"That's Entertainment" script, Scene J

Yes, there's no Scene I.  We begin Act Two with another set-up scene, this time two pages long.  In the script, "Frank is doing movements similar to Carmine's dance steps in D scene" [sic].  Then he bows and touches the floor with one hand but needs Carmine's help getting back up and sitting down.  In the episode, the two of them are already sitting.  Carmine says that music has changed so dancing has changed.  Frank says that it sounds like men tearing up the street.  Carmine says Frank would like rock & roll if he gave it a chance, and Carmine starts naming off some bands.  Then we fade to Lenny and Squiggy and their California band.  But it's, again, longer in the script:

FRANK

You ask me, I think it's noise.  It ain't romantic.  You can't dance to it.  The way kids dress nowadays, you can't tell the boys from the girls anyway.

CARMINE

(SMILING) I can.  Mr. DeFazio, you gotta keep up with the times.  There's a lot of good music out there.

FRANK

I'd rather stick with my kind of music.  I don't want to be some middle-aged teeny-bumper.

CARMINE

That's teeny-bopper.

FRANK

Whatever.

CARMINE

Mr. DeFazio, I know you'd like rock and roll if you gave it a chance.  Have you heard the Sopwith Camel, the Strawberry Alarm Clock, The Electric Prunes...

FRANK

Are those the groups or the songs?

A couple things going on here.  Frank is again asserting he'd rather stick with what he knows and what fits with his generation, while Carmine argues that Frank should keep with the times and keep an open mind.  Also, Carmine's list of groups (no, they're not songs) are heavy on the psychedelic rock, suggesting that this takes place in the Summer of Love or later.  The episode as aired blurs both points, in order to move things along and not spend as much time on set-up.  Another thing I never really thought about before was that the girls started calling Mrs. Babish "Edna" fairly early on, but I don't think Carmine ever got to the point of calling Mr. DeFazio "Frank."

"That's Entertainment" script, Scene H

That's right, there's no Scene F or G.  The two-page dialogue-less dance number obviously has to follow Scene E's set-up, but it's H.

The script breaks down the specific sections of the dance, in some cases saying how many bars they last.  And, yes, the mirror shots are here, although there were only supposed to be six max of Laverne and I count at least a dozen in one shot.

Maybe it's the rapport Eddie and Penny had, but it's actually flirtier onscreen (to the extent it is) than in the script, where she does not, for instance, jump into his arms.

And thus ends Act One.

"That's Entertainment" script, Scene E

And we're back to Cowboy Bill's for another set-up scene.  For some reason Carmine and Frank enter again, but from where?  Frank is "finishing his interpretation of the sketch."

FRANK

(NURSE'S VOICE) Doctor, Mrs. Kolodny wants you to come over and deliver her baby.  (DOC VOICE) Tell her I'll mail it to her in the morning.

FRANK AND CARMINE HAVE HYSTERIC CONVULSIONS OF LAUGHTER.

In the episode, they just laugh, not convulsively.  We get the exchange about Carmine being a singer and dancer, not a comedian.  The impatient customer does not appear in this version.  Instead, there's this:

FRANK

So hold on, we had the best of some of those, too.  George M. Cohan, Eddie Cantor, Al Jolson... get me?

CARMINE

You want me to perform in blackface?

FRANK

Funny, Carmine.  I'm makin' a point here...

Frank taking Carmine by the hand and dancing into the fade is not in this version.

Again, I think the scene as shot was an improvement.  This version is trying too hard and the "blackface" joke wouldn't have worked even in the early '80s.  I do have to wonder, was Frank's "nurse voice" like Carmine and his "doc voice" like Shirley, or did he go with the more traditional genders?

"That's Entertainment" script, Scene D

This eight-page scene is set in "a typical doctor's examination room."  There's supposed to be "a pin up of a muscle builder" on the wall, but I've
never noticed it.  The skeleton drummer is supposed to have "a cigarette dangl[ing] from one lip" (what lip?) and "a fedora sits very jauntily to one side of the skull a la a very hip musician/drummer."  That would've been interesting, but I guess the prop department didn't go for it.

Shirley's entrance is much like on the episode, although she calls the mooing patient "Mr. Jackson."  But then "Shirley stops next to the muscle builder picture and lustily growls at it.  She sees the door open and quickly pulls down a chart in front of the picture, which shows the same pose, but medical chart style, depicting the veins, arteries, lungs, etc."

