Top TV Moments: Joanna Pettet

I was saddened by the recent news that Joanna Pettet had died. In the Comfort TV era she was a frequent guest star on several quality shows and was always memorable regardless of her role. To me she was television’s equivalent to the cool patrician blondes favored by Alfred Hitchcock in films like Vertigo and Marnie, and I’d argue she was a better actress than either Kim Novak or Tippi Hedren.

In her personal life she played a bit part in one of the most infamous crime stories of the 20th century, having had lunch with Sharon Tate in Tate’s home just hours before she was murdered by the Manson Family. Rumer Willis played Pettet in Quentin Tarantino’s film Once Upon a Time...In Hollywood.

Unlike many performers from that era, she was also busy in feature films, appearing in the first (sort of) James Bond movie, Casino Royale, the wartime mystery The Night of the Generals, and the underrated cult horror hit The Evil (trust me, it’s good). But it was on television that most of us came to know her, starting back in 1964.

Route 66 (1964)
In “Child of a Night” Tod and Linc are determined to carry out a dying man’s wish of getting a large sum of money to its rightful recipient. Making her TV debut, the British-born Pettet manages a convincing southern accent as a would-be claimant of the fortune.

The Doctors (1964)
As nurse Judy Lloyd, Pettet appeared in 18 episodes of this daytime drama that debuted the same year as General Hospital.

The Fugitive (1966)
A traveling carnival provides a colorful backdrop to this typically strong episode, featuring Joanna Pettet as an emotionally troubled young woman who falls for Kimble, and jeopardizes his freedom after she is rejected. She would have an equally doomed romance with David Janssen eight years later in the Harry O episode “Forty Reasons to Kill.”

Night Gallery (1971)
Series fans have dubbed Pettet the Queen of Night Gallery, since she appeared in four different episodes. “The Caterpillar” may be the most satisfying but she’s just a supporting player in that tale of lust and murder. More interesting, at least until its climax, is “The House,” in which she plays a woman who tells her psychiatrist about a recurring dream she’s had for ten years: she is driving along a country road and sees a beautiful house – she knocks on the door but wakes up before anyone answers.

On the day she is released from a sanitarium, she spots the house from her dream and finds out it’s for sale. What happens next? No spoilers here, except to say that even Joanna Pettet wasn’t satisfied. “The ending makes absolutely no sense at all,” she said in an interview. 

Banacek (1972)
One reason Joanna Pettet was always in demand is how she seemed to have chemistry no matter who she was paired with on screen. Here she brings out a softer side of George Peppard’s smug, sexist hero. 

In “Project Phoenix” Pettet plays an automotive engineer who falls under suspicion after an experimental vehicle disappears from a moving train. Lots of familiar faces in this one – William Windom, Bert Convy, Peter Mark Richman, Herb Edelman, John Fiedler – what a wonderful era of television this was, with so many great character actors making every part memorable.

The Captains and the Kings (1976)
The 1970s were awash in ‘prestigious’ miniseries adaptations of popular novels, and while this one never made the same splash as Roots or Rich Man, Poor Man, it’s good trashy fun. It’s a multi-generational story of one Irish American family, loosely based on the Kennedys (unofficially to avoid any lawsuits). Amidst a huge all-star cast, Pettet appears as Katherine Hennessey, an early object of desire for young Joe Kenn…er, Armagh, who helps to smooth his rougher edges before his rise to power.

Charlie’s Angels (1980)
“Nips and Tucks” is one of the better fourth season (Shelley Hack) episodes, thanks in part to guest star Louis Jourdan as a renowned plastic surgeon being blackmailed into changing the appearance of a wanted racketeer. Pettet plays the crook’s girlfriend, who’s ready to kill anyone getting in the way.

The Love Boat (1981)
Most of Pettet’s resume consists of heavy dramatic roles, so it’s fun to see her playing light comedy for a change. In “I Love You Too, Smith” she plays a fussy customs agent whom Gopher despises, until she sails on the Pacific Princess, and you can guess what happens next.

