Touches You

Best movie ever!

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

It's funny to recall jokes about a show because of the advert, but never watched the show itself. When I would see Beverly Archer in other things, I would think, that's the same woman I saw in that commercial for that other show. You never think that watching a commercial thirty-plus years ago, you will still be reminiscing about it. I thought the guy was Oliver Clark, but wasn't sure. In the commercial, she is trying to open something in the kitchen and having no luck and it finally falls out KLONK! across the stove. Laughter.In the other, she must have quit her job with Tom Poston as he hollers at her that she won't be able to get along without him and as the elevator door closes, she calmly says, "shoes are on the wrong feet" and the door closes. Poston looks down at his feet, but the elevator door has closed on the office plant Archer is holding and we see the plant slowly descend down the elevator door to the floor. Poston yells at the plant on the floor "I like them that way!"

I liked this one quite a bit. The two leads, Beverly Archer and Oliver Clark, clicked as a couple. I remember being a little annoyed at the other characters because they seemed to have been plugged in from other series: the smart-mouthed secretary, the wacky photographer, the bimbo model, etc. But this one gets a 9 from me anyway because of Archer and Clark. Perhaps they were too "real" for a '70s audience seeking escape, or maybe it's just that this element of the show was well ahead of its time. As a series on present-day USA or TNT, I think it would have been successful.BTW, I thought Beverly Archer was rather cute. She was cast as "plain," but she had that smile. I recall her being interviewed in TV Guide when this show premiered, and she mentioned that she'd gotten married not long before, and there was a time when she thought she'd never meet her soulmate because of her looks. Wikipedia says they're still married after 36 years. It's nice to know they've still got each other, and I've always been a sucker for a happy ending.

It's a pity this show didn't last longer. While I remember very little about the episodes themselves, I do remember that the chemistry between Oliver Clark and Beverly Archer was real and quite believable. Here were two people who looked like someone you might actually see in line behind you at the grocery store buying milk and eggs. He wasn't a Neanderthal slob guy (think Jim Belushi) married to the very smart and absolutely magazine model gorgeous wife (Courtney Thorne-Smith, but almost any television actress will do there). I can remember thinking that this show was unusual even back then for portraying main characters who weren't gorgeous and body conscious.As I recall, the dialogue was consistently funny and intelligent, the situations were amusing and it left one with a warm and happy feeling that watching a rerun of "Friends" just doesn't deliver. (Sure, "Friends is funny, but warm? Nope. Nada.) To echo the previous poster, yup, they don't make programs like this anymore because they aren't "sophisticated" enough. Pity, because, frankly, the latest round of "sophisticated" sitcoms seem to be getting meaner and meaner. If mean names, nasty comments and vulgar language is "sophisticated" I guess I will take the "naive" humor of this type of show over that.

The 1970's was a notorious decade for one-season wonders. This show wasvery comfortable to watch. The chemistry was there, the scripts were cute. I wish they would bring back shows like this.