Steve isn’t as much of a stuffed shirt as George is, and his relationship with Hazel is less contentious. And Barbara is sweeter and more down to earth than Dorothy. I also like Mona and Fred, Steve and Barbara’s neighbors. Mona is a good foil for Hazel and isn’t quite as overbearing as Deirdre.

Steve isn’t as much of a stuffed shirt as George is, and his relationship with Hazel is less contentious. And Barbara is sweeter and more down to earth than Dorothy. I also like Mona and Fred, Steve and Barbara’s neighbors. Mona is a good foil for Hazel and isn’t quite as overbearing as Deirdre.


I disagree I like the original family better ! ;)I loved the banter between Hazel and Mr. George B !! :D

While I think the George & Dorothy shows are better I'm also not one to poo poo the Steve & Barbara year either. It also had it's very own good qualities some of which you just named. Steve was more the boss in the house and didn't let Hazel run all over him (most of the time anyway).

Also the best part of the 5th season was Barbara as she wasn't constantly threatening to leave Steve high & dry and take all his money in divorce unless he constantly cow-towed to Hazel. Dorothy even let's it slip her divorce money schemes when she mentions in one of the episodes Calif. being a community property state. I fear trouble ahead for George, but the good news is, he'll finally be rid of that nag Hazel.:D

Steve isn’t as much of a stuffed shirt as George is, and his relationship with Hazel is less contentious. And Barbara is sweeter and more down to earth than Dorothy. I also like Mona and Fred, Steve and Barbara’s neighbors. Mona is a good foil for Hazel and isn’t quite as overbearing as Deirdre.

Yeah but don't forget Deirdre is still around in the Steve and Barbara year. She almost badgers Barbara into sending Susie to an "elocution" school, whatever that is. Hazel got Barbara to stand up to her; Dorothy was a Deirdre-enabler.

Good point about the neighbors. Mona is a good portrayal, kind of a snob but not so much that she doesn't get along well with Hazel. And Fred is down-to-earth, and they don't overplay the differences between him and Mona.

I'd compare them very favorably with those silly neighbors George and Dorothy had toward the end of the first season. The ones with those silly-acting teenagers, the boy with a ridiculous crush on Dorothy and the girl who played phone jokes on her hoped-to-be boyfriend and snubbed Hazel from the sleepover that Hazel thought up. I agreed with the snobby Doris Singleton-played lady, they're all a bunch of brats!

I liked that Deirdre showed up a few times during that last season. It added some nice continuity.

I was aware of the show in the 70s and saw a few episodes, but I really became familiar with it in the 80s when the old CBN cable channel was running it. They did not run the B&W episodes and I’m not even convinced they had all the color seasons, because they came back to the Steve and Barbara episodes pretty frequently. Those are the ones I saw first so I’m particularly fond of them.

Yes, I used to tape those CBN Hazel's and they only played the color years though they did play one or 2 b/w's as I recall. (They did use alternate edits though than WOR later used, so they were good for getting scenes not included in the WOR versions.) But it wasn't until WOR, their old "Superstation" ran Hazel that I finally saw the b/w episodes that I hadn't seen since the 1960's when I watched as a kid. WOR did though skip Dorothy's Birthday and instead of showing that proper show from the series they instead showed the pilot of Hazel which used the exact same storyline BUT with Edward Andrews playing George and Hal something (Otis from Andy Griffith) playing the mailman. Hazel's hair was also a lot thinner there, she later wore a wig for the real Hazel series. That pilot was always shown on WOR instead of the real Don Defore version.

I recorded all those Hazel's back then and later transferred them all to DVD. And that was my sole source for continuing to watch Hazel for years when Hazel disappeared from cable TV again in 1993. My old theory once again happily employed, that is NEVER rely on a TV station to always be playing your "favorite" show, it's a guarantee, unless you record it or for today buy the DVDs you will DEFINITELY not be seeing it again for perhaps decades or never. Buy the DVDs or don't complain when your show is taken off. You've been warned countless times by me.:tiphat:

The pilot was uploaded to YouTube at some point, since removed. DeFore is a major upgrade over Andrews. The story is the same, almost word for word if memory serves. I had forgotten Hal Smith was the mailman.

Steve and Barbara just didn’t have the charm of George and Dorothy. The final season has always been difficult to watch.

Also the interior was different in that pilot version. The entranceway, for one, had big black and white tiles in front of the door. I've seen that same entranceway in another Columbia show, but don't remember which it was, Farmer's Daughter maybe? The script in the pilot was almost word for word the same as the later filmed Don Defore version.

I disagree I like the original family better ! ;)I loved the banter between Hazel and Mr. George B !! :D

I like George & Missy better Too. S5= JTS for me.

I like George & Missy better Too. S5= JTS for me.


;) :wave:

I like George & Missy better Too. S5= JTS for me.

Yep, original Mr. B. & Missy are my picks, too! :)

I'm watching Hazel right now, a really old black & white ep. :)

Hazel was a lot better with George and Missy !;) I love how exasperated Mr. B gets with Hazel !!:lol:

I really dislike the Mona character. Too whiny and materialistic. One flaw in that season was how suddenly they decided to give them a child - Jeff. Initially, they didn't have any kids.

I'm the one who had the pilot on YouTube, but they shut down my channel years ago because of copyright issues. I had lots of Battle of the Network Stars stuff but I think it was the It's a Living episodes that got me banned.

I love the "cards" scene in the pilot. Hazel is sharp as a tack, even prickly at times, in what would have certainly been the way the character would have been played had Thelma Ritter taken the part.

And I don't mind Season 5 at all. I think Ray Fulmer and Lynn Borden were wonderful and some of my favorite episodes are from that season.

I'm the one who had the pilot on YouTube, but they shut down my channel years ago because of copyright issues.

Was it the pilot with the different Mr B? I never got to see it!! Do you still have it???

As I said above: the "pilot of Hazel which used the exact same storyline BUT with Edward Andrews playing George and Hal something (Otis from Andy Griffith) playing the mailman. Hazel's hair was also a lot thinner there, she later wore a wig for the real Hazel series. That pilot was always shown on WOR instead of the real Don Defore version."

Barbara Baxter seemed like a typical housewife who lived for her husband.

Dorothy Baxter had her own thing going with her interior decorating business, she seemed more independent and sure of herself too.

Yes, it was the one with Edward Andrews as George. I still have the old VHS tape but it is in storage. I converted it to an mpg file that is on an old external hard drive somewhere. I no longer have a YouTube channel though.