Knots Landing (1983)
This was Pettet’s last recurring series role; she appeared in nine episodes as police detective Janet Baines.

The Fall Guy (1984)
Colt and company are shooting a James Bond-type movie (“Always Say Always”), but that’s not what makes this episode memorable. It’s the guest appearances by three former Bond girls that made it more fun – Pettet (Casino Royale), Lana Wood (Diamonds are Forever) and Britt Ekland (The Man with the Golden Gun).

And as it turned out, 1984 was Pettet’s last busy working year. She also appeared in episodes of Hotel, Knight Rider, The Yellow Rose and Finder of Lost Loves. After that IMDB lists only four more projects before she began more than 30 years of (hopefully happy) retirement.

My Journey Through 1970s TV: Tuesday Nights, 1978

CBS and NBC tried their best with new and returning offerings, but neither had a chance against the juggernaut that was ABC’s Tuesday night hit factory. Four of the season’s top ten shows aired back-to-back this evening, and while one must applaud the network for tapping into what America liked to watch, it’s also unfortunate that their dominance claimed one series on a rival network that deserved a better fate.


CBS
The Paper Chase
CBS Tuesday Night Movie

“You teach yourselves the law, but I train your minds. You come in here with a skull full of mush and if you survive, you’ll leave thinking like a lawyer.”

After a long and distinguished career, John Houseman at age 71 found the role that defined his career as law professor Charles Kingsfield in The Paper Chase (1973).

After receiving the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, Houseman reprised the role in this series that, despite such a pedigree, was canceled after one season. The Showtime network brought it back for three more seasons five years later, but only about one-third of American households had cable back then. It remains one of 1970s television’s largely undiscovered treasures. There were DVDs released but they’re long out of print, available only at inflated prices on the secondary market.



ABC
Happy Days
Laverne & Shirley
Three’s Company
Taxi
Starsky & Hutch

The first three shows were in ABC’s Tuesday lineup in the previous year and are still topping the charts: Happy Days at #3, Laverne & Shirley at #1, and Three’s Company at #2. Taxi replaced Soap and finished the season at #9.

The excellent series Family was moved from Tuesdays to Thursdays, but that did not improve its rating. In its place on Tuesday – Starsky & Hutch, then limping through its final year.

NBC
Grandpa Goes to Washington
The Big Event

With Chico and the Man canceled shortly after the death of Freddie Prinze, NBC immediately put Jack Albertson into another series, and into a very different role. Political science professor Joe Kelley is forced into retirement at age 66 and decides to explore how political theory meets reality when he runs for a Senate seat and wins.

Grandpa Goes to Washington borrowed from Frank Capra’s Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, though Albertson’s Joe was not as wide-eyed and naïve. A time slot change and a stronger supporting cast might have kept the series around longer – Larry Linville played Joe’s son, once again the butt of every joke after years of similar abuse on MASH.

Shows Missed:
The Don Knotts Show (1970)
San Francisco International Airport (1970)
Nancy (1970)
The Headmaster (1970)
The Man and the City (1971)
Search (1972)
Assignment: Vienna (1972)
The Delphi Bureau (1972)
Jigsaw (1972)
The Little People (1972)
The Sixth Sense (1972)
Faraday & Company (1973)
Kodiak (1974)
The New Land (1974)
McCoy (1975)
Joe and Sons (1975)
Beacon Hill (1975)
Mobile One (1975)
Big Eddie (1975)
Executive Suite (1976)
Ball Four (1976)
Young Dan’l Boone (1977)
Rafferty (1977)
Mulligan’s Stew (1977)
Big Hawaii (1977)
We’ve Got Each Other (1977)
Lifeline (1978)

Still Stuck in the 1970s, Part Two

The 1970s returned to the news recently as older Americans wondered why the 250th anniversary of our nation’s founding did not generate the same national pride as the Bicentennial in 1976.

