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Too bad she's known primarily as Ben Stiller's mother and Jerry Stiller's wife. Anyone who caught this odd little film saw Anne Meara prove her extraordinary talent as an actress. She captures the complexities of a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown as skillfully as any of our leading character actresses -- Sally Field, Sissy Spacek, Jane Alexander. Look again at those little comic sketches she and Jerry Stiller did on Ed Sillivan back in the 60's -- they were wonderful character pieces.

Based on Lanford Wilson's early -- and quite autobiographical -- stage play, "Lemon Sky" is atypical TV fare. It's non-linear structure and surealistic staging might be off-putting for the average couch-potato. But Wilson is a brilliant writer, and Kevin Bacon gives possibly his best performance as a young man trying to fit into the family of an abusive father who left him as a child. This is the film where Bacon fell in love with Kyra Sedgewick, and so did I. Her sexy, tough, tragic performance raises the question of why she never became the major star that her talent deserves. I taped this from PBS, and showed it to dozens of my high school drama classes, and they loved it every time. I wish it were available on video.

Down at General Hospital, recovering from her acid-induced statutory gang-rape at the hands of Sunset Strip "long-hairs", twenty-something teenager Mimsey Farmer gets snippy with her police captain daddy, Aldo Ray, and sneers, "Things that happen to me aren't usually fatal." Maybe not, Mimsey, they can sure damage a girl's career. Unbelievably bad expose' of the wild life of teenagers who terrorize LA by standing around passively on the Strip wearing groovey clothes and carrying signs that say things like "We want peace, not police." Career high-point for Mickey Rooney's kid, who does more flipping of his hair than any given season of Charlie's Angels. Most ludicrous [and longest] moment: Mimsey accidentally drops acid and does a very long, robotic interpretive dance with lots of arched-back, breasts-out wanna-be Ann-Margret faux-eroticism. Groovey, Baby. Best line: "Who's the rat-fink that put the finger on us?" Favorite character: the girl in the cool green dress who takes acid and spends the rest of the movie draping herself across various pices of furniture, railings, window sills, etc. and trying to laugh demonically. Great micro-scene by Margaretta Ramsey as Mimsey's pre-Jerry Springer alcoholic hag-mom.