Starting With the Sixth Season....

[ILuvCarolBurnett]

I am watching the complete series DVDs and I am up to season six. I've watched about the first 10 episodes of the sixth season and was wondering if anyone else noticed that the quality of the writing took a nosedive at this time. The shows were just .... not funny. I did notice that there appears to be a lot of new producers, writers and directors at this time, and they didn't seem to be familiar that much with the show. I haven't seen the "Burbank" shows in several years, but I do remember not liking those nearly as much as when they were in Milwaukee.

[associate]

Moving the girls to CA was one of the worst moves ever. That the girls were brewery line workers who lived in a dank basement apt in Milwaukee in the late 1950's was all part of the formula that made it great.

When they moved to CA, they had jobs at an upscale department store, had a nice apt in sunny CA in the mid 60's. It changed the whole dynamic of the show. It became like every other CA based show like Three's Company & Too Close For Comfort.

I know that a lot of people felt that as the girls aged they needed to change the time and location to keep up with times. But that's not true, take MASH or Happy Days for example. The Korean War lasted 3 years but the series lasted 11. Happy Days stayed in Milwaukee for their 11 years. So there was no reason for L&S to leave Milwakuee and go from the late 50's to the mid 60's.

[LittleRickyII]

Originally Posted by ILuvCarolBurnett

I am watching the complete series DVDs and I am up to season six. I've watched about the first 10 episodes of the sixth season and was wondering if anyone else noticed that the quality of the writing took a nosedive at this time. The shows were just .... not funny. I did notice that there appears to be a lot of new producers, writers and directors at this time, and they didn't seem to be familiar that much with the show. I haven't seen the "Burbank" shows in several years, but I do remember not liking those nearly as much as when they were in Milwaukee.

MeTV is airing S6 right now and, yes, it's pretty horrible. I saw the first couple episodes this week. I don't think I had seen these episodes since they originally aired some 35 years ago. They were as bad as I remember them. A couple nights ago, they aired the episode where they first arrive in California and there is an earthquake. I was trying to time it. It went on for almost 3 minutes! The longest recorded earthquake in Los Angeles was back in the late 1800s and only lasted 49 seconds. There were no really major quakes in the '60s when this episode took place. And in recent decades, the really bad quakes have not lasted more then 15 seconds. It was so over the top. I get that they were trying to redo the I Love Lucy bit in the rickety hotel, and from The Lucy Show with the electric mattress, with beds moving across the floor. But it just didn't work here at all. It was just really labored silliness.

And Penny and Cindy (especially Cindy) are so over the top in their performances. That's the thing that bothers me most is the over-the-top acting and lack of subtlety. But at this point in the series, the scripts don't even make sense.

Last night they aired that Troy Donahue episode. That scene with Laverne and Shirley on a movie set playing cavewomen is painful. I was wondering if there was even a script involved here, or if the director just said, "Penny and Cindy, just go out and act silly and do whatever you want in this scene for the next few minutes." It seemed like a bunch of nonsense to fill the time with no substance. There is nothing funny about "wanga, wanga." And this Rhonda character, she's a beautiful woman, the but the character is not believable at all.

[ILuvCarolBurnett]

Originally Posted by associate

Moving the girls to CA was one of the worst moves ever. That the girls were brewery line workers who lived in a dank basement apt in Milwaukee in the late 1950's was all part of the formula that made it great.

When they moved to CA, they had jobs at an upscale department store, had a nice apt in sunny CA in the mid 60's. It changed the whole dynamic of the show. It became like every other CA based show like Three's Company & Too Close For Comfort.

I know that a lot of people felt that as the girls aged they needed to change the time and location to keep up with times. But that's not true, take MASH or Happy Days for example. The Korean War lasted 3 years but the series lasted 11. Happy Days stayed in Milwaukee for their 11 years. So there was no reason for L&S to leave Milwakuee and go from the late 50's to the mid 60's.

Hollywood has this bizarre idea that they have to tell the rest of the country CA is nothing but surfboards, bikinis and hard bodies. I've lived in LA for 23 years and not everyone looks like they are going to or coming from the beach.

[ILuvCarolBurnett]

I saw Cindy Williams at a book signing for her book in LA a few months ago. She was asked by someone in the audience about the CA shows. She krinkled her nose and said, "No, I didn't like the CA shows. It was not a good idea to move us there." So that was what Cindy Williams herself said about them.