"The Rock and Roll Show"

This isn't helping Laverne's ulcer.

"The Rock and Roll Show"
January 25, 1983
C+

Maybe I'm so beaten down by Season Eight that I sort of liked this episode, even if there's something a little heart-breaking about an episode with this title not only missing Michael McKean but with Lander soloing in the opening credits.  (And Squiggy isn't even in it that much.)

In Jill Gordon's third and final L & S story, Laverne encourages Chuck to pursue music because of his harmonica skills.  (Fleischer's harmonica had perked up a dreary final-season Welcome Back, Kotter episode four years earlier.)  He recruits a bunch of science geeks from work, played by Jack Mack and the Heart Attack, and it's up to briefly Carmine but mostly Laverne to teach these nerds how to rock out.  That they achieve only at best a sort of Huey Lewis and the Far from Headline News isn't her fault.  And don't get me started on the stadium audience that looks like it's from 1957 rather than '67.

Promoter Bob Perlow had written three episodes but this is his only onscreen appearance on L & S.  Former writer Chris Thompson does his only directing gig on the series, here in the post-Bosom-Buddies phase of his career.  Note that IMDB claims that "Weird Al" Yankovic is uncredited as the keyboard player, but I don't buy it, especially since the keyboardist looks too tall and not really anything like WAY would look in the "Ricky" video from later that year.

"Death Row: Part 1"

"Death Row: Part 1"
November 16, 1982
D+

Sigh.  This episode.

When I thought of Season Eight before this project, this was one of the episodes I thought of, although my main thoughts were "Laraine Newman" and "anachronisms."  Well, yes, this episode has both, but I can see why I blocked the rest out. 

At fourteen, I had the feeling that the whole "RALPH" (Radical Action for Love, Peace, and Happiness) thing was at least five years off, feeling like a satire of the Symbionese Liberation Army.  Like Patty Hearst in 1974, Laverne joins a radical group, but she's not kidnapped but is instead hungry for friendship and male companionship.  Even more than joining the Playboy Club, this episode shows how lost Laverne is becoming without Shirley as her conscience.  At a certain point, I had to question her intelligence, and her street-smartness, especially when, even in the midst of a bank robbery, she doesn't get that these people are not her friends.

The comedy, such as it is, becomes unsettling, even when Laverne is again imitating Marlon Brando and Eleanor Roosevelt.  Even a slapstick armed robbery is an armed robbery.  Still, I was willing to just say that this was one of the worst episodes ever, not the absolute worst, until we got to "Smith and Jones."

Ben Powers on Good Times

Laraine Newman (who I usually liked and still like) has been playing her character throughout the episode as some sort of hippie Valley Girl.  (She says "gross me out" at one point.)  Then we get to the police station and, even though Sheba has betrayed Laverne and never seemed that bright to begin with, Laverne follows her example by giving a false last name.  (They, or at least writers Braunstein & Perlow, are so lazy they don't even bother with first names.)  These just happen to be the names of two female prisoners who are about to go to Death Row.  So let's not bother with fingerprints or paperwork, OK?

All that said, I didn't hate the episode.  It has a certain surrealness to it, in all its details, and it puts Carmine in a corncob costume and Rhonda in a "Mexican bride" costume (and has her speak in a Swedish accent).  But I can't say I waited with bated breath to find out Laverne's fate the next week, and I'm not now racing to watch Part 2.  But I'll get it over with, I promise.

Bank Manager Garry Goodrow previously played Mr. Caulley.  Doris Hess, who was Dolores and Sgt. Shannon before, would return in Part 2 as Kluger.  Ben Powers, who's Aaron, the leader who does celebrity impressions, would play Rick West in the final episode.

"The Most Important Day Ever"

Ta-da!

"The Most Important Day Ever"
October 13, 1981
C

So the Tuesday night ABC line-up was intact for the moment, as Happy Days entered Season Nine, L & S Season Seven, and Three's Company Season Six (now with Terri as the blonde roommate).  A lot had changed over the years, and I'll be honest right now, I probably remember even Season Eight of this show better than I do Season Seven.  The title of this season premiere is ironic, since it's a very forgettable episode, although I can make some observations.

