TV ON TV -- "ENDLESS TOMORROWS"

Following yesterday's video break focused on 'Barney Miller'.

For the most part, this ABC NYPD sitcom (1975-1982) portrayed the routine of police work realistically.  Sure, every so often an alien, a time traveler, and a demon showed up in the squad room, but those could be chalked up to characters with behavioral issues.  (LOL - "could be"... but not by me.  I take those characters at face value!)

That realism even extended to mentions of movies and TV shows.  Even though they should all be sharing the same TV dimension, the detectives would mention other TV series like 'General Hospital', 'The Waltons' and 'Nurse'. But occasionally a TV series only to be found in Toobworld was mentioned.  

The most detailed one was a soap opera, "Endless Tomorrows".  A woman came to the squad room to complain about all of the things she had witnessed: that poor Grace Edwards was going blind; Meg Scott was secretly a prostitute; and Judge Fenton Powell was secretly gay (which only his chauffeur was privy to.)

When the detectives went to her apartment to investigate, thinking they would see all of this happening out her window, they found that she had given them all the correct information... as found on Page 27 of Soap Opera Monthly.  She had confused the plotline with real life.

Soap operas are probably the easiest type of television program to lampoon within the reality of Toobworld.  Skitlandia has had a few notable ones - 'The Days Of The Week' ('SCTV') and 'As The Stomach Turns' ('The Carol Burnett Show') being perhaps the most notable.  In the main Toobworld, fictional soap operas are often tossed off in random references, but have also been prominently featured in the backgrounds of shows like 'Twin Peaks' ('Invitation To Love'), 'One Life To Live' ('Fraternity Row'), 'Hot In Cleveland' ('Edge of Tomorrow'), and 'The O.C.' ('The Valley').  And several TV shows were built around fictional soaps with 'All Is Forgiven' (with the soap opera having the same title), 'Telenovela' ('Las Leyes de Pasion') and the third season of 'The New Dick Van Dyke Show' as a few examples.

With just a cursory look at two sites with other suggestions, I'd have to say there are about fifty examples of fictional soap operas to be found in the greater TV Dynamic!

Just for bleeps and giggles, I've decided to cast actors seen only on TV to play those roles... and I chose only the fictional actors from episodes of 'The Beverly Hillbillies'.  (It amused me to have characters from such a broad, rural comedy appear in a subtler urban sitcom.)  By the late 1970s, several of these characters were probably on a career decline

GRACE EDWARDS 

(going blind and needing a cornea transplant)

Gloria Swanson

Miss Swanson played herself in the BH episode "The Gloria Swanson Story"

MEG SCOTT 

(secretly a prostitute involved with drugs and organized crime)

Gladys Flatt

Played by Joi Lansing in the BH episode "Delovely And Scruggs"

JUDGE FENTON POWELL 

(wise, compassionate, very distinguished looking... closeted homosexual)

Rex Goodbody

Played by John Dehner in the BH episode "The Soap Star"

BRAD CLINTON 

(lets Meg Scott use his apartment) 

Jake Clampett 

Played by King Donovan in the BH e[pisode "The Clampetts Are Overdrawn"

RICK EDWARDS 

(Sent to prison for embezzlement, has two illegitimate children)

Dash Riprock 

Played by Larry Pennell as a recurring role on 'The Beverly Hillbillies'

THE CHAUFFEUR
(the only one to know Judge Powell's secret)

Tom Kelly

Played by George "Robot Monster" Barrows in the BH episode "The Gorilla"

BCnU!