Carmine! Spinoff?

[McGillicuddy]

I was watching Laverne & Shirley on the HUB channel, and during the break, they showed the (would be) opening credits to Carmine!, starring Eddie Mekka. Was Carmine! a one time un-sold pilot?

[shotzette]

Yes. They tried to make the series finale of L&S a backdoor pilot for a new, NYC based show starring Eddie Mekka. IMO, that showed how little respect a once wonderful show received from ABC.

While I think that Eddie Mekka is a wonderful entertainer, they waited too long to make a spin off. All of the Marshallverse was pretty much winding down at that point, so by the time the Carmine pilot aired, it was past it's prime.

[McGillicuddy]

Thanx. Well that explains what I saw. To bad the whole pilot can't be shown.

[shotzette]

Originally Posted by McGillicuddy

Thanx. Well that explains what I saw. To bad the whole pilot can't be shown.

Actually, the last episode of L&S was the pilot. Unfortunately for Eddie Mekka, it wasn't picked up. If/when they put season 8 of Laverne & Shirley on DVD, it will include the last episode, "Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow". If you get The Hub, you may get to see it before then.

[snowpeck]

Is there video of the opening anywhere? Or does the Hub show it with any regularity?

[Marvo301]

They should have spun off Carmine at the same time the girls moved to California. The backdoor pilot should have been the last Milwaukee episode. Carmine moves east and the girls move west.

[MacLeaper]

I'm watching Season 6 of "Laverne & Shirley" on DVD now and I'm definitely glad they kept Carmine there with them in California. I'm quite interested in seeing this opening credits sequence for "Carmine!" though- I didn't know that existed- it'd be great for this to be included as a bonus on a Season 8 DVD release...

[shotzette]

Originally Posted by Marvo301

They should have spun off Carmine at the same time the girls moved to California. The backdoor pilot should have been the last Milwaukee episode. Carmine moves east and the girls move west.

I've wondered about that too, Marvo. Carmine didn't show up for a few episodes and the character of "Sonny", aka Carmine Lite got a lot of screen time. I wonder if they were thinking about the spin off then, or was there some sort of contract/salary dispute going on?

[Marvo301]

Originally Posted by shotzette

I've wondered about that too, Marvo. Carmine didn't show up for a few episodes and the character of "Sonny", aka Carmine Lite got a lot of screen time. I wonder if they were thinking about the spin off then, or was there some sort of contract/salary dispute going on?

Sonny did seem like he could be a replacement character for Carmine. So perhaps they were considering the spin-off at the time.

[McGillicuddy]

Originally Posted by MacLeaper

I'm watching Season 6 of "Laverne & Shirley" on DVD now and I'm definitely glad they kept Carmine there with them in California. I'm quite interested in seeing this opening credits sequence for "Carmine!" though- I didn't know that existed- it'd be great for this to be included as a bonus on a Season 8 DVD release...

Well, if Carmine! was the last episode of Laverne & Shirley, then it should be on season 8 DVD. Question is--do they use the Carmine! opening or the Laverne & Shirley opening??

[Wawwie]

It's a shame that Carmine didn't get his own spinoff series. He was a very talented singer and dancer. My favorite time he sang on the show was when he sang "Danny Boy."

[James]

Originally Posted by shotzette

Yes. They tried to make the series finale of L&S a backdoor pilot for a new, NYC based show starring Eddie Mekka. IMO, that showed how little respect a once wonderful show received from ABC.

How did the final episode show "little respect" for "L&S"?

[Wawwie]

Originally Posted by James

How did the final episode show "little respect" for "L&S"?

You just answered your own question when you quoted shotzette.

[TMC]

Originally Posted by Marvo301

They should have spun off Carmine at the same time the girls moved to California. The backdoor pilot should have been the last Milwaukee episode. Carmine moves east and the girls move west.

Why could he own a dance studio in Milwaukee but he couldn’t get one started in California? He may have gone out in the first place to visit Shirley and just stayed, but since he was a dance instructor, he should've been really the only one that made sense for being in California.

[TMC]

Laverne and Shirley Limped Off the Air With No Shirley and a Halfhearted Carmine Spinoff Attempt

Today, we look at how the series finale of Laverne and Shirley followed a depressing Shirley-less season by halfheartedly trying to spin Carmine off into his own series.

This is Back Door Blues, a feature about “backdoor pilots.” Backdoor pilots are episodes of regular TV series that are intended to also work as pilots for a new series. Sometimes these pilots get picked up, but a lot of times they did not get picked up. I’ll spotlight examples of both successful and failed backdoor pilots.

December is a month of Back Door Blues! Following our look at how The Facts of Life‘s series finale tried to set up a new series, we’ll look at a week’s worth of series finales serving as backdoor pilots!

CONCEPT: Carmine – Carmine (Eddie Mekka) moves to New York to try to make it on Broadway.

SERIES IT AIRED ON Laverne and Shirley

As I’m sure you know by now, the final season of Laverne and Shirley was extremely depressing, as Cindy Williams (Shirley) left the show at the start of the season, leaving Penny Marshall alone as Laverne sans Shirley. Marshall was obviously the star of the show, so it wasn’t quite as dramatic as, say, Williams had remained and Marshall had quit, but it was still very ridiculous.



I mean, well, come on, right? It’s still called Laverne and Shirley and there is no Shirley!

To add extra insult, Michael McKean (half of the other duo on the show, Lenny and Squiggy, with David Lander as Squiggy) ALSO left the series midway through the final season, so there was basically no cast, just Marshall and four extremely pointless supporting characters (Phil Foster as Laverne’s dad, Leslie Easterbrook as Laverne’s buxom neighbor, Rhoda, Lander as a Lenny-less Squiggy, and Eddie Mekka as Carmine “The Big Ragoo” Ragusa, who had been SHIRLEY’s love interest, so he had no real connection to Laverne).

So the show limps through an awful final season, and in the finale, I guess the producers figured they’d throw Mekka a bone for sticking with this turkey for ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY EPISODES, and the series finale is devoted to Carmine moving to New York to make it as an actor. He rents an apartment with another would-be musical performer, Rick West (played by Ben Powers, who had previously been Thelma’s husband in the final season of Good Times). Carmine first checks that Rick is not gay before becoming his roommate.

In any event, Carmine’s dreams actually come true in the episode, as he gets cast in Hair (so does Rick)! He calls Laverne, who lent Carmine the money that she had been saving up to buy a water bed (she sold her and Shirley’s old beds, so she temporarily has no bed), so she is sleeping in an inflatable kids pool, and Marshall’s final scene of the series is this depressing scene of her in this inflatable nonsense. Very pathetic.

DID THE PILOT GO TO SERIES? It did not.

SHOULD IT HAVE? Honestly, Mekka and Powers had good chemistry, and the musical number in the episode is actually quite good, so, I mean, maybe? It’d still be a sitcom based on CARMINE from Laverne and Shirley, so I guess not? But hey, I’ve seen far worse sitcoms from the early 1980s than this, so maybe!