What's Up Doc Online

ABC-TV tried turning the hit 1972 comedy "What's Up, Doc?" into a 30-minute TV sitcom, but only the pilot was ever shown (or, in fact, filmed). If I recall, it was aired on a Friday or Saturday night at 8pm. It featured none of the star-power which infused the movie, however Barry Van Dyke acquitted himself admirably in Ryan O'Neal's role of Howard Bannister. The action begins with Howard and Judy in the airplane above Iowa, pretty much where the movie left off, but instead of bringing Eunice Burns back, it turns out Howard has yet another old-flame to complicate matters for new-flame Judy. Great pains were taken to match the costumes and character attributes to the movie version, but the script was lacking. It was filmed on interesting locations (or maybe a studio backlot) with a laugh-track, but apparently no one had any faith in this forgotten attempt at TV screwball--and the negative must now be a dusty relic somewhere in a bin in Hollywood. Too bad for Barry, he gave it a honorable try...

TV producers are forever turning successful movies into series. Sometimes this works (Stargate and The Courtship of Eddie's Father, for instance). Sometimes they don't. This was one of those times.

The pilot picks up where the movie ends. Howard (Barry Van Dyke) and Judy (Harriet Hall) are on the plane on their way back from the conference in San Francisco where they met. They are optimistically looking forward to their future together. When they arrive at Howard's house, they meet Howard's fiancée, Claudia (uncredited on this website), who greets him wearing a slinky black lingerie. Quick on the uptake, Judy introduces herself as a new student of Howard's "Brahmsy Dardanella," and pretends to have just figured out that Howard's intentions towards her are less than honorable. She leaves in a huff, but arranges to meet with Howard later. When they meet, she expresses surprise that Claudia isn't the frumpy woman Howard described. Howard is equally surprised since after Judy left, Claudia told Howard that she was going to try to be less frumpy and more attractive. Judy and Howard concoct a plan to break the news of their relationship to Claudia. The plan involves Judy dressing up as a delivery boy from a Chinese restaurant, who insistently (and over Claudia's objections) explains that she and Howard are in love. Believing Judy to actually be a Chinese male, Claudia exclaims, "Oh my God! A gay Chinese!" and then faints. When she comes to, she recognizes Judy as "Brahmsy" and Judy and Howard explain the situation to her. Unfortunately, Claudia gets melodramatic and heads for the roof with the intention of jumping. Judy goes up to talk her down, and convinces Claudia that not only should she not give up on life, but she should fight for Howard. Claudia realizes that Judy got Howard by being cute, and that to get Howard back she, too, must be cute. Believing that cute people always do what they say they're going to, she refuses Judy's offer to come down from the roof, and jumps, landing safely, if somewhat messily in the bushes. After Claudia and the rest of the crowd assembled leave, Judy and Howard discuss how they're going to handle the "new" Claudia.

It's a plot that is just as wacky as the movie, and the writing was just as funny. The only glaring error is that in the movie, Howard had a fiancée named Eunice, who chose to stay in San Francisco at the end. The pilot was written as though Eunice never existed, which can be a little hard to ignore if you know the movie at all. Otherwise, the laughs were nonstop, and I still quote this pilot. However, I do have to admit that such hilarity would have been hard to maintain on a weekly basis. And perhaps the feeling was that the public wouldn't buy into an ongoing story, given that the movie had such a satisfying ending.

Van Dyke and Hall did great jobs with their parts. Hall's Judy was a little more bubbly than Streisand's, which could get a bit cloying. Van Dyke's Howard, however, was a little more intelligent than O'Neal's, making him much easier to buy as a college professor.

It's a shame this didn't get picked up. It's an even bigger shame they never show it any more. I haven't laughed so much in a half hour before or since.

I recall this series well as I was living in Ames, Iowa, at the time. I looked forward to its release because of the Ames connection, but was disappointed. For one thing, as I recall, the location was change to Los Angeles. In addition, although all the expected characters from the movie appeared, their personalities were changed in such a way that the only real connection I made to the movie (which I enjoyed) was the title.

For example, Eunice Burns suddenly became a sexy woman more than willing to please her man. Judy became someone who worried about Eunice, and Howard was caught in the middle.

This series may have interested me had there been no connection to the movie, but I was interested in seeing a continuation of the movie at the time.