Tag Archives: Charlotte Rae

Thunder In Paradise (1993, directed by Douglas Schwartz)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

R.J. “Hurricane” Spencer (Hulk Hogan) is a former Navy SEAL who now lives in Florida and makes his living with his superboat, Thunder.  Spencer’s best friend, Bru (Chris Lemmon), is also his business partner.  There’s nothing that Spencer and Bru can’t do.  This movie starts with Spencer taking the boat down to Cuba so he can rescue the family of a dissident and bring them back to Florida.  It ends with his using his boat to save the lives of his wife (Felicity Waterman) and his stepdaughter (Robin Weisman) from some treasure hunters who have made the mistake of kidnapping them.  Spencer’s marriage is one of convenience.  His wife needed a husband to get her fortune and he needed a rich wife to keep his business going.  His father-in-law (Patrick MacNee) doesn’t trust him but Spencer’s a top-notch American hero.

Though it was initially released direct-to-video, Thunder in Paradise was actually a pilot for a syndicated television show that started a few months later.  Both the film and the show were from the producers of Baywatch and it shows with the emphasis on the beach, the bikinis, the corny humor, and the cartoonish villains (led, in this case, by Flash Gordon himself, Sam Jones).  Of course, it’s a Hulk Hogan movie so none of that is really a negative.  Hogan might be playing Hurricane Spencer but he’s really playing himself and there’s enough self-aware humor to make Thunder In Paradise entertaining in a way that No Holds Barred definitely was not.  (I liked that, during a fight on another boat, there just happened to be a wooden chair sitting on the deck that Hogan could break across his opponent’s back.)  Chris Lemmon and Hulk Hogan are a surprisingly good team (Lemmon’s brain provide a needed  contrast to Hogan’s bawn) and Carol Alt is on-hand as the owner of a beach bar.  Naturally, a handful of Hogan’s fellow wrestlers shows up as well, Brutus Beefcake, Jim “The Anvil” Neidhardt, Giant Gonzalez, Jimmy Hart, and others.  As a fan of The Avengers, I was happy to see Patrick MacNee, even if his character was just a typical distrustful father-in-law.

Corny, silly, dumb, and more fun than it probably should be, Thunder In Paradise is an entertaining product of its time.

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 5.22 and 5.23 “Pride of the Pacific/The Viking’s Son/Separate Vacations/The Experiment/Getting to Know You”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986!  The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

This week, a special two-hour Love Boat sets sail for Alaska and adventure!

Episode 5.22 and 5.23 “Pride of the Pacific/The Viking’s Son/Separate Vacations/The Experiment/Getting to Know You”

(Dir by Roger Duchowny, Originally aired on March 6th, 1982)

The Pacific Princess is sailing to Alaska!

The Sea Princess, commanded by the strict and haughty Gunner Nordquist (Ted Knight), is also sailing to Alaska.  Steve Bloom (Sonny Bono) of the Cruise Ship Association has arranged for a series competitions between the crews of the two ships.  At each stop, the rival crews will compete in races, tree-sawing, tug-of-war, and wrestling.  The crew that wins the most competitions will receive a trophy.  All of the passengers are really excited about it, though I’m not sure why.  I would not want to spend my vacation watching a bunch of strangers take part in a competition that has nothing to do with me.

Gunner is determined to win.  Stubing is determined to have fun.  Or, at least, he is until his crew is absolutely humiliated during the second competition.  When he learns that Gunner has brought in a bunch of ringers, Stubing becomes determined to win at all costs.  Only the tears of Vicki can reveal to Stubing that he’s becoming a monster.  Stubing realizes that he’s been pushing too hard and he apologizes to his crew.  At the final stop, Stubing suggests a dog sled race between him and Gunner.  Gunner agrees.  Steve Bloom says it’s okay.  The crowd is excited for some reason.  In the end, Gunner wins the dog sled race and the competition but only because Stubing kindly refuses to take advantage of an accident that occurs during the race.  Gunner announces that the trophy properly belongs to Stubing and his crew.  Gunner also says that it’s okay if his son (Woody Brown) wants to become a cruise director instead of a navigator.  I’m glad that all worked out….

Actually, this whole storyline made no sense to me.  Beyond the fact that the passengers were oddly excited about the whole thing, I really didn’t see the point of making the members of the crew compete in stuff like tug-of-war and wrestling.  Wouldn’t it have made more sense to compete to see who could be the first to reach the next port?  I appreciated that at least some of this episode was shot on location.  The Alaskan scenery was lovely but the whole competition storyline was just weird.

