"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."

"One Flew Over Milwaukee"

"One Flew Over Milwaukee"
March 23, 1976
C

This Warren & Bickley episode, with its Cuckoo's Nest title, is the weakest so far, although not without interest.  It was the middle of the Season One episodes to air, although it's clear that it was made before the previous episode, since Lenny was already in the Army Reserves there, while here he's joining up.  It's also the first time we actually see him and Squiggy with dates, and in fact, Squiggy's hello-entrance is with his tall date, Dolores (Doris Hess, who would return twice each in two different roles, in '79 and '82).  Note that Laverne asks Lenny about his "little date," not in a jealous way but certainly with more curiosity than she shows over who Squiggy is dating.

And there's definitely some Shirmine shipping, as he's protective and concerned about her when her pet bird flies away and she literally waits by the window, while it's snowing, for the bird to fly home.  I felt like too much of the episode was about Shirley's near-obsession with the bird, which while it may reflect Williams's love of animals, just isn't that entertaining to watch.  And if she has to sing "Sixteen Tons" to lull the canary to sleep, couldn't she do that in the living room rather than disturb poor Laverne?  Still, this episode's "friendship" moment is when Laverne buys a new bird for Shirley, who then realizes she's gone overboard.

Oh, and I think this is the first episode that uses the window of the basement apartment for comedic effect.  As I recall, this set became a character in itself as the show went on.  (Until the move to California of course.)

 Michael Kidd has only one other directing credit, from '58.

"A Nun's Story"

"A Nun's Story"
February 24, 1976
B

I vaguely remember this episode more than the others so far, suggesting it struck a chord with me either in first run or in reruns.  The script by Michael Warren and William Bickley (their first of three as a team, compared to fourteen and seventeen respectively for Happy Days) offers a farcical flashback, something I was a sucker for then and, OK, now.  But it's overall solid, sweet and funny.

Shirley is holding her fourth high school reunion in three years, for the class of '56, so we know that this is 1959 and they're about 21.  Obviously, there are going to be timeline errors, but this is the first real information we've gotten on that.  We also get some background details to not only the girls but also Lenny, who makes a confession to their old friend Anne Marie (Rochelle Richelieu, who wouldn't act on film again until Gran Torino more than 30 years later), who has become the nun of the title.  The three girls were "the three Musketeers" in high school, known as Gutsy (Laverne), Nutsy (Anne Marie), and Klutzy (Shirley).  AM got revenge on Lenny and Squiggy's friend Hector (Greg Antonacci, a role he'd return to later that year), and there's a good payoff to this later, helped by Foster bringing out the protective Italian father in Mr. DeFazio.

Note that not only Lenny and Squiggy went to high school with the girls but so did Carmine.  He gets the two of them to sing the alma mater, which starts with Shirley (I played this back a couple times) calling their h.s. "Fillmore Millard" or some or other error, not necessarily scripted.  And after the song, Carmine kisses Shirley's hand.

I don't remember if it started in this episode or the previous one, but we get the girls locking the door and arming themselves, sometimes with baseball bats, when someone knocks.  I'd forgotten this detail, that there wasn't always an open door policy.  So far Squiggy's hellos are either at work or the Pizza Bowl, so that image of his (and usually Lenny's) comedic entrances through the girls' front door doesn't yet match the show.

However, this is very early days and things haven't quite fallen into place.  Still, I felt like this was the first episode to really show the potential of the series.