Welcome to Late Night 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 Highway to Heaven, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1989.  The entire show is currently streaming on Freevee and several other services!

This week, Jonathan and Mark head to Broadway!

Episode 2.8 “The Smile In The Third Row”

(Dir by Michael Landon, originally aired on November 20th, 1985)

Fred Fusco (Lorne Greene) is a veteran actor who is appearing in a Broadway play.  In the play, Fred plays a man who learns that he’s about to die.  During the third act, Fred’s character actually does die and Fred ends the play with a monologue about owning the choices he made in his life before he ascends into Heaven (via a harness).

It’s a depressing play and the theater is usually half-empty whenever Fred performs.  But one night, Fred claims that he spotted God sitting in the third row.  Fred also says that God really enjoyed the show.  When the news get out, the play becomes a huge success as audiences turn out to see a play endorsed by God.  Fred becomes a huge celebrity and befriends a terminally ill boy who promises to say hi to God when he goes to Heaven.  However, when Fred starts to talk about leaving his fortune to charity, both his sister (Mary Ann Gibson) and his nephew (David L. Lander) conspire to have him committed.

Fred also happens to be Jonathan and Mark’s later assignment.  Mark gets a job at the theater while Jonathan puts on a collar and becomes Father Jonathan.  While Mark is convinced that Fred is actually seeing God, Jonathan is skeptical because Jonathan doesn’t see God in the theater.  Why, Jonathan asks, would God reveal himself to an actor but not an angel?  There’s an interesting subtext here, as it quickly becomes obvious that Jonathan isn’t so much skeptical as he’s jealous.  He even rather recklessly reveals to Fred that he’s an angel in his quest to convince Fred that he hasn’t actually seen God.  Fred reveals that he’s willing to accept Jonathan’s word that he’s an angel but then asks why Jonathan is not willing to accept his word that he sees God in the theater.

Is God in the theater?  At the end of the episode, Fred’s harness is broken but, at the end of the third act, he still ascends above the theater and then vanishes.  The newspapers call it a hoax but the show suggests that, much like Elijah, he’s been assumed straight to Heaven.  Is Fred meant to be a modern day Elijah?  Would that therefore make his sister a modern-day Jezebel?  Perhaps but, fortunately for her, she is never eaten by wild dogs.

As usual, there wasn’t much subtlety to be found in this episode of Highway to Heaven but it still worked surprisingly well.  When Fred met the dying child, my first instinct was to roll my eyes at the obviousness of it all but those same eyes had tears in them by the time the scene was over.  The episode benefitted greatly from Lorne Greene’s strong performance as Fred Fusco and Michael Landon’s strong portrayal of Jonathan’s mixed feelings about Fred’s claims.  All in all, this was a strong episode.