"Laverne & Shirley Go to Night School"October 17, 1978
C+
This is saved from a C or lower by two things: the cameo by Hans Conreid (although I wish he had better material than the script by Marc Sotkin) and the heart-to-heart talk with Laverne and her father, where he says that she's just like her mother, only able to learn things she cares about. However, it was hard for me get past Shirley pressuring Laverne to go to night school to become a medical technician, something that seems to make Laverne even more uncomfortable than candy-striping did. Note that Laverne thinks Shirley is the smart one because Shirley got "straight C's" in school.
Carmine, Lenny, and Squiggy are all missing, although there's a perfect "Hello" moment when Laverne tells Edna, "You have a lot of filth living in this building." Co-creator Lowell Ganz didn't direct any other L & S episodes, which is probably just as well.
Fun fact - according to a Penny and Cindy interview (and I think one of the class reunion episodes?) - Squiggy was their class' valedictorian.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I thought that was hilarious when I heard that interview, but then in the 10th-year reunion we're told that Squiggy never graduated???
DeleteWhich doesn't explain why Lenny and Squiggy go to all of Shirley's class reunions in S1. Maybe because they're unofficial?
DeleteWell, in Season One I think the girls have been out of high school three years, which gets retconned later.
DeleteYep, I think that's about right. I can't remember the dates from L&S Move in.
DeleteWhat I recall from "Laverne & Shirley Move in" is the girls have been out of high school for six months and have just started working at Shotz. I don't remember the year it's supposed to be, although logically it should be '56.
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