In the episode, she sits at her desk, but in the script she remains standing, so after Carmine enters "sexily" and asks if she wants him,  and she says she has a headache, she "pats him on cheek."

After she "raises his blood pressure" with a kiss and asks him to remind her to do that four times a day, there's this omitted dialogue:

CARMINE

Did you operate this morning, Doctor?

SHIRLEY

Yes, on Mr. Wolfson.  I gave him a heart transplant.

CARMINE

He was only supposed to have his appendix removed.

SHIRLEY

(SNAPS FINGERS) Darn!  I told him to get a second opinion.

In the script, Shirley is supposed to "growl" at the sight of Carmine's bottom.  On the other hand, her little spank before he leaves the room was added.

Instead of the "tongue depressors" joke, there's this:

SHIRLEY CROSSES TO MIRROR ON THE WALL AND EXAMINES HER EYES.

SHIRLEY

Look at those eyes.  (PUTS TONGUE DEPRESSOR IN MOUTH AND LOOKS)  Look at that mouth.  I gotta get a doctor.

In the script, Frank notices the sign about the rates so he exits and comes in again, while in the episode he just pretends he's been there before.  The episode omits Shirley's line, "We don't validate parking."

Frank's visit is very brief in the episode, while in the script it goes on for about four and a half pages, full of corny medical jokes.  Considering this is Frank's "fantasy," it's worth mentioning that he's not only a rather smutty Shirmine shipper, but he imagines this exchange:

FRANK

...Do you want me to take my clothes off?

SHIRLEY

Sure do.  But there's no rush.  First we'll talk... maybe have a drink.

And when Frank calls her "a pretty poor excuse for a doctor," she replies, "You're not so bad-looking yourself, buster," I guess in response to the "pretty" part.  But, yes, this is more memorably a scene about Shirley's lust for Carmine.  In the episode, she again kisses Carmine while he's lying down on the examination table, but in the script, she "grabs Carmine, drags him to the floor and kisses him passionately."

I'm not sure why this scene was toned down (unlike the "operetta," which we'll get to), but it's probably just as well it was shortened.

"That's Entertainment" script, Scene C

It's "Cowboy Bill's - Later."  It can't be that much later since, as on the episode, "Frank and Carmine enter singing their own versions of 'Blue Moon.' "  The dialogue is pretty much the same between the script and episode, but there's no mention of the Ritz Brothers in the script.  Also, the stuff with Carmine putting on an apron and starting to clean tables does not come up in the script, although his "waitressing" was mentioned earlier.  The scene is four pages, which seems kind of long for a transitional scene.

"Penny Marshall & Cindy Williams" book, Chapter Three

Cindy explains that she didn't grow up "dirt poor" but "lower middle class," yes, like Shirley.  Also, like Shirley, Cindy was an optimist.  And like Penny, she's half-Italian, although on the mother's side.  She got her sense of humor from both parents.

She wanted to be a nurse, "but the sight of blood was my downfall," interesting in light of how interested Shirley would be in medicine, and doctors.  Like Penny, she worked as a secretary for awhile but really wanted to get into show biz.

There is no mention of her father's alcoholism, perhaps not surprisingly.  It does mention that his death when she was 21 hit her hard.

The chapter seems to end around '71, as she goes to an interview with Garry Marshall, who told her (when she weighed 132 pounds), "I like you; you're like a chunky Barbara Harris."

This chapter doesn't have any of the memorable anecdotes of Williams's Shirley, I Jest and makes Cindy seem like a much less colorful character than Penny.

"That's Entertainment" script, Scene B

"Int. Stage," which is described as "a very simple, elegant setting."  If by that you mean Rhonda in front of a blue curtain, then sure.  Interestingly, she was supposed to sing in three styles, not two.  We do get her singing as a "torch-singer a la Helen Morgan of the 1930's."  But the '40s style isn't in this draft, and the second page of the scene goes straight into the '50s, as on the episode.  Maybe they wanted more of a contrast. 

Then we dissolve to Scene C....

