Three's a Crowd

The finale of Three's Company has Janet having her wedding in the apartment. Jack Tripper (John Ritter) and flight attendant girlfriend Vicky Bradford (Mary Cadorette) get into a fight caused by her disapproving father James (Robert Mandan). She turns down Jack's marriage proposal due to her parents' troubled divorce. Jack agrees to live together with her in an apartment above the restaurant. The couple is surprised by her dad who bought the building along with the restaurant from Mr. Angelino. Jack hires surfer dude EZ Taylor as his assistant chef. A recurring role is Vicky's mother Claudia (Jessica Walter).

Three's Company presents itself as a young, sexy sitcom but at its core, it's a standard conservative show. The problem with the sequel is that it starts with Jack being the conservative partner. Vicky is doubly a dud. They're like an old married couple despite their living-in-sin situation. That's fine but nothing else is funny. Mandan is a standard sitcom comedic heavy. EZ contributes nothing. No matter how hard John Ritter tries, few of this works. The basic premise is flawed and it gets tired trying to live up to its predecessor's success. The title probably came first and then the premise got assembled after that. I would have put a young teen girl as the third wheel in the apartment. That would be a more direct symmetry to the first show. It would also allow Jack and Vicky be the old couple trying to corral a rebellious teen who would essentially be the new Chrissy. In that case, the dad James would become the Ropers and Mr. Furley and Mr. Angelino combined into one. It's an easier group than this one. The continuing conflict between Jack and Vicky about marriage gets tiresome. Even the theme song sounds tired. Despite being a new show, this is actually running on fumes from its predecessor. As for Janet and Jack doing the new show together, Janet would definitely have more chemistry than Vicky. It's still no guarantee that it would work much better. It's not like the show had a great track record of good spinoffs.

I don't understand why this show wasn't a hit, It only lasted one season, In my opinion it was slightly funnier than Three's Company. I taped many episodes about three years ago when a local channel aired it in syndication. Oh well...

Just finished a Three's Company marathon, complete with spin-offs (I also wrote a review for The Ropers).

TAC is not as bad as some other reviewers have stated, but it's certainly a letdown after Three's Company. It doesn't help that by the time Season 8 of Three's Company came around, the show had grown a bit stale: still enjoyable but running out of steam. That does not make for a great hand-off to the new show.

And the new show is in a lot of ways the same as the old show, only much more tepid. Mary Cordette as Vicki Bradford, Jack's girlfriend, is perfectly fine, but comedy is not her metier. Robert Mandan as Mr. Bradford is a pro. His presence is stabilizing, as is the reoccurring role of Jessica Walter as Claudia, Vicki's mother. Alan Campbell as Jack's surfer-dude sous-chef is a bit grating.

But tepidity is the issue. The show doesn't know what it wants to be. The first five or six episodes are sluggish because they mostly continue the new-couple-in-love storyline that, quite frankly, dragged down the final episodes of Three's Company. In fact, this rom-com-lite feel permeates the entire single season of TAC. Other times, the show tries to go for the tried-and-true formulae of TC: the physical pratfalls of Ritter, the double-entendres, the overheard conversations, the misunderstood conversations. Occasionally, they are hilarious, and one is briefly reminded of the pure farce of TC.

Farce. That's what I and so many viewers loved about TC. The original show did not try to be serious. It did not try to lecture or pander. It refused to turn mawkish or maudlin (NOTE: The show's final hour-long episode is an exception, awkwardly going for gush instead of gut-busting laughs). TAC, thus, is in an awkward position. If it tries to rehash TC's blueprint, it risks being lambasted as unoriginal. If it tries to go in a different direction--lukewarm and fuzzy romance with dashes of humor added in--the show is also painted into a corner.

Nonetheless, the show is far from awful. In fact, it finds its semi-stride for a number of mid-season episodes. TAC is harmless and nostalgic, especially for anyone, like me, who misses Ritter, Three's Company, and 80s neon fashion!

When i look back at three's Company, I see one of the greatest comedys of all time. Every episode was a classic. With or without Somers (who was by far not the star of the show) the show was great. But when i stop and think about what would of been one of the greatest ideas for any show, was to have JAck and Janet realize there feelings for one another and fall in love. The show would of been REborn or it quiet possibly would of Started a very Succsessful spinoff. and what is funny is how i look at other peoples comments and think the same exact thing. Why didnt the Producers think about this. John and Joyce's chemestry was one of the best TV has ever seen....(Way better then with Somers was with Ritter). I could guarentee that the show or the spinoff would of Lasted alot longer and people would be very intrested in New jokes about MArriage..Parents and even Kids eventually. If you think about it.....the show lasted 7 years with just Dating....it could quiet easily lasted another 7 in the marriage state. John Ritters new show (which is quite good) could of had him and Joyce being the PArents of there daughters. If the actors and producers wanted to commit themselves...Three's Company could of lasted twice as long as it did...or its spinoff being just as classic as the original show.

Just think on what might it could of been! Its makes me sad.

I was a big fan of Joyce DeWitt on Three's Company, but a Jack and Janet spin off just wouldn't have worked for several reasons. First of all, over the course of the series the relationship between Jack and the female roommates moved strongly in the direction of a brother-sister relationship instead of the romantic one. To see these pseudo-siblings married might have seemed as out of place as a Brady Bunch spin off called "Greg Loves Marcia".

The second reason it would have failed is that "Three's Company" broke some social TV taboos in its day, so the successor should break some in its own day. Back in the 80s, the controversial trend was to dismiss the concept of marriage with the idea that you didn't need a contract from the government in order to be in a committed loving relationship (yet oddly enough the controversial trend in our current decade is the opposite belief) so having Jack shack up with a woman was the next logical step. Jack living with Janet, however, would not have made sense because both characters had previously expressed value in the concept of marriage and we've already seen them living together for the past 7 years. What would we gain, especially when her parents already like Jack! A third reason it wouldn't have worked is that the entire franchise was based upon the British "Man About the House" franchise. I understand the value in copying the core concept, but I don't know why the producers continued mirroring that franchise. (Legal reasons perhaps?) At any rate, "Three's A Crowd" was designed after "Robin's Nest" and trying to force Janet and her family into those roles would have been awkward. The bitter relationship between the parents of Jack's girlfriend was key to the reason behind their living together and it was also the source of a lot of comedy with the un-Father-in-Law. (It's odd. Vicki wanted this arrangement so that they were living together because they wanted to live together instead of being forced to live together. Apparently splitting up a relationship where two people share the same living environment, property, bills, and possibly kids is only difficult if that couple is married) We already met Janet's parents and they seemed fairly contented with each other... and fairly boring too.

I also think the producers wanted to get lots of fresh blood into the mix. If the female lead was Janet the name of the series might as well have been called "Three's Company Lite". (Though the series "Angel" did show that you can create a new series with a cast comprised completely from a subset of the cast of another show yet still have it feel like its own show) But all my arguments are a moot point considering that the series did fail.