A YouTube video entitled “The 12 Things That Made Americans Happier in the 1970s (That We Destroyed)” provides some insightful answers into how the country has changed in the last 50 years. The first six of those things, and how many of them were connected to television or were reflected in the shows of that decade, were covered last week (just scroll down to read that post).

We left off on a particularly salient point related to Comfort TV: “Entertainment was shared.” It relates how, on a single evening in 1972, more than half the people in the United States were watching shows on one of the handful of channels available. Then, the next day at work and school and at the grocery store there was something to talk about: “a common thread running through the entire country."

Now, of course we consume entertainment on personal devices, individually, with thousands of programming options instead of four channels. That common thread no longer exists.

Moving on to point #7: “Food was just food.” I love this one. Food wasn’t as closely examined then as it is now, when it has become a source of anxiety and moral judgement. Mothers took their kids to McDonald’s without feeling guilty. Saturday mornings were spent wolfing down sugar coated cereals while watching cartoons. 

No one talked about probiotics or keto or meat and dairy alternatives, which is why ‘70s shows were blissfully free of any such references. And for those who think all this nanny state nonsense has produced a healthier populace, every study shows there were fewer obese people in the 1970s than there are now.

Point #8: “You were not comparing yourself to anyone.” This is like an observation in the previous blog about how social media gave us a barometer to measure ourselves against everyone else in the world, which for some added pressure to be doing better. “Keeping up with the Jones” is not a new sentiment, but in the ‘70s it was a localized phenomenon. If someone down the street bought a new car, or put a pool in their backyard, you might have felt some pressure to do the same. But your summer vacation at the King’s Island Amusement Park shouldn’t seem less enjoyable because someone you’ve never met was swimming with sea lions in the Galapagos Islands and shared the video on Facebook.

Next, “Institutions could be trusted.” Oh, boy. Our confidence has been shaken in government, media, church, schools, and the medical establishment. As reflected on TV shows in the ‘70s, if a student was sent to the principal’s office, or a kid like Danny Partridge was caught shoplifting, there was an automatic assumption that the authority figure was in the right. 

That assumption no longer exists, leaving each of us to personally adjudicate the truth of everything. That’s stressful, and exhausting.

Point #10. “There was a clear path, and it worked.” We all knew what it was, and how it was reinforced by most family shows on TV: finish school, get a job, get married, buy a house, have children, retire with a pension. I didn’t follow that path exactly, but I still saw the value in it. Fewer people do so now and even doing so does not guarantee a stable future.

Next, “Aging had a place.” Our older relatives were a respected source of wisdom to convey to grandchildren. Now they are “a problem to be managed, rather than a resource to be valued.”

The video’s final point is one that connects to many of those it preceded: “Time.” We just don’t have as much of it anymore. Is it better to be time-rich and money-poor? Or Money-rich and time-poor? Money can’t buy happiness but leisure hours, away from work, from computer screens, can add immeasurably to our peace of mind.

What do you think? The video has drawn more than 200 comments. Most are what you might expect – some blame the political left for our present perilous state (“Feminists ruined the one paycheck model”), while others blame the right (“Then we got Reaganomics and it just went downhill ever since.”). For others it’s just politicians regardless of party, or the media, lawyers (Shakespeare would approve) or technology (some truth there). And there are the usual voices condemning millionaires for not giving everyone more of their money.

But in many ways, we are to blame because we’ve done this to ourselves. The good news is we could reverse course if we wished to do so. Before televisions needed software updates. Before the internet put idiots on Tik Tok on equal footing with experts who have studied an issue for decades (with the idiots always getting more clicks). Before heads of prestigious medical schools could testify with a straight face that men can get pregnant. Before exposure to a 24-hour news cycle that has us convinced the country and the world are in far worse shape than they are.

