"Playing the Roxy"

"Playing the Roxy"
September 19, 1978
B

Did I mention that the Family Hour had been dead for a year at this point?  So not only would "Good Old Reliable Janet" go to a nude beach at 9 p.m. that night, but here we have sweet, innocent Shirley thinking she's a stripper!  And, blame it on puberty, but I remember this episode from the time better than anything from the first three seasons, although still not crystal-clear.  However, I can recite Bosom Buddies dialogue from two or three years later, and that show was definitely not heavily syndicated.

This is in fact directed by Joel Zwick, his first of an impressive thirty-three times, all before he'd move over to BBuddies for eighteen episodes (including the one with "special guest Penny Marshall" as herself).  Along with the script by co-writers Stephen Nathan and Paul B. Price (their first of three for Season Four, although Nathan also played Kevin in Season One), this gives this episode a different, naughtier feel than usual.  Plus it was just fun to see Cindy W. play with her more wholesome image, as Joyce DeWitt would play with hers a half hour later.

The girls are sitting around eating breakfast, Shirley in her pajamas and Laverne in her slip.  Shirley discourages Laverne from going out to check the mail and offers to go herself, first putting on a robe.  When Laverne teases her about this, Shirley says a line which I'm willing to bet is one of my Top Five for lines I remember from the time: "I treat my body like a temple, Laverne, while you treat yours like an amusement park."  In an episode understandably filled with raucous studio audience reactions, that gets quite a response, as does Laverne's delayed reply after Shirley has gone out, "My body is not amusing," which I also remember from when I was ten.

Shirley tumbles down the stairs while Laverne goes into the bedroom and puts on a robe.  She has been reading a Confessions issue with the serialized reminisces of a stripper named Roxy LaTour.  Shirley thinks Laverne should be reading something classy like Jane Eyre, but she's been reading the smut, too.  And when Shirley-- Sitcom 101 lesson here-- gets a bump on her head she, that's right, thinks that she's Roxy, hence the title.

In a plot thread that should feel sleazier than it does, Carmine is turned on by this more sexual version of Shirley and in the tag even shows up in his bathrobe to pick up where they left off.  (Roxy lets Laverne touch Carmine's chest, even though Laverne says, "I'm not allowed," and Laverne clearly enjoys it.)  Definitely sleazier is that the entranced Lenny and Squiggy not only hope that Roxy will strip in the living room, they book her a gig at the smoker for their lodge!  And even that didn't offend me, because I thought this episode was funnier and more complex than the "Bachelor Party" episode in Season One.

And I can mostly attribute that to the way that Penny M. and Cindy W. play their scenes in this episode, with Laverne having what feels like a crush on Roxy, or at least an admiration for this brassy dame who's shown up in her apartment and in the body of her best friend, who "doesn't even have a heiny" but does have all the moves.  When Shirley has regained her memory and identity (which she almost does at the sight of Boo Boo Kitty), she's sort of jealous of Roxy.  Laverne says she doesn't prefer Roxy as a roomie but it wouldn't hurt for Shirley to have a little Roxy in her.  I'm going to guess that as actresses, it was fun for Cindy and Penny to mix it up a little, have Cindy play the more outrageous one, but I think also as characters they're exploring new ways of behaving, as the show edges gradually into the '60s, while still negotiating the virgin-whore trope of society, which was still alive and well but bendable in the late '70s.

Frank and Edna are both absent, but I imagine he would've been scandalized by Shirley's behavior.  I should mention that this was not the first glimpse of Laverne DeFazio that ABC audiences had after the New York two-parter.  In what remains one of the ultimate crossover episodes, the premiere of Mork & Mindy on Thursday, September 14th, had Mork flash back to the Fonz fixing him up on a date with Laverne.  Unlike Shirley's double-dates with Richie, they did not hit it off, and Morkverne is not a thing.  (Reviewed here: https://reviewingeverytvshowiown.blogspot.com/2016/07/mork-mindy-pilot.html.)