Happy Days: "The First Thanksgiving"

Premiered November 21, 1978.

"Thanksgiving is a time of family togetherness, a time of sharing and working together toward a common...uh... common turkey!"
-Marion Cunningham

It's Thanksgiving Day in Milwaukee, 1950-something. The Cunninghams and their guests Fonzie (Henry Winkler) , Potsie (Anson Williams) and Ralph (Donnie Most) are glued to the TV, watching a football game.

Meanwhile, Marion Cunningham (Marion Ross) is slaving away in the kitchen, preparing their Thanksgiving feast.  She asks various family members for assistance and is ignored, they can't take their eyes off the game.  Marion reaches the end of her rope and turns off the TV.

She says they have forgotten what Thanksgiving is all about and "insulted the memory of our forefathers."  Marion decides it's a good time to tell them the story of the first Thanksgiving in 1621.

We see the story acted out, with the Cunninghams and friends playing pilgrims:

Howard (Tom Bosley) is a blacksmith in Plymouth, where he lives with his wife Marion and their kids Richard (Ron Howard) and Joanie (Erin Moran).  Marion suggests that the community should celebrate a very successful harvest by organizing a feast of Thanksgiving.

Richard's friend "Master Fonzie", shows up at the house.  Howard doesn't like him due to Fonzie's "strange ways."  Fonzie has also broken the elders' rules and made friends with the Indians.

"Master Fonzie" arrives on his "motorcycle."

Later at the inn owned by Alfred (Al Molinaro), two trappers named Wolfstalker and Bearslayer (Potsie and Ralph) stop in for cider.

Fonzie confronts them and accuses the trappers of taking pelts from the Indians in exchange for "counterfeit wampum."  The Fonz brings the Indians in seeking justice.

But Howard says that inviting Indians into their compound violates the law, and Fonzie must be put in the stocks.  Richard believes this isn't fair and petitions for Fonzie's freedom.  

Mistress Joanie arrives at the inn with her foot caught in a trap.  It's the work of Wolfstalker and Bearslayer, but they don't know how to open it.

But "Pilgrim Fonzie," just like his 1950s counterpart, has super powers and uses them to free Joanie.  Howard is grateful, realizes he was wrong about the Fonz and invites him to Thanksgiving dinner.  But Fonzie has already been invited to dine with the Indians.  Howard says they may come too, and Thanksgiving Day is born!

But what about Marion of 1950s Milwaukee?  Will her family help her with food preparation and cleanup?

J.A. Morris' says:
I saw this when it first aired in 1978, so I bring some nostalgia to this review.  I should mention that "The First Thanksgiving" ran a season after  Fonzie (and Happy Days itself) famously "jumped the shark", but it's a solid, entertaining Thanksgiving episode.

It's funny to see familiar characters dressed up in Pilgrim "drag."  Fonzie's 15th century "motorcycle" is especially amusing.  Marion's garbled definition of "the meaning of Thanksgiving" is also funny.

"When Master Fonzie talks, EVERYBODY listens."

This episode will be released on dvd this December 2 as part of of Happy Days:Season 6.  But it is currently (at "press time") streaming for free at Hulu.

Ralph brings a bucket of "Plymouth Colonel" chicken to Thanksgiving dinner.

"The First Thanksgiving" is not classic television, but it's an enjoyable holiday episode and a humorous retelling of how the tradition of Thanksgiving began.  If you enjoyed Happy Days, it's a nice excuse to revisit the series. 

J.A. Morris' rating:

 3 pumpkin pies.


RigbyMel says:

Unlike J.A. Morris,  I have never seen this particular Happy Days episode before this year.
I found it to be amusing but not especially great.

I also think that a little of the "Ye Olde Speechifcation" goes a long way.   It is rather overused by writers who seem to have thought it much cleverer than it really is.   How many times can we hear "Greeteth" and "Master Fonzie" before it gets old?   (Not very many, in my estimation.)

I did enjoy "Master Fonzie's" wooden motorcycle and the message about tolerance of people who look different.  This episode is okay, but probably not worth going out of your way to watch unless you are a die-hard fan of Happy Days.  

RigbyMel's rating:

2 pumpkin pies

Happy Days: "Haunted"

Premiered October 29, 1974.

"Everyone knows about old Magnolia Simpson.  Ever since she lost her head, anyone who goes in there gets THEIR head chopped off too!"
 -Joanie Cunningham

The kids decorate Arnold's for Halloween

It's Halloween in 1950s Milwaukee.  Ralph Malph (Donny Most) has a plan for his Halloween party.  He wants to hold it in "the old Simpson House," an abandoned house that many believe is haunted by the headless ghost of Magnolia Simpson.  Ralph figures "chicks think it's haunted, they get scared, they need comforting."  Ralph tells Richie (Ron Howard) and Potsie (Anson Williams) not to tell anyone their plan.

