Fresno (1986)

I had almost forgotten that this spectacular mini-series was shown on Danish TV and what luck when I found it on some obscure web-channel that starts with a You.It's a must that you have a minimum of knowledge of soap operas before you can enjoy this hilarious send-up of them. And also, if you have the chance, check out Barry Kemp's interview on Archive of American Television's web page. Then you will appreciate just how good this is.It follows the story lines of standard soap opera bibles and twist them ever so slightly to make it just a notch more broad. But, you have to pay attention or you will miss the joke. It reminds me a little bit of the short-lived series Police Squad!, although the comedy is a lot more subtle for the most part.Here is a few examples of the comedy of ridiculous on this show: Some of the characters talk in these overblown southern accents and others don't even though they are sometimes siblings. The plot revolves around a raisin empire. A handyman who on the surface is just an annoying subplot character, but as the story continues becomes more and more comic. Absolutely side-splittingly funny country music numbers sung by the Teresa Ganzel character. Also check out the name of her and her boyfriend. That's just a few examples.So if you can stomach it, check all five hours at once. I guarantee you will either love it or say: What the hell was that?

Back in the 80's, on principle, I hated mini-series-- or at least, the way they were run in the US. Over in England, it's common for short-run series to air one hour a week. Nice and orderly, and doesn't totally disrupt your schedule. Not like here, where the habit was to run several hours a night, several nights in a row, sometimes tying up an entire week (as did SHOGUN, which I wound up despising once I got to its unbearably cynical ending). I tended to avoid them like a plague.FRESNO was an exception, because it was a comedy, and it starred 3 of my very favorite people at the time. You had Carol Burnett, whose series I loved in the 70's (barring those interminable "musicals" she'd cap off each week with); Dabney Coleman, who I've followed in MARY HARTMAN MARY HARTMAN, BUFFALO BILL, TOOTSIE, 9 TO 5, THE SLAP MAXWELL STORY, MADMAN OF THE PEOPLE and THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES movie; and Teri Garr, who I've adored since STAR TREK, McCLOUD and YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN.FRESNO was a MAD-magazine style parody of night-time soaps (DALLAS, DYNASTY, FALCON CREST, KNOTS LANDING, etc.), played with amazing deadpan-serious performances accompanied by insanely screwball things going on in the background, in the dialog, in the plots, and even in the some of character names. It was very much in the style of AIRPLANE!, only more subtle and subdued, and looking back I find it much funnier than POLICE SQUAD (which I re-watched only weeks ago).There's so much to like here, the increasingly-twisted, convoluted plotting and character relationships among them. One of my favorite bits is when Teri Garr's "Tallon", wanting to get back at her ever-cheating husband Charles Grodin, comes on to mysterious (and always-shirtless) Gregory Harrison, who turns her down, saying she's a "lady" (which shocks her) and he doesn't want to be used that way. As she returns to the big house, she crosses the lawn in full view of the hired workers, with HER shirt off. Later, at the breakfast table, she shows up wearing an unbuttoned shirt, and NOTHING underneath. It was quite a kick to see her in such a rare "bad" girl role.Infuriatingly, CBS murdered the show both times they ran it. The first time, instead of running 2 hours a night over 3 consecutive nights (which would have made some sense), they ran 2 hours the first night, then 1 hour apiece over the next 4. OR, they would have, except the 5th hour of the show was PRE-EMPTED by a Ronald Reagan press conference in which he defended the Iran-Contra "guns for hostages" scandal. CBS did not run the episode of FRESNO scheduled for that night, but the next day ran the story's finale ANYWAY.Then, sometime later, they re-ran the entire story, but the 2nd time around, added a LAUGH TRACK, which totally destroyed the entire presentation.Ever since the late 70's, the programmers in charge of all 3 networks have been increasingly chaotic and incompetent in how they run their shows. It continues to boggle my mind how some people get paid exorbitant amounts of money to do work THAT BADLY.

I, too, had this amazing mini-series on VHS tape. Those are long gone. Later when it was reshown I decided to re-record it at a better quality (higher speed) and edit out the commercials. Unfortunately, they added a LAUGH TRACK and RUINED IT!!! Not the same and it lost all it's humor with uproarious audience laughter (in the wrong spots), sheesh. Brilliant cast, and I quote lines from this all the time. Like at breakfast with Carol Burnett as Charlotte Kensington saying to her daughter-in-law, Talon (Terry Garr), "Talon, just because you're not blood doesn't mean you're not just as much a part of this family as, say Tiffany." Tiffany being her ADOPTED daughter played by Valerie Mahaffey. They really need to re-release this on DVD.... WITH NO LAUGH TRACK!!! One of the best TV shows I ever watched.

I still pull my copy of this one out every now and then to watch it. I've got the original broadcast recording of it that I taped myself....cut the commercials and everything. The quality is not great, but it's good enough to still enjoy immensely. If memory serves, the ratings for this mini-series were less than stellar. I can't remember what was going on that week, but it seems there was something big going on that prevented a lot of people from viewing this classic. Everyone in this production is at the top of their game and deserves recognition for it. Hopefully it will make it to DVD someday....I'll be first in line!