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In 1982, Bob Newhart
brought his patented stutter and unique timing back to network audiences with
"Newhart," which ran until September of 1990. With the advent of the new show,
most TV aficionados expected Bob Newhart to act like, well, Bob Newhart. And that's just
what he did. But the real question was whether Bob's dryer-than-dry delivery would work in
a rural environment, far from the slick setting of Chicago, where his last show took
place.
Much to the delight of audiences,
network executives, and Bob Newhart himself, it did work. While
visiting his son's university in Spokane, Washington,
Bob observed the clerks behind the desk interacting
with the patrons and imagined the variety of people
they dealt with on a daily basis. Bob suggested the
idea of an inn keeper in Washington State to Newhart's
creator Barry Kemp. Barry suggested the inn be
located in New England, Bob agreed, and a series was
born. Newhart played Dick
Loudon, a "how-to" book writer from New York who decided to practice what he
preached by moving into and renovating a Vermont inn built in 1774.
For Dick and his wife Joanna, it
isn't the Inn that's high-maintenance--it's the townsfolk that accompany it. Each
character seems to have more than a few screws loose. George Utley, whose ancestors have
been caretakers in the area for more than 200 years, is needy. Kirk, who runs a nearby
cafe/gift shop, is a compulsive liar. Stephanie, the maid, is a rich, spoiled brat, just
like her cousin Leslie, who abandons the maid job after a year. Weirdest of all are the
three brothers who drift in and out of the Loudons' lives. Two of them are named Darryl.
Neither Darryl nor Darryl speaks; that chore goes to their fraternal leader, Larry.
Eventually, Dick branches out into
local television and ends up with more nuts on his hands, the worst of them being Michael
Harris. Michael not only produces Dick's show, but ends up marrying his maid.
The show's run ends with one of the
most famous final episodes in television history. We won't give it away here, but it
contains a surreal, slightly unsettling reference to Bob Newhart's previous series, which
is only fitting: Whether he's Dr. Bob Hartley or Dick Loudon, Bob Newhart's character
still can't seem to pick off the parasitic loonies that cling to him no matter where he
goes. |
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