Ralph tells Richie & Potsie that his Halloween party will take place in a "haunted" house.

He especially doesn't want a local gang called the Demons to know about the party.  The Demons' leader Bag Zombrowski (Neil J. Schwartz) has a history of crashing parties.

Arnold's carhop Marsha (Beatrice Colen) tells Bag she has no time for him & his gang, the Demons.

Ralph asks Richie to check on the house before the party, to make sure it looks appropriately scary and dusty.

Richie & Joanie check out the Simpson house.

Richie and his sister Joanie (Erin Moran) stop by the house to inspect it.  Joanie believes the house is haunted and doesn't want to go inside.  She says everyone who enters gets their head chopped off, adding that four people disappeared inside the house last year.   Richie scoffs, but upon entering the house, he opens the closet and sees something that scares him.  Richie freaks out (much to Joanie's amusement) and runs away.

Howard & Richie get scared while watching a horror movie.

Richie tells his father Howard that he saw a "headless body."  Howard says his "mind must have been playing tricks" and that these stories have been around since he was a kid. Richie's father says he needs to look at things logically, but adds he "wouldn't be caught dead" at the Simpson house.

Fonzie bristles when he hears Richie mention the Simpson house.

At Arnold's the next day, Richie seeks advice from Fonzie (Henry Winkler) about his spooky experience.  The Fonz tells him he must face his fears to get over them.

Gloria & Richie nervously walk through the Simpson house.

On Halloween night, Richie and his girlfriend Gloria (Linda Purl) set out for the Simpson house.  They're both a bit edgy, but Richie refuses to give in to his fears.  Richie and Gloria walk through the house, trying their best not to be afraid.  They see a coffin in front of them...it starts opening from the inside!

  But it turns out to be a Halloween gag from Ralph!
 

Potsie and the rest of their friends emerge and the party begins.  It appears that Richie's has conquered his fears...but the Simpson house has some more Halloween surprises for Richie and his friends...

Potsie, Ralph & Richie encounter...Magnolia Simpson?!

J.A. Morris says:
This episode is good, not great, but it's grown on me after multiple viewings.

Fonzie draws glasses on a skull decoration.

It gets the spookiness of Halloween right.  Director Garry Marshall and Cinematographer Richard A. Kelley do a nice job creating the atmosphere of a horror movie.  It's got a lot more jump cuts than the average episode. 

When I was a kid, every town I lived in had a "Simpson House", allegedly haunted by ghosts. Even hardcore skeptics like myself can get creeped out by such houses, so I can identify with Richie here.  It seemed like every year, some kid would talk about breaking into the local "haunted" house on Halloween, but they always chickened out.

Ralph shows off his "Alfred Hitchcock" costume!

I watched Happy Days religiously when I was a kid, but I can't say I remember watching "Haunted" before I "discovered" it a couple years ago.  I thought Ralph's "Alfred Hitchcock" costume was a nice touch.

Potsie bobs for apples; Ralph asks "Weren't you the main course at my last Hawaiian luau?"

There aren't a lot of big laughs in "Haunted", but it's still an entertaining Halloween episode. Erin Moran gets the funniest lines here as Joanie, relentlessly mocking Richie for being afraid of ghosts.  At one point, Joanie says that Richie looks like "Bela Lugosi sucked all the blood out of you!"

Fonzie and Cloris dressed up as "Lone Ranger & Tonto".

"Haunted" is also interesting because it was made before Happy Days became the show most of us remember.  Fonzie has a fairly small role here, this was before "The Fonz" broke out and became a national sensation.  But Henry Winkler still makes an impression in the two scenes where he's featured.

Marsha runs through a gauntlet of water balloons & Halloween pranks.

Characters Bag and Marsha were recurring characters in early seasons, but both disappeared by season 4.

This was the last season that the series was shot with a single camera, with a laugh track.  The first two seasons feel a lot like the film American Graffiti, one of the series' inspirations.  The famous Happy Days catch phrases "Sit on it!", "I still got it!" and "AAYYYY!" are notably absent from "Haunted".  These days, I find these earlier, quieter episodes more enjoyable.

Now we get to the not-so-good parts of "Haunted": The music.  In the original edit, this episode opens with Fats Domino's classic "I'm Walkin'".  Another scene prominently features "Bird Dog" by the Everly Brothers.  But currently, the only "official" release replaces these with generic music that sounds like it was recorded in the 80s or 90s.  It's very distracting, it took me out of "the moment" and sucks the fun out of several scenes. 

Fonzie shows the gang how he "bobs" for apples.

Here's some trivia about "Haunted" :
Two kids come to the Cunningham house to trick or treat, one dressed as a cowboy the other dressed as a princess.