"That's Entertainment" script, Scene A

So, I found a website that sells PDFs of scripts for $10 each, and of the ten Laverne & Shirley scripts available, I decided on this one to start with, because it is such an odd episode, narratively and otherwise.  It is, as I noted in my review, the only L&S script written by either Etan McElroy or Larry Strawther, so I'm curious to see what their "revised final draft," from December 22, 1981 for an episode that would air two and a half months later, is like.

First off, I have to note that the list of sets matches neither the episode as aired nor the script.  It was supposed to be "Girls' Apartment" (presumably downstairs), "Girls' Bedroom," and "Ballroom."  How it ended up with the framework of Cowboy Bill's, I have no idea.

Scene A is, as broadcast, set in the downstairs of the Girls' Apartment, at "night," although I'd say "evening" is more accurate.  Frank is watching Carmine sing "It's Not Unusual," like "Tom Jones with squat thrusts and pelvic grinding."  Carmine does indeed do these movements, although it's mostly shown from the waist up.  The lyrics go on for almost two pages (of the six for this scene), which is thankfully cut short in the episode as aired.

The dialogue between Frank and Carmine is pretty much as we'd hear it.  Until we get to the part where Carmine talks about Frank taking him to a Dodgers game and comparing the L.A. team to the Brooklyn team.  This is the comparison in the script:

CARMINE

Oh yeah, what about when I took you to see Goldfinger" [their typo, not mine] and all you talked about is how they don't make movies like "Gone with the Wind."

FRANK

I'd like to see 007 make a dress outta drapes.

When asked to suggest a "nice song," Mr. DeFazio first goes with "Inka Dinka Doo" by Jimmy Durante.  Carmine says that nowadays people listen to songs that mean something.  So Frank asks what the lyrics are to the number one song that week.  Carmine reluctantly recites from "Hanky Panky" by Tommy James and the Shondells.  (That song hit the charts in 1966, if that's any help with chronology on this show.)

Mr. DeFazio wants Carmine to "waitress" since the girls aren't home.  (This sort of answers my question about why Carmine is waiting on tables in this episode.)  Then they argue about whether "Blue Moon" is a ballad or a rock & roll song.

They "exit arguing as we dissolve to" Scene B....

I don't expect any "Monastery" level changes from script to screen, but I'd say that for the most part this scene is smoother and snappier as aired, although I like the "drapes" line.

"Penny Marshall & Cindy Williams" book, Chapter Two

This chapter focuses on Carole Penny Marshall (first name from Carole Lombard) from birth in 1942 to her arrival in California in '67.  And the family name was originally Marciano.

"Although the Marshalls and the clan of comedy writer and producer Carl Reiner were neighbors who lived opposite each other on the same block for seven years, they hardly knew each other.  Penny has only vague memories of the Reiner family, mostly because, she confesses with her typical deadpan wit, 'We weren't allowed to cross the street.' "  (That's probably my favorite quote in the book.)

Nonetheless, Penny did get Carl R.'s autograph, which she still had as of the time of this book.

I haven't read Penny's biography, but from the title, My Mother Was Nuts, I'm guessing that this book glosses over things a bit.  It does mention that Penny hated dancing but preferred it to chores, the deal her mother offered.

She was also insecure about her "ethnic looks," and notes, "To relive this [her '50s youth] before millions of Americans is a trauma."  She thought she wasn't pretty enough to be a star, so instead she dreamed of "being married with seventeen kids and living on a ranch"!  At the same time, her mother sent her to kosher summer camps because her mother "said Jewish boys make the best husbands."  She did date Jewish boy James Caan.

And she felt lonely because of the age gap between her and her siblings. 

She claims her mother thought New Mexico was closer than Ohio, although this might be a joke.  When Penny went to college in NM, she was "surrounded by all these blond six-footers.  I was in heaven...."  Just in case you were wondering if Penny had a type.

And she married one of them, Michael Henry.  The book is fuzzy on the chronology of her pregnancy, but I remember reading online that she got pregnant out of wedlock and considered abortion.  Instead, she got married and dropped out of college.

The marriage lasted two years and, at the time of this book, Penny apparently knew only vaguely that Mike lived in Arizona.  The Internet tells me he died in Phoenix in 2009 at age 65.

She continued to live in Albuquerque after the divorce, although she felt like she wore a "Scarlet Letter" as a divorcee.  She had various jobs but eventually got into acting.

