What if Shelly Long doesn't leave Cheers?

Shelley made a really bad sitcom in the 90s. Painful to watch. Can’t remember what it was called but Treat Williams was in it.

 

Bit off topic, but are the DVDs of Cheers nice looking PQ wise?

 

Long was a terrific comic actress, but the time had come to leave the show or risk repeating herself endlessly. She was amazing as Carol in the two Brady parody movies, and achieved some sort of cable immortality with the evergreen comedy, THE MONEY PIT.

I wish she'd been able to do something like the Christopher Guest movies, or even a sketch show. She was very good at presenting conflicted interiors and facades and had displayed an ability for impressions.

 

Slightly off-topic but found this picture and thought some would find it interesting.

 

You'd be better streaming the episodes in HD. The DVDs looked soft and of course the colors would smear. It's OK for the format if you have an old CRT non-HD TV but the HD versions look far better.

 

True,
but the rest of the cast never liked her - she was always the sole outsider - and it got worse; so there wasn't really anything she could do.

I like season 1 the best.

 

What's going on with the hall that goes to the bathroom and back room where the pool table is?

It appears a wall was built there? Crazy union stage hands....

 

NORM!

 

I don't know if there was ever an intention to have her appear more than occasionally. But I have wondered whether the Modern Family people found Shelley difficult to work with as well... after creating a role for her that plays into her specialty of playing impossible high maintenance people.

I do find of odd that on a show that's all about family Mitchell and Claire's mother is hardly ever mentioned. Though it's well established that they can't deal with her.

 

This bothered me so much as I was binging the series last summer. Some episodes it'd be there, other episodes, the pool room and window would be visible. I eventually found a blog post by Ken Levine that stated auxiliary sets would be built where the pool room was. So basically, any episode that had non-bar scenes had that brick wall there.

 

Why didn't they just put a door there?

 

I think the idea was that the brick wall, on TV and somewhat out of focus, would look like the wall of the pool room. Really, what I initially thought I was noticing was the window appearing and disappearing. It took me awhile to realize it was a closer brick wall, and that was in HD on a 46" screen.

 

It keeps my interest. Kirstie Alley never grew on me

 

There are a lot of good characters on that show (Modern Family), and they are well written. I just thought that it was a missed opportunity. That character was comedy gold, IMO.

 

They must've bricked up Sam in there. Remember, that's where he went in the last shot of the series.

 

I think I actually liked the show better after Shelley left. It was good for the show. Gave it some fresh material to work with.

 

I never really liked Shelley in Modern Family...I can see why she never became a regular. Now, Pepper should be a regular

 

I think Season 6, the first without Long, is the best. The (non-main cast) regulars at the bar are more involved in the chatter, the jokes were funnier, and the main storylines were very diverse. The show as a whole seemed to get a shot of viagra due to the cast change of Long to Alley, and Frasier and Lilith becoming bigger parts of the show helped big time.

 

Great point. I think these shows with great ensemble casts (such as MASH, which did just fine when Henry, Trapper John, et al. left) have such a deep bench and talented writers, that even a central character like Diane leaving will not kill the show.

 

As much as I liked the early seasons the Sam/Diane had run it's course.

Did she ever make another appearance??

 

I don't think she ever came back, though she did appear on a few Frasier episodes.

 

She returned in the very last episode(s) for one more will they/won’t they storyline with Sam.

 

Besides the final Cheers episode, she returned For the 200th episode, which broke format and was a panel discussion among the cast members, moderated by John McLaughlin.

 

I saw an interview with her a few years after she left that she making more money making movies that were flops then she did for an entire season of Cheers. She even used the word "flop". I doubt if she was lying.