This series always seems strange, but so does Mickey Rooney. We can see him back to his starring slapstick kid comedies, which made him, technically the last living silent film leading man. He became a well loved top star, and an incredibly long career. But this series is typical of his work. He must have stored in him every bit of comic business and story situation he ever saw, but there's something hollow about it. In this episode, typically, he can be bumbling and stupid, but we know he's not. He and other characters can have basic uncomprehension of obvious circumstances, like children, at any time, yet we know they aren't like that because they usually aren't.
Call it a lack of logical consistency; In the world of filmed sitcoms, No matter how ridiculously preposterous the situations get, such as in "I Married Joan" or how crazy "My Little Margie" and her schemes went, they retained their own rationale, their own fantasy world, where people will always behave in a certain illogical way that preserves the fantasy.
Mickey's show seems like they just toss everything in. In this episode, for instance, He gets a call from his boss asking where a certain bottle of ink has gone down at the office. Mick says it's in his desk drawer. Boss finds just the bottle's cap. Mick instructs him to look in another drawer, where he finds it, spilled all over his hand and presumably, everything in the drawer. Boss really blows up and Mickey's in trouble again.... hey, wait, that made no sense. But it's not pressed at all- why the cap and bottle are separated -in different parts of the boss's desk. We've been given junk. At another point, Mickey encounters a vacuum cleaner. He clumsily lets it vacuum his face and makes a mess of the parlor. Absolutely flat stuff that might amuse a baby.
A family vote is taken, with scrap paper ballots drawn out of a hat. BUT THERE'S ONLY THREE PEOPLE INVOLVED. That makes no sense, and nobody would do such a thing, anywhere. We're being thrown more junk.
When Mickey takes over his father's barbershop quartet singing with his pals in their home, to deliver a bop version of "The Old Mill Stream", the huge blast of canned applause that follows is stunning.
This is Mickey's problem, as the TV Guide critic said at the time, there was a lack of Heart in it. It's more than that. It would seem Mickey's famed ego made him think all he had to do was be there, and it would be good enough. Perhaps the writers, like Blake Edwards, just thought so little of the audience's intelligence that they didn't have to be better than this.
Call it a lack of logical consistency; In the world of filmed sitcoms, No matter how ridiculously preposterous the situations get, such as in "I Married Joan" or how crazy "My Little Margie" and her schemes went, they retained their own rationale, their own fantasy world, where people will always behave in a certain illogical way that preserves the fantasy.
Mickey's show seems like they just toss everything in. In this episode, for instance, He gets a call from his boss asking where a certain bottle of ink has gone down at the office. Mick says it's in his desk drawer. Boss finds just the bottle's cap. Mick instructs him to look in another drawer, where he finds it, spilled all over his hand and presumably, everything in the drawer. Boss really blows up and Mickey's in trouble again.... hey, wait, that made no sense. But it's not pressed at all- why the cap and bottle are separated -in different parts of the boss's desk. We've been given junk. At another point, Mickey encounters a vacuum cleaner. He clumsily lets it vacuum his face and makes a mess of the parlor. Absolutely flat stuff that might amuse a baby.
A family vote is taken, with scrap paper ballots drawn out of a hat. BUT THERE'S ONLY THREE PEOPLE INVOLVED. That makes no sense, and nobody would do such a thing, anywhere. We're being thrown more junk.
When Mickey takes over his father's barbershop quartet singing with his pals in their home, to deliver a bop version of "The Old Mill Stream", the huge blast of canned applause that follows is stunning.
This is Mickey's problem, as the TV Guide critic said at the time, there was a lack of Heart in it. It's more than that. It would seem Mickey's famed ego made him think all he had to do was be there, and it would be good enough. Perhaps the writers, like Blake Edwards, just thought so little of the audience's intelligence that they didn't have to be better than this.