going to volunteer to be her husband."  The scene is somehow played for both laughs and sentiment and it mostly works.  (The line "Plus, I'll practically never hit you or nothin' " is admittedly funny because it emphatically doesn't belong in a proposal, but that doesn't make it not disturbing.)  When Lenny explains that his last name of Kosnowski means, "Help there's a hog in my kitchen," Laverne's confused, nasal "That's nice," underlines the real emotions of these often cartoony characters.  The situation isn't funny but the way they handle it can't help but be funny.

And when Laverne, even under stress, can't help a wisecrack with "Awww, and you lost, huh?", she rubs his arm, so that she's mocking herself but also grateful to her friend.  And then he says, with utter sincerity, "No, I won."  And the studio audience just melts.  Who knew that Lenny wasn't just a wrist-biting weirdo?  (At the beginning of the last scene, he and Squiggy are ogling girls, and Lenny doesn't exactly act like he was ready to make a lifetime commitment to Laverne.)

He references his Lone Wolf jacket, and we again see that her L is on his back, but he acts like he's ready to settle down, promising to take the dispatcher's test and support her.  He concludes by saying he likes her and he'd like her to marry him.  He's already kneeling and he now puts his head on her knee, as if he's humbly asking her to do him a favor.  The studio audience is even more moved this time, not just letting out "awws" but clapping and whistling.  OK, it's an overhyped, mid-'70s, ABC sitcom audience, but still.

And Laverne, who couldn't figure out how to get the grease off her hand after stroking Lenny's hair on the "Hi, Neighbor" episode, rubs his back and sweetly calls him Len.  She has him sit beside her, where she "can see his face."  She calls him a "big dope," but gently, and she says she's "real flattered" by his proposal.  She strokes his shoulder but tells him she can't accept.  He looks genuinely disappointed.

She gets to her feet and explains why getting married because she might be "in trouble" (Shirley had used the word "pregnant" earlier) would be wrong, and the title makes sense, that Laverne could leap into marriage with Lenny but it wouldn't be right (at least at this time).  He stands up, too, but puts his hands in his pockets, understanding and accepting what she's saying.  She tells him he's a "great friend and a real sweet guy."  She hugs him and his hands struggle helplessly in his jacket, unable to hug her back, a sight gag that gives the audience the release of more laughter, while fitting the scene.

Both Marshall and McKean play the scene perfectly, hitting all these different tones.  At the time, I don't think there was a conscious Lavenny thread for the series (if there ever was), but this is probably the episode where such a ship becomes plausible.  Even if you think Laverne's feelings are platonic, her fondness comes through, and I think it's arguable that this is the episode where Lenny begins to be smitten, not just having a casual lust for his old friend.  And of course, it would not be the last time he'd propose to her.  Even if you don't ship Laverne & Lenny, you have to admit that this scene humanizes him in a way we haven't seen before.

When Shirley returns, she says that Squiggy told her and she thinks it's "the most beautiful, wonderful, adorable thing she's ever heard of in her whole life."  However, she is not a Lavenny shipper, so when Laverne pretends she accepted, just to get a laugh, Shirley thinks Laverne is crazy.

In the last scene, Laverne silently tells her father she's not pregnant, then she and Shirley whisper the good news to Lenny and Squiggy respectively.  Frank tells Edna, and they embrace, although I'm not clear if they're a couple yet.  (Remember, this is the first scene we see of them together.)  Shirley whispers to Carmine, who's got his regular gig singing at the Pizza Bowl.  He breaks into "Hallelujah," and Shirley, Squiggy, and Lenny join in.  Squiggy puts his hands on Shirley's shoulders from behind, and she doesn't push him away.  An embarrassed Laverne buries her face on Lenny's chest.  And the episode ends there, perhaps forever changing the game, or is this just a blip?  Stay tuned....



*In January 1975, The FCC established the Family Viewing Hour, which tried to move "sex and violence" out of the 8 to 9 p.m. block of television.  It was repealed on November 4, 1976, shortly before this episode aired, but wouldn't officially become null and void until the next season.  You'll notice that when Three's Company originally aired in the Spring of '77, it was at 9:30 on Thursdays.  Racier innuendo aired in the 9 to 10 p.m. block, while "wholesome" shows, like Garry Marshall's Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley, had to be less direct.  A typical early Three's Company joke would be Jack telling Chrissy he's so depressed that he "can't even raise a smile" when he walks in on her showering.  That would be too out there for Laverne & Shirley, at least at this point.