And brother Garry was "an up-and-coming writer and producer" in L.A.  Re California, Penny says, "As soon as I moved out here, in 1967, I knew I had made the right decision.  The women in Hollywood were all neurotic.  They had all been married for a minute somewhere.  I didn't feel like an outcast."

After contacting Garry, she made arrangements to move there, with daughter Tracy.  "The last thing she would have expected was that less than ten years later, she would emerge as one of the hottest TV stars around," a good cliffhanger to end the chapter on.

"Laverne & Shirley": The Collector's Edition, Volume 1

In 1997, Columbia House Company issued a ten-volume, forty-episode set of the series on VHS.  Copies are still floating around out there and I recently was able to purchase the complete set.  I will be reviewing these tapes on the following basis:

• How does it compare to the DVD versions I acquired last year?
• What are some notable aspects of the packaging?
• Why these episodes and these themes?

As for the numbering, these tapes don't actually say "Volume 1," etc., but this one has the lowest number, 21275, and it makes sense to start with "Meet the Girls."

The back cover says, "Shortly after Laverne DeFazio and Shirley Feeney, two ambitious and feisty girls with lower-class backgrounds, showed up in 1975 on a double date with Richie Cunningham and Arthur 'Fonzie' Fonzarelli, the two girls were given their own series.  Pessimistic Laverne and optimistic Shirley were best friends who worked together at the Shotz Brewery, lived together in a basement apartment at 730 Hampton Street [sic], and yearned for a better life.  As the theme song says: 'We're gonna make our dreams come true.  And we'll do it our way!' "

This is an OK summary, although it doesn't explain how Laverne can be both pessimistic and ambitious, "yearning for a better life."  At least it points out the main character contrast, suggesting what to expect as we "meet the girls."

The first episode is appropriately enough the first episode of the series, "The Society Party."  The look is not as sharp as on the DVD and I was disappointed that we still get just a snippet of Fats Domino's "I'm Walkin'."  The content seems identical, except for Fonzie saying before a commercial break, "Hey, I'd stay tuned if I were you.  Dig it!"  Here's the summary on the videobox:

"When Laverne and Shirley need evening gowns to attend a fancy dinner party, Lenny and Squiggy borrow two dresses from an uncle's wax museum.  Note: Henry Winkler appeared as the Fonz on Happy Days.  Mary Treen (Nana Shotz) played Hilda on The Joey Bishop Show.  The episode promoted in the coming attractions at the end of this episode can be seen on tape six in this collection."

An uncle?  Well, yes, Uncle Elliott is an uncle, but why not say whose uncle?  And why is the viewer supposed to not know who Henry Winkler is and yet somehow care who was on The Joey Bishop Show?  (No offense, but Wikipedia says the 1961-64 sitcom struggled in the ratings and I can't imagine it had much of a following even in '97.)

Next up is another Season One episode, "How Do You Say, 'Are You Dead?' in German?"  Again, the only difference in content from the DVD version is Shirley saying before the last commercial break, "No, no, don't touch that dial, we'll be right back."

Here's the summary: "When a young, non-English-speaking German man working as a delivery boy for a dry cleaner faints in Laverne and Shirley's apartment, his boss fires him-- leaving the girls to break the news to him.  Note: In this episode, Shirley exclaims the classic line: 'You can't send a man out into the world with nothing but a bag of sauerkraut.' "

While there are certainly episodes I enjoy more, I can see this one being chosen to again show a contrast between the girls, here how they think it's best to help a man down on his luck.

The third episode on this tape is the first from Season Two, "Drive! She Said!"  Once again, it's just that last going-to-commercial-break "don't touch that dial" message that is missing on DVD, although this time it's a two-person announcement.

SHIRLEY:  There'll be more fun when the commercial's done.  Laverne, I made a rhyme!
LAVERNE: Whoopie.

The summary from the videobox: "After convincing Laverne to go 'halfsies' with her to buy a 1947 gray Hudson from one of Carmine's dance students, Shirley agrees to teach Laverne to drive-- using a record album as a steering wheel and a banana as a gear shift.  Note: In this episode, Laverne reveals Shirley's middle name and a few other personal secrets."  Well, one other personal secret, about her bra-stuffing.  It is nice to know the type of car they buy, since I don't think it's ever mentioned in canon.

