Week of Sep. 12: A Look Back At Murphy Brown

Diane English's version of "The Women" is in theaters this week. So it's a good time to take a look at English's best-known creation - "Murphy Brown," which ran on CBS from 1988-98.

The show starred Candice Bergen in an Emmy-winning and truly star-making role as the title character, a newswoman ("Mike Wallace in high heels") who is a recovering alcoholic - out of the Betty Ford Center as the series begins. Murphy Brown is one of the correspondents of "FYI," along with anchor Jim Dial (Charles Kimbrough), daredeveil Frank Fontana (Joe Regalbuto) and former beauty queen Corky Sherwood (Faith Ford). The executive producer is 25-year-old Miles Silverberg (Grant Shaud). They all hash out life at the bar Phil's (Pat Corley played Phil.). Murphy comes home to a townhouse being remodelled by rebel Eldin Bernecky (Robert Pastorelli). During the course of the series, Murphy lost her mother (played by Colleen Dewhurst, who died in real life) and had a baby, and Corky got married and divorced. The series poked fun at two targets that are lots of fun to poke at - politicians and the press.

Sadly, only the first season of this very funny sitcom has been released on DVD so far - presumably because of music rights issues (The introductions frequently had Motown songs.) -but YouTube has tons of clips.

The show was never funnier than when it poked at the dumbing down of television news. Here is a link to a clip from the first season, when Murphy and Corky filled in on a morning show for a week:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFOAbZ83alY

There is also the famous/infamous episode, "You Say Potato, I Say Potatoe," filmed after then-Vice President Dan Quayle decided to take issue with fictional Murphy becoming a single mom. Here's the link to the first part of that episode, and the rest is available at the same page:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Btgn3qUD8Q8

Sorry to say, there are no clips from what was probably my favorite episode, Season 2's "Brown and Blue," when an offensive comedian (played by Michael Chiklis of "The Shield") tests Murphy's patience and Miles' bleeper.

After the contretemps with Quayle, the show slowly began to lose steam; the brightest spot was Garry Marshall's spot-on network executive, which he later said he'd based on real-life executives. Shaud would leave the show, to be replaced by Lily Tomlin, the gifted comedienne who has developed a reputation for joining series after they've peaked (The West Wing). Pastorelli, who sadly died of a drug overdose in 2004, also left before the series took its last bow.

Here's hoping the music issues can be worked out, and more seasons of this very funny series can be released on DVD.

See you next week. Until then, Happy Viewing!