There were other storylines, of course.  A couple played Charles Nelson Reilly and Charlotte Rae spent the entire cruise in their cabin, getting to know each other because they fell in love at first sight and they wanted to make sure they can handle marriage.  (I can think of one big reason why Charlotte Rae marrying Charles Nelson Reilly might not work out but, this being The Love Boat, it never comes up.)  Two Harvard researchers (John James and Mary Crosby) tried to come up with a pill that would make shy Dave (Douglas Barr) irresistible to women.  Both of those stories were pretty boring.  John James was handsome so the show had that going for it.

Slightly more interesting was the story of Harry Meacham (Tom Bosley) and his wife, Dorothy (Michele Lee).  As they’re in the process of divorcing, Harry sails on The Sea Princess while Dorothy board the Pacific Princess.  Of course, Doc makes his move as soon he realizes the Dorothy will soon be single.  While Dorothy has a chaste fling Doc, Harry has a chaste fling with massage therapist Britta (Priscilla Barnes).  Eventually, Harry and Dorothy realize they still love each other.  Awwww!  Yay!  This story was sweet.

Otherwise, this was not the most memorable cruise to Alaska that the Love Boat has ever taken.  Next week, let’s hope for no musicals and no athletic competitions.  Come on, Love Boat, we all know why we’re here!

Retro Television Review: Beane’s of Boston 1.1 “German Week”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Thursdays, I will be reviewing Beane’s of Boston, which aired on CBS in 1979.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

This week, we take a look at an attempt to bring a British show to America.

Episode 1.1 “German Week”

(Dir by Jerry Paris, originally aired on May 5th, 1979)

Beane’s of Boston is a venerable department store, a landmark of Boston.  The store is housed in a multi-story building and it is run by the elderly but still horny Frank Beane (Tom Poston).  Frank takes a break from ogling his secretary and sneaking off to the strip club to demand this his nephew, Franklin Beane (George O’Hanlon, Jr.), explain why the 4th floor — which houses the Men and Ladies’ Wear Department — is losing money.

Franklin admits that sales have been off but he has a plan.  What if the store only sold German products for a week?  And what if the employees dressed in lederhosen and did German dances?

The 4th floor employees are not particularly enthused.  The head of Ladies’ Wear, Mrs. Slocum (Charlotte Rae), served as a WAC during World War II and once found herself with a German soldier on top of her after a landmine went off.  Mr. Peacock (John Hillerman), the stuffy floor manager, feels that he looks like an idiot dressed in a German outfit.  Meanwhile, in the Men’s Department, elderly Mr. Granger (Morgan Farley) sleeps while the flamboyant Mr. Humphries (Alan Sues) answers the phone in his most “masculine” voice and Mr. Lucas (Larry Bishop) hits on the just-hired administrative assistant, Ms. Brahms (Lorna Patterson).

German week is a disaster, bringing in a profit of $12.94.  But, fortunately, old Frank Beane is dating a German woman and she loves the idea.  So, no one loses their job….

If this sounds familiar and if you’re reading this in America, you’ve probably seen an episode of the infamously terrible British sitcom Are You Being Served? on PBS.  Beane’s of Boston was an attempt to do an American version of that sitcom and, just as The Office would do decades later, the pilot essentially took a script from the British series and populated it with American actors.

Setting aside the question of whether or not the world needed more than one version of Are You Being Served?, the idea of transporting that very British sitcom to Boston was not, in itself, a terrible one.  Boston is one of our oldest cities and, while it may be best-known today for its robust blue collar culture, there were still enough stuffy Protestants around to make it believable that a store like Beane’s could survive.  That said, the pilot still falls flat, largely because everyone but John Hillerman seems to be miscast and even Mr. Peacock is considerably less amusing once you take away his title of colonel.  While the British original was known for its broad comedy, it appears like a model of subtlety when compared to the performances of Alan Sues as Mr. Humphries and Larry Bishop as Mr. Lucas.  As well, why would any store do a German week in a city that is best-known for its strong Irish community?  Why not do an Irish Week?  It perhaps made sense in Are You Being Served? but, in Beane’s of Boston, it just makes Franklin seem like such an idiot that you almost feel like he deserves to lose his job.

Beane’s of Boston did not have the same success as Are You Being Served?  German Week would be the only episode aired.