When L&S moved to California for the last three seasons of the show they met two new individuals in Rhonda Lee and Sonny St. Jacques.

Is it me or was Rhonda featured a lot more than Sonny? It seems to me that Sonny was there for only the first part of the third-to-last (1980-81) season.

Ed Marinaro (Sonny) only had a contract for 13 episodes (I don't think that included the "Antonio the Amazing" episode set in Milwaukee where he plays Laverne's Italian cousin, but I don't know). He then went on to Hill Street Blues. Leslie Easterbrook (Rhonda), however, stayed on the show and played Rhonda until the final episode.

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"Well, Laverne is sort of childish" -Shirley

"Childish? Childish? Coming from a grown woman who throws tea parties for her stuffed cat!" -Laverne

"Well at least I don't sew L's on everything I wear!" -Shirley

"Well that would be pretty stupid considering your name's Shirley!" -Laverne

I think that Sonny was one of those characters that you could only take enough of until you get bored, and just keep him as a recurring character. Rhonda was a funny and annoying character, and characters like that usually tend to help the others performing on the series out. I mean you see Leslie Easterbrook one minute on L&S playing an annoying California baywatch-type gal, and then she's in Police Academy doing tons of things that you would have never thought that Leslie would have ever done.

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Andrew Carden