Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing St. Elsewhere, a medical show which ran on NBC from 1982 to 1988. The show can be found on Daily Motion.
Send in the clowns….
Episode 3.22 “Tears of a Clown”
(Dir by Janet Greek, originally aired on March 13th, 1985)
Do you like clowns?
Then this episode is for you because there are clowns all over the hospital! When Dr. Chandler tells circus clown Bonko (Gina Hecht) that she should quit the circus because she has MS, her fellow clowns all show up at the hospital to support her. And yes, they wear their clown makeup! Bonko’s partner, Corky (Dennis Dugan), understands that Bonko is a born performer. As the episode ends, Bonko and Crky perform in an elevator and cheer up Andrea Fordham (Ann Hearn), Dr. Caldwell’s plastic surgery patient. Having had her declaration of love rejected by Bobby, Andrea could definitely use the cheering up.
Dr. Morrison needs some cheering up to. Working as a resident, a medical student, and a single father is a lot of pressure and his relationship with Clancy (played by Helen Hunt) isn’t bring him much relief. Morrison is suffering from insomnia and headaches and popping pills. He’s late to a timed exam and flunks. I swear, Morrison can never get a break. The only thing keeping him from being the most depressing character on the show is that Westphall somehow always seem to be even more afflicted with melancholy.
This episode features Westphall finally finding a condo that he can move into. He’s accompanied by Dr. Craig and they are mistaken for a couple by the realtor. Craig looks annoyed. Westphall looks glum. Westphall always looks glum!
Finally, Elliot discovers that Mrs. Hufnagle left him her entire meager estate. It’s also now his responsibility to spread her ashes.
After last week’s dramatic and emotional episode, this week felt rather lowkey. How you react to this episode will probably depend on how much tolerance you have for clowns.
It was an okay episode, even if it did ultimately feel like filler. After last week’s emotion-packed installment, this episode served to remind us that life goes on, even after Hufnagle dies and Shirley Daniels pulls a gun on everyone. That’s just the way things are in the city of Boston.
Jeff Mills (Tim Daly) is an attorney who might be unlucky in love but who still owns a copy of every movie that Frank Capra has ever directed. (There is even a scene where two of his friends are seen looking at his movie collection and saying, “He’s got every movie Capra ever made!”) Miranda (Kelly Preston) is the beautiful and mysterious woman who Jeff saves from an abusive boyfriend. Within minutes of meeting her, Jeff invites Miranda to say with him in his apartment. For Jeff, it is love at first sight but his friends (Rick Rossovich and Diana Bellamy) worry that Jeff is getting in over his head with a woman about whom he knows nothing. Weird things start to happen in Jeff’s apartment and a woman (Audra Lindley) shows up in his office, taunting him about how she dug up his mother’s bones and used them in a black magic ceremony. Eventually, Miranda confesses that she is on the run from a Satanic coven that was planning on sacrificing her but is she telling the whole truth?
Through the Shattered Lens 