I had this discussion and I want to bring it here to the forum, was the scenes with Mary's home life really all that necessary? Should the show just focused on her work and moving up the ladder? Did here home life in any way bring down the show?!?

I absolutely don't think her home life brought the show down; if anything it enhanced it. It showed Mary's totality and that she was orderly, considerate, reliable, balanced and refined in every area of her life. I think the show would have been woefully incomplete without it.

The only problem with listing Mary's virtues is that it's hard to know where to begin as there are so many; look what I came up with right off the bat. Perhaps her BEST quality is her ability to get along well with others. If there is ANYTHING that is essential for (maximum) career success that is it.

Of course, there are "sharks" who will walk over dead bodies and get very high up, but they make enemies along the way just waiting for that right moment to exact revenge . But when you have multitudes who adore you you always have powerful allies in your corner.

Her home life was important to the show however her scenes at work or whenever she was with the people she worked with(even if they took place in her home) were more interesting and funny.As the show went on they cut down a bit on her home life and in my opinion made the right decision.

Excellent posts guys. I guess some people just want to see a workplace in a workplace comedy, if you can even call The Mary Tyler Moore Show that.

It was the interaction between Mary,Rhoda and Phyllis that first got my attention and made me love the show.

They also changed for the better the characters of Ted and Lou.

Ted became more of a lovable fool and so funny as each season went on Lou

was very shouty in the first season,Ed made him more of Lou building up to

an outburst which was even funnier.

I think if we didn't have the home life, it would have seemed weird. B/c nobody works ALL the time. And Mary did go to Lou a lot w/ her personal problems, but I think she would also need an actual girlfriend to talk to sometimes. Plus Mary and Rhoda were such opposites in so many ways, and that made their interactions a lot funnier than if Mary's best friend and been just like her.

I don't think this show would have been good if they left out Mary's home life. First off, one of my favorite characters was Rhoda, and she was kind of the opposite of Mary which was an interesting contrast. Also, there are only a few shows that can pull off only focusing on one aspect of a character's life. In this case though, I think Mary, Lou, Ted and Murray would have all seemed one dimensional.