Watching Sitcoms

I found the DVDs for the first season of Mork & Mindy at the library. I remember when this show came out, I must have been in like 7th or 8th grade. I had forgotten, however, that it was a spin-off from Happy Days.

The first couple of eps dealt with Mork coming to earth and showed a “flashback” of him meeting up with Fonzie, who sets him up with Laverne from Laverne & Shirley. I’m putting the term flashbacks in quotes, because that never actually happened on Happy Days, they just made it up for this ep of Mork & Mindy.

It’s pretty confusing, actually, although I don’t remember it being so at the time. The time line is like this: Mork’s first appearance, on Happy Days, was in the episode My Favorite Orkan, which aired on 2/28/78. They ended that ep as though Mork’s visit was all a dream. Once they announced Mork & Mindy for the fall schedule, they added another scene to that ep of Happy Days, which showed in the repeats, where Mork talks to Orson and tell him he made them all forget he was ever there and he is headed off to his mission in 1978.

The pilot ep of Mork & Mindy, with the Fonzie/Laverne flashback, aired on 9/14/78. In that episode, Mork tells Mindy he has been on earth before, and shows the “flashback” of his second visit to earth in the 1950’s.

In reality, the second time Mork is on Happy Days is the episode Mork Returns, which aired on 3/6/79, after the start of Mork & Mindy. In that episode, he actually goes back to see Richie, to talk to him about the problems he’s having adjusting to life in 1979 with Mindy.

Possibly the purpose of the fake flashback was to have both Fonzie (Henry Winkler) and Laverne (Penny Marshall) on this new show filled with pretty much unknown actors (Robin Williams and Pam Dawber) so that people would watch it. And, of course, Mork & Mindy was created by Garry Marshall, Penny’s brother and the creator of Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley.

In any case, Robin Williams is amazingly funny. I think I’d forgotten that. The DVDs are worth watching, just to see him act in his crazy way. Granted, Pam Dawber’s character was a little over the top, but it’s not that annoying.