FRANK SAVAGE - YESTERDAY & TODAY

Dan Stark, the Houston police detective who's one of the two main characters in 'The Good Guys', used to have a partner named Frank Savage. But Frank had a nervous breakdown after Dan coerced him into jumping out of a moving vehicle.

Someday Frank Savage may show up in the series, so we can't make too many suppositions about him. But I have to figure he must be close in age to his former partner - nobody older than Dan would take his bleep, or get talked into jumping out of a moving car. As for Dan Stark's age, the common rule in Toobworld is that unless otherwise indicated by the script, the characters are generally the same age as the actors who portray them. So Dan Stark is about 51 years old since Bradley Whitford was born in 1959.

I figure Frank Savage to be within the 1950 - 1960 rangefor birth years. And if that proves to be true, we lost a powerful, albeit still theoretical link based on family trees.

Robert Lansing is THE Frank Savage of Toobworld, an ace fighter pilot during WWII who unfortunately didn't make it home after a mission, as seen in the series '12 O'Clock High'. Therefore, he died too soon to be the father of the former cop Frank Savage.

But the new Frank Savage could be his nephew, son of a younger brother, who was named in his honor.

BCnU!