Marilyn Child | Through the Shattered Lens

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.

I apologize for the delay in posting this review. I was feeling under the weather last week. This week, I feel well enough to share this review of one of the most emotional hours of television that I’ve ever watched.

Episode 4.3 “Haunted”

(Dir by Mark Tinker, originally aired on October 23rd, 1985)

This episode begins where the previous one ended. After crashing his car, Stephen Craig and his wife, Yvonne, are rushed to the Emergency Room. Despite the best efforts of Drs. Chandler and Axelrod, Stephen dies in the ER. Yvonne goes into labor, eventually giving birth to Dr. Craig’s granddaughter. Dr. Mark Craig and Ellen show up shortly after Stephen has been pronounced dead. While Ellen immediately slips into denial (“That’s not Stephen!”), Dr. Craig calmly tells Chandler that he knows Chandler did everything that he could.

Throughout the episode, Ellen struggles with her grief while Mark holds back his emotions. He suspects that Stephen was once again using drugs and he even goes to the autopsy to see for himself. While Stephen’s organs are being weighed, Dr. Craig starts to talk about how he was never close to his son but how, when Stephen was young, they used to read Dr. Seuss together. “Thank you Sam I Am,” Dr. Craig recites under his breath, right before hearing that Stephen had used cocaine shortly before dying.

For Dr. Craig, Stephen’s renewed drug use is an excuse to refuse to mourn for him. For Ellen, Stephen’s drug use is proof that his father was too critical and pushed him too hard. Ellen tells Mark that he never cared about Stephen except for when Stephen said he wanted to be a doctor. As the episode ends, Dr. Craig sits in his office and thinks about the words of Dr. Seuss and finally, he starts to cry.

I cried too. I cried a lot while watching this episode. This was the most emotional episode of St. Elsewhere that I’ve watched so far. Both William Daniels and Bonnie Bartlett were heartbreaking as a couple who each dealt with their grief in their own way. It was hard to watch Ellen fall apart in the Emergency Room but it was even harder to watch Dr. Craig fall apart as he realized that his wife was right. When Stephen was young, the only time they were close was when they read that Dr. Seuss book. And now, that memory is all Dr. Craig has left.

There were other things that happened in this episode, of course. One thing about St. Elsewhere is that there are always several stories going on at once. Elliot worried about his weight, even after discovering that his girlfriend liked the fact that he wasn’t thin. Dr. Caldwell spent the weekend at a recently purchased house in Cape Cod and Fiscus showed up unannounced. Dr. Morrison encouraged the other male residents to donate sperm. Dr. Westphall continued to try to push through his efforts to make St. Eligius a community-centered hospital. But none of the other stories could match the power of Mark and Ellen Craig losing their son. In fact, I found myself resenting being taken away from the Craigs. “Who cares about Cape Cod!?” I said, “The Craigs have lost their son!”

This was not an easy episode to watch but, in the end, it was powerful, it was touching, and it made me cry.

This week. Dr. Craig finally gets to perform his first heart transplant.

Episode 2.4 “Qui Transtulit Sustinet”

(Dir by Victor Lobl, originally aired on November 16th, 1983)

It’s a busy day at St. Eligius.

While Morrison struggles to come to terms with the death of his wife, her heart is transplanted into Eve Leighton. Morrison tells Westphall that he wants to keep working at the hospital and that he doesn’t need any time off. Westphall tells Morrison that he’s too distraught to be trusted with patients and that he has to take some time off. Westphall actually has a point, even if he does come across as being a bit cold when talking to Morrison. Even Peter White, that drug-addicted sleazebag, tells Morrison that he’s needs to take some time. Seriously, I think this is the first time that Dr. White’s been correct about anything since this show began.

Dr. Craig finally gets to perform a heart transplant but afterwards, in a wonderfully-acted scene, he tells Westphall that he feels a bit let down. After all the anticipation and the preparation, Craig isn’t sure what to do now that he’s actually performed the surgery. For once, he doesn’t want to talk to the press, regardless of how much the city of Boston expects him to. It’s a nicely human moment, one that we don’t often get from Dr. Craig.

Nurse Rosenthal attempted to console another breast cancer patient and met with Mark Harmon’s Dr. Caldwell to discuss getting breast reconstruction surgery. Nurse Rosenthal’s breast cancer storyline has consistently been well-acted and well-written and it has also been consistently difficult for me, as someone who lost her mother to cancer, to watch and write about. That was certainly the case for me with this episode.

Meanwhile, Fiscus and Luther pool their money to make an investment in silver but, at the last minute, Fiscus pulls out of their investment. His nerves get the better of him. Luther makes a lot of money. Fiscus doesn’t. Hey, guys — Morrison’s wife is dead. Show some respect and save the comedy for another episode.

This was an intense episode but it ended on a beautiful note, with Dr. Morrison listening to the sound of his wife’s heart beating in someone else’s body. A beautiful note but also a very sad one. I’m worried about Jack Morrison. I’m worried about the recipient of the heart. I’m worried about Helen Rosenthal. I’m worried about the entire hospital!

Here’s hoping for happier days ahead.