They're played by Scott and Lori Marshall, the children of Happy Days creator, Garry Marshall.

And another of Marshall's kids, Kathleen Marshall, plays one of Joanie's friends, dressed as a witch:

Also, Linda Purl plays Richie's girlfriend Gloria here and in several other season 2 episodes.  Purl would later join the cast (in season 10) as another character, Fonzie's live-in girlfriend Ashley Pfister.

"Haunted" is a generally fun episode, but the music replacements cost it a jack o'lantern or two.  So for the 1st time in this blog's history, I'm giving a program two different ratings:
J.A. Morris' rating:
For the version that contains the original music:

3 jack o'lanterns.

For the version that contains the "new" music:

2 and a half jack o'lanterns

RigbyMel says:

This is a okay episode of Happy Days, but not one of the best.   The Halloween decorations and mild mayhem are enjoyable, but the episode feels a little bit flat to me.

A coffin buffet

As regards the music substitutions in this episode, I agree with J.A. Morris that this really detracts and distracts from the overall atmosphere -- the exact opposite of what good soundtrack music is supposed to do.

Happy Days is always worth watching, but "Haunted" is not on my list of required annual holiday viewing.

RigbyMel's rating:

 2 jack o'lanterns

The Paul Lynde Halloween Special

Aired October 29, 1976.

Paul Lynde is getting ready to open his new Holiday special...only he doesn't seem to know what Holiday he's supposed to be celebrating.  He shows up in a Santa suit.

His housekeeper Margaret (Margaret Hamilton) tells him that's the wrong holiday.  He then guesses it must be Easter or Valentine's Day, still wrong.  Margaret reminds him it's Halloween and he opens the show.  

Lynde starts the show with a monologue.  He says he was obese as a child which made Halloween difficult. One year his mother put a shower curtain on him and he went as the Hindenberg.  "It was a disaster!"  

Lynde's monologue leads into a performance of the song "What's The Matter With Kids Today."  Lynde sang this tune in the film Bye Bye Birdie, but this time he adds some new lyrics that comment on Halloween and lampoon the pop culture of 70s.   

Donny and Marie Osmond show up to play a Halloween trick

Margaret says they should get away from the kids & their Halloween pranks.  They drive off to visit Margaret's sister. 

The sister turns out to be a witch, Witchiepoo (Billie Hayes) from H.R. Puffnstuf,  to be exact.  It turns out Margaret is a witch too!  She turns into the Wicked Witch of the West (the character Hamilton played in The Wizard Of Oz).

Witchiepoo,  Paul and Margaret

  
Lynde is naturally scared, based on all the bad things he seen witches do in Snow White, Hansel & Gretel and The Wizard of Oz.  Margaret says the stories he's heard are "distortions" --  "Dorothy asked for it...and her little dog too!"    
The witches want Lynde to help "soften the image" of witches.   

Another guest arrives, it's Miss Halloween 1976 (Betty White!).  Lynde has been brought to be her date, but she expected Paul Newman as 1st prize and teleports away rather than go on  a date with Lynde. 

Betty White as "Miss Halloween 1976"

The witches tell Lynde the National Association Of Witches want Lynde to be their spokesperson.  He will tell the world witches are better than their reputation.  In return, Lynde will get 3 wishes granted by the witches.  He agrees. 

Lynde looks pretty excited to be the "Rhinestone Trucker"!

For his first wish, he says he'd like to be a truck driver.  Lynde becomes Big Ruby Red, the "Rhinestone Trucker" and his friend Long Haul Howard (Tim Conway)  have a conversation over their CB radios.

Tim Conway and Paul Lynde as CB wielding truck drivers

They talk about how their both getting married later that night.  It turns out Long Haul and Red are both marrying the same woman, a waitress named Kinky Pinky (Roz Kelly).  This leads to a duel for Pinky's hand. 

Lynde comes back to reality.  The witches bring out Kiss to play "something peaceful".  The band launches into "Detroit Rock City".

"You gotta lose your mind in Detroit Rock City!"

Lynde tires of the witches' company and says he wishes he was in the Sahara Desert.  Margaret says that counts as a wish.  He is turned into a Sheik in the romantic mold of 1920s-era heartthrob Rudolph Valentino.

He has kidnapped a wealthy British heiress named Lady Cecily Westinghouse (Florence Henderson).  He woos Cecily and promise to make her his "with one burning kiss."

For his 3rd wish, Lynde says he'd like to wish for something that Witcheepoo and Margaret would like. They've always wanted to go to a "Hollywood Disco", so Lynde uses their wand to turn their living room into a disco.

The witches ask Lynde to act as the Master of Ceremonies, he introduces Florence Henderson.  She performs a lounge/disco arrangement of 'That Old Black Magic."