Most obviously, the credits are similar to Season Six but with some significant changes.  Lander & McKean get a well-deserved bump up to having their names in the opening credits.  Although Rhonda is absent this episode, she is shown in the end credits, as she was in the previous season.  Sadly, Betty Garrett is gone (busy doing theater), although Edna's absence wouldn't be addressed until the next season I believe.

The opening and end credits now feature New Year's 1966, and the kitchen calendar is still a 30-day month that starts on a Monday, but it now says 1966, which doesn't match up to any month in 1966!  Oh, and Laverne is a Capricorn, putting her birthday in the first month of winter.

The writers of this episode, Gene Braunstein and Robert Perlow, were TV newbies who would go on to write, among other things, some of the more memorable episodes of the second half of the run of Who's the Boss?  This is actually the first thing Braunstein wrote for television, while Perlow did "The Diner" episode back in Season Five.

The episode begins with a shot of a lake, and we find out a couple minutes later that Laverne's boyfriend's wife pushed Laverne into a lake.  Shirley tells Laverne how to spot married men, which Laverne soon has an opportunity to put to the test because Lenny and Squiggy have mysteriously invited six Latvian men to stay in the girls' apartment, and Laverne decides to try the "international language" of flirting.  The men are actually acrobats, and there's not any reason for the boys, or Carmine, to keep this a secret.  Surprisingly, Shirley admits to "cruising the side-streets of Smut City" to get Carmine to talk, but to no avail.  ('The Ragoo boy" by the way has much shorter, less curly hair this season.)  Laverne kisses the Latvian, who speaks no English, and of course his wife catches them.  This eventually leads to the girls having to be "ta-da girls" for the act on the Hollywood Palace TV show.  And of course the girls have no opportunity to rehearse before being thrown into the air repeatedly.

When, after a frantic but not terribly funny fight breaks out in the living room, the girls decide to talk to the boys when things are calmer.  They each call to the one they think is dumber, Lenny for Shirley, Squiggy for Laverne.  Shirley threatens Lenny, who finally tells them what's going on.  Of course, the most interesting part of this sequence is Lenny's sympathy when Shirley pulls the popsicle off Laverne's injured lip.  (Squiggy, in contrast, blames "Laverne DeFloozio.")

Hey, at least Lavenny is still a thing in Season Seven, so there's that.  But the writing will hopefully pick up soon, because this is definitely the weakest season premiere of L & S so far.

"The Diner"

"The Diner"
May 6, 1980
B-

Robert Perlow's first of three L & S stories has Lenny inheriting the title location from his Uncle Lazlo.  Due to a signed agreement, Squiggy gets half of the inheritance, but the guys don't know anything about running the place, so they agree to hand it over to the girls, who know a little bit more than nothing.  The main thing I remember about this episode from the time is cook Laverne saying, "Betty, please," whenever she has an order for waitress Shirley to pick up.

I'd forgotten about Shirley getting pinched by men several times in a row and then Laverne saying into the microphone, "Please don't harass Betty please."  And I'd forgotten how much Lavenny there is in this episode, although part of that is when Lenny startles Laverne with a kiss, as Squiggy startles Shirley with one, because that's how they plan to greet all their female customers.  Lenny informs us that women are hungrier after sex, as if he'd know.

The Laverne/Lenny starts with Laverne going over and comforting Lenny, who's crying over his dead uncle.  She even puts his head on her chest, although she knows the grease will ruin her bottle-capper's smock.  He asks her to do him a favor and from her reaction, we can tell she expects something sexual, but he says, "Not that," and has her open a telegram.  She, and Shirley, are protective of Lenny when Squiggy claims his share of the diner. 

And then when they go over to the diner, to see what the boys have done to it, besides the "surprise" kisses, we also see the boys holding the girls' hands, including Lenny leading Laverne out by hers so he can hang up the sign.  There's definitely a subtext that Lenny wants to share his sorrow and joy with Laverne, although of course he bails on the diner when he gets the chance.  He may love Laverne, but he's happy for her and Shirley to do all the work.

Oh, and Carmine sings a couple songs, one with the jukebox ("There's No Business Like Show Business," while you'd expect something food-related) and then one with the girls (Shirley's jingle for the diner).

This time, Jack Lukes plays Lou.  Linda McMurray would direct one other episode.

Some Lavenny stills for your viewing pleasure: