The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited

'The Dick Van Dyke Show' was one of the greatest sitcoms of all time. A comedy show that was actually *about* comedy, this series brilliantly combined slapstick, low banter, high wit and sophisticated cultural references. Three episodes addressed the changing nature of race relations in America during the early 1960s.

Oddly and regrettably, while many other (vastly inferior) sitcoms of later vintage engendered 'reunion' episodes, for many years Dick Van Dyke refused all offers to take one more trip across the ottoman as Rob Petrie of New Rochelle. It was not until several members of the supporting cast had died that Van Dyke finally agreed to do this reunion special.

The good news is: it was worth the wait! 'The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited' does full justice to the original classic series. Annoyingly, the special is introduced by Ray Romano, an actor I don't care about who stars in a series I don't watch. But I recognise the realities of modern television; the producers of this special were eager to bring in a current 'name' actor as insurance for all these old-time names. (Anybody whose stardom peaked more than five years ago is a has-been for today's amnesiac audience.)

The show opens in that familiar New Rochelle living room ... but the person living here now is Richie Petrie, all grown up and still played by the same untalented (former) child actor who was the biggest drawback to the original series. After this painful opening scene, we cut to Rob and Laura Petrie, who must be the only couple who moved *to* Manhattan to retire. Rob is now dabbling in computer animation. (In real life, Van Dyke is a talented caricaturist: here, we see a pointless piece of animation in which a badly-animated cartoon Dick Van Dyke dances alongside a video clip of the real one. The impressive dancing of the real Van Dyke - still supple at nearly 80 - merely emphasises the crudeness of the animation.)

Rob's wife Laura teaches ballet classes in their Manhattan home, but yearns to open her own dance studio. We briefly see several little girls in leotards and tights, one of whom addresses Laura as 'grandma' even though Richie Petrie looks like he never had sex with anybody. Along comes a voice from the past: Rob's old boss Alan Brady, who wants to pay him and Sally Rogers (Rose Marie) a lot of money to write his eulogy so that Brady can hear it while he's still alive.

The dialogue cleverly establishes that Buddy Sorrell, Mel Cooley and the Petries' neighbour Jerry Helper are all dead (the actors who played them are now deceased). Laura is still friends with her former neighbour Millie Helper, who is now dating Rob's somnambulist brother Stacy. (Dick Van Dyke's real brother Jerry played Rob's brother Stacy in a few episodes of the original series, but here he seems to be reprising his annoying character Luther from 'Coach'.) The perennial spinster Sally Rogers is now in a dull boring marriage with Herman Glimcher, the mama's boy she dated back in the early 1960s (and played by the same boring actor, minus his hair). Sadly, no mention whatever is made of Buddy Sorrell's wife Pickles.

The real delight of this reunion special is the barrage of clips from the original show, although I wish the clips had been selected with more emphasis on comedy rather than music. It's a shame that there isn't even a brief clip of Van Dyke and Henry Calvin doing their Laurel & Hardy routine in the episode 'The Sam Pomerantz Scandals'. One clip included here may baffle viewers unfamiliar with the original show. In that classic series, Rob's boss Alan Brady was played by Carl Reiner, but he made his arrival gradually. Brady was only an offstage presence in the early episodes, making his first few appearances with his back to the camera and his face concealed. During the transition period before Alan Brady's face was shown, Reiner occasionally guest-starred in other roles in this series. This reunion special includes a long clip from the episode 'October Eve', featuring Reiner as eccentric portrait artist Serge Carpetna. Reiner is very funny in this role, but -- since Reiner as Carpetna looks exactly like Reiner as Brady -- modern viewers may wonder why Alan Brady is speaking with a European accent. (By the way, I savoured Reiner's guest appearance as Alan Brady on an episode of 'Mad About You'.)

'The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited' should have been done ten years sooner, but it's a pleasure to be reunited with these beloved characters one more time. Mary Tyler Moore is still trim, and clearly delighted to show off her lithe figure in dance clothes. Despite a few minor flaws and some odd production decisions, I'll rate this delightful special 10 points out of 10.

I saw this show recently on TV land . It was very bad. Whoever wrote it had no idea how to realistically bring the characters of Laura Petrie, Rob Petrie, Alan Brady, Sally Rogers, Ritchie Petrie and Millie Helper back together again. It all plays out very badly. First, Alan Brady calls Rob Petrie out of the blue at his old home from that they had in the 1960's to ask him to wrote a eulogies for him when he dies. How realistic would it be for Alan Brady to call a comedy writer to do his eulogy and how realistic is it for him to ask a man who he has not spoken to for 30 to 40 years to write his eulogy , never mind the comedy writer part? Usually, eulogies are written by close friends and after someone is dead, duh. And who calls people and asks for their eulogy in advance anyway? I know the character of Alan Brady is vain but come on. So, he calls the house and somehow Ritchie picks up the phone. So, apparently Ritchie is living in the same house the Petries had in 1960. How unrealistic. He informs Alan that his parents have moved and then not long after the scene cuts to a boring self indulgent scene of mugging and hamming it up from Laura and Rob who both do a dance sequence even though they both elderly. Alan calls them. They met with Alan. Rob and Laura have none of their old spark. In fact, in whoever wrote this seems to have Laura fawning over Alan Brady saying "Oh Alan!" instead of "Oh Rob!" and then they are series of comments from the surviving male members of the cast telling Laura how "fantastic" she looks for a old woman. Most of the clips of her and the guy who played Alan. They even dare to show one scene where the guy played was on the show not playing Alan but guest starring as a painter who painted Laura nude even though she was wearing clothes and showed Laura's nails on chalk board squeaky hyper reaction to it all. I guess they did this because Carl Reiner did not make many appearances on the show and they needed more footage of him. This reunion seemed to be a homage to the two of them. I wondered where are all the funny clips of Buddy and Sally and Mel and Rob. They really made the show. The premise for reuniting them wasn't funny at all. By the end of the episode the issue is not even resolved. Rob does not decide if he is not going to write eulogy or not. After the series of clips runs, Rob and Laura step out of character and return to their 1960's living room and say to each other, "Gee, it was funny being Rob Petrie again." "Gee, it was nice being Laura Petrie again." Gag. Well, I'm glad they had fun because their entire reunion show was a train wreck.

This was probably one of the best reunions of a 60s sitcom in the last ten years or so. Instead of having an hour of reminisces, Carl Reiner decided to write a good 45-minute storyline of the Petries in 2004. Some, in fact, a lot of this story-line works: Alan Brady is not dying, but wants Sally and Rob to write his eulogy so he can have the chance to rewrite it. Laura now has a small dance studio at home, and Sally is finally married to the guy she was always going out with.

Yet, there are some parts of the reunion show that doesn't make sense: Why did Rob stop writing? Didn't he write a book? Also Millie and Stacey's little "date" is strange, but funny. Yet, despite these few flaws, The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited still retains some of that old "magic," mostly because Dick Van Dyke, Rose Marie, Ann Morgan Guilbert, and Carl Reiner stepped right back into the shoes of their old characters. Unfortunately, though, Mary Tyler Moore's performance is a bit stale and rushed, almost as if she forgot how to make a comedy show. Larry Matthews' appearance is quick, strange, and we really don't learn what he's doing forty years later.

And why did Ray Ramano host this? What does he have to do with Dick Van Dyke? His scenes are even stranger than some of the weirdest parts of this reunion.

Finally, the clippings of the old show also make this reunion. When the new footage starts going a bit stale, they add in footage of the "good 'ole days" when these people were younger and funnier. Yet, all in all, this was a pretty good reunion, and I recommend it to every fan of The Dick Van Dyke Show to watch.

I hate reunion shows of old TV shows. They always stink, but at least this one has a lot less stink than most of the others. It's not a bad film and it does reunite SOME of the original cast around a reasonably believable plot (the dead ones, thankfully, were not brought back). It also isn't so maudlin like many reunion shows. But, it also isn't all that wonderful and if you don't see it you aren't missing much. I loved the original show (except, of course, for episodes where they put on musical variety shows), but felt pretty tepid about this--the film isn't really necessary nor is it offensive. Now, believe it or not, this is a VERY positive review, because compared to other reunion shows I have seen, this is Hamlet-quality. For a nauseatingly bad reunion show, try the Beverly Hillbilly reunion. Or for a rotten time, but not quite as traumatic, try the Leave it to Beaver or Andy Griffith Show reunions. Now they ARE truly bad.

It was good to see the gang again. The writing was sprightly and stylish, but the premise was all wrong. Who cares about a eulogy for Alan Brady? That angle fell completely flat. I would much rather have spent more time with Rob and Laura in their old living room where we had last seen them; and in color!

As far as I'm concerned, the whole show should have centered around Rob and Laura selling their home in New Rochelle and moving into that Manhattan apartment. It would have been a more fitting way to bring us from the 60s and into the 21st Century. It also would have had more of the flavor of the old show as they faced quirky prospective buyers, real estate agents, etc. Alan Brady could have made an offer to buy the house and turn it into a rental property with a shrewd Ritchie stepping up to buy it out from under him.

One last party at the New Rochelle house to celebrate the move would have given the cast a chance to reminisce over archival footage. It would have been far more upbeat than spending an hour talking about death. Who knows? It could have provided Carl Reiner with a great platform for spinning off another reunion show. With critics panning this reunion as they did, they may never do another reunion episode again. I hope that's not the case.