Hello, Larry

Hello, Larry premeired as a mid season replacement series on the NBC network starting in January of 1979 and ending in April of 1980, totalling thirty eight episodes over that short two season span. The series starred McLean Stevenson, Kim Richards, Joanna Gleason, Donna Wilkes (Season One, was replaced by. Krista Errickson in Season Two) and George Memmoli (Season One only). When Season Two began, new cast members, such as Ruth Brown, Fred Stuthman, John Femia and Meadowlark Lemon were added.

The series was created by producers of both Diff'rent Strokes and One Day at a Time. They even utilized some of the same writers from both of those TV shows for this TV show.

The series dealt with divorced father Larry Alder, who hosted a talk radio show dealing in psychology and was raising two daughters as a single father. The series was based around the life of Alder, his career and his raising of his two teenaged daughters after he and his wife divorced, which made him and his daughters move to Seattle Washington to start over. Much of the series dealt with how Alder dealt with the challenges of balancing his career and raising his two daughters. Later episodes dealt with him spending more time with his daughters while also still maintaining his carreer and his relationships with various people.

The series was canceled way too soon.

Hello, Larry was actually a very good show. It was funny, charming and bittersweet. The series was also well written and was also very realistic. It actually was a wonderful series and was severely underrated. Stevenson was superb in his portrayal of Larry Alder and also, his supporting cast turned in some good performances as well. Hello, Larry was a pretty funny show and it deserved more a chance than it did when the series was on the NBC network. NBC simply canceled this series way too soon. It never really got the chance that it deserved. It was funny and entertaining. Again, it deserved more of a chance on TV than it did during its initial run.

To clarify here, this series wasn't a spin-off of Diff'rent Strokes. The episodes that featured characters from both Diff'rent Strokes and this show were simply crossover episodes.

I used to watch thjis show myself as a child. I loved this show and watched it until it left the air.

Hello, Larry was severely underrated and really deserved a better chance that its initial run on NBC. It was canceled way too soon. It was a very good and very entertaining show.

I remember watching this show in the late seventies and thinking "McLean Stevenson left MASH for this?!" But the show began to grow on me and it was fun watching a single dad raise two teenaged daughters. One episode that hit home with me was when Ruthie decided to rechristen herself as Ruth. That's my name (officially Ruth Ann, but call me Ruthie) and I can relate to being Ruth (serious, professional, etc.) as well as Ruthie (cute, informal, etc.)-it's been going on for almost 55 years. Granted, this show will never equal MASH, but McLean Stevenson could be knock-down funny when he wanted to and it was sad to see him go through so many projects (the reason he left MASH was to possibly host the Tonight Show) and it was sad to see him die without equaling his work on MASH. The show got better when Krista Errickson replaced Donna Wilkes as older daughter Diane and the other cast (Joanna Gleason, Ruth Brown, Meadowlark Lemon, etc.) did very well. This was a show that should've gotten a better chance. And that's the Ruth(ie).

Hello Larry was, strangely enough, the most successful TV show McLean Stevenson was ever on. After he left MASH that is. Every single show he was the headliner for was cancelled after one season. Hello Larry ran for two. He later admitted that leaving MASH was the worst career decision he ever made and... I have to agree with him.

The show itself didn't feel complete. It was shown after "Diff'rent Strokes" and was by the same producer so in order to cement this they had a couple crossovers where Larry and Mr. Drummond met as they were old war buddies. Nothing really came of it though. After those three episodes they never met again.

The story itself was of a guy on the radio giving people advice but he wasn't very good at it. He often made smart-alec responses to what the callers would call in about. After a couple episodes it was decided to change the format around and now he was supposed to focus on his two daughters. After his divorce he moved, with them, to Portland from LA for this job.

Older daughter Diane and younger daughter Ruthie. They.. were typical sitcom kids. Nothing of real note.

In the end it just wasn't interesting enough to carry along and was dropped.

This was a series that I never missed, but also never recorded. It would be nice to see it go back on air sometime. It was about a single father raising 2 teenage girls.

"Hello Larry" was part of Fred Silverman's attempt to ruin, er, resurrect NBC from the ratings doldrums. Amongst other great works he begat "Supertrain," "Turnabout," "Diffrent Strokes," and "Hello Larry." Despite it's abysmal badness, the show ran for two seasons simply because so many of the network's offerings bombed that they had nothing better to run, a fact that beleagured network execs cheerfully admitted to. While the show was lousy and never drew good ratings (despite often being paired with "Diffrent Strokes") Mac at least was a "name" actor and supposedly a proven commodity. Poor McLean Stevenson, so loveable as the boob Henry on "M*A*S*H" never again found material as good. Unfortunately unlike fiascoes like "In the Beginning," "Condo," or even "The McLean Stevenson Show," "Hello Larry" ran long enough for people to remember it as the series that wouldn't die, and poor Mac is now probably as well remembered for being trapped in TV purgatory there than he will be for "M*A*S*H."