“We are not going to pretend the 1970s were perfect. There were real injustices that needed fixing, and some were fixed, and that was good,” the video states in its conclusion. “But the things in this video were not injustices. They were the load-bearing structures of an ordinary contented life, and we knocked them down without noticing they held up the ceiling.”

Still Stuck in the 1970s, Part One

Over the 14-year history of this blog I’ve tried to give equal attention to shows throughout the Comfort TV era. But looking back it’s perhaps obvious that more pieces have been devoted to 1970s television than any other decade.

I have many favorites from the 1950s and ‘60s, but they were discovered after their first runs, so I didn’t have a connection with them when they were new. And while the 1980s also introduced several classic shows, it also planted the seeds for where television was headed in the ‘90s and beyond.

The 1970s took me from age 6 to age 16. I grew up with these shows and never stopped watching them. Their characters, references, fashions and music are imprinted on my DNA. That’s why I so enjoyed a YouTube video entitled “The 12 Things That Made Americans Happier in the 1970s (That We Destroyed).” Especially interesting is how many of them were connected to television or were reflected in the shows of that decade.

The video is nearly 30 minutes, so I’m going to cover it in two parts.

It begins with a statement backed by data that the average American in the 1970s reported levels of happiness and life satisfaction that have not only been unmatched in any subsequent decade but have declined almost continuously over the last 50 years. In doing so it introduces us to Ray, head of a middle-class family in Flint, Michigan. His house was smaller than what many people have now, his car wasn’t as nice and his TV only got four channels, “but he was happier than you are.”

Why? Here is introduced the first point: “One income was enough for a comfortable middle-class existence.” We saw that illustrated by that quintessential ‘70s TV family on The Brady Bunch. Mike supported six kids and a housekeeper on his income, which was enough to cover the mortgage, food bills, clothing bills, utilities and other necessities, and whatever they paid Alice.

What happened to family structure, stability and economic security once two incomes were necessary? I think we know.

The video’s second point: “The neighborhood was real.” Again, something reflected in the shows of that decade. People knew their neighbors and looked out for them. Bob and Emily knew Howard Borden. Mary had Rhoda and Phyllis. Archie Bunker had George Jefferson, and when George moved uptown he had Mr. Bentley. Your neighbors were a part of your life. They were when I was a kid in the ‘70s. Today where I live now? Never even met them.

Next, and this one was especially intriguing: “There was nothing to optimize.” Ray, we’re told, did not count his steps, monitor his macros, or measure his heart rate variability. He did not have a side hustle or a personal brand. He did not think of himself as a project to be improved. He worked, he came home, he ate dinner, he watched TV, and he went to bed, and did the same thing the next day. And “he did not experience this as a failure to maximize his potential.”

Two things to note: first, one of the unintended consequences of social media is how it gave us a barometer to measure ourselves against everyone else in the world, which for some added pressure to do more, be more, and share every action along the way.

Second, Ray’s chosen after-dinner activity was to watch television, just like tens of millions of other Americans at that time. Before the internet and video games that were more sophisticated than Pong, that was how pleasant evenings were spent. Doing so was certainly more relaxing than checking our phones every ten seconds, and it was an activity we were sharing with households across the nation; a common interest of the kind that also no longer exists to the same extent.

Point #4: “The future felt like it was getting better.” Do I even need to elaborate? For many of us that is certainly no longer the case, and it’s a damn shame.

Point #5: “Work ended when you left.” This may still be the case for many, thankfully, especially those who work in an office or a retail shop and like Fred Flintstone can’t wait to hear the horn that means it’s quitting time. 

I know this wasn’t always true in the ‘70s either. Bob Hartley’s patients sometimes called him at home. The doctors on Medical Center and Marcus Welby, M.D. stayed on call when it was necessary.

But as the video says, “the modern American carries their work in their pocket, everywhere, always.” Too many of us are wired to our workplaces through our phones, so that hard physical boundary between work and life no longer exists.

