Day by Day

The eighties brought a plethora of sitcoms. I remember Julia Louis-Dreyfuss before Seinfeld. Linda Kelsey was the heart and soul of the show. It was about a daycare center being run out of the Harper home. It had a delightful cast and mediocre sense of humor. It was a fine sitcom that only lasted two seasons. Linda Kelsey was the star of this show and never got another chance to really shine in her own right. Kelsey brought joy and a world of experience to this sitcom. It should have been a vehicle for Kelsey but Julia Louis-Dreyfus's end up having the last laugh. She played a serious lawyer who wasn't kid friendly.

I saw a rerun of this on TV Land. It was a reunion episode where, my favorite actress, Julia Louis-Dreyfus is the main character. This was her pre-Seinfeld show & I've got to say Seinfeld is better by a landslide. It's very corny, but if you're in the mood to relive the 80's, this is a good show. No wonder it only lasted two seasons.

On an episode of "Day By Day" Ross, played by C.B. Barnes (as he was know at the time) falls asleep while watching a Brady Bunch Marathon on television. While asleep he dreams that he is the fourth Brady son "Chuck". Chuck is requested by his father to get out of Ross' ever present blue bathrobe and to get a perm as "all Brady men have perms". Chuck has a run in with nearly every Brady kid, including a very pregnant Marsha, and as you would imagine hilarity ensues. Coincidentally, in 1994 Christopher Daniel Barnes (as he is now referred to) was tapped to play the role of oldest brother Greg Brady in director Betty Thomas' "The Brady Bunch Movie" a role he recreated for the 1996 sequel aptly titled "A Very Brady Sequel".

I read about this series in an article on Julia Louis-Dreyfuss and tracked down a couple of episodes on youtube. The first one I found was the "Brady Bunch" episode, mentioned in most of the IMDB user reviews. It was pretty cute, as a slacker kid gets to life love as a Brady surrounded by BB's original cast. Not amazing, but cute.

Then I found the first episode, which was quite mediocre. The cast is a pretty well-known group, but both episodes focus primarily on an unappealing teenage boy. Louis-Dreyfuss shows up now and again and is amusing, but she's a peripheral character.

This is like a million forgettable sitcoms from the 80s.

I haven't actually seen the show since the 80's but I LOVED it. I remember Ross, the teenage boy, always wore a blue robe around the house. My favorite episode is the one where he watches the Brady Bunch marathon on tv and falls asleep, dreaming he is a Brady kid. I'd love to see this show in reruns.