After that, Kiss returns to perform their song "Beth".  Lynde says "Beth" is "a monster of a hit."  

Margaret introduces Lynde to Kiss.  He says they're just what he always wanted "four kisses on the first date."

Because he's been good, the witches grant Lynde one last wish.  He wishes Kiss would play one more song. The band plows into "King Of The Nighttime World."

Next, Lynde asks Roz Kelly to teach him how to disco dance.  She leads the entire cast in a song-and-dance number.  

Lynde says goodnight, thanking the cast for their participation and the viewers for watching.  He hopes the show was "a howling success."

J.A. Morris says:

In a word: Wow.  

I should mention that I was born in the early 70s, Paul Lynde was huge presence in the popular culture of my childhood.  It seemed like he was everywhere:  Hollywood Squares, various variety series & specials, as the voice of Templeton the rat in Charlotte's Web, etc.  The young version of me was a big Paul Lynde fan and I still think he's hilarious.  But I somehow missed this special. 

It's like they tried to cram every piece of 70s pop culture into one hour-long special! 
Here are a few examples:

-The cast includes actors from 3 of the quintessential 70's series: Betty White (The Mary Tyler Moore Show), Tim Conway (The Carol Burnett Show) and Florence Henderson  (The Brady Bunch)

-We get a sketch that references the CB radio craze.

-Lynde makes jokes about Fonzie, Laverne & Shirley, the Sweathogs, Bugsy Malone, Alice Cooper and Billy Jack!

-2 Disco dance numbers. 
-3 Kiss performances!

-A cameo by Donny & Marie Osmond.
 -Roz Kelly is billed as Roz "Pinky Tuscadero" Kelly, referring to the character she played on Happy Days just a month before this special.  

This show is equal parts "Hilarious" and "What the Hell were they thinking?!"  Getting Margaret Hamilton to reprise her role from The Wizard Of Oz film was a stroke of genius.  She's a good sport here and has great chemistry with Lynde.  Same for Billie Hayes as Witchiepoo.  It was an odd choice to have Witchiepoo in this special, since H.R. Pufnstuf was cancelled four years earlier, but it works.  Hamilton and Hayes cackle as if their lives depended on it.  Tim Conway and Betty White have small roles, but they're  lots of fun here too.

 A game of "Witch Monopoly"

The only things that don't work particularly well are the musical contributions of Roz Kelly and Florence Hendeson.  But Henderson gives her all in a scene that requires her to make out with Lynde!

Lynde's opening musical number is amazing, worth the price of the dvd all by itself.    His interaction with Kiss is also a wonderful pop culture moment. 

Speaking of Kiss, I was a huge fan of them when I was 6 (not so much today!).  I remember getting their Destroyer LP when I was in 1st grade.  They perform 3 tracks from that album here (their first prime-time network appearance), so that was a nice trip down memory lane (unfortunately, one of the songs is "Beth"). Their live shows of this era were legendary, so it's fun to see them at the peak of their powers.

At the end of the special, Lynde thanks the audience for "making me feel wanted."  This adds a bit of sadness, since Lynde's off-screen life was filled with pain and controversies.  And then he goes back to disco dancing, which sort of sums up the differences in Lynde's private and public lives.

This special is available on dvd and can be bought or rented on Amazon Instant Video. 

DVD case.

The Paul Lynde Halloween Special is highly recommended to Lynde fans and anyone who remembers the 1970s.  If you're too young to remember that era, this special serves as a good introduction to Paul Lynde and it will give you a good idea of what the tv was like back then.  One thing is certain, once you watch it, you will NEVER forget it.

My rating:
4 Jack O'Lanterns

RigbyMel says:

Speaking as someone who remembers the 70's, but was a little bit too young to have seen this special the first (and only) time it aired on television,  I have to agree that it sort of feels like an amazing time capsule of many cheesy things from the decade.   But it is gourmet cheese, for certain.  I was aware of who Lynde was mainly because of his voice role as Templeton in Charlotte's Web and from Bye Bye Birdie, but when we discovered this special a couple of years ago, I gained a deeper appreciation of his skills as a performer.   This is old-school showbiz in fine variety show form complete with unexpected and somewhat bizarre cameo appearances.   (This is the kind of special Stephen Colbert sends up in his A Colbert Christmas special from 2008.)   It works remarkably well and all of the participants give their all  -  Margaret Hamilton even delivers a variation on the "I'll get you, my pretty and your little dog too!" line from The Wizard of Oz with gusto (while in witch mode).
I highly recommend this special if you remember the 70's or if you're just interested in the history of popular culture - it is a delightful artifact from the decade and the fact that it's a Halloween variety special  (rather than the more ubiquitous Christmas ones from the 60's and 70's) makes it extra fun.

RigbyMel's rating:
4 Jack O'Lanterns