The New Dick Van Dyke Show

I remember as a kid tuning in hoping to relive the excellence of the earlier Dick van Dyke show, only to get this.

Hope Lang was not MTM, which she repeatedly demonstrated with her wan performances and her insufferable camera glances. The supporting players were uninteresting and there was none of the dynamism the old DVD show managed to bring to both home and office. MTM advanced, DVD struggled.

I don't know whether the "making love" scene was true, but it does sum up the era - with inhibitions gone, any absurd thing became relevant. It may be that DVD as a comic performer needed the supporting cast he had, not the ones here that he ended up with.

Not a good show.

Dick van Dyke and Hope Lange, likeable stalwarts of 1960s sitcoms made a second series together with pretty good results. No particularly memorable plots but you really believed them as a modern married couple with a young teenage daughter.

The writers wanted to make a more modern series; this was after all the era of ALL IN THE FAMILY. That led to the one scene that people remember from the show and a scene likely to appear on TV comedy retrospectives-- It's night time, the daughter is asleep and the parents have gone off to make love in their bedroom. The camera shows the hallway linking the two bedrooms. Out of the door on the right, the daughter comes out, calling to her parents in a sleepy voice. She crosses to her parents' room, opens the door, and enters. Wait two beats..... On the third beat she backs up back into the hallway and silently crosses back to her room. Wait two beats.... The parents, hurriedly tying bathrobes shut, head to the daughter's room!

A nice scene follows where the parents try to explain what the daughter saw. The daughter listens intently, nods her acceptance, and then giggles the punchline, "You two sure looked funny!"

Dick Van Dyke at the time this new sitcom came along,was still at the height of his fame,but during the early 1970's he made a second sitcom which was very good and truly outstanding that nowadays is easily forgotten and likewise faded into our memories. Only this time around, he would portrayed a character that was about the same but likewise totally different. You see that in "The New Dick Van Dyke Show",the character would be totally different from the original cache that occurred in his famous 1960's sitcom series,but with a brand new twist. However actors,Dick Van Dyke and Hope Lange(From the TV Series,"The Ghost And Mrs. Muir"),are likeable stalwarts of two different sitcoms which made and impression of impaccable chemistry as a winning team and with pretty good results which gave the green light at Van Dyke's former employer,CBS-TV the go-ahead with this series which only lasted four seasons,1971-1975. Here,there are no particularly memorable plots,but you really believed them as a modern day married couple living in suburban America with a teenage daughter. Here Dick Van Dyke portrays,Rob Preston,a advertising executive working for a huge company where his wife is a stay at home suburban housewife that looks after the young teenage daughter,who is in high school. The writers wanted to make a more modern series since this came out after all in the era of classic 70's family oriented/situation comedy shows:"All In The Family", "The Brady Bunch","The Waltons","The Bob Newhart Show","Maude",and "Mary Tyler Moore".

However,the show was produced by Saul Turteltaub and Bernie Orenstein,who were the producers of a ton of vintage 70's shows like "Sanford and Son","Good Times","The Jeffersons",and "What's Happening!" and so much more,were also two of the writers along with Sheldon Leonard on the 1960's original "Dick Van Dyke Show" series,along with the show's creator and executive producer Carl Reiner,who was executive in charge of production of this series. Not to mention the superb writing and directing talents of veteran directors Jay Sandrich,Jerry Paris,Alan Rafkin,Don Weis,and Peter Baldwin(from TV's "The Bob Newhart Show"). This show also provided a great cast including original cast members from Van Dyke's 1960's sitcom as either regulars or supporting cast members like Rose Marie,and Richard Deacon along with a supporting cast of greats:Marty Brill,Richard Dawson,David Doyle,and Nancy Dussault and in some episodes Carl Reiner. Hilarious? Yep,lots of laughs which Dick Van Dyke himself supplying the mischief in every episode. Hope Lange is excellent here,but you can tell that she is no Mary Tyler Moore here,but she gives that ultimate spark of chemistry within the two characters. Overall,a great series that is unfortunably forgotten and faded into our memories.

I was a fan of the first two seasons of this series. With the third, and final, season there were multiple cast changes and Dick, Hope and the girl that played their daughter were all that was left of the original cast. Interestingly, I recall reading that prior to being cast as Jenny in this series, Hope Lange's acting experience had been as a film actress and she had never performed before live audiences until this time. She made a great transition! In one episode Dick & Jenny are resolving an argument and he makes a comment about, "Whoever said blondes were dumb?" Jenny's reply; "Probably some dumb brunette." Were they giving Mary Tyler Moore a little jab? :-) Although the ratings remained good (not great) after the cast changes, the reason this series was pulled from the CBS schedule was because of an episode the network refused to air; Dick & Jenny's daughter accidentally sees them making love. Her parents then explain what she saw. CBS found the topic too controversial. When Dick Van Dyke and Hope Lange protested, the series went into permanent hiatus. Remember, only a decade earlier Rob & Laura couldn't even sleep in the same bed. But only a few years later CBS allowed Edith Bunker to deal with rape and Maude Findlay with menopause.

BTW ~ In regards to sensitive subject matter, Hope gave a fine performance in the TV movie "That Certain Summer."

This show had lots of stars and sorta-stars, but never lived up to the period-excellence of DVD's previous show.

A clear case of the parts being greater than the whole.