There are a number of sitcoms that I don't like very much and Green acres in one of them. Normally I wouldn't post a "I hate this posting", but this is kinda unusual.

You see, I don't really know for sure why I dislike this show! It could be that I'm just crazy. Oddly enough, I do like its cousin, Petticoat Junction.

So I am wondering if I am alone, or do any of you somehow get a negative feeling from this show that's hard to pin down.

I liked the show.Petticoat Junction was good too,but in a different way.

Then again,they had different writers.Charles Stewart,who'd written for Andy Griffith before,was content with down-home humor.On the other hand,Jay Sommers delighted in the surrealism that was the show's trademark.

My parents didn't like Green Acres-but they weren't Eddie Albert fans.

Granted, "Green Acres" isn't for everyone. It has a bizarre, loopy sense of humor that many describe as "surreal." It didn't try to be all things to all people, like so many sitcoms. As a result, some love it and some hate it.
To me, when the show was at its best, it was as funny as any show of the '60s. Albert and Gabor had a great rapport. The supporting cast was wonderful.
And the scripts by Jay Sommers and Dick Chevillat had a strange, off-the-wall quality that just defy description. No jokes -- just strange, twisted, funny dialogue. And lots of clever touches no one at the time seemed to notice. Characters acknowledged it was just a TV show, 20 years before "Moonlighting." The opening credits might show up on hotcakes or the back of a bathrobe. Clever stuff for 1965.
I will grant the show's critics one thing: it did go downhill. In the last couple of seasons, the energy level seemed to drop like a stone. It just seemed to be on autopilot in seasons five and six. Sadly, I think some of the episodes from its last season are downright unwatchable.
It's a shame, because in seasons one through four, the show is absolutely hilarious at times. If the show had ended in 1969, it would be one of the best sitcoms of all time. It's still a favorite of mine, though I agree it's not for everyone.

I loved the show. Especially if characters from Petticoat Junction appeared on it.

I loved the seris Green Acres. But i hated the very last 2 episodes they were very very poor and had nothing to do with Hooterville at all. I think they were pilots for some seris which never surfaced.

I enjoyed watching the show. Especially when the pig (Arnold) would come.

< So I am wondering if I am alone, or do any of you somehow get a negative feeling from this show that's hard to pin down. >

The only "negative feeling" I ever got from GA was in just knowing how we have to *lower* ourselves or our standards to enjoy this kind of comedy, and knowing that we ARE enjoying it means we are successful in this lowering of standards. Actors and production people want to create successful shows, but many of them have before admitted a "negative feeling" about how they must lower the believability and sophistication in order to produce something that will work.

Maybe your dislike for Green Acres is because that all of us are like Mr. Douglas in a way. To us, we have an idea of how the order of the world is supposed to be. Yet in Hooterville, Mr. Douglas is made to be the insane one.

Many times I tell my kids the right way to do something, and they look at me like I'm an idiot.

Green acres is one of my 10 fave shows of all time.

I always liked Green Acres, as the "goofy, surreal, sitcome" when I watched it as a city dweller. It wasn't until I moved to the country that I realized that it actually was a documentary.

I'll admit that I didn't like a lot of the fifth season episodes of "GREEN ACRES". The very last two episodes of the show were actually pilots for two other series which never even came through, and I didn't even like them.

During that particular season, which was the 1969-70 season, it was on Saturday nights at 9 o'clock, and I just can't picture it being on Saturday nights. It was on Wednesday nights in the beginning, and in it's last season, 1970-71, it was on Tuesday night. to me, it was always a Wednesday night show and that's that.

Most of the episodes that I like were from it's Wednesday night run, and it was during this time period when Eva Gabor was at her most glamorous.

But still, "GREEN ACRES" is still my all-time favorite show.

< It wasn't until I moved to the country that I realized that it actually was a documentary. >

So, are you are a real-life Oliver Wendell Douglas? What did you find in the "country" that leads you to say GA was a "documentary?" Did you have to climb a pole to use your phone? Did you buy a 2nd-hand tractor (or mower) and its wheels would fall off if you pointed at them? Did it take you 6 months to get electrical power after you applied?....

Green Acres is one of the all-time best sitcoms ever. It was loaded with crazy characters- Mr. Haney(my favorite), Hank Kimball, the Ziffels, the Monroe brothers and Eb. Even Lisa was good. And in the midst of all that insanity was the best straight man in the world, Oliver Wendell Douglas.