The last point we’ll cover in part one is perhaps the most relevant to this blog: “Entertainment was shared.” I know this was true. In the ‘70s families watched TV together, in the same room on the same set. Ray’s coworkers were watching the same programs in their homes. This was, as the video states, “a shared, communal, synchronizing experience.”

When I wrote my book When Television Brought Us Together (revised version coming soon!), this was one of its main premises: television gave the country a common set of cultural references. Now, we are more likely to consume entertainment on personal devices, individually, with thousands of programming options instead of four channels.

More variety is nice, I guess. But how much of it is really worth watching?

The rest of the video will be covered next week. Please check it out before then, and perhaps by then you’ll also pine for what life was like in America 50 years ago.

My Journey Through 1970s TV: Monday Nights, 1978

During this journey we’ve seen how some prime-time schedules in the 1970s were just more interesting than others. Monday nights in 1978…is not one of those times. Still, ABC finishing third is surprising given its previous ratings dominance. For the second straight evening viewers mostly stayed with a CBS lineup of returning favorites and one new series that definitively proved that turkeys can’t fly.

CBS

WKRP In Cincinnati
People
MASH
One Day at a Time
Lou Grant

I’m not sure why WKRP seems to bubble just under confirmed “classic TV” status. Maybe it wasn’t on long enough. But I still can’t get through Thanksgiving without one reference to flying turkeys. And while the “Jennifer or Bailey” debate never reached the heights of “Ginger or Mary Ann,” we all know where discerning men of culture pledged their troth.

People, hosted by Phyllis George, was the network’s attempt to launch a second magazine-style series after the success of 60 Minutes. Like the actual People magazine, which achieved a circulation of more than two million copies a week in the 1970s, it featured interviews with celebrities. It didn’t last long, but Entertainment Tonight debuted in 1981 and is still going strong. Go figure.

MASH, now in its seventh season, was the evening’s highest-rated series (#7), followed by One Day at a Time (#18) and Lou Grant (#30). WKRP would break into the top 20 in its second season.



NBC
Little House on the Prairie
NBC Monday Night Movie

Monday gave NBC its strongest showing of the season, with Little House at #14 and the Monday Night Movie at #21.


ABC
Welcome Back Kotter
Operation Petticoat
Monday Night Football

Ratings had begun to drop for Welcome Back Kotter in its previous season, and here in season 4 they continued to plummet. John Travolta was gone, replaced by a new Sweathog played by Stephen Shortridge. 

Gabe Kaplan also cut back on his appearances, citing a contract dispute with the network.

By this time viewers had also abandon ship on Operation Petticoat, but enough returned for Monday Night Football to rank at #28 for the season. Given the viewer numbers football draws now, it’s hard to believe there were 27 shows with higher ratings.


Shows Missed:
The Don Knotts Show (1970)
San Francisco International Airport (1970)
Nancy (1970)
The Headmaster (1970)
The Man and the City (1971)
Search (1972)
Assignment: Vienna (1972)
The Delphi Bureau (1972)
Jigsaw (1972)
The Little People (1972)
The Sixth Sense (1972)
Faraday & Company (1973)
Kodiak (1974)
The New Land (1974)
McCoy (1975)
Joe and Sons (1975)
Beacon Hill (1975)
Mobile One (1975)
Big Eddie (1975)
Executive Suite (1976)
Ball Four (1976)
Young Dan’l Boone (1977)
Rafferty (1977)
Mulligan’s Stew (1977)
Big Hawaii (1977)
We’ve Got Each Other (1977)
Lifeline (1978)

People (1978)

Getting Reacquainted with The New Avengers

Last year I mentioned a company in Australia called Imprint that has been putting out some impressive Blu-rays of classic television shows. One of their more recent releases was The New Avengers, which I was eager to revisit as I hadn’t watched an episode in decades.

I’ve had the Emma Peel episodes of The Avengers in my DVD collection since they were first released, and I vaguely recall enjoying this revival, but sometimes the memory can cheat on such things. However, I’m happy to report that if anything these 26 episodes surpassed my expectations, and once again Imprint did an outstanding job on picture and sound quality, as well as providing a generous selection of extra features.

No, it wasn’t as good as the Steed-Peel years – but what could be? Replicating the impeccable chemistry between Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg hardly seems possible. But there is great chemistry as well in this new trio of heroes, and I would rewatch their adventures over any of the Tara King episodes.

It’s 1976 – seven years have passed since we last saw John Steed. In The New Avengers he has not yet retired but has clearly moved up to a more senior role within the British government. He’s still capable of knocking out an enemy agent with his steel-lined bowler, but now leaves most of the fighting to Mike Gambit, played with suave James Bond charm by Gareth Hunt.

Casting a new female agent had to be the show’s toughest challenge, as Honor Blackman and Diana Rigg were tough acts to follow. But the series struck gold in Joanna Lumley as Purdey, who had the same mix of sass, sophistication and sex appeal as her predecessors.

This may be sacrilegious, but to me Lumley was more convincing in her fight scenes than Rigg or Blackman. In episodes like “The Midas Touch” it’s clear she’s doing many of her own stunts; I can only imagine what those who first met her on Absolutely Fabulous would think of seeing the always sloshed Patsy running, jumping and high kicking bad guys with the lithe grace of a ballerina. With these two series and Sapphire and Steel on her resume, I hope Lumley has been afforded the status of national treasure in what’s left of British England.

In every incarnation this series is known for its cool, detached approach to dangerous circumstances, but behind the scenes things were more chaotic. A second season was only made possible through foreign financing, which resulted in episodes being filmed in Canada and then in Paris. For such a quintessentially British show that might have been disappointing, but regardless of the change in scenery it still feels like The Avengers.

Much of the credit belongs to Patrick Macnee, who inhabits Steed so naturally that one wonders if there really was any distinction between the actor and the character. But we must also extol the irreplaceable contributions of Brian Clemens, a virtual script-writing machine.

If you had a favorite episode, chances are Clemens wrote it (“The Cybernauts,” “The House That Jack Built,” “Honey for the Prince,” “From Venus with Love”). He knew the precise tone that best served this property and carried it into the revival in episodes like “The Eagle’s Nest” and “Faces.” Dennis Spooner’s episodes were not always as good, but he did give us the unforgettable “Gnaws,” an homage to Jaws in which our heroes face off against a giant rat.

Imprint Blu-rays are pricey limited editions, a sales strategy that seems out of step when fewer stores even stock physical media, and streaming has replaced DVDs as a primary source for classic shows. But I will always prefer to own the shows I like, and this is a purchase I do not regret. Even in lesser episodes there will be a line, a look, a reaction, a flirtatious exchange between Gambit and Purdey, that could only emerge from the unique world of The Avengers. 

As with British classics Doctor Who and Monty Python’s Flying Circus, it’s a show like nothing else on TV before or since. And that’s worth raising a glass (champagne, or course) to celebrate.

Remember? Specialty Acts of the Comfort TV Era

Last week's review of 1978 programs on Sunday nights included Mary Tyler Moore’s return to television in a variety show that was canceled after just three episodes. A sign, surely, that audiences had grown tired of the comedy-variety format after a decade of oversaturation.

That was sad news for the specialty act performers who made their living doing guest spots on these series. 

The best of them always delivered a highlight moment – the worst offered viewers an opportunity for a snack run without waiting for a commercial. Here are the first five I recalled from that era, ranked from worst to best.

5. Bill Saluga as Raymond J. Johnson Jr.

Most variety performers brought fresh material to the gimmick they had created so audiences wouldn’t tire of them. Not so Bill Saluga, who did the exact same bit every time, to the delight of those who loved it and the frustration of everyone else. And if you’re around my age, you’re probably already reciting it in your head.

