Chuck Cunningham Syndrome

That was explained - Barney got divorced.

 

Scrubs also brilliantly had JD's father (played by Ritter) die; lovely human being.

 

They didn't dump Elinor Donahue, she asked to be let out of her contract, and they agreed. She had nothing but kind words about her time working on the show, but she said she felt she had little acting chemistry with Griffith, but she liked him, and the show's focus changed a bit from what she had expected (and what they told her before she started) to highlight the comedy between Andy and Don Knotts, plus she had personal problems at the time. She tells it in these clips
youtube.com/watch?v=F768wetjbmc
youtube.com/watch?v=F7EhI1p3Vik

But as far as the show went, she disappeared without a trace. Then the show tried a few more times to fill a girlfriend spot for Andy, trying out Joanna Moore, Susan Oliver, and Sue Ane Langdon, but for the show they didn't work right either for one reason or another, and they disappeared too.

 

He did not get divorced, they separated for awhile. But they get back together and she is in a few episodes later on.

 

Roy??

 

I think that if Downey had stayed it might have extended the life of the series. The two characters seemed to work well together, and it might have been a way for Ally to recover from the loss of Billy. According to Wikipedia, the plan was to have Ally and Larry marry.

 

One of the poker playing buddies. Murray (Al Molinaro) got featured regularly. Vinnie and Speed were brought back a bit, but not used as much as 1st season. Roy was dropped after the first season.

 

One of the poker buddies, Oscar's accountant.

 

For something that's supposed to be such a classic, The Odd Couple was an awfully thin concept for a series. Other than they lived together, what? Yes, they had jobs, but that wasn't the primary focus of the show.

They were both professional men. Was their alimony/child support that bad that they couldn't afford their own place? You couldn't pay me to take on a roommate at that age. Most people are going to want privacy, "Odd Couple" or no odd couple.

 

Like most classic sitcoms, it's a classic because of the actors and the writing, not because of the setup.

 

They still had a reliance on episodes featuring Billie Jean King and Howard Cosell. How many episodes can you do of them playing poker?

 

Christina Moore was a LOT more beautiful than Lisa Robin Kelly (the original sister), but she wasn't nearly as funny.

 

That's one of my complaints about Big Bang Theory. Why are those two guys living together? They're both physicists -- what, neither one can afford to pay rent for apartments by themselves on a physicist's salary? Ridiculous. And there's no amount of money on earth you could pay me that would get me to agree to live with someone like Sheldon.

 

I remember one writer at the time saying the play/movie only had them together for a few weeks and he asked rhetorically “what can I do next...have one of them get pregnant?”. It was a show on the verge of being cancelled every season but summer reruns saved it. It found its legs in re-runs. Klugman and Randall, while not enemies in real life, became closer in the late 1980s when Klugman had cancer.

 

If I'm remembering right, the premise is that Felix doesn't want to get his own place because he is certain that the arrangement is temporary, that his wife will relent and take him back. I just checked, and in the end she does.

 

Great show but I didn’t like it without Phil.

 

I stand corrected. Thanks for the info.

 

I think this is a case of a situation which is fine for a movie, but takes a bit of stretching to make it into a long-running sitcom. However, sometimes it works (like with The Odd Couple).

 

Donna's sister on that 70's show, her only appearance:

 

Yeoman Janice Rand was reassigned off the Enterprise early-on. Necessary personal issues there. But, she did get to re-appear elsewhere in a couple of the Trek films, but of course nothing was spoken of her when she was just beamed-off the show.

Poor thing - lost her gig, and she didn't even have a red shirt on.

Ensign Ro at least got a proper sendoff, a generation later.

 

Yeoman Janice Rand was a red shirt (or red dress).

 

As durable as the Odd Couple property has been, it's a remarkably thin concept. Felix moves in, and everything is marking time until he moves out. Oscar messes up his place again, and that's all you need to see. Oscar has no meaningful definition outside of his relationship with Felix and vice versa, and the characters are not amenable to developing a strong supporting cast. As opposed to something like Laverne and Shirley, similar roommate concept that was able to develop a supporting cast. OR M*A*S*H or Alice, also developed from movies, but with more specific settings that could be developed. Odd Couple is a neat guy and messy guy in an apartment, and that's it. Probably why it's gotten adapted so much, it's impossible to really screw it up.

I think if it had come along a few years later, the divorced dad ideas would be built out a lot more than they were at that time. I suppose the homosexual implications as well, as those close of the Klugman/Randall version was about the end of the era where that could go without mention.

 

The Odd Couple does seem very adaptable. One version I faintly remember is The Oddball Couple, an animated series by Depatie-Freleng. They took the the neat/messy aspect and pushed it, with the characters living in a home that was divided down the middle, one side was a pristine mansion, and the other side was (per Wikipedia) a dilapidated shack.

 

The first scene of the first episode of every season of Homicide: Life on the Street starts with two detectives explaining why certain cast members have disappeared (on suspension, eloped, AWOL etc)

 

Then there was Police Story, where every week, every episode, the characters from the last episode disappeared.