Not sure what the analog TV is like up north, but a few years ago I got a digital antenna when CBS was off Directv for a week so I could still watch football, and there's a couple retro comedy channels in the Buffalo area that plays all kinds of stuff from the 70s to the 90s like Growing Pains, Family Ties, Drew Carey Show, Night Court, Alice, Wings, Who's the Boss, etc. Even this show, which was one I really liked as a kid...
Gimme a Break! told the story of Nell Harper who agrees to look after her dying friend's family by kind of becoming their housekeeper. Looking back, it's kind of funny to think you had two shows at the time, Diff'rent Strokes where a white man adopts two black children, and he's a millionaire, but you have a black woman pseudo-adopt a white family by becoming basically their housekeeper. Imagine how people would react to these shows in our ridiculously politically charged era.
Watching episodes now, it's kind of sad to watch Dolph Sweet, who played the father Chief Carl Kanisky, slowly die from stomach cancer before our eyes, growing thinner and gaunter as seasons progressed until he died on May 8th, 1985.
Sweet's passing was addressed the following year's debut poignant episode "Joey's Train" when the Chief's middle daughter, Julie who had married Jonathan Silverman (of Weekend at Bernie's fame) needed more space than her childhood bedroom they'd been staying in, wanted to move into the master bedroom, but Nell was against the idea as everyone still hadn't come to terms with the Chief's passing and she forbade anyone from going in the room. The situation is furtherly made worrisome when Officer Simpson brings a wrapped gift from the police station that the Chief had been saving for Joey's birthday. Later that night, Nell hears Joey in the room and finds him playing with an electric train set the Chief had wrapped for him, and by entering the room, Nell learns to come to terms with the Chief's death, and eventually concedes to the newlyweds taking over the room. It's a pretty emotional episode IMO.
Fortunately, the show had earlier added child actors Joey, whom the Chief had busted for scamming donations but later agrees to let the homeless boy live with them, and later still Nell takes in Joey's younger borther played by his real life bro, Matthew Lawrence, and the show slowly shifted to stories about them and Nell as Carl's teenage girls grew older and got their own lives. I always thought the show was funny for the time, with pretty good supporting characters like the always funny Grandpa Kanisky played by John Hoyt, and Officer Simpsons played by Howard Morton. Not shy to address societal issues of the time like drugs or teenage pregnancy, there's even an episode where the youngest Kanisky, Samantha, calls Nell the n-word in anger, and the meaning and hurtfulness of the word is addressed. There's another episode where Samantha tricks Joey in to performing in blackface at Nell's church to get revenge on Nell, so the show while often funny, addressed many serious issues. Of course, "very special episodes" were the rage of shows of that time (see Nancy Reagan on Diff'rent Strokes). Geez, looking back, Samantha was kind of a rotten child.
In later seasons, they moved to New York where Nell adopted Joey and Matthew from their absentee father who had moved the children there previously. These seasons saw the additions to the cast of a a landlord played Paul Sand and a neighbor played by a young Rosie O'Donnell.
There were also a lot of musical guest stars throughout because of the character of Nell Harper and Nell real-life background in singing, so stars of the era such as Andy Gibb, Buffalo's own Ray Parker Jr., Whitney Houston, and the Pointer Sisters appeared. And any show that gets Sammy Davis Jr. to sing is alright in my book.
Joey Lawrence would of course go to be a teenage heartthrob on Blossom , while his younger brother Matthew Lawrence would later get a reoccurring role on Boy Meets World.
Hey, look at this, I said this wasn't going to be like the Toon thread where I spent a lot of time writing up long descriptions on shows and instead just play the themes, but here we are. I guess I can't help myself, lol, it's like revisiting with old friends. I gotta find a life.