Saluga would appear in the same brown suit, fedora hat and big cigar, and someone would always address him as Mr. Johnson, at which time he’d launch into this response:

And then he’d repeat it a second time, and sometimes a third. Was it funny? I don’t know – humor is highly subjective. But Saluga got more mileage out of one 30-second monologue than many comics achieve in 20 years. He created the character in 1969, performed it in the famous Lite Beer from Miller commercials, and then on variety shows featuring Redd Foxx, Tom Jones and David Steinberg.

Bob Dylan referenced the bit in his song “Gotta Serve Somebody” (“You may call me Bobby or you may call me Zimmy”) – how’s that for a tribute? But it was also referenced on The Simpsons and King of the Hill – though not in the same flattering terms. 

As Krusty the clown observed, “That thing was funny for about three seconds.”


4. Rod Hull and Emu

Long before the Liberty Mutual insurance commercials, the most famous emu on television belonged to puppeteer Rod Hull, whose slapstick-heavy act made him a star in Australia and the UK before he began appearing on American variety shows, most notably The Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Show.

Credit Hull for this – he always went full speed ahead with this act no matter who was in his proximity. He famously destroyed the Queen Mother’s bouquet of flowers at a Royal Variety Performance, and it takes real guts to assault Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show. 

This is one of his subtler routines that spotlights how, like the best of puppeteers, he could make an audience believe that puppet was real.

3. Shields & Yarnell

Mimes are so often mocked, even by other entertainers, but for a brief moment in the ‘70s the team of Robert Shields and Lorene Yarnell became so popular they were given their own variety show.

The duo first rose to fame after appearances on The Mac Davis Show and The Sonny and Cher Show, playing robotic characters dubbed “The Clinkers.” I can still recall the first time I watched this routine, and being absolutely fascinated by it. Their blank wide-eyed stares and mechanical movements, accompanied by motorized sound effects, was like nothing anyone had ever seen before. The novelty wore off eventually, but not the appreciation for how they had mastered this one aspect of their craft. It’s still remarkably impressive now.




2. Foster Brooks

Though he had largely retired from performing by the late 1980s and passed away in 2001, Foster Brooks is probably the best-remembered of the acts mentioned here.

Dozens of content reactors on YouTube have discovered him through his appearances on The Dean Martin Show and The Dean Martin Roasts. I always enjoy watching those who at first don’t get it: “Is he really drunk? How sad! Oh, the tragedy of alcoholism!” But most find him hysterical, which is reassuring given how a sense of humor was the first casualty of this millennium.

Funny drunks are rarely considered funny anymore, but they’ve been around as long as film and television, from Jimmy Stewart in The Philadelphia Story to Otis in The Andy Griffith Show. But Brooks set a new standard for the archetype. That he was such a distinguished looking man only added to the comedic impact of his slurred speech and halting mannerisms, all of which he clearly prepped meticulously to make the most of every word. Plus, his material was always A-list as well.

1. Bob Einstein as Super Dave Osborne

I don’t know if this will elevate or diminish my readers’ opinion of my taste in humor, but in my 50 or so years of television viewing the Super Dave Osborne skits are some of the funniest things I have ever watched.

On the surface it’s just updating physical humor that goes back to the silent era. And a skit with a 6-9-minute set-up for a payoff that lasts maybe three seconds shouldn’t theoretically work. But every aspect of these presentations is so well-conceived that the build-up is at least half the fun.

For the uninitiated, Super Dave is a daredevil stuntman clearly modeled after Evel Knievel. Each segment features Dave, sportscaster Mike Walden, and Dave’s stunt coordinator Fuji, who somehow keeps his job despite nearly killing his boss. Einstein explains each stunt with a low-key deadpan delivery and faux earnestness, always emphasizing safety. One of the best running jokes is how his protective gear is always comprised of genuine Saskatchewan sealskin bindings. But despite such careful preparation, something always goes wrong.

Einstein was asked for his favorite Super Dave moment, and he selected “King of the Hill.” If you’ve never seen it, here it is. Enjoy!