No Soap, Radio

For reasons unknown, vague memories of this show of which I watched perhaps 2 episodes when I was a pre-teen bubbled up to my conscious thoughts today. All I could recall was that it was a sitcom from around 1980, it was set in a hotel, and it included many weird non sequiturs. Luckily that was enough to pin down this title in the IMDb advanced search. Until I can find some episodes to watch I can't say if it was good or bad but the memory of it is still with me 35 years later which is saying something.

The plot of "No Soap Radio" involves a man inheriting a broken-down hotel in Atlantic City which has been in his family for three generations, and trying to make it into a successful business venture. Along the way, has to deal with the "wacky" guests and staff and many "zany" situations.

I use the words "wacky" and "zany" here advisedly, as most things about the plot are incredibly bland, in that, from a plot standpoint, this looks like a pretty standard sit-com of the type which were so prevalent in the 70s and 80s.

What sets "No Soap Radio" apart, is that while it had a pretty generic plot, all of the action of the show was interspersed with very frenetic and surreal sketch comedy which was very reminiscent of Monty Python, Benny Hill, or Spike Milligan. For instance, some of the guests at the hotel might be walking down a hallway, when they are suddenly almost crushed when a giant foot comes crashing down in front of them. Zoom out to reveal that the foot belongs to a father who has just accidentally stepped on his sons model of a hotel. This would launch a totally unrelated sketch, which would then weave its way back into the main plot.

I vividly remember watching this show when I was a kid. I thought the sketch pieces were absolutely hysterical, I loved the way the sketches were interlinked to the main plot (which I was generally less impressed with). I found it frustrating that the show was only on intermittently during the summer and vanished after just a few episodes.

It was only recently that I managed to find a copy of the few existing episodes on eBay. As you can well imagine, I eagerly watched them, and while I revisited many of the skits that I remembered as a child, I was a bit disappointed with the show as a whole. There seemed to be too great a disparity between the main plot and the sketches. The main plot dragged on for far too long, usually on a paper-thin premise, while the sketch bits (most of which were truly unique with very funny concepts behind them) felt very rushed, as if the director was in a hurry to wrap them up quickly and get a laugh, this usually spoiled most of the punch-lines. In general the timing seemed off.

Of course, this is going to happen in the early stages of any program, when the people who created it haven't fully come to terms with their material. However, this show was such an unusual concept, so different from other programs which ABC was running at the time (to give you an idea, some of the other shows on ABC at the time were "Love Boat," "Fantasy Island," and "Happy Days"), you got the impression that the network executives had commissioned some shows, and when they saw the product, canned the whole project, and used the existing episodes as fill in when their summer season had a few holes in it.

Its a pity this show wasn't allowed to grow to its full potential, but I guess we're lucky that it ever aired at all.

I just got my hands on 3 episodes and watched them. Brilliant! Take a bit of Monty Python, mix in a slightly more coherent and unified story line and add more surreal bits and transitions. OK, the acting is mediocre and some of the stuff is silly, but some is wonderful! If I could get more episodes (there were between 4 and 6 depending on where you check) or better quality, I would! I actually tried sending mail to various stars of the show and got no where. eventually, i spoke to a comedian who was a guest star who said he would check with Bob Saget who was also a guest star, but that never got me anywhere. I must say that Steve Guttenberg, Stuart Pankin and Edie McLurg have not returned my emails. This has been a 20+ year quest for me. To have gotten 3 episodes is an unbelievable thing for me.

This show appeared in what we may now call a "golden" period for network television. in the early 1980s, for whatever reason, the commercial networks seemed willing to take chances on dicey shows, even airing programs with admittedly no chance of commercial survival.

It was in this atmosphere that "Live from Studio 8H" aired on NBC--a program featuring classical music performances from the studio where Arturo Toscanini once conducted live concerts. And, over on ABC, a "limited-run" series called "Police Squad" cracked us up for six episodes, then was gone. During this period "No Soap, Radio" also aired on ABC, enjoying only a brief run.

"No Soap, Radio" was evidently never intended to succeed. One may suppose that the "doomed" shows of the 80s were aired to lend prestige to the networks which carried them. In any case, "No Soap" was a funny show and brought some wonderful talent back to television, notably Bill Dana, who had been one of the Sixties' stars of the medium.

The humor on "No Soap" was decidedly out of the mainstream. Many folks would (and did) turn the channel when confronted with it. But the show was funny, and appealed to the same type of humor connoisseur who worshiped "The Dick Van Dyke Show" (which, by the way, was a hit).

So, "No Soap, Radio" is an unjustly neglected show. The talent involved with it alone should have made it a hit, but it was never meant to be. The commercial networks in those days were willing to put these shows on the air, but not to stand by them or promote them. A couple of years after this show, "Buffalo Bill" and "Domestic Life" met the same fate on NBC.

• that is, if it is the right show. The show I laughed at back then had inserted skits that were completely unrelated to the main story about Guttenberg running a hotel, such as a spoof on the trailer for a 50s sci-fi, called "The Day Everybody's Name was Al". The captions read for instance "The Most Terrifying Film", and, true to 50s film clichées, one of the words would be blown up on the screen - but in this skit, they would send totally irrelevant adverbs flying into our faces, such as "MOST" in the caption mentioned above. I was sick with laughter. I also recall another skit about a guy applying for a job in a hat firm where the manager was just a head. The interview contained remarks such as "I think the hat is the most important piece of clothing, don't you?" His secretary, too, was only a head (she typed with her nose), and at the end of the skit, the manager sneezed and was catapulted back into the waste paper basket. I'm sorry, but I was in stitches. I also recall something about a man-eating armchair.

I'd love to find that series somewhere again... hm. I think I shall try e-bay...