Late Night Retro Television Review: Check It Out! 3.5 “Not For Commercial Use”

Posted on January 25, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Saturdays, I will be reviewing the Canadian sitcom, Check it Out, which ran in syndication from 1985 to 1988. The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

This week, the news comes to Cobb’s!

Episode 3.5 “Not For Commercial Use”

(Dir by Alan Erlich, originally aired on October 18th, 1987)

The local news station is coming down to Cobb’s to do a story on how things have changed at the store now that the company is under new management.

Really?

Is it just a super slow news day or something? The insinuation is that it’s actually going to be a 30-minute news special, all about an obscure grocery store in the suburbs of Ontario. (In this episode, Check It Out! finally admits that the show is taking place in Canada.) I mean, even if it is a slow news day, I just can’t imagine that a thirty-minute story about Cobb’s would be a huge ratings grabber.

Howard is excited about the idea of being on television. He calls his Aunt Lil and promises to tug on his ear so that she’ll know that he’s thinking of her. Howard imagines himself as a TV star. There’s Howard hosting a talk show! There’s Howard as a tough detective. It’s all kind of silly but, in its way, kind of cute. Howard is a lot more likable this season than he was during the previous two seasons. And Don Adams, who can sometimes seem a bit indifferent when it comes to playing Howard, actually gave a lively performance in this episode.

TC Collingwood (Elizabeth Hanna), who I guess is supposed to be the liaison between the store and the corporate offices, does not want Howard to appear on TV. She feels that Howard is a bit too …. I guess “dorky” would be the right term to use here. She thinks that Howard is going to embarrass the store with his bad jokes and his Bogart impersonation. TC would rather focus on employees like Leslie, who now wears a chef’s hat and who has apparently transferred from working as a cashier to working in the deli.

(One thing that I’ve noticed is that, during season 3, the show finally hired enough extras to make the store seem like a real place. There are now employees and shoppers all over the place. Marlene is no longer the only cashier and Leslie appears to have a good crew working with him at the deli)

As for Howard, he does manage to get on television. He simply cannot be stopped! He wanders in front of the camera. He tells bad jokes. He does even worse impersonations. TC ends up locking him in a meat locker but it turns out that the CEO of the company really enjoyed Howard and his antics. Good for Howard, I guess.

This episode continued this season’s pattern of being far better than the two that came before it. For once, every member of the cast was allowed a chance to shine. This episode was worth watching for Viker’s attempt to tell a knock knock joke alone. Check It Out! was a deeply silly show but at least in the third season it’s finally got consistently funny.

Embracing the Melodrama Part II #59: Hardcore (dir by Paul Schrader)

Posted on May 5, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

“Turn it off…turn it off…turn it off…TURN IT OFF!” — Jake Van Dorn (George C. Scott) in Hardcore (1979)

Jake Van Dorn (George C. Scott) is a businessman who lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He’s a deeply religious man, a sincere believer in predestination and the idea that only an elite few has been prelected to go to Heaven. Jake is divorced (though he occasionally tells people that his wife died) and is the father of a teenage girl named Kristen (Ilah Davis).

One of the first things that we notice about Jake is that there appears to be something off about his smile. There’s no warmth or genuine good feeling behind it. Instead, whenever Jake smile, it’s obvious that it’s something he does because that what he’s supposed to do. Indeed, everything Jake does is what he’s supposed to do and he expects his daughter to do the same.

When Kristen goes to a church camp in California, she soon disappears. Jake and his brother-in-law, Wes (Dick Sargent), fly down to Los Angeles and hire a sleazy private investigator, Andy Mast (Peter Boyle), to look for her. A few weeks later, Andy shows Jake a pornographic film. The star? Kristen.

Jake is convinced that Kristen has been kidnapped and is being held captive. Wes tells Jake that he should just accept that this is God’s will. Andy tells Jake that, even if he does find Kristen, Jake might not want her back. Finally, Jake tells off Wes, fires Andy, and ends up in Los Angeles himself. Pretending to be a film producer and recruiting a prostitute named Nikki (Season Hubley) to serve as a guide, Jake searches for his daughter.

The relationship between Jake and Nikki is really the heart of the film. For Jake, Nikki becomes a temporary replacement for his own daughter. For Nikki, Jake appears to be the only man in the world who doesn’t want to use her sexually. But, as Jake gets closer and closer to finding his daughter, Nikki realizes that she’s getting closer and closer to being abandoned.

Hardcore is a pretty good film, one that was shot in location in some of the sleaziest parts of 70s Los Angeles. Plotwise, the film is fairly predictable but George C. Scott, Season Hubley, and Peter Boyle all give excellent performances. (The scenes were Scott pretends to be a porn producer are especially memorable, with Scott perfectly capturing Jake’s discomfort while also subtly suggesting that Jake is enjoying himself more than he wants to admit.) And, even if you see it coming from miles away, the film’s ending will stick with you.

Shattered Politics #70: The Brady Bunch In The White House (dir by Neal Israel)

Posted on February 5, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

What happens when architect and suburban dad Mike Brady (Gary Cole) is elected Vice President of the United States? Well, President Randolph (Dave Nichols) ends up having to resign when it turns out that he’s thoroughly corrupt. Mike Brady is sworn in as the new President and then appoints his wife Carol (Shelley Long) as his new Vice President. He and his wife run an ethical and determinedly old-fashioned administration. When Senators argue, Carol suggests that they need a time out. When Mike is handed a report that indicates trouble for the economy, Mike looks at it, signs it, and says, “We can do better.” When a racist Senator is seated next to a black nationalist at a White House reception, the two opponents are both served peanut butter on crackers by the Alice, the Brady Family housekeeper and soon, they are bonding over their shared love of peanut butter.

Of course, not everything’s perfect. For instance, middle daughter Jan (Ashley Drane) is haunted by voices in her head that tell her that she’ll never be better than older sister Marcia (Autumn Reeser). However, fortunately, Jan discovers a talking portrait of Abraham Lincoln who talks some sense to her.

And then, middle son Peter (Blake Foster) accidentally breaks a priceless Ming vase. All of the other Brady kids take responsibility for breaking it. President and Vice President Brady quickly figure out that Peter was responsible and, in order to make him confess, they punish every Brady kid but Peter. And then…

Okay, are you getting the feeling that Brady Bunch In The White House is a stupid movie? Well, it is. This 2002 film was made for television and serves as a sequel to the earlier Brady Bunch Movie and A Very Brady Sequel. It features the same basic idea as the first two films: the rest of the world is cynical and angry while the Bradys are still trapped in the wholesome world of their old television show. Mike is still offering up life lessons. Carol is still smiling and saying, “Your father’s right.” Marcia is self-centered. Jan is obsessive. Cindy has issues with tattling. Greg thinks every girl that he meets is really happening in a far out way. Peter is always feeling guilty. Bobby … well, Bobby doesn’t do much of anything.

The big difference is that the Bradys are in the White House now. They’re still reliving incidents from their TV show but now they’re doing it in the White House. And, some of it is kinda cute. Well, I take that back. Most of it is really stupid but the part about the vase made me smile despite myself.

So there’s that.

But, honestly — no, I really can’t think of any clever way to prove that the Brady Bunch In The White House is actually a subversive satire or anything that’s really worth recommending.

Sorry.

However, I did see A Very Brady Sequel on Cinemax last night. It’s kind of funny and features a lot of pretty Hawaiian scenery. Go watch that. Forget about the Brady Bunch In The White House…