"The Bridal Shower"

"The Bridal Shower"
November 9, 1976
B-

This story, written by two women— Paula A. Roth (her first of thirteen) and Judy Skelton (her first of two)— is about Laverne and Shirley going to the title event, even though it's being hosted by their frenemy Rosie Greenbaum.  White gives a swaggering, memorable performance as Rosie and understandably became a recurring character.  The script isn't hilarious but it has its moments.  Note that their friend Anne Marie being a nun is mentioned, when the girls try to think of who else in their high school social club, the Angora Debs, is still single.

Although the show is set in the '50s, when "the girls" can be seen as old maids at 21ish, it was made in the '70s, so L & S get revenge by making their single life sound more exciting than their friends' married life.  (I kept expecting Rosie being married to a proctologist to lead to tasteless or at least censor-baiting jokes, but it's just thrown in there a couple times, and this isn't M*A*S*H.)  Their friend Elinor, whose shower it is, says that neither married nor single life is perfect.

I can't think of any shipping notes, other than Squiggy suggesting that Laverne and Shirley pretend to be on a double date with him and Lenny for Couples' Night at the Pizza Bowl to get half-price pizza.  It is notable that Mrs. Babish is more clearly the landlady here and even has a line that sounds looped in later about not understanding her tenants.

Valorie Armstrong, who plays Cookie here, would be Bernice later.

"Excuse Me, May I Cut In?"

"Excuse Me, May I Cut In?"

October 26, 1976

B

This is what a crossover episode should be, taking established characters and seeing how they interact together, figuring out how to make their worlds collide.  Although, yes, it does have the obligatory hyped-up-mid-1970s studio audience cheering madly at entrances.  It's the only L & S story written by Fred Fox, Jr., who did do twenty-nine for Happy Days, but he gets L & S enough that he can make a joke about the absent Lenny & Squiggy.*  The main oddity is that Betty Garrett just shows up as Edna Babish, the new landlady, without explanation, but that may be a production-order vs. airdate issue.

The girls are still having problems with their TV set, but then Shirley hears about a dance contest at Jefferson High, where his & hers TVs are first prize, so she comes up with a scheme to go on a double date with Richie Cunningham (Ron Howard of course) and Potsie Weber (Anson Williams in his only appearance on this show, and no relation to Cindy W.).  Laverne was the best female dancer at their high school, and Potsie is the best male dancer at Jefferson.  Shirley thinks Richie is crazy about her, so she decides to use sex appeal to set up the date, without mentioning the TVs.

I'll paraphrase the exchange since I didn't write it down, but when Shirley suggests following up on their date from eleven and a half months ago (the HD episode "A Date with Fonzie" indeed aired November 11, 1975), Richie thinks that's a great idea.

RICHIE: What would you like to do?

SHIRLEY: (seductively) Anything but murder, Mister.

Williams's delivery on this is wonderful and she had me in hysterics, but I also want to say that I'd forgotten how funny Ron Howard can (or at least could) be.  Richie is a senior at this point and trying to seem mature but he's still naive, so some of the humor comes out of that.  Potsie pretends to be more experienced than he is, claiming to have been with nine or ten women, but one big smooch from Laverne stuns him.  Richie is so thrown off by Shirley's kiss that he tries to exit through the closet, and Howard and Williams have a nice chemistry together (going back to American Graffiti of course), if you can get past the age difference and the fact that, as Shirley realizes in the tag, her character is using his.

Carmine is hosting the dance and sings "At the Hop," but mostly it's generic instrumentals.  We do get to see Potsie and Laverne dance a little, until the girl he promised to go to the dance with kicks him in both shins.  (Stephanie Faracy, then 24, plays the girl Potsie dumped for Laverne, and she would later star in the early '90s sitcom True Colors.)  Laverne makes Richie her dance partner and guides him all the way through.  (Penny M. learned to dance at her mother's studio, but this is the first episode that really showcases that talent.)  He sounds sincere later when he tells Shirley he had a fun time, if not the one he hoped for when he showed up at her door twice singing his signature tune, "Blueberry Hill."  So then she gives him the big kiss, telling him it's because she wanted to, not because she had to.

The previous episode mentioned that Carmine had a date with Lucille, and here we find out her full name is Lucille Lockwash, and the actress who plays her is Sandy Wirth.  She's referred to as Mrs., presumably divorced or widowed, and she was in the backseat with Carmine before Shirley interrupted them.  Not only that, she's taking Carmine to Europe!  It's funny that, on a very shippy episode, this is the relationship that's, well, going on a cruise.

*And he'd write the first part of the "Shotgun Wedding" crossover night for Happy Days, more on that later.