The writing was hilarious, the music great. I really love this show.

Originally posted by ShermanW
Granted, "Green Acres" isn't for everyone. It has a bizarre, loopy sense of humor that many describe as "surreal." It didn't try to be all things to all people, like so many sitcoms. As a result, some love it and some hate it.
To me, when the show was at its best, it was as funny as any show of the '60s. Albert and Gabor had a great rapport. The supporting cast was wonderful.
And the scripts by Jay Sommers and Dick Chevillat had a strange, off-the-wall quality that just defy description. No jokes -- just strange, twisted, funny dialogue. And lots of clever touches no one at the time seemed to notice. Characters acknowledged it was just a TV show, 20 years before "Moonlighting." The opening credits might show up on hotcakes or the back of a bathrobe. Clever stuff for 1965.
I will grant the show's critics one thing: it did go downhill. In the last couple of seasons, the energy level seemed to drop like a stone. It just seemed to be on autopilot in seasons five and six. Sadly, I think some of the episodes from its last season are downright unwatchable.
It's a shame, because in seasons one through four, the show is absolutely hilarious at times. If the show had ended in 1969, it would be one of the best sitcoms of all time. It's still a favorite of mine, though I agree it's not for everyone.


Well said. It was so strangely clever, I think that's a point a lot of people fail to realize or understand.

I enjoyed the entire series, but it probably should not have run as long as it did - that is true of every television series.

Peace ~

I love Green Acres. I think rural comedies have gotten a bad reputation and I don't know why.

Hi mr. roper - :wave:

I've read some of the archives and I think it's funny that anyone would find GA to be offensive or hick or dumb, etc. It was very sophisticated in its mix of city and rural humor - there are so many clever aspects to the concept and to the writing. I think those who criticize the show do so because, while they may know what the show was about, they just don't "get" it, you know? There was a lot more to the series than what appeared on the surface or in the opening theme.

It's just one of my top favorites of all time.

Peace ~

Originally posted by goldie
Hi mr. roper - :wave:

I've read some of the archives and I think it's funny that anyone would find GA to be offensive or hick or dumb, etc. It was very sophisticated in its mix of city and rural humor - there are so many clever aspects to the concept and to the writing. I think those who criticize the show do so because, while they may know what the show was about, they just don't "get" it, you know? There was a lot more to the series than what appeared on the surface or in the opening theme.

It's just one of my top favorites of all time.

Peace ~ I agree. Green Acres and The Beverly Hillbillies are 2 of my favorite shows of the 1960's. They were not respected then and they aren't now. I can't wait for Green Acres to come back to TV Land.:wave:

I liked Peticoat Junction better than Green Acres too. GA was best taken in small doses. Getting in depth with the show its unsatisfying (not all shows have that problem). Pretty Eva Gabor was really part of the problem. We mostly knew (all too well) in real life she wasn't anywhere near that good a woman who could stay dedicatedly married to just one man, so very unlike her smallscreen alterego, Lisa Douglas. The Monroe Brothers were rather annoying and nearly totally unappealing too. Haney wasn't that bad but he wasn't fully up to being so much a country big shot as his character was supposed to be. More sparse appearances from him would have been better. Kimball was so/so (good considering how oblivious his character was written to be). Drucker was pretty good as a character despite being well you know. Oliver was really too grouchy and intolerable of others.

Alot of people have been comparing Green Acres to Petticoat Junction. Personally, I liked both series, however, I liked PJ a hell of alot more than GA.

GA was just too slapstick. All the characters were basically morons. The PJ characters were educated and had a certain amount of class.

I enjoy watching reruns of both series when possible, but I'll always prefer PJ over GA!

Jim

I love this show, I don,t remember much of the last 2 seasons during the initial run, I was 17/18 years old and I had more important things to do on Saturday night by then or at least I thought they were important at the time. Jay Somers was a genius, this is one of the best written shows of all time and if you look real hard you can find a little bit of green acres in every successful sit com that followed it.

Everyone just has chemistry with different shows. My mother dislikes Green acres but I love it. On the other hand, I could never stand Petticoat and always found it boring as sin. So I guess it's back to the classic line of different strokes for different folks

I like Green Acres, and I don't remember much about the last two seasons of the show.

my brother, who lives in Arkansas, loves it, but his wife hates it.

