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.
This week, Bobby Caldwell faces his future.
Episode 4.16 “Family Affair”
(Dir by Bruce Paltrow, originally aired on February 12th, 1986)
This episode deals with the fallout of the assassination of Sen. Gordon Endicott. As I watched it, I found it surprising that the doctors and the patients didn’t seem too shaken by the fact that a presidential contender had been shot in the chapel. One could argue that this was meant to show that violence in the United States had become so commonplace that people barely noticed it. I think it has more to do with bad writing. There is no real emotional impact to the Endicott family drama because the Endicotts themselves never come across as actual human beings. They’re thin stand-ins for the Kennedy family, and the show doesn’t seem to know what it wants to say about them. St. Elsewhere was an undeniably liberal show, and the Endicotts, with their sense of noblesse oblige, are clearly meant to evoke nostalgia for the Kennedy era. At the same time, the show can’t quite convince itself that the Kennedy era was all it was cracked up to be.
The Endicott story comes to an end here. Augusta survives her heart surgery. Her granddaughter goes into labor and gives birth to the first Endicott of the next generation. Augusta’s grandsons argue over who will lead the family. It falls flat. That’s especially true in 2026, when the Kennedys are no longer deified. Today the name Kennedy is just as likely to bring to mind vanity congressional campaigns as it is Camelot.
(For all the effort St. Elsewhere put into recreating the Kennedy family, no effort is made to recreate Mary Jo Kopechne.)
Far more compelling is the story of Bobby Caldwell, who struggles to carry on as a doctor despite his AIDS diagnosis. At first, only Westphall, Auschlander, and Morrison know. Morrison tells Fiscus, mostly to get Fiscus to stop giving Caldwell a hard time about his scar. Westphall tells Dr. Craig. Craig confronts Caldwell, says “Tough break,” and then asks him to leave the hospital. Craig also says he had no idea Caldwell was, in Craig’s words — not mine — “a fag.” Caldwell says that he’s not but the implication is clear. In Craig’s eyes, the virus is a punishment.
Caldwell’s illness makes Fiscus hesitant about sleeping with Clancy, at least until Fiscus’s own AIDS test comes back. Bobby’s ex, Joan Halloran (Nancy Stafford), gets tested and is relieved to discover she’s negative. When Joan complains that she’s never done anything to deserve getting sick, Morrison tells her that AIDS is a disease, not a metaphysical judgment. I’m glad someone finally pointed that out.
Caldwell resolves to kill himself in his apartment, but just as he’s about to take a lethal objection, someone knocks on his door. The young daughter of the woman who lives above him needs help with a leak in their bathroom. Caldwell realizes that having AIDS doesn’t mean he can’t help people.
In the end, Caldwell does leave St. Eligius. He tells Westphall that he’s moving to California to work at an AIDS hospice. He takes one last look around the hospital and then exits both St. Eligius and the show.
I have to admit I was really moved by the episode’s final image of Caldwell stepping outside. He hasn’t always been my favorite character. When he was first introduced in the second season, he seemed bland. During the third season, the show didn’t know what to do with him. He spent much of the fourth season treating everyone else terribly. But in this episode, Caldwell finally seemed like a real person. Mark Harmon’s performance, especially in those last moments, was outstanding.
Goodbye, Bobby Caldwell.