"Bachelor Mothers"

"Bachelor Mothers"
October 19, 1976
C+

The Fonz is shoehorned into this story, written by Barry Rubinowitz (his first of eight), although I suppose you could argue that only his powerful smooches, of both Laverne and Shirley, could've convinced them to babysit on a Saturday night.  He also demonstrates that his finger-snap and/or "Ayyyyy!" work as well on babies and television sets as on jukeboxes.

Actually, it looks like this was sort of a two-parter, as Udana Power (who's most recognizable to me as Nurse Nancy Darwin on Soap) also played Louisa Corrigan on Happy Days that night, although in "Fonzie the Father" she's very pregnant by one of Fonzie's oldest friends.  Anyway, if they wanted to have an episode where the girls babysit, there were probably less contrived ways to bring this about.  They turn out not to be great sitters, wanting to ditch the baby when two fellas they like call, although Laverne can't even remember which one she likes.  And when Shirley has to race in the rain to catch Laverne at the bus stop before Laverne heads pointlessly to Chicago, Shirley leaves the baby under the care of Lenny & Squiggy, who tune the TV in to Heckle & Jeckle (the magpie cartoon referenced on I believe the episode where the guys move in upstairs).

Note that Carole Ita White is credited onscreen and at IMDB as Rosie Greenbaum, but I'm not sure where she would've fit into such an apartment-centered episode.

"Angels of Mercy"

"Angels of Mercy"
October 5, 1976
C

In the episode where the girls found out that their old friend had become a nun, Shirley claimed that they were candy-stripers, while here it comes true.  Unfortunately, I didn't find the episode, written by Bickley and Warren, particularly funny.

Charles Frank returns as Jerry Callihan, the cute writer neighbor that Laverne has a crush on.  (In fact, it turns out everyone in the building but Jerry knows this.)  She does his laundry and feeds fish, and even agrees to work in the hospital to try to win him over.  He doesn't ask her out until she's honest with him (offscreen), but then we never see him again.

Meanwhile, Shirley has dreams of meeting and marrying a rich doctor, dreams that she refuses to give up on, even after a doctor attacks her in a supply closet, ripping her uniform and trying to give her ether!

Mekka is credited, but I'm pretty sure he couldn't have been in any of the scenes, even in first run.  There aren't really any shipping notes, although it is weird as an adult to see Shirley straddle a sleeping patient while trying to help Laverne change his bed linens.  Also, the opening credits for Season Two have wisely dropped "DeFazio" and "Feeney."

"Drive! She Said"

"Drive! She Said"
September 28, 1976
B-

Laverne & Shirley came back for Season Two, so I and millions of others watched it at 8:30 every Tuesday, after Happy Days.  (Eight Is Enough wouldn't start until the following March and it's entirely possible I didn't watch anything in the 9:00 clock slot yet, definitely not CBS's M*A*S*H in its fifth season, since I was only eight.)  I was more into Welcome Back, Kotter (Season Two) and What's Happening!! (Season One) in the eight to nine block on Thursdays, but I was already an ABC-sitcom connoisseur and Tuesdays would've been my second-favorite night.

Anyway, I laughed a few times at this episode watching it today and I do feel like the cast and production team are gaining more confidence.  Storm knows how to move the characters around, even in the extended driving sequence, and Jack Winter's first of three L & S scripts seems to have a good handle on said characters, from their tendency to name-drop relatives (Shirley apparently has only two cousins, Mikey and Mickey I think it was, and a 79-year-old uncle whose name escapes me) to Laverne's fondness for milk & Pepsi.  Not that everything is in place yet.  For instance, when Lenny & Squiggy make their first entrance, it's through an already open door and they are actually coming downstairs to complain that Laverne and Shirley yelling secrets out the window is interrupting their "orgy"!  And later we see Laverne and Shirley throwing them and their dates out of the car the girls have bought.

The only plot (no subplot or even sub-subplot, like Lenny joining the Reserves, this time) is about Shirley teaching Laverne to drive and it going badly, so Laverne gets her father to teach her.  The weird thing is, I don't remember Laverne and Shirley owning a car at any point and certainly it's gone by the time they have Lenny and Squiggy drive them to California in an ice cream truck.

Bo Kaprall returns as Officer Norman Hughes, who reluctantly gives Laverne a ticket after she runs over his foot!  We find out that they've gone out five times and she agrees to go out with him again, so he says he'll pay for her ticket.  Other than that, no real shipping notes, with Carmine seeing a woman named Lucille (not credited on IMDB) but still calling Shirley "Angel Face."  Note that in the revamped credits, we see Betty Garrett as Mrs. Babish, but her character is not yet introduced or even referred to, although if the girls are going to keep parking their car out front, you'd think the landlady should be informed.