< The only "negative feeling" I ever got from GA was in just knowing how we have to *lower* ourselves or our standards to enjoy this kind of comedy, and knowing that we ARE enjoying it means we are successful in this lowering of standards. Actors and production people want to create successful shows, but many of them have before admitted a "negative feeling" about how they must lower the believability and sophistication in order to produce something that will work.

Although I respect your opinion, tdr, I happen to disagree whole-heartedly. We are not at all lowering our standards to enjoy this kind of comedy at all; if anything we may be raising them. Very few people realize how sophisticated and ahead of its time Green Acres really was because they don't catch the great satire lying beneath it. Not unlike The Simpsons, you must be familiar with what was going on in the world at that time to fully appreciate and understand the ingenius satire hidden behind the strange antics. Green Acres may have been a silly show but there was a hidden intelligence in it that you must search for, just like The Simpsons (which by the way, got its inspiration from Green Acres).


Pretty Eva Gabor was really part of the problem. We mostly knew (all too well) in real life she wasn't anywhere near that good a woman who could stay dedicatedly married to just one man, so very unlike her smallscreen alterego, Lisa Douglas.

I also happen to disagree with you, ficlopri. I happen to be a big fan of Eva Gabor and I think its unfair of you to make such a judgement against her and the show. Just because Eva Gabor never found the right husband, it doesn't mean she is a bad person. In fact, most of the time, the divorces were her husband's fault due to infidelity. It it also unfair to let her love life reflect your feelings toward the show. After all, it is just a show. It wasn't supposed to reflect reality, but in fact, provide an escape from reality and to provide you with a happy place to forget all your troubles. And I happen to think Green Acres did a very good job of doing just that. I know it always makes me feel better after a hard day.

Although I respect your opinion, tdr, I happen to disagree whole-heartedly. We are not at all lowering our standards to enjoy this kind of comedy at all; if anything we may be raising them. Very few people realize how sophisticated and ahead of its time Green Acres really was because they don't catch the great satire lying beneath it. Not unlike The Simpsons, you must be familiar with what was going on in the world at that time to fully appreciate and understand the ingenius satire hidden behind the strange antics. Green Acres may have been a silly show but there was a hidden intelligence in it that you must search for, just like The Simpsons (which by the way, got its inspiration from Green Acres).




I also happen to disagree with you, ficlopri. I happen to be a big fan of Eva Gabor and I think its unfair of you to make such a judgement against her and the show. Just because Eva Gabor never found the right husband, it doesn't mean she is a bad person. In fact, most of the time, the divorces were her husband's fault due to infidelity. It it also unfair to let her love life reflect your feelings toward the show. After all, it is just a show. It wasn't supposed to reflect reality, but in fact, provide an escape from reality and to provide you with a happy place to forget all your troubles. And I happen to think Green Acres did a very good job of doing just that. I know it always makes me feel better after a hard day.

I too am a big fan of Eva Gabor. In fact, I'm her Number One fan. Just because she was married and divorced five times doesn't mean she was a loose woman. She was very conservative in her views, she did not believe in living together before marriage, and she hated cheating and lying.

In fact, she divorced her last two husbands because she found out that they were cheating on her and having affairs. I do know that when she was doing Green Acres, her husband at the time, Richard Brown, was seeing another woman behind her back for a whole year, while he was still married to her. My mother had told me that both Eddie Albert and her mother knew about it, but they didn't want to tell her because they didn't want to hurt her feelings. When she found out, she was not only hurt and crushed, she kicked him out and divorced him. He then wanted to get back with her, but it was already too late.

Her last husband, Frank Jameson, who was an aerospace executive, was seeing a much younger woman behind her back. In fact, I had read in column in Parade magazine that he had left her for another woman. But when I saw her on the Joan Rivers show back in 1990, she said that he didn't leave her. But anyway, because of the hurt and devastation that she felt because of the way these men had treated her, she said that she would never get married again. Even though she went out with Merv Griffin, she remained single for the rest of her life because she said that men had caused her nothing but pain and heartache, she did not want to get married again because she didn't want to get hurt again. In a 1992 television interview she said that she loved living along and that living alone doesn't mean that you're lonely. But I'll bet that if she had married Merv Griffin, she would have been happy and he definitely would have been a good husband. Every time she was with him, she was so happy. Even when she appeared on his talk show, they were always joking, laughing, and kidding around. But Eva always kept her professional and personal life separate.

she sounds like my girlfriend!:lol: :lol: