The Curious Case of the Missing Coach

Two characters I've talked little about thus far for this blog have been Carla and the Coach. The simple reason for this is that storyline hardly ever revolve around either of these characters. Another reason I haven't discussed either of them much is because, to be honest, their characters are pretty flat compared to the others in this show.

Carla is the constantly pregnant, foul-mouthed waitress who cannot stand Diane. And Coach is, well, the Coach. A lovable old man whose good at his job and dumber than dirt. Great minor characters for a sitcom, but alas static.

That said, I've become concerned as I've closed out season 3 of Cheers as The Coach appears to be missing.

In episode 60, all is well as Mayday and Coach go back to school to get their GEDs -- Coach, it is explained, went off to war while Sam was offered a minor league contract and thus neither one finished high school. Coach works hard to pull out an A in his last required class, geography, while Mayday simply bangs the teacher to get his A. Again, in episode 60 all is well a good.

Yet he doesn't appear to be around in episode 61. And ep 62, which I've already blogged about, is Coachless as well. The reason, as Sam explains, is that the Coach went up to Vermont to renew his driver's license because their test is easier than that in Massachusetts. Something's fishy...

In the following episode, Sam explains that the Coach is in Ohio for a family reunion. The only problem is it's not Coach's family but rather an African-American family who sent an invite to Coach's address by mistake. Not wanting to be rude, it is explained by dialogue, the Coach attended the reunion. That was in 1977, Sam explains, and Coach has made it out to Ohio every year since.

Mayday explains Coach's absence in the following episode, 64, by stating that he's visiting his sister in Minnesota. The kicker with this story is that Coach told his sister to pick him up from the airport so she, apparently also dumber than dirt, drove from Minnesota to Boston to meet him at the airport.

Again, something's afoot.

There's no sign of Coach, and no explanation for his absence, in the following episode. Yet in episode 66, Coach is back! And yet, he doesn't appear again in the series until episode 69 in which he's only in the cold open.

Not to spoil things -- because I'm going to do that in my next post -- but I do believe I know the reason behind all of this. But I'm going to have to do some research to find out what the hell happened to Coach and why, apparently, many of the final episodes of season 3 were shot out of order.

The Coach is Dead, Long Live The Coach

I make no delusions to myself as to the popularity of my literary status be it as a novelist, poet, or blogger; indeed, I do realize I don't have a lot of followers who read this blog regularly.

But I do know I have some people who read this blog. And from discussions I've had with some of these people, I understand that a good number, perhaps even a majority, of people who are joining me on my little journey here were never a big fan of Cheers, and thus have only seen a handful of episodes, if that. And I also know some of you have never even seen a single episode and only have a basic understanding of the show due to it's place in pop culture as a television icon.

So for those folks, what I'm discussing here today may be new information. But for those of us who watched the show (to some extent) as a child, we are aware of the fact that Diane leaves the show halfway through the series and is replaced by Rebecca Howe. That's always been the big change of the show since the switch of female lead had an impact on the tone of the series.

Yet there was another big change that occurs between seasons 3 and 4, which is (spoiler alert) the death of Nicholas Colasanto, the actor who portrayed Mayday's old pitching coach, Ernie Pantusso.

If that name, Ernie Pantusso, sounds foreign to you, it should. The character was hardly ever called by that name as he was known affectionately to everyone at Cheers simply as "Coach." Hell, even Diane, who never fails to call Norm "Norman" and Cliff "Clifford," calls Coach by his nickname.

His character was hardly original. Serving as Sam's main bartender, Coach was often naive, in over his head, and the butt of the joke. To put it more bluntly, Coach was dumb as hell. (Essentially, he was an older version of Barney Rubble from The Flintstones.)

I almost devoted a post solely to this character back in July when I started this project. Though I never wrote such a post, I already had the title in my mind ("Is the Coach Retarded?!?"). Throughout the series Coach would make asinine comments or correct people (ie Cliff) whenever they made a comment that was meant to be sarcastic. As I envisioned it, the post would have been an overly long (as most of my posts are) diatribe into TV's lineage of lovable morons from All in the Family's Edith Bunker, to the Coach, to Kimmy Gibbler from Full House and Waldo from Family Matters.

I still may write that post one day (especially given the fact that Coach is replaced by bright-eyed Woody Boyd who is just as dumb). But I'll stay focused on the Coach, who though as dumb as a sitcom character could possibly be, had a pivotal role in the series. He was the embodiment of Sam Malone's backstory. He was there when Mayday was in the minors and was a part of the Red Sox organization during Mayday's heyday.

Also, as the show recounts several times, he was also there when Malone spiraled out of control. And he was the one who, at the beginning of season 3, serves as a catalyst by convincing Diane to return to the bar to save Sam from himself.

After doing the research I said I'd do in my previous post, I discovered that the episodes of this season were indeed aired out of order. Nicholas Colasanto died in February of 1985, before the show could wrap it's production on season 3. This is why Coach was gone for episodes at a time with Sam either seen talking to him on the phone or explaining to Norm and Cliff the man's current whereabouts.

He appears in a few odd spots, only in the cold open of episodes because Colasanto was already dead at that point and the show's writers didn't know how to explain his absence. And because of that, the Coach's final scene is one in which an old friend from his days playing in the minors comes by, only to have Coach sing his praises to the entire bar. Known as "The Blind Man," the old friend supplemented his income selling venetian blinds. But of course Coach, in the nature of things, always assumed the guy couldn't see.

The man tries repeatedly to explain the origins of the nickname, only for Coach to warn him to watch out for the steps on the way out. Carla tries telling Coach that she believes his buddy can see. Coach's response? "In some ways, he can see more."

And on that note, the Coach leaves us. Obviously when an actor dies mid-season, it's impossible to give his character a proper send off. Yet this last scene of his seems, somehow, fitting. The Coach was dumb as hell, clearly. But in some ways, he was also a tad bit wise.

In some ways, he could see more.

Michael Richards, Phone Books, Travel Agents, and Other Things Horribly Outdated

Yeah, yeah, I know it's been nearly a month since my last post (in which I vowed to make one post a week). If you don't like the infrequency of my posts, you're more than welcome to go find someone else on the Internet who was lame enough to watch every single episode of Cheers and then blog about the experience.

In all seriousness, I am going to make the effort to blog more regularly. And it should be easier now that things have really started to pick up on this show.

Today, I want to talk about sitcom plot devices and the rapid change they encountered thanks to advancements in technology. Also, I want to talk about the HOLY SHIT! moment I witnessed in episode 62 of the series when Cosmo Kramer himself, Michael Richards, walked into the bar.

As you can see to your left, Richards looks, well, normal playing a customer sitting in a Boston tavern in 1985. Throughout the episode, he shows no signs of eccentricity or physical hilarity from the Seinfeld days. That said, Richards plays a character named Eddie who has all the makings of the asshole we all saw on stage at the LA Laugh Factory in the fall of 2007.

You see, the premise of the episode is this: Some years ago, back when Sam Malone was still a raging alcoholic and on his way out of the majors, he made a bet with Eddie that he could marry the actress Jacqueline Bisset by a set date. If Mayday fails in this goal, the bar belongs to Eddie. By this point, in the here and now of 1985, Sam has forgotten both the bet and Eddie himself. In typical a-hole fashion, however, Eddie has with him the signed paper from that drunken night and threatens legal action against Sam if he doesn't hold up to his end of the deal.

Typical sitcom fodder, no? Of course it is. And, also in typical sitcom fashion, it's foul-mouthed Carla (who, it should be noted, is at this point in the series preggerz with her SIXTH child!) who suggests to Mayday that the terms of the contract dictate he most marry a woman named Jackie Bisset, not necessarily the Jackie Bisset.

With this epiphany, Mayday, Norm and Cliff set off to find a woman named Jackie Bisset by -- wait for it -- combing over Cliff's extensive collection of phone books from every metropolitan area in the United States. Granted, I was only a 2-year-old at the time, but I had no idea how tough life was in 1985. It's amazing how so many dilemmas in movies and TV shows from the 70's, 80's, and even 90's would easily be solved with either Google or a cell phone. A quick search on Facebook would have easily gotten Sam a list of a hundred Jackie Bissets.

(This, by the way, raises the question: What would a Facebook profile of Mayday Malone look like, anyway? Would he be a celebrity athlete that people could "like" on Facebook? Or would Mayday have an actual regular person profile with upwards of 2,000 "friends," half of whom would have been former lovers and the other half of whom would be girls he'd actively be trying to nail? I think I'm on to something here...)

While on the topic of technology, it should also be noted that Sam could easily take the paper contract he signed with Eddie Google legal counsel who charge reasonably so that he can determine if the contract even has a leg to stand on. Hell, he could even look up Massachusetts law precedents himself to check the validity of the drunken contract signing.

Though I will get into this in a post in the very near future, the show goes on to date itself several more times in Season 3 with Sam struggling to hook up an answering machine for his office phone and later on needing Cliff to help him find a travel agent who can look into the possibility of there being any flights going from Boston to Italy that night. (Spoiler alert: A certain someone has run off to Italy with a certain Frasier Crane and a certain Mayday has mixed feelings about this certain someone...)

Eventually Cliff finds a Jackie B living in West Virginia who is willing to come up to Boston (based on the lie that she's won a free vacay from a radio station contest). She doesn't want to marry Mayday but eventually falls for him. Eddie comes back to the bar, ready to collect his prize, only to find Mayday has stumped him. Showing that he's not quite the a-hole he's been made out to be, Eddie calls off the bet. Diane talks Jackie B out of wanting to marry Sam and Mayday keeps the bar. Everyone wins and nothing changes.

Again, is this the stuff of typical sitcom narrative? Absolutely. And was the whole story wholly outdated by watching it in 2011? Of course. And I was obviously taken out of the episode so much that I wrote two legal pad pages worth of notes and paused Netflix to snap a photo of pre-Kramer, pre-racist ranter Michael Richards. But I did laugh a number of times. And I did enjoy myself. And more than being entertained by this show, I've come to learn that the 1980's were really tough in Reagan's America...

Norm Peterson: Abject Failure or Everyman?

As you can discern from the title of this blog post, I'll be talking today about the character of Norm Peterson and his failings -- and if you watched more than three episodes of Cheers, you already know he had many.

Yet I should begin with my own failings as it's clear I haven't updated this site in awhile. I left the confines of my native Michigan for California and Arizona in two separate trips over the past few weeks and I have been kept busy with obligations and issues in both my professional and personal life. That said, there is no excuse for going more than a week without publishing at least some small post here. Who says one week is the rule? I do. And from now on, even though I'm going to get extremely busier as the weeks of the fall roll on, I will try my best to adhere to my own standards.

This brings us back to Norm, the lovable, consistently unemployed accountant/severe alcoholic who many would cite as their favorite character from Cheers. I've talked previously about Norm's struggles and accolades -- including the times in which he prevented his boss from forcing himself onto Diane and when he had a heart to heart with Sam and admitted he loves his wife Vera, both of which, naturally, occurred in Cheers' pool room.

And of course, Norm's wit is something that should never go unnoted as his way with words is on the shows many continual delights.

That all said, anyone who's watched the show understands Norm is essentially a never-do-well. Yet the reputation seems to change in one episode of season 3 once Normy gets a clean bill of health after a medical scare. Rejoicing in the fact that he's not going to die, Norm takes the good news as a sign he needs to do more with his life and decides to move to Bora Bora.

Needless to say, the rest of the gang is skeptical. Yet Norm insists that this is a final decision and even goes so far as to cancel a job interview by using the bar's phone so that everyone can see his seriousness. Norm's BFF, Cliff, of course believes Norm's putting everyone on and refuses to believe Norm's plans until the night Norm leaves the bar without his shoes (because, well you know, you don't need to wear shoes in French Polynesia...).

As you would expect, Cliff, and a few others, are depressed without Norm hanging out at the bar day in and day out. Yet, Cliff begins to take a certain pride in knowing Norm followed through with making such a bold decision, even if it's a decision that hurts Cliff himself since he's now sans-BFF. "To Norm!," Cliff says more than once in his somewhat stereotypical Bostonian accent as he salutes his friend.

And as anyone can figure out -- whether or not you've seen a single episode of Cheers -- Norm doesn't stay in Bora Bora forever. Hell, he doesn't even go to Bora Bora at all; he ends up living in the closet in Sam's office and having a friend mail Cliff postcards.

Eventually Sam discovers Norm living in his office (supposedly weeks after Norm was to have left the country) and tries to convince him to come out of hiding. Norm is hesitant to do so because he overhears Cliff's admiration for him and he's afraid of becoming a joke to his friends.

And it's this very conversation between Norm and Sam that has propelled me into writing a post about this one episode. Being afraid of what others think of you is something we all go through. And being afraid of letting friends know you've failed at something is sometimes even more difficult. But what can be even worse than failing is not following through with trying, which is exactly what Norm has done here as he chickened out of making a life altering change by leaving Boston for Bora Bora.

Mayday, always the encouraging friend, gets Norm to understand that it's okay to fail. And it's okay to change your mind. And it's okay to fail. Failure is something we all go through in life and is something we experience at varying levels. But no matter what, failure hurts. And here in this scene, I thought the show did a great job of portraying Norm and Sam as real people.

As I said before, Norm is perpetually unemployed throughout the series and things never go his way. But to see him vulnerable, unshowered and unshaven in Sam's office facing the consequences of his habitual failures makes him, and the show more endearing. In, most importantly, it makes the character of Norm someone with which we can all identify. And isn't that why so many of us love this show in the first place?

There have been 3-5 of these such discussions between these two, who by all accounts are the two male leads of this sitcom, and I've enjoyed them all as they've always come across as realistic, heartfelt, and have helped to add some depth to the characters and the show itself.

The Era of Crane Begins

Season three's first episode, as I blogged about on Monday, focuses on Sam's downfall after breaking up with Diane in the season two finale. And by episode's end, Sam is introduced to Dr. Frasier Crane, Diane's "friend" she has brought to the bar to help Sam battle his alcoholism.

The following episode, Diane comes clean about her relationship with Frasier, announcing the two are intimate. "Ewwww," Sam and Norm say in stereotypical sitcom unison. Yet Sam and Frasier begin to get along fairly well and, thanks to some prodding from Coach, the two realize having Diane come back to work at Cheers will be a suitable arrangement.

And even though he's still listed as a guest actor throughout the third season, Kelsey Grammer's Frasier Crane is a full-on presence in the series by the end of the third episode of season three.

Here, Frasier comes to Sam asking him for advice (Oh, the irony!) after Diane calls out Sam's name in bed. In the natural ways of the American sitcom, Frasier disguises the situation by saying the scenario is that of a patient and not Frasier's own dilemma.

Sam realizes that the woman in Frasier's story is indeed Diane, yet doesn't want to rub it in as the two men have begun to develop a friendship over the previous two episodes. Rather, he lets Frasier leave his office believing Sam doesn't know what's up and, as soon as Frasier's out the door, Mayday picks up a mirror and begins singing "Unforgettable" to his reflection.

Funny? Sure. Typical Mayday behavior? Absolutely. So what's this episode got to do with Frasier's role in the series being cemented? Well, this comes moments later when Diane comes into the office and Sam lets Diane know he knows whose name she called out the other night. Diane reluctantly admits that there still is a spark there between her and Sam.

The embrace, then kiss. "Oh, Diane!" Sam calls out. To which Diane says, "Oh, Frasier!" In her typical, spunky way, Diane gives Sam a little smile and walks away, leaving Sam to feel the confusion and humiliation Frasier felt the other night.

And there it is. Perhaps the biggest laugh this series has gotten out of me thus far, and also the scene that lets us know Dr. Crane's going to be sticking around for awhile. And by awhile, I mean until 2004 when his titular spin-off series finally ends...

Mayday Malone: Off the Wagon, Back on the Sauce

Two phrases I use quite often (both on the blog and in everyday conversation) are tomcatting and hound-dogging. These two words are verbs, actions. When one is tomcatting, they are in the act of being a tomcat, for instance. The difference between tomcatting and hounddogging is that a tomcat is a playboy (or ladies man or whatever phrase you want to use), yet the actions of a tomcat are for the most part respectful and innocent. When one is out tomcatting, he's looking to hook up with chicks (or dudes; if there can be female tomcats, there certainly can be gay tomcats) but the target of a tomcat knows what she/he is getting into. Both people realize what the situation is -- there are no broken hearts with a tomcat.

A hound dog, on the other hand, is less gentlemanly than a tomcat. A hound dog doesn't know when to give up. He pushes and pushes his agenda to the point of being creepy. Or he comes across as embarrassing, making those around him uncomfortable with his actions, whether or not they are the target of his sights.


And, ladies and gentlemen, the Sam "Mayday" Malone we are introduced to at the start of season 3 is a hound dog. He's unruly, unshaven, and going out at all hours of the night, picking up -- and presumably having his way with -- a great deal of women. But most importantly, he's back on the sauce.

In the scene from which the photo above comes from, Mayday comes bursting into Cheers during the middle of the day with two baton twirlers around his arms. (He explains that he picked them up from a parade earlier in the day.) As you can see, he's got a five o'clock shadow, is wearing a poorly tied neck tie, and wearing a hat. In other words, this is what a recovering alcoholic who has fallen off the wagon looks like in 1984.

What's more, in the picture above, Mayday is the spitting image of what a hound dog is -- a man (or woman) whose selfish, womanizing ways are hurting the ones around him. Coach is the man who got Mayday to seek help years ago for his alcoholism. And we find out Carla is ragged and tired after working night after night as the only waitress because Sam keeps hiring waitresses to replace Diane (who quit in the season 2 finale) but these replacements themselves keep quitting because Mayday bangs 'em and leaves 'em. In fact, he's hired 8 women to replace Diane and (according to Carla), Mayday had his way with all of them and it's six months later and she's still without a fellow waitress to work beside her.

And on this particular afternoon, Sam has brought these two showgals to the bar because they didn't believed he owned one. Coach confirms he owns Cheers and the ladies are impressed. So, naturally, Sam takes them back to his office saying as they walk "It's time for the halftime show at the Sammy Dome!" (Of, that Sam!)

Coach is brokenhearted to see Sam back to being his old self, so he goes to Diane's apartment to get her help. What he doesn't know, however, is that Diane has had some difficulties of her own as we see Diane and her mother's chauffeur bringing in luggage after her extended stay in therapy. Reluctantly, Diane agrees to help Sam even if it means going back to the Cheers bar she vowed to never return to while in therapy.

The next day, Mayday comes into work and heads into his office. As he enters the door, the audience sees several customers standing and sitting at nearby tables. And, since I have the luxury of hindsight as I watch these episodes, I know something is afoot because one such customer is Kelsey Grammar in a three piece suit.

Coach, Carla, Norm and Cliff discuss Mayday's downfall, debating whether or not they must intervene and moments later, Sam returns from his office, asking Coach what day of the week it is.

"Friday," Coach answers.

"Well that's it for me. Goodbye, everybody," Sam declares as he grabs a fifth of vodka and heads for the door.

But that's not it for Mayday. No, far from it, as Diane walks in and stops him in his tracks. The two discuss life since they broke they broke up and eventually the conversation turns to Sam's boozing. He denies being a drunk to Diane and asks Norm and company to vouch for him; they don't.

"When you try to be a good time drunk, you really find out who your friends are," Mayday declares.

Diane tries reasoning with Sam, asking him if he'll at listen to her friend she met while in therapy. Reluctantly, Mayday agrees to here the guy out, prompting Frasier, now seated next to Cliff at the bar to extend his hand and say hello to Sam. Mayday, naturally, jumps at being startled and accuses Diane of running a sting operation.

While I got more than a few laughs at this episodes writing (ie the dialogue I quoted in this post) and at the way Ted Danson played Sam Malone as a down and out drunk, I'm not sure how long I want this off-the-wagon version of Mayday to last. It's intriguing, for sure, but having the lead character of a sitcom outwardly expressing signs of out of control alcoholism won't be entertaining for too long...

Oh, Sam. Oh, Diane. Oh, End of Season 2...

A few blog posts ago, I said I was enjoying the heck out of the Season Two Version of Diane and Sam (manly because of the witty dialogue between the two). And that I've wrapped up the second season of Cheers, I'm a little sad to see how the season concludes.

The Season 2 finale is a two parter featuring Christopher Llyod as Phillip Semenko, a famed, if not extremely eccentric artist who Sam hires to paint a portrait of Diane. Why a portrait? Because Sam is trying to get out of the dog house after doing an interview with Boston Magazine after being named one of the top 20 hottest bachelors in town. (Oh, that Sam!)

Semenko, however, makes a bad impression with Mayday who sees him as nothing but a showman who uses his talent and assumed genius to bag women. Thus, Sam calls off the portrait painting arrangement; but Diane goes through with it behind Sam’s back because she respects Christopher Lloyd’s talent.



This causes obvious friction between S and D and we end up with the two slapping each other in the face in an empty Cheers bar, because, you know domestic violence is ha-larious! After pinching one another's noses for two minutes (which the live studio audience goes bonkers for, by the way), the two end up saying goodbye to each other.

I’ve got to admit I wasn’t feeling this episode for the simple reason that I new this goodbye was not THE goodbye. Diane’s got a few more seasons left on the show and even after that, she returns in the final episode of the series. That said, I did like the final scene of the season in which Sam tells Diane “One more thing… get the hell out.” They say their “final” goodbyes and Sam, just for a second, physically displays that he’s considering running after her before walking towards his office. From inside the bar, we see Diane’s legs walking back down the steps and stopping, only to walk back up the stairs after noticing Sam is walking away. Needless to say, this scene got me pretty emo.

I’m interested to see how they bring Diane back to the bar in season 3. And I’m also excited as all hell for the beginning of the Frasier Crane era!