This is a pretty good episode (it still makes me laugh), and a good example for comparison and contrast of the two girls, although I don't know that we're exactly "meeting" them by Season Two.

And lastly, there's an episode from Season Four, which, yes, is really late to meet the girls, but it is a flashback episode, making me wish that "A Nun's Story" had replaced "HDYSAYDiG." 

Here's the videobox summary: "When Laverne's father, Frank, makes a surprise visit at night dressed up as a prowler and the girls spray him with whipped cream, Laverne and Shirley calm their landlady, Mrs. Babish, by explaining how they first became roommates against Frank's wishes.  Note: Betty Garrett (Edna Babish) played Irene Lorenzo on All in the Family."

Again, the only difference (other than much higher visual quality on the DVD) is that Shirley does a pre-tag "stay tuned" message, this time, "There's more coming up, so don't you go away."

This volume is a pretty good first entry in the collection, although I don't think it's worth getting if you have the series on DVD, even if you own a VCR.  I'm still curious about the other tapes, but I'm not eager to view them.

Beehive Girl before the Beehive?

From "From Suds to Stardom," way back in Season One, you be the judge.  (Here are the verified photos: https://revisitinglaverneandshirley.blogspot.com/2020/05/a-salute-to-beehive-girl.html.)

With her future beau?

And from "Bridal Shower," early in Season Two, at least the same girl as on "Suds," if you look at her eyes, cheeks, mouth, and chin:

Same actress in the next episode, "Look Before You Leap" (note her height in relation to Squiggy):

ETA 11/24/20, I just spotted the same actress in "Excuse Me, May I Cut In?", from that same time period.  There's a lot going on in this scene (including Garry M. on drums), so she's easy to miss.

"Penny Marshall & Cindy Williams" book, Chapter One

"It all started as a favor...."

This chapter explains how Penny and her "cute, dimpled" friend ended up playing "bimbos" on Happy Days.  By now, it's an oft-told tale, but obviously it was less familiar back in '77.  I don't know if it's a sign of Connie Berman's innocence or ignorance or what, but she says that they " 'vo-de-o-do'd' their way through that single episode of Happy Days."  Laverne upstairs with Fonzie, maybe (whatever would be retconned later), but Shirley didn't do more than kiss (and punch) Richie on this first date.

According to this book, "The time is 1959, a sweetly innocent time."  So Season One is '59, or it was '59 by the time this book came out?  And say what you will about L & S, but it is not "sweetly innocent."

" 'Quips Penny, 'One thing about the show taking place in the fifties is that it reminds me of the worst fashion period of my life.  Here I am dressed in those same horrible clothes again.' "  Not only is this one of the great Penny quotes from the book, but it's significant that her outfits would get more flattering as the series continued.

"The contrast between the personalities of Laverne and Shirley is as much a focal point of the show as the plot action in the brewery, pizza parlor, and bowling alley."  I'd argue it's much more a focal point, especially compared to the bowling alley.

Squiggy and Lenny are described as "addle-brained housemates," which seems a bit harsh, although they'd be called worse.

Cindy describes her character as a dreamer and Penny's as a realist, and she says, "There haven't been very many attempts in television or movies to have pairs of women, like Redford and Newman, with the camaraderie."  

What Penny would later refer to as them regrowing their hymens is described by Cindy as "less bimbo and more lady."

The book tells of the immediate success in the ratings, including the irony of displacing All in the Family, with Rob Reiner.  It sums up the early crossovers with Happy Days, mistakenly saying Laverne breaks an arm rather than an ear off a statue in "The Society Party."  It also claims that Fonzie "gets up to tell off the uppity crew and then exits in a huff with Laverne and Shirley trailing after him."  In fact, Laverne tells them off and the Fonz eats his soup and looks on approvingly.  But the book is correct about the class clash.

The book attributes the show's instant popularity to '50s nostalgia and the appeal of the title characters, including their friendship, as well as the "considerable talent" of the two actresses.

There's something poignant in both Cindy and Penny being surprised by the sudden fame, and there's an anecdote of Penny and her good friend Louise Lasser (later to be on the infamous "Monastery" episode) at a Hollywood party, jumping up and down in the bathroom, exclaiming, "We're famous!"

The last paragraph mentions the "humble beginnings" of Marshall and Williams, which will be the subject of the next two chapters....