The Terrible Catsafterme

SEASON 1 – ABC

Theme music composed by George Aliceson Tipton, narrated by Rod Roddy

• 001. Episode #1.1 – 9/13/1977
  • We are introduced to the Tates and the Campbells, two families living in Dunn’s River, Connecticut. Chester (Robert Manden) and Jessica Tate (Katherine Helmond) are an affluent couple, with three children: Corinne (Diana Canova), Eunice (Jennifer Salt), and Billy (Jimmy Baio). Their cantankerous butler Benson (Robert Guillaume) can’t stand Chester, hasn’t spoken to Eunice in twelve years, but has a soft spot for Billy, who is concerned that he has a pimple before a big date. Jessica’s father, simply known as The Major (Arthur Peterson) still believes that World War II is going on…inside the Tate house. Mary Campbell (Cathryn Damon) is Jessica’s sister and has re-married to Burt (Richard Mulligan) following her ex-husband Johnny’s suicide. Mary has two sons who don’t get along with Burt, Danny (Ted Wass), who may be involved with the Italian mafia, and Jodie Dallas (Billy Crystal), who by all appearances is gay, much to Burt’s chagrin, although Danny will not accept it. It turns out that Burt has actually murdered Mary’s ex-husband because he was a criminal, which has caused him to become impotent. We also learn that  Chester is having an affair unbeknownst to his wife, who is also having an affair with tennis instructor Peter (Robert Urich), who in turn is having an affair with Corinne. Rod Roddy narrates each episode. 8/12/14

• 002. Episode #1.2 – 9/20/1977
  • Jessica and Mary meet for lunch and Jessica confesses her affair, also adding that she never realized how much she likes sex until now. Chester’s secretary Claire (Kathryn Reynolds) catches him talking to another girlfriend, and threatens to not only expose the affair they’ve been having for more than ten years, but report him for SEC violations unless he devotes himself full time to her. Jodie, while dressed in his mother’s clothes, declares that he wants to have a sex-change operation. Burt relates the story of how he ran into his oldest son whom he hasn’t seen in fifteen years at a sporting goods store and has invited him to dinner at the Tates’ house. Danny tries to leave his mafia family but the Godfather (Richard Libertini) tells him that in order to get out, he’ll have to kill the man who murdered his father… not telling him that it is his stepfather Burt. At the dinner party, Jessica tries to hide the fact that she is ‘glowing’ from her affair. When Burt’s son shows up, he is revealed to be Peter – with whom both Corinne and Jessica (and possibly Jodie, based on his reaction) are having an affair. Stephen Mendillo is the Godfather’s henchman Sheldon. 8/14/14
• 003. Episode #1.3 – 9/27/1977
  • Jessica is afraid to come out of the kitchen during the dinner at the Tates’ house, after seeing that Burt’s long-lost son is Peter. The dinner degenerates into a food fight between Burt and Danny, after Jodie hits on Peter. Jessica tries to confess her affair, but Chester thinks she is accusing him of an affair. He pretends to be upset so he can leave the house…and go and see Claire. Burt and Danny patch things up and agree to get along, with Burt even promising to help Danny with the task he needs to perform to get out of the mob; Burt also agrees to try and look at Jodie like a person instead of a gay man. The Godfather tells Danny that it was Burt who killed his father, and tells him if he doesn’t kill Burt, the mob will kill Danny. 9/12/14
• 004. Episode #1.4 – 10/4/1977
  • Jessica tries to break it off with Peter, but ends up sleeping with him again. As she is getting ready to leave Corinne shows up and is suspicious of what is going on. Jodie directs NFL quarterback Dennis Phillips (Bob Seagren), whom he is dating. Dennis, who is trying to stay in the closet, tells Jodie that he is interested in a woman. Jodie tells him that he is looking into have a sex change operation. While Chester is out for lunch with Claire, she lays out her blackmailing demands, and he is confronted by another lover named Pigeon (Marianne Bunch). One of her demands is that he divorce Jessica. Billy asks his girlfriend Molly (Olivia Barash) to go steady and she agrees after taking his swimming medal to wear. Danny tries to kill Burt but only succeeds in helping him make a sandwich. 9/13/14
• 005. Episode #1.5 – 10/13/1977
  • Danny makes another failed attempt to kill Burt after checking in with his Godfather. Chester arranges a meeting with Claire, but Benson foils it by exposing Chester’s fake are injury. During a lunch meeting with Dennis, Jodie spots his cousin Eunice at the restaurant with another man, who turns out to be a married congressman. Dennis and the congressman sneak out, and Jodie and Eunice form a bond over their love of men. Corinne visits Father Timothy Flotsky (Sal Viscuso), and old high school boyfriend with whom she is in love, to confess that she is moving in with Peter, hoping he will talk her out of it. At Peter’s place, he finishes an affair with Mrs. Fine (Nita Talbot), confessing that Corinne will be moving in with him. Jessica shows up to break it off with him and during their kiss goodbye, Corinne walks in and catches them and storms off. Jessica runs into Mrs. Fine, who had been hiding in the bathroom, and they know one another. Jessica also mentions while talking to herself that Corinne isn’t really her daughter, but the illegitimate child of someone else. 10/12/14
• 006. Episode #1.6 – 10/25/1977
  • Chester consoles Billy about his break-up with Molly. Then at breakfast Jessica and Corinne drop the bomb on Chester that Corinne is moving in with Peter. Jessica attempts to apologize to Corinne about her affair with Peter, but Corinne storms out. Burt finds out that his other son Chuck and his ventriloquist dummy Bob are coming from Hawaii to stay with the family. Corinne makes a final plea to Father Tim to leave the priesthood and be with her before she moves in with Peter, but he just keeps reading his Latin prayer louder and ignoring her. Danny makes another plea to the Godfather to excuse him from killing Burt, but the Godfather reiterates that his boss Mr. Lefkowitz has now insisted that Burt be killed. He tells Danny that he needs to take him to a remote cabin the woods and do him in. Ian Wolfe appears as Father Tim’s Monsignor. 10/13/14
• 007. Episode #1.7 – 11/1/1977
  • The Major gets out and kidnaps the neighbor Mr. Kirby (Alan Oppenheimer) thinking he is the enemy. Danny climbs to the top of Burt’s skyscraper to ask him to go fishing with him at the cabin in the Poconos, where he intends to kill him. Claire continues to put the screws to Chester to leave Jessica, and Chester calls her bluff and tells her to go ahead and tell her about their affair. When she does, Jessica simply thinks that Claire is delusional. Burt’s other son Chuck (Jay Johnson) and his ventriloquist dummy Bob shows up, and Bob insults everyone. Danny gets Burt up to the cabin, retrieves the gun left for him in the chimney, and reveals to Burt that he is going to kill him. 11/11/14
• 008. Episode #1.8 – 11/8/1977
  • Danny cannot bring himself to kill Burt so he decides to go into hiding to avoid the Godfather. Before he leaves, Jodie finally gets Danny to accept the fact that he’s gay and may be becoming his ‘sister.’ Danny tells his mother that he has been recruited as a spy and that he will be gone for long stretches, only appearing to them in disguise. The Campbells visit the Tates for dinner, but Chuck and Bob come later as they’ve had a fight over their act billing. Danny comes to visit as a messenger in a beard, and as he is leaving, shots are fired. Bob claims he is hit, but miraculously recovers when Chuck tells him he can be billed first in the act. Everyone continues to have trouble getting along with Bob, especially Mary, who is about ready to have a nervous breakdown. 11/11/14
• 009. Episode #1.9 – 11/15/1977
  • Jodie enters the hospital for his sex change operation and befriends an older Jewish man named Barney Gerber (Harold Gould). Nurse Nancy Darwin (Udana Power) also vows to change Jodie’s mind about women. Burt visits psychiatrist Dr. Medlow (Byron Webster) for his impotence issue and reveals the circumstances that he killed Johnny Dallas (Eric Mason): after falling for Mary while building a house for the Dallases, Burt is pressured by Johnny to join their organization or be killed. Having lost his wife and now facing losing his construction company, he plans to kill himself by jumping from the scaffolding of a site. Johnny comes to kill him, and he ends up deciding to live and throws Johnny off. The doctor says this is self-defense, which causes Burt to think that his problem might be resolved. Back at the hospital, Jodie questions Dennis about his loyalty, and Eunice and Corinne visit Jodie, and they all reveal their secrets. Benson also visits and is surprised to hear about Dennis, although he claims to know everyone’s secrets. Danny visits dressed as a nurse. Jessica and Mary have lunch together and spot Chester kissing Claire. Chester tells Claire that he plans to leave Jessica. 12/21/14 
• 010. Episode #1.10 – 11/22/1977
  • Jessica and Mary return from lunch and have a look through the family album where they spot their long-lost brother Randolph. Thinking back they are both convinced that their family is suffering a curse. The Godfather shows up at the Campbell house looking for Danny, just before Danny shows up dressed as a rabbi. The Godfather does not recognize him. Burt comes up looking for love after being cured, but with everything happening, Mary is not in the mood. Corinne visits Father Timothy, who then prays for a sign since he is becoming more and more tempted to leave the priesthood. Dennis breaks it off with Jodie and convinces him not to have the sex-change operation, claiming to still love him, but is afraid of his future in football and beyond and is going to marry a starlet named Jill. Jodie decides to end it all by taking a high quantity of pills in the hospital. Not knowing that he had taken him, Mr. Gerber gives Jodie a life-affirming speech as Jodie slips away. 12/21/14
• 011. Episode #1.11 – 11/29/1977
  • Burt and Jessica finally have a chance to be romantic, but they are interrupted by a man entering the house wearing a mask who they assume to be Danny. It ends up being a robber (Jerry Houser), and the real Danny shows up dressed as an Arab. They get the call about Jodie’s attempted suicide, and they head to the hospital, remembering at the last minute to get the robber out of the house. Jodie is fine and apologizes for what he did and says he’ll never make that stupid mistake again. Corinne confronts Peter about his affairs and says she’ll kill him if she ever catches him cheating. Jessica confronts Chester about Claire and confesses her affair without naming Peter. Chester thinks she is lying at first and will not own up to his affair. Jessica walks out on him. 2/7/15
• 012. Episode #1.12 – 12/6/1977
  • The morning after Jessica walked out on Chester, she returns after being out all night and agrees to ‘shelve’ the topic of his philandering, even if not forgetting it, and warns him it better not happen again. In the hospital, Jodie says goodbye to Barney and they agree to keep in touch. Jodie agrees to a date with nurse Nancy, which thrills Burt, who criticizes Jodie’s shirt as being too pink and gives him other advice about dating women. Jodie insists that nothing is going to happen between them. Jessica goes to visit Peter in hopes that she can reconcile with Corinne. She finds Sheila Fine there and threatens to kill him if he breaks Corinne’s heart. Corinne calls Father Timothy to her motel for comfort after she finds Peter cheating again, re-iterating that she’d like to kill Peter. Later Peter takes a shower in his apartment when an unknown assailant comes in and shoots him. Shelly Morrison is the motel maid. 2/7/15
• 013. Episode #1.13 – 12/13/1977
  • Burt and Mary bask in the afterglow the morning after finally sleeping together again. Burt is also thrilled about Jodie going on a date with a girl, even though he claims he didn’t do anything with her. Burt wants to have a party to celebrate everything. He goes over to invite Peter and finds him murdered. After the funeral, Chief of Police Tinkler (Gordon Jump) shows up at the wake to investigate Peter’s murder, claiming that the murderer is in the room, describing the motives of Chester, Jessica, Corinne, Benson (for being black and being the butler), Eunice, the Major, Danny, Jodie (for being gay), Chuck, Bob, Mary, and Burt. Chester finds out that Jessica’s affair was with Peter. Tinkler tells them all to stay in town because one of them will ultimately be arrested for the murder. 3/20/15
• 014. Episode #1.14 – 12/27/1997
  • Chester berates Jessica for having the affair with Peter, but finally realizes that he has made her feel the same way for year. They apologize and agree never to hurt each other that way again. The Tate and Campbell families pontificate about which member of the opposite family committed Peter’s murder. Then they turn their own families and suspect each other. Eunice interviews Congressman Walter McCallam (Edward Winter), with whom she is having an affair, on an airplane with his wife Marilyn (Judith Marie-Bergan) in tow. Eunice tells Walter that she needs an alibi since she was with him during the murder. A drunk Marilyn sees Eunice leave the bathroom and then finds Walter inside. He attributes it to her hallucinating while drunk. Billy’s social life improves since all of his classmates are talking about the murder. Chief Tinkler shows up and after discussing, eating, and choking on some prime rib, arrests Corinne for the murder. 3/20/15
• 015. Episode #1.15 – 1/3/1978
  • Corinne is taken to the police station by Tinkler and Chester works toward getting together a $150,000 for bail money. Burt works on re-creating the crime in order to figure out who did it, and comes to the conclusion that is must have been multiple members of the Tate family. Danny tells Jodie that he tired of running and plans to break into the home of Mr. Lefkowitz to plead his case. When he does, he is confronted by Lefkowitz’s daughter Elaine (Dinah Manoff), who forces him at gunpoint to have sex with her. Meanwhile in somewhere in Ecuador, the Swedish Ingrid Swenson (Inga Swenson) sits with her British companion Randoph (Bernard Fox) and sees a newspaper announcing Corinne’s arrest and says she must return to Dunn’s River. Jodie assures his mother that he won’t try to kill himself again, but says he is taking a break from romance. Jessica is forced to tell Billy what has been going on with Peter and Corinne. Ingrid shows up at the prison and announces that she is Corinne’s mother. Series creator Susan Harris appears as prostitute Babette. 6/14/15
• 016. Episode #1.16 – 1/10/1978
  • Chester and Jessica admit that Ingrid is really Corinne’s mother, and Corinne throws them out of her cell. In an attempt to exonerate Corinne, Ingrid sends private detective Heinrich Himmel (William Daniels) to question the Campbells. Mary tells how their brother Randolph impregnated their housekeeper Ingrid and their mother had them deported to Ecuador and had Jessica raise the baby as their own. Himmel puts forth various motives for reasons that the Campbells could have committed the murder. When he does the same at the Tates’ home, Benson reads him the riot act. Burt continues investigating the murder by snipping hair from Jessica and Mary. Tinkler releases Corinne but shows up with Himmler at the Tate house and arrests Jessica after finding the gun, knife, and brick that killed Peter in their house. 6/14/15
• 017. Episode #1.17 – 1/17/1978
  • Jessica is taken to jail, much to the delight of Ingrid, who also visits the Campbell home to tell them of her intentions to destroy the entire family. Burt’s behavior gets stranger and stranger as he buys 200 Bunsen Burners to do his investigating, thinks he can turn himself invisible, and blows up the basement. Danny meets Charles Lefkowitz (Sorrell Booke) in person, who tells Danny that he will forgive his debt of the murder he never committed if Danny would do him a favor… which unbeknownst to Danny is to marry Elaine. Eunice visits with Walter, who has just received a blackmail note asking for $50,000 or they will expose photos of him with Eunice. Benson shows up to visit Jessica, posing as a lawyer, not long before her real lawyer Mr. Franklin (Howard Hesseman) visits her and determines that her case in unwinnable considering that the gun and knife that killed Peter were found in her room, she had the motive, and has no alibi. Lee Weaver is the Sergeant. 8/5/15
• 018. Episode #1.18 – 1/24/1978
  • Father Tim visits Corinne, who is now staying with Ingrid, to tell her that he can’t stop thinking about her and is going on a religious retreat in Canada to get away from her, likely to never return. Mary confronts Burt in the bathtub, where he has been for a day and a half, to advise him that he need psychological help, particularly for thinking that he can turn himself invisible. Chester visits top-notch lawyer E. Ronald Mallu (Eugene Roche) and engages him to defend Jessica, despite the fact that he’s already mortgaged his house to bail her out of jail. Benson catches Jessica at the airport about to flee to Rio and convinces her to come back home so that Chester doesn’t lose his bail money. Jessica returns but tells Mary that she is still going to move out, likening herself to an old doll that no one has the heart to throw away. Mary convinces her that she is loved and needed. Chester breaks it off with Claire, telling her that he needs to sell the car and get rid of the apartment that he’s provided her with. Clair creates a scene then calls the SEC to report Chester’s illegal activities. Lupe Ontiveros is the woman at the airport. 8/6/15
• 019. Episode #1.19 – 2/7/1978
  • Jessica’s lawyer Ballu talks to each member of the Tate and Campbell family trying to find someone who isn’t crazy to testify on Jessica’s behalf. Ballu discounts Burt for thinking he is invisible, Danny for working with the mob, Jodie for being a suicidal homosexual, Chuck for his dummy, Eunice for her affair, and Chester for his SEC violation accusations. Benson seems to be the only credible witness. Mary brings Burt to see Dr. Medlow to address his invisibility thoughts. Jessica visits Corinne and makes a plea for her to come back home. Corinne almost does so, until Ingrid convinces her that Jessica is just trying to prevent Corinne from testifying against her. Walter summons Eunice to show her that a blackmailer has a picture of them together and is demanding $50,000. Eunice has to hide on the ledge of Walter’s hotel room when his wife unexpectedly returns. Walter accidentally gives the incriminating photos to a press messenger (Marvin Braverman). 11/10/15
• 020. Episode #1.20 – 2/14/1978
  • Eunice escapes from the edge through a man’s (Milt Oberman) apartment, then joins Walter trying to retrieve the incriminating photo from the news mailroom. When they don’t have any luck, they decide to run away together… until the messenger shows up with the envelope and Walter retrieves it. Jodie gets angry when he can never talk to Chuck without Bob, so he hides Bob. Chuck can only speak by using various foods as a dummy. Danny tries to break it off with Elaine, but she threatens to have her father kill him. Danny goes to Mr. Lefkowitz to try to break it off with his daughter, but before he can, he is told that he needs to marry Elaine as the favor he owes him. Mary tells Burt that she’s going to have him committed for his own good. Mr. Franklin shows up in court and announces that he is the prosecuting attorney against Jessica… but claims to be Franklin’s twin brother, and not her former lawyer. The judge on the case, Judge Petrillo (Charles Lane), is someone whom Chester caused to lose a $40,000 investment. The Tates refuse to plea bargain and they head to trial. 11/10/15
• 021. Episode #1.21 – 2/21/1978
  • Danny brings Elaine home to meet his family, hoping that the craziness of Burt’s invisibility, Chuck’s ventriloquist dummy, and Jodie’s homosexuality will be enough to scare her off. Elaine simply thinks they are pretending and announces that their wedding will proceed as planned. Corinne tracks Father Tim to his subzero mountain retreat and pleads with him to leave or allow her to stay. Father Tim, who admits that he’s having trouble forgetting his love for her, refuses and forces her to leave. On the morning of Jessica’s trial, the Major turns up missing. He eventually shows up and claims he’s met a woman and is in love. Jessica locks herself in the bathroom and refuses to go the trial until Benson threatens to climb on the roof to enter the bathroom. Jessica confesses that she doesn’t want the trial to end because it has brought her and Chester closer. Jessica ends up late to the trial and makes a flamboyant entrance, and then threatens Mr. Franklin that she is going to walk out of the trial if he isn’t ‘nicer’ in his presentation to the court. Mallu’s secretary Carol David (Rebecca Balding) is attracted to Jodie and asks him out to lunch at the trial. Tim Rossovich is Elaine’s bodyguard. 1/7/16
• 022. Episode #1.22 – 2/28/1978
  • Jodie goes out with Carol and continues seeing her but insists that they can only be friends. While eating at a Japanese restaurant, he agrees to spending a weekend with her at the Cape, but still maintains it is only as friends. Mary checks Burt into the psychiatric hospital, and while there he becomes friendly with Harold Bronfman (Milt Oberman), a paranoid who is afraid that the Argentinian police are after him and thus keeps changing hats to hide from them. Billy runs away from home, but is found by Benson, who is posing as Chief Tinkler. Billy says he ran away because he was failing math and there were already too many issues in the family. Mary confronts Danny and asks if he really loves Elaine, and Danny confesses that he is marrying her under threat of being killed by her father. At the trial Chester and Benson both testify that Jessica was at home at the time of Peter’s murder. The judge nearly throws out the case until Mr. Franklin promises a surprise witness for the next day. Dick McGarvin is Dr. Resnick. Fred Iwasaki is the Japanese chef. 1/8/16
• 023. Episode #1.23 – 3/14/1978
  • Eunice waits for Walter in a restaurant and his confronted by his wife Marilyn, who insists that Eunice stop seeing him. Eunice refuses, but when Walter shows up and Marilyn tells him that she has purchased the blackmailer’s photos and will end his career if he doesn’t stop seeing Eunice, Walter walks out on Eunice. Burt runs away from the hospital, which brings Mary, Danny, Jodie, Chuck, and Bob there to wait for him to return. When he does, Burt confesses that he has a secret that he can neither tell the hospital or Mary. She finally drags it out of him that Burt killed her ex-husband. Ingrid sleeps with Judge Petrillo to try and convince him to convict Jessica. Corinne is disgusted by Ingrid’s behavior and walks out on her. Father Timothy visits his mother Flo (Doris Roberts) to tell her that he is considering leaving the priesthood because of Corinne. leaving his mother very disappointed. Mallu prepares a defense for Jessica, which is jeopardized when Franklin brings forth his surprise witness Mrs. Fine, one of Peter’s former lovers, who testifies that she heard Jessica tell him that she’s like to kill him. Jodie and Carol plan a trip together as friends, but Carol has other ideas. Luis Avalos is the doctor.  3/16/16
• 024. Episode #1.24 – 3/21/1978
  • Jodie gets irritated at the advances Carol is making toward him during their weekend together and threatens to walk out, which causes her to break down crying. Jodie’s sympathy for her leads to sleeping with her. Jodie admits that he enjoyed it, but still maintains that he doesn’t want to do it again. Mary struggles to get past Burt’s confession, despite Danny telling her that he has forgiven him. Burt nearly leaves home, but Mary, though clearly disturbed, tells him that he can stay. Corinne returns to the Tate home, much to Jessica’s delight, and tells her that it took her leaving to realize who her family really is. No one in the Tate household can sleep as they worry about the trial… except for Jessica who seems oblivious to the whole thing. Ingrid barges in and tries to take Corinne back to her real home, but Corinne refuses causing Ingrid to threaten the whole family with revenge. Tinkler shows up and presents Chester with an arrest warrant for stock fraud brought on by the SEC. In court Mallu presents his closing arguments to a sleeping judge. The Major crashes through the court window and attempts to protect Jessica by taking Franklin as hostage. It is Benson who is able to get the gun from him, and Jessica convinces the judge to not arrest him. Jessica tells the jury to hurry with their decision because she can’t stand to spend another day with the grumpy judge. 3/16/16
• 025. Episode #1.25 – 3/28/1978
  • Burt feels guilty for ruining everyone’s lives by killing Mary’s husband. Danny decides to run away to Australia to avoid the wedding with Elaine, but Lefkowitz warns him that if he does that, he will have Danny’s family killed. Father Timothy tells Corinne that he is leaving the priesthood for her, but that he won’t sleep with her until they get married. Jodie reluctantly agrees to move in with Carol, once again stipulating that it can only be as friends. Dennis runs into them and tells Jodie that his marriage has broken up and that he loves Jodie and wants him back. Jessica still thinks she won’t be found guilty but starts to face the reality that she might be put away in prison. Mallu tells Jessica that he’s in love with her. When the verdict comes in, Jessica is found guilty and is taken into custody pending sentencing. The narrator reveals that Jessica did not in fact kill Peter Campbell, but that the true killer was either Chester, Burt, Jodie, Corinne, or Benson. 6/19/16

SEASON 2

• 026. Episode #2.1 – 9/14/1978
  • The Tates and the Campbells return from court in shock that Jessica was found guilty. They argue amongst themselves, and some fear that they will be accused of the crime. When Bob accuses Benson, he throws Bob out the window. Meanwhile Chester is in the other room contemplating and attempting suicide since he’s lost his wife and career and faces prison time. He keeps getting interrupted and decides against it, but in the process gets hit on the head by a bucket. Burt and Danny help Jodie move in with Carol. Burt meets Dennis for the first time and acts like a gushing fan… until Danny tells him that he was Jodie’s lover. Mary and Benson visit Jessica in prison. An offhand comment by Jessica leads her to think that Burt is having an affair. Benson gets emotional with Jessica, who tells him to be strong for the family. Mallu pledges his love to Jessica and tells her that he will do everything he can to get her name cleared. Tim and Corinne visit Tim’s mother Flo, who puts a curse on them and their marriage. Despite Jessica pleading with her family for the real killer to come forward, she is sentenced to 50 years in prison, with a chance for parole in 25. Chester finally comes forward and confesses to the murder, saying that he repressed the memory and has no idea why he committed the murder, but that the memory came back when he was hit on the head while trying to kill himself. Chester’s kids all meet in the kitchen that night, and Jessica tells them that they need to stand by their father. Chester is subjected to a bully cellmate, murderer Dutch Leitner (Donnelly Rhodes). Mary accuses Burt of having an affair, but he convinces her that he is only working late to make a better life for their family. Jessica comes to see Chester and pledges support in behalf of the entire family. Dutch tells Chester that he will kill him if he doesn’t help him escape. Danny tells Jodie that Carol didn’t fall for Danny’s faked impotence, but she quickly gets around it. Carol is visibly upset that things aren’t working out with her and Jodie the way she expected… especially since she is pregnant but hasn’t revealed it yet. NOTE: This was a one-hour episode. 6/21/16
• 027. Episode #2.2 – 9/21/1978
  • Dutch forces Chester to help him escape by having him scream, and then when the guard (Rene Le Vant) comes, taking his keys, then climbing out the window. They successfully escape, with further prisoners escaping behind them. Burt offers to make Danny a partner in his business, and after discussing some of his other aspirations, Danny agrees. As Danny’s family helps him get ready for the wedding, he shares a heartfelt moment with him mother… and also breaks down laughing because he is marrying a ‘pig’. Charles Lefkowitz announces at the wedding that he is cutting off Elaine, so she and Danny are forced to go live with his parents. As Jodie tries to end his relationship with Carol, she tells him that she is pregnant and plans to have it. During dinner, Jessica sends her kids down to the basement to find Benson and they all disappear. When she follows them down by candlelight, she is grabbed and pulled away. Florence Halop is Aunt Esther. 9/9/16
• 028. Episode #2.3 – 9/28/1978
  • The man in the basement turns out to be Dutch, who has brought Chester back to hide out in the basement with him. The Campbells try to have a meal with Elaine, but she drives them crazy enough that each try to attack her, with Danny ending it by hitting her with a pie. Dutch comes upstairs to check out Eunice, and after they bicker, they end up sleeping together. Mary starts to question whether Chuck needs psychiatric help. Jodie tells Burt and Mary that Carol is pregnant with his baby, but his mother can’t come up with any advice for him. Mary tells Jessica about Jodie, and Mary tells Jessica about Chester staying in the basement. Benson has a touching moment with Corinne before her wedding. Flo Flotsky shows up at the wedding to object to it, but the wedding continues with Father Juniper (Ian Wolfe) presiding and Tim says his “I do”. 9/9/16
• 029. Episode #2.4 – 10/5/1978
  • Jessica visits Corinne after the wedding and attempts to give her some advice. Chester, who has been living in the basement, makes friends with a rat he names Arnold, but Benson mistakenly kills the rodent. He also begins experiencing headaches and nearly passes out, precluding Jessica’s romantic advances to him. Father Tim is extremely nervous on his wedding night, but once Corinne makes him comfortable, he starts to warm up… only to be interrupted by a phone call from his mother who claims she has had an attack. Mary interrupts Burt’s sleep to tell him how bored she is with her life, and tells him her plans to go back to school. Burt and Danny have a chat on a skycraper – nearly falling off – and Burt tells him that he has some advice on how he can get rid of Elaine. Chester’s family gives him a turtle to replace Arnold, while the Major gives him his inanimate dog Sigmund. Chester suffers another attack and passes out. Knowing that by calling an ambulance the police will locate him, they move him to the front porch to claim that he just arrived before passing out. Dutch has to flee as well, promising to return for Eunice. J. Pat O’Malley is Orville the bellboy. 12/3/16
• 030. Episode #2.5 – 10/12/1978
  • Chester is taken to the hospital and falls into a coma. Dr. Kanter (Ron Rifkin) says that Chester has yelled out his son’s name, but he actually yelled out for Arnold the rat. Two police officers (Jeffrey Kramer, Edwin Owens) question Benson and nearly arrest him when they find out he killed ‘Arnold’. The family is quiet about telling the truth or exposing the whereabouts of Dutch. Elaine teases Mary about going back to college. Mary nearly attacks her before being stopped by Burt, who shares his plan that everyone kill Elaine with ‘kindness’. Danny starts dowsing her with affection and ripping off her dresses claiming they’re not good enough for her, leaving Elaine embarrassed and confused. Jodie proposes marriage to Carol, but she questions whether they will ever be able to have sex. Tim and Corinne visit his mother to tell her that her that he intends to live life his way for once, which causes her to drop dead. Danny gets a threat from Mr. DeBlasio who is awaiting payment for Elaine’s loan and is hit on by the construction company secretary Sally (Caroline McWilliams), and after being rebuffed, turns around and immediately hits on Burt. Dr. Kanter notifies Jessica that Chester has a lesion on his brain, which is causing his insanity. Jessica approves of a possibly fatal brain surgery for him and worries about him pulling through. Fred Iwasaki is the Japanese chef. 12/4/16
• 031. Episode #2.6 – 10/19/1978
  • Corinne fears that Tim has left her after his mother dropped dead, but he comes home feeling that he is cursed and doesn’t think he can live in the Tate house. Mary gets a ride home from her Professor Anatole Martins (Lee Bergere), causing Burt to become jealous, but she reassures him there is nothing to worry about. Billy thinks that he and Eunice are the only two people in the house who are still sane, but then he catches Dutch sneaking into her room and attacks him. Dutch leaves Eunice behind to continue life on the lam. Jodie tells Dennis about getting Carol pregnant, and that he still intends to marry her, despite Dennis threatening him that he’ll make sure their marriage doesn’t work. Elaine starts to feel crazy with the way Danny is treating her and Burt advises her to be nicer. Mary in turn requests that Danny be nicer to Elaine, resulting in them finally getting along. Chester wakes up from his coma with amnesia. Dr. Kanter, who removed Chester’s lesion, is surprised to find that he is alive at all. 3/13/17
• 032. Episode #2.7 – 11/2/1978
  • Although Chester hasn’t regained his memory, he finds himself very attracted to Jessica. Carol has Jodie help her break the news of her pregnancy and their engagement to her manly doting father “Boomer” (Michael Conrad). He seems okay with it at first, but privately tells Carol that if she brings Jodie around again, he’ll beat him up. Danny confesses he’s tired of fighting with Elaine, so he’s giving up. Carol tells him that she really loves him and tells him about her background when her young sister died and her father told her that he wished it was her who died, which is why she is so mean. Mary tries to talk Burt out of working so much and into spending more time with her. Mary, Jessica, Corinne, and Eunice have a discussion about how they are all sexually frustrated with their men. Sally tries to tender her resignation because she is in love with Burt. He tells her that if he wasn’t married things would be different, so she decides to stay and leave the offer to be together on the table. 3/14/17
• 033. Episode #2.8 – 11/9/1978
  • Chester’s short-term memory loss causes him to constantly forget his family members and their names. Jodie moves his things out of Dennis’s home and Dennis gives him a guilt trip and belittles Carol, causing Jodie to punch him. Eunice and Dutch meet on two separate rooftops in the slums, and Dutch tries to break it off with her for her own protection. Eunice doesn’t want to separate, so Dutch invites her to join him on his grandmother’s farm. Corinne tells her mother that she’s pregnant, worries about having Tim’s baby when they don’t yet have anything, but Jessica eases her fears. Professor Martins drives Mary home and asks to come in for an aspirin, then hits on Mary and throws her on the couch. Although Mary throws him out, Burt walks in and sees them and leaves, gets drunk, and then goes to visit Sally. She insists that he stay the night with her. 9/5/17
• 034. Episode #2.9 – 11/23/1978
  • Burt wakes up in Sally’s bed and feels guilty for what he’s done, then heads home to Mary as he tries to come up with an excuse. Chester begins behaving like Marlene Dietrich, and Jessica tries to allow herself a good cry but can’t get the tears to flow. Mary fears that Burt is dead when he doesn’t come home, but once Burt arrives he comes up with a story about being in an airplane that landed on the highway. He questions Mary about the professor but she doesn’t tell him anything. Mary and Carol bond like a mother and daughter. Tim starts work at the construction site and ends up falling into cement, then quits because he thinks he’s a jinx. The women throw Carol a wedding shower, and Jessica points out how everyone’s marriage is screwed up except for Mary’s…who bursts out into tears because she is questioning Burt’s story about the plane and assumes he’s having an affair. Jessica tries to make Mary feel better, and is thankful that she can be of help to Mary for once instead of the other way around. 9/5/17
• 035. Episode #2.10 – 11/30/1978
  • Dutch breaks into Jessica’s room to ask for their blessing to run off with Eunice, and tells Jessica how he came to be arrested by killing a loan shark’s henchman, the loan shark happening to be the Chief of Police. After Eunice bids farewell to her father, Chester laments his worry at the fact he can’t remember anyone. Mary confesses to Jodiethat she’s pretty sure that Burt is having an affair, but acknowledges that she can’t do anything about it. Meanwhile Burt breaks it off with Sally, but she is inconsolable since Burt had told her that he was in love with her. Unable to handle her meltdown, Burt back-tracks and tells her it’s not over after all. When he leaves, she makes a phone call, saying that her plan is working and Burt will soon be a broken man. Chester turns up missing, and when the family can’t find him, they report him as a person to Deputy Bobby Gilmore (Harrison Page), an old friend from Benson’s neighborhood, who Benson reports used to be a chicken. Danny and Elaine continue to get along terrifically, but while Danny is out of the room, two kidnappers Dave (Greg Antonacci) and Mel (Frank Coppola) take her and leave a ransom note. 4/10/18
• 036. Episode #2.11 – 12/7/1978
  • Elaine’s kidnappers call Mr. Lefkowitz and demand a quarter of a million dollars as ransom, but he refuses to pay, so Danny and his family decide they will try to come up with the money. Jessica hires a private detective named George Donohue (John Byner) to search for the missing Chester. Corinne visits the gynecologist (Jo de Winter) and finds out that she is actually five months pregnant, meaning that Tim can’t be the father. But since Peter has been dead for six months, he can’t be the father either, leaving Corinne baffled since she slept with no one between them. Jodie directs a commercial for Rain Flakes with the characters Peppy Flake (Alex Henteloff) and Rodney Raisin (Wendell Wright) in a giant bowl of milk, and is visited by Carol, who tells Jodie that with everything going on, they should call off the wedding. Jodie wants to continue with it, even when Dennis visits the set and offers to quit football and come out of the closet to be with him. Danny and Burt visit a phone booth to get instructions for the payoff, and negotiate to pay $50,000. In addition to having to pay more money than they have, they also get stuck in the phone booth. 4/10/18
• 037. Episode #2.12 – 12/14/1978
  • Elaine’s kidnappers let Danny talk to Elaine over the phone when they get another call from them at the bus terminal, and Danny agrees to make the drop-off, telling Burt that he really loves her. Dutch and Eunice make their way to Dutch’s grandma’s run-down cabin in the woods and do battle with a spider. Detective Donohue reveals to Jessica that he is in love with her, but vows to still find Chester, saying he’d rather compete with a man than a memory. On Jodie’s wedding day, Burt and Danny both attempt to give him marital advice. When it come time for Carol to walk down the aisle, she doesn’t show up, leaving only a note behind. Jodie is crestfallen and tells all of guest there won’t be a weeding, but they’ll continue with the reception. Ellen Blake is the lady on the phone. 12/8/18
• 038. Episode #2.13 – 12/21/1978
  • As Burt and Danny wait to make the drop-off of the ransom money, the kidnappers Mel and Dave argue over who will be driving…as Elaine escapes and is shot at by Mel. Corinne tells Tim that she is five months pregnant, which means she got pregnant before they got married. Tim doesn’t believe her when she says she hadn’t slept with anyone and storms out. After Burt and Danny drop off the money, leaving the police to trail the kidnappers, they return home and are baffled by Bob’s ability to tell what objects people are holding while he is blindfolded. Mary confronts Burt about his affair, and Burt counters by accusing Mary of having an affair with her professor. When she tells him that the professor was attacking her, Burt admits what he did, but says that it’s only because he was drunk and jealous, and that he truly loves her. Mary says she will try and forgive him. Jessica fires Donohue because her feelings for him are reciprocal, but since she’s married she wants to suppress the feelings. She then has second thoughts and wonders if it is possible to love two men at the same time. She re-hires him and allows him to give her a kiss on the cheek. Benson warns him not to hurt Jessica, but is satisfied with his response and they have a drink together. Elaine shows up the Campbell house with a bullet wound. Danny tells her how much he loves her as she dies in his arms. 12/8/18
• 039. Episode #2.14 – 1/4/1979
  • Burt break things off with Sally, who doesn’t take it well and threatens both suicide and to get even with Burt. Jessica, Billy, and Benson come and visit Dutch and Eunice at their cabin hideout, but when Police Officer Hickey (Richard Stahl) shows up, Dutch and Eunice hide out and Benson pretends to be Jessica’s husband and Billy’s father. Hickey appears to fall for it, but then sees Dutch and Eunice through the window. Danny continues to mourn the death of Elaine, and talks Burt into helping get revenge on her killers. Detective Donohue delivers the news that Mr. Tate was killed in a train accident when his clothes and wallet are found among the wreckage. Chester however is actually still alive, and finds out from a hobo (G.W. Bailey) informs him that he is in Toledo having been thrown from a train. Chester starts to regain his memory, but then the hobo hits him over the head and robs him, leaving with his amnesia. 10/20/19
• 040. Episode #2.15 – 1/11/1979
  • Jessica holds a funeral for Chester, but no one can think of any amusing or touching stories to tell about him. Sally pays Mary a visit and identifies herself as the secretary with whom Burt had an affair, but also embellishes and tells her that Burt also cheated on her with an 18-year old girl. Jodie travels to Texas to visit with Carol and her mother (Peggy Pope), and is shocked to find out that she wants Jodie to have no involvement with their child. Jodie pleads with her to allow him to be part of the baby’s life. Chester visits a soup kitchen, and after some conversation with a hobo named Lance (Charles Hallahan), and based on a few key words, remembers that his name is “Lester Pate” and sets out to find his family. 10/20/19
• 041. Episode #2.16 – 1/18/1979
  • Burt and his family hang out in New York City where he gets drunk with Jodie, Danny, Chuck, and Bob, and they all lament their lost loves. Jodie, reeling from the loss of Dennis, Carol, and the baby, boasts that he has never thrown up, and Danny tries to make him throw up, but it only makes Bob sick. Tim tells Corinne that he is leaving her to go live in a cave and become a hermit to make himself right with God again. Eunice and Dutch celebrate Eunice’s birthday, but it is interrupted when they are surrounded by police. They pretend that Eunice is a hostage so she won’t get arrested as an accomplice. Dutch wants to make a break for it and risk being shot, but Eunice says she’ll wait thirty years for him if necessary, so he goes out willingly and is arrested. Jodie takes a night walk on the Triborough bridge, where he meets a woman named Alice (Randee Heller), who assumes he is jumping. Jodie tells her that he is just talking to himself, but she admits that she is a lesbian and was planning to jump. Jodie talks her into going and having coffee with him. Breakfast at the Tates seems quiet with just Jessica, Billy, the Major, and Benson, but then they are visited by Detective Donohue then Mary, who tells them that she has left Burt and wants to stay there, the Eunice, who comes crying about Dutch, and finally Corinne who has gone into labor. 3/28/20
• 042. Episode #2.17 – 2/1/1979
  • The doctor (Jo de Winter) announces to an anxious family that Corinne has given birth to a beautiful baby boy, but wonders how a nine-month baby could have been born to a five-month pregnant woman. Burt goes to see Mary, but Jessica says she doesn’t want to see him, but hints that she couldn’t stop him if he goes up to her room to see her. Mary is furious and throws thing at him, before telling him what Sally told her. He admits that it was Sally he had the affair with and not some ‘old fat woman’, but says that the affair with the 18-year old was a complete fabrication. Mary says their marriage is over, but Burt vows to prove his innocence. A nervous Detective Don0hue hosts Jessica for dinner, but she turns him down when he asks if they can ‘mate’… but she does plant a romantic kiss on him. Alice begins staying at Jodie’s apartment, but it drives him crazy when she keeps rearranging the furniture. She gets the hint and leaves, but suddenly he realizes that he enjoys having her around and doing all of the chores, so she returns to stay, as they gradually begins behaving like an old married couple. Chester is working as a cook known as Cookie in a dive called Cafe BBQ. When a bully customer named Buck (Burton Gilliam) pushes Chester and he hits his head, Chester connects the words ‘cheddar on a plate’ to ‘Chester Tate’ and finally remembers that he is Chester Tate from Connecticut with a wife named Jessica and a son named Benson. He sets off for home. Jane Daly is waitress Midge-Ann. 3/28/20
• 043. Episode #2.18 – 2/8/1979
  • The Tate household adapts to waking up in them middle of the night for baby feedings. Jessica comes home at 3am and chats with Mary about how she couldn’t go through with sleeping with George. Mary on the other hand is itching to have an affair or one-night stand, and soon Jessica decides she will have the affair with George. Burt goes to see Sally to confront her about her lie about having a long-term affair. Sally tells Burt that she never even slept with him because he couldn’t, and that she can’t tell him why she lied. Sally tells him that she is being blackmailed and then has him hide in the closet when someone comes to the door. The blackmailer turns out to be Ingrid, who is hellbent on destroying both Mary and Jessica for taking Corinne for her, and has a compromising film of Sally that she made when she needed money for her sick brother. Burt forgives her and they embrace and kiss… which is caught on camera by Ingrid. Danny visits Jodie to see if he can help him talk some since into their mother to return to Burt. Danny meets Alice and mistakes her for being Jodie’s lover and finds it hard to believe that she is gay, while Alice thinks Danny is Jodie’s lover. Jessica sleeps with George, and the morning after tell each other that they love the other. George proposes marriage but Jessica says they have plenty of time. When they come back to the Tate mansion the next morning, Benson criticizes them for not calling. The doorbell rings and Chester appears telling Jessica that he’s home. 7/9/20
• 044. Episode #2.19 – 2/15/1979
  • With Chester back home, Jessica tells George that she loves him but has to be with her husband. While Chester takes a bath, Jessica confesses that she got rid of all of his clothes and had an affair with Detective Donohue, which Chester finds laughable. Meanwhile Billy runs into an old classmate named Lisa (Ruth Cox) who always made him nervous due to his crush on her, and who is now on another dimensional plane with the Church of the Golden Ray. She convinces Billy that he is troubled and she invites him to come along and live with the ‘Sunnies.’ When she tells him that she loves him, he agrees to go check it out. Eunice goes to see Dutch in prison, and when the guard (Dick Miller) sees them kissing the glass, he puts a stop to it. Dutch wants to escape, but Eunice tries to convince him to turn state’s evidence in order to get out. Danny and Jodie tell Mary that Danny is sick in order to get her to the house so Burt can explain the truth. They also bring along Sally to corroborate his story and tell her about Ingrid blackmailing her. She shows her the reel of porno film as evidence, and once Mary is convinced of his innocence, she and Burt reconcile. Back at the Tate house, Jessica coos over the new baby boy while Corinne laments that Tim doesn’t know that he was born. Benson waits until everyone leaves the room before he does his cooing. With only the baby in the room, everything in the room begins moving on its own and a sinister laugh (voice of Tim McIntire) is heard. 7/9/20
• 045. Episode #2.20 – 3/1/1979
  • Chester has breakfast with the family and notes all of the strange changes since he first left: Billy’s cult, Eunice being in loved with a murderer, Father Tim in a cave, and the strangeness with the baby. Detective Donohue stops by to see Jessica, and Chester finally realizes that she truly has feelings for him. Chester vows to try and get her feelings back for him. Jodie brings Alice over for dinner at the Campbells’ house, but Burt and Bob can’t get over the fact that she is gay. Jodie and Danny finally throw Chuck and Bob out when he keeps making jokes about her. Danny gets a call from his friend Cheech, who claims to know the whereabouts of the kidnappers. Danny leaves with a gun to pursue them, and Burt insists on going along. More strangeness with the baby ensues, with it moving objects in the room, nearly strangling Benson with the crib, and actually speaking in a maniacal voice. Corinne goes to see Tim in his cave and tells him that she gave birth to the baby boy, and convinces him that the baby is possessed and that he needs to come back and address the issues with his son before he will ever make his peace with God. Danny and Burt stake out a farmhouse where the they think the kidnappers are. Danny breaks into the house while Burt waits at the truck, and realizes that he has the wrong house. While Burt is playing, the truck starts shaking and Burt spies a spaceship taking off into the air. Danny doesn’t see it, and vows to get him back to the doctor that helped him when he thought he was invisible. 10/25/20
• 046. Episode #2.21 – 3/8/1979
  • Burt tries to convince his family that he truly saw a flying saucer, but Chuck and Bob can only laugh at him, and Mary can’t decide if he is crazy or if he really saw it. Benson goes to see Billy at the Church of the Golden Ray, where one of the Sunnies sings the praises of Reverend Sun Ray Sung. Billy tells Benson that he has no interest in the religion but is crazy is about Lisa. Benson tells him to be careful and tells him that he can always come see him if he needs him, to which Billy responds by telling Benson that he loves him. Jessica has lunch with Detective Donohue to tell him that she isn’t breaking it off, but needs more time to decide between him and Chester. Donohue simply struggles to order from the rude French waiter (Maurice Marsac). Jodie and his date Larry (Charles Lucia) wind up at the apartment at the same time as Alice and her date Maxine (Kit McDonough). As they each offer to let the other have the apartment, Maxine decides she needs to leave, so Larry accompanies her home. When Jodie and Alice start to pick at each other’s dates, they both realize that they are jealous of each other, and decide to go out on their own date. While Benson is too scared to dress up their room, Tim returns to try and deal with the devil inside his son. Jessica still has doubts about the possession, but can hardy deny it when the house seems to suffer a series of mini-earthquakes. Tim tries to exorcise the devil, but is thrown out of the room. He is beckoned by the devil to return, but Tim says he needs someone to help him, and then gives Corinne the name of Father Carvelas to call if he should be killed. Benson volunteers to help Tim, and they both head upstairs. 10/25/20
• 047. Episode #2.22 – 3/15/1979
  • Benson and Father Tim try to drive out the devil from Corinne’s baby, while the devil taunts them by demanding that they follow him. Burt suggest that it might be aliens, and then he and Chester start to bicker until Chester throws him out. Jodie comes over to join the family, and the devil lifts him off the ground. As Chester flees in fear, Jessica and Mary join the battle against the devil, but later come down in a disheveled state. Corinne blames herself since she says she’s slept with every man in town… including the Mayor and his last election opponent. Jessica think it’s because of her affairs with Detective Donohue and Peter. Mary assures them that the devil is there in spite of them, not because of them. Danny tracks down Elaine’s killer Mel (Frank Coppola), but can’t pull the trigger on him and merely wants to have him arrested. However he is hit from behind by Mel’s girlfriend Millie (Candice Azzara), and Mel announces he is going to kill him. Meanwhile Reverend Sung (Michael DeLano) has tea with Billy and tells him that he is ready to indoctrinate him into the cult. When Billy tries to leave, a bodyguard holds him there against his will. The entire family joins the exorcism at the Tate mansion, and  after Father Tim is suced out the window, Jessica finally manages to drive the devil out of the baby by telling him that he’ll never break up her family since they’ve stayed together through every adversity. Once the devil is gone, Jessica hands the baby boy back over to Corinne. Jessica invites Detective Donohue over and sits him down with Chester. They bicker and challenge each other to a duel, but Jessica assures them that the decision is hers no matter what they do. She tells them both that she has made her decision between them. Burt roams the area where he last saw the UFO, talking to himself and wondering if he is crazy. As he recalls all of the recent strange events in his and his family’s lives, the spaceship descends on him and he disappears. 2/12/21

SEASON 3

• 048. Episode #3.1 – 9/13/1979
  • Jessica makes her decision between Chester and Donohue by writing the words ‘yes’ and ‘no’ on a piece of paper and inserted them into envelopes. When they open them, Chester is destroyed and Donohue is thrilled. However, Jessica then tells them that she got the envelopes mixed up. Donohue agrees to leave, but when he gets the door he collapses. Jessica tells him he can stay until he feels better, so he continues to linger around the house. Chester wakes up aboard the alien ship, where he encounters a group of tiny space men. They tell him that he will remain with them, while they will send one of them in a cloned version of his body to live with Mary. The alien is greatly excited at the chance for intimacy with Mary. Jodie and Alice celebrate their first three months together, and while having their cake, Carol’s mother Mrs. David visits with Jodie’s baby daughter Wendy and asks if she can stay with them for a bit. After holding her, Jodie doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to let her go. Eunice complains to Corinne that her baby is keeping her up all night, while Chester complains to Donohue that he is still in the house. Benson returns from his new job at the Governor’s mansion to tell everyone that he visited Billy and thinks that he is being held against his will. The Major heads up a mission to rescue him, putting Chester, Donohue, and himself in camouflage black face. ‘Burt’ shows up at home, and immediately takes Mary to bed. NOTE: A compilation special aired on August 30 that recalls earlier storylines, while also containing new scenes of Jessica and Benson discussing his new job at the Governor’s Mansion – as seen in the sitcom Benson. Although the third season premiere episode alluded to Benson ‘returning’, they never explains where he is returning from. 2/13/21
• 049. Episode #3.2 – 9/20/1979
  • The fake Burt is a wild man in the sack with Mary, but in the morning, he awkwardly tries to answer her various questions. He also becomes immediately attracted to Jessica when he meets her. Two of Reverend Sun’s henchmen Simon (Robert Englund) and Roger (Scott Mulhern) try electroshock therapy to brainwash Billy into believing that Reverend Sun is now his lord and master. Billy seems to acquiesce, but when they leave the room, he gives them a raspberry. Carol’s mother tells Jodie that Carol as run off with a cowboy and abandoned the baby, so she’s offering her to Jodie… with the condition that Alice leave, as she doesn’t like the fact of Wendy being raised by two gays. He threatens to take her to court, but she guarantees that he will lose. Burt meets another man named Saul (Jack Gilford) in the spaceship prison, who claims that he’s been there for the last 4000 years. He says he was plucked from Moses’s day, and that no one gets older on the ship. Eunice goes to see Dutch in prison, and finds that he’s getting ready to escape dressed as a woman. She tells him to just turn state’s evidence, and he’ll be out in weeks. He refuses to be a snitch, but she tries to talk him into putting her first for once in her life. He considers it, as an officer walks into the room. Benson and the three men in blackface break into the Church of the Golden Ray. They are nearly caught by Roger, but they pretend to be an act known as the Step Brothers who are there for an audition, and then they proceed to go into a dance routine. They finally get into Billy’s room, where they find Simon holding them at gunpoint, telling them that they’ve been expecting them. 6/9/21
• 050. Episode #3.3 – 9/27/1979
  • With Simon holding the Step Brothers at gunpoint, Donohue tells a joke and diverts his attention, enabling Billy to smash a chair over his head so they can all escape. They all return him to Jessica and his sisters, and Jessica expresses her thanks to all. Saul talks the aliens out of prodding Burt during examination, but is unable to convince them to send him back to his family. Instead, he vows to help beam Burt back down. Alice overhears Carol’s mother’s demands, so she decides to move out and go to Alaska. Jodie tries to think of another way, but she is adamant, so they say their goodbyes and he helps carry her bags. Mary invites Jessica over to talk about her suspicions that Burt isn’t really Burt. However she doesn’t see how that is possible, so she is concerned that she is going crazy. Saul tries to beam Burt back home, but winds up sending him into blackness. He brings him back, and then he tries again. This time they are both beamed together… somewhere. Benson bids Jessica an emotional and tearful goodbye before going off to work at the Governor’s mansion. Before he leaves, he even compliments the cake she made for him. 6/9/21
• 051. Episode #3.4 – 10/4/1979
  • Burt and Saul are beamed down from the spaceship to Rome 107 A.D., where they are about to be sent by he cellkeeper (Mark Rhuday) to fight the lions in the Colosseum. Saul beams them out just in time, but this time they end up in front of a firing squad in 1850 Mexico where a Federale (Hector Elias) accuses them of being a revolutionary. This time the beamer doesn’t want to work and they drop it just before the squad fires, Saul steps on it and they disappear again. Back at the Tate house, Chester tries to make love to Jessica, but keep getting interrupted by George Donahue, who is still staying with them because he keeps fainting whenever he tries to leave. When he sends Chester to get an aspirin for him, he proposes to Jessica again. She explains that even though she is still in love with him, she has made her decision. When she starts to cry, he says he is okay now and agrees to finally leave the house. After Chester catches them in a final kiss, he heads out… and faints. But then he again agrees to leave. Jessica and her girls and her sister Mary all get together in the morning, after being up all night: Jessica making love with Chester, Mary making love with the alien Burt, Corinne waiting for Father Tim to make love to her, and Eunice excited for Dutch’s release from prison. Meanwhile, Danny wakes up in a barn with Millie, as they wait for Mel to return to kill hm. Leslie starts to fall for Danny, and knocks Mel out with a shovel when he returns to kill him. Danny agrees to take Millie with him, rather than leaving her with an unconscious Mel. Chester gets propositioned again by a secretary named Joyce with whom he used to have an affair with, and he tries to resist… for a while. Chester then heads out to meet her again. Billy has been spending extra time with his teacher Leslie Walker (Marla Pennington) since has a lot of work to make up since he was held prisoner by the Sunnies. They get to talking and she tells him she is divorced, and ends up crying because of her lonely predicament. Billy gives her come comforting words… and then they they kiss passionately. 10/9/21
• 052. Episode #3.5 – 10/11/1979
  • Now that Dutch is out of jail, he joins the Tate family for dinner, but everyone agrees that they need to find a new cook for the house now that Benson is gone because the food is so terrible. However, Dutch has spent so much time eating prison food that he is scarfing it down prison style. He apologizes for being so rough around the edges but asks everyone to be patient with him because he loves being part of the family. Danny arrives home with Millie and introduces her to the family. Alien Burt tries to acclimate to the ‘new’ members of the family, and also becomes instantly attracted to Millie. When Danny asks Burt about the latest with the spaceship, Alien Burt nearly freaks out. Carol’s mother Mrs. David finally heads back to her home, and as soon as she heads to the airport, Wendy starts crying and he doesn’t know how to deal with her… but he gets his head together and sings to her, and she quiets down. Burt and Saul beam back to the spaceship, and Saul figures out the issue with the beamer and fixes it. He decides to stay on the ship since he’s been there for 4000 years and considers it home. Saul sends Burt back to his front porch, and when he goes inside, he finds the Alien Burt, and they both freak out. Burt decides to call Mary, so he doesn’t shock her when she sees two Burts. Back at the school, Billy and Leslie see each other again, and although they recognize everything inconvenient about the possibility of dating each other, they still immediately embrace and kiss again. They agree to meet at her place, so they can lay the ground rules for the budding relationship. 10/9/21
• 053. Episode #3.6 – 11/1/1979
  • Burt runs up to Cline’s Drugstore and calls Mary to tell her to meet him there, adding that she shouldn’t talk to ‘him’ if she sees him before she gets there. Back at home, Millie complains to Danny that Burt is a sex maniac and accuses him of getting into shower and into the bed with her. Mary gets ready to leave to go to the drugstore, and she sees the alien Burt in the house. She is confused because the caller sounded like Burt, but alien Burt convinces her it must have been a practical joke. Jessica accuses Chester of having an affair again due to the fact that he’s been so caring and cheerful, that he’s been going to the gym, was out all night, and came home smelling like perfume. He blames it on a gay colleague of his. Corinne and Eunice have lunch together, and Eunice confesses that she is tired of Dutch and wants to get rid of him. While they are there, Corinne spots her father with another woman. Corinne insists that if he’s not with their mother, then it is not Chester. Corinne complains that she never sees her husband and they never have sex. Billy goes to an out-of-the-way restaurant with Leslie, since it is a place where people go that don’t want to be seen. There they run into two of Leslie’s fellow teachers, and Billy spots Eunice there with another man besides Dutch. He, however, doesn’t care if anyone sees them, and says they’re no one else left to run into. Just then Chester and his girlfriend come in, see Billy, and run back out before he sees them. While Tim is reading the Bible before bed, Corinne tries again to get him bed, but he refuses her again. Tim accuses her of behaving like a nymphomaniac, while she says he behaves like a eunuch. The two get into an argument, but although neither wants a divorce, they agree that it is probably the best thing for them. Tim says he left the church for her, but he still loves it the way he loves her, and his former life won’t allow him to be sexually active. Corinne is inconsolable that she has lost her husband, and cries on her mother’s shoulder. Martin Ferrero is the waiter. 4/4/22
• 054. Episode #3.7 – 11/8/1979
  • The Tates decide to have a party for the Campbell family to celebrate Duke getting out of prison. Chester is none too happy about hosting the Campbells, and when the alien Burt starts asking Chester which one of his daughters is the hot one, Chester tries to punch Burt, but he is too strong and throws Chester’s arm back and it hits Dutch. This causes the Major to fire his gun, then mistake Millie for an old lover. Millie also has a strange conversation with Corinne about her breakup, and an even stranger one with Bob. This helps her decide that she doesn’t want to marry Danny after all, because she’s afraid he’ll become as crazy as the rest of the family. Meanwhile, Billy goes back to Leslie’s apartment for the evening but they are interrupted by her ex-husband Charlie Walker (Kip Gilman). When Charlie is rude to Leslie and threatens to throw Billy out, Billy puts Charlie in a headlock and tells him he knows martial arts and will use it if he doesn’t leave. Although Billy is bluffing, it works and Charlie leaves. The real Burt calls Mary from Cline’s again and reiterates his instructions for her to come see him and to ignore the other him if he sees him before she gets to him at the drugstore. Before Mary arrives, the aliens attempt to bring the alien Burt, X-23, back to the ship, but Burt is having too much fun with sex to go back. He jams his beamer so they can’t bring him back. Mary arrives at the drugstore, and Burt tries to explain the truth to her about how he was beamed into a spaceship by aliens. She suggests getting him a doctor, but in the middle of the conversation, the aliens beam him back up, causing him to disappear in front of their very eyes. The aliens explain to Burt that there cannot be two of them there at the same time, and that the real alien refuses to come home. Burt begs that he is given the chance to talk to his alien counterpart, so the aliens give him one change to convince X-23 to come back, and if he can’t, he will be beamed back onto the ship forever. 4/4/22
• 055. Episode #3.8 – 11/22/1979
  • The Tate family has Dutch make a Hungarian goulash dinner, which they all enjoy, even if Chester is annoyed that he prepared enough for 360 people. Mary shows up at the dinner, and attempt to explain what she saw with Burt disappearing, but her dialogue is as hard to follow as Burt’s usually is. Eunice and Corinne arrange to meet with their father at the same restaurant where they spotted him with another woman. Corinne is adamant that he had better stop cheating, while Eunice is more apt to believe anything he says. Chester claims that he was meeting with a business acquaintance. While Jodie is up with the baby at 3am, Burt comes over since he is a nervous wreck about going home and confront Burt X-23. Jodie thinks he is talking crazy, so he tries to call his mother, only to have the other Burt answer the phone, puzzling him even more. Billy asks Leslie to meet him at a hotel, and then tries to check in as Tater Jones. Leslie doesn’t think it is a good idea, not only because she is older and his teacher, but because if something happens between them, she wants it to happen naturally and not as an arranged event. Billy admits to her that she is a virgin, and she thinks he is adorable. While they are in the lobby, they run into Eunice and a man named Erik, who are also checking in. Eunice tries to say that she is there for an auction, and that Erik is the auctioneer. Then Corinne and a man named Joe check in. Dutch comes looking for Eunice, but Billy covers for her and tells Dutch that she was there to pick out a banquet hall for a shower for him as a surprise. Finally, Chester shows up with a woman, sees Billy, and is able to escape before Billy sees him. Burt finally catches up with Burt X-23 on a construction site and demands that he let Burt have his life back. At first the alien Burt says no, but then starts to utilize his new conscience when Burt explains how he has toiled his whole life so that he can spend what’s left of it in comfort enjoying his wife and family. Burt X-23 asks if he can stay for a while longer, even if it is just for one night, but Burt declines and tells him he has to leave now. A construction worker sees the two Burts chatting with each other and falls off a beam as he’s being lifting, landing in the lake below. Burt X-23 turns his beamer back on and disappears before Burt’s eyes, and the real Burt finally makes his plans to go home. Bruce French is the hotel clerk. Lew Palter is Claude the waiter. 8/2/22
• 056. Episode #3.9 – 12/6/1979
  • Jessica runs into Billy in the kitchen after he’s been out late with Leslie. He tells her about Leslie, but instead of saying that the story is about him, he claims it is his ‘friend’ who is having an affair with his 27-year old teacher. Jessica is supportive and says that relationships with age differences can often work out well, but then she freaks out when she realizes the story is about him when Billy can’t keep his ‘friend’s’ name straight. Burt returns home and tries to explain to Mary about the spaceship and all that he has been through. She thinks he is just as crazy as she feels, until he explains how horny the Burt alien has been. She finally puts it all together and realizes that this is why ‘Burt’ has been so amorous with her. Burt is bothered that she slept with Burt X-23, but she truthfully states that she though it was him. When Burt asks if the other Burt was any good, she lies to him and says that he wasn’t at all…because it wasn’t him. While visiting Elaine’s grave, Danny runs into a grieving widow named Polly (Lynne Moody). They start talking and Danny proposes going out for coffee. After they each ‘ask’ their late spouses, they decide that their dead partners are giving them the okay. At the Tate breakfast, Corinne berates Billy for lying to Dutch and covering for Eunice, while Corinne and Billy both berate Eunice for cheating on Dutch. Eunice says that Dutch is too dumb to ever figure it out anyway. Dutch serves up Leavenworth porridge to the family, but when he gets to Eunice, he pours it on her head. Chester tries to defend his daughter, but Dutch puts the pot over his head and bangs on it. He tells Eunice that he really isn’t too dumb to figure out she was cheating on him and warns her that if she ever does it again, it will be the sorriest night of her life. Mary meets up with Jessica later that day for drinks at the hotel, and she delivers the good news about Burt being an alien, but now the alien is gone and Burt is back. Jessica is confused but just goes with it because her mind is really on Billy’s predicament with his teacher Leslie. They both spot Chester at the hotel going up in the elevator with another woman. Mary tries to make possible excuses for him, but Jessica says she has to know the truth, so she follows behind him in the next elevator. 8/2/22
• 057. Episode #3.10 – 12/13/1979
  • As Chester and the woman (Karen Austin) he picked up at the hotel get ready to make love in the hotel room, Jessica shows up at the door. Chester makes the woman pose like a table and then throws a blanket over her. Jessica searches the room, the closet, and the bathroom, but manages to miss seeing her. She bends down to apologize for being so suspicious of Chester as he props his legs up on the woman table. When she starts to crawl away, Jessica finally sees her and tells Chester not to come home. Burt and Mary both see Dr. Saxon (Richard McKenzie) for physicals, mostly because Burt has insomnia. He claims that he has ‘space lag’ from his recent alien encounter. The doctor thinks he is joking and plays along. Back at home, Danny laments to Burt that he really enjoyed talking to the woman named Polly he met at the cemetery but didn’t get her phone number. Burt suggests that he might get her husband’s name from the headstone and then track her down. He remembers that his name was Peter Dawson but finds two columns filled with that name in the phone book. Burt is stunned when he finds out that Polly is black and claims that he is only worried about Danny and the complications that might arise from dating a black widow. When both Danny and Jodie express their distaste from his apparent prejudice, Burt agrees to help track her down. He even agrees to sit in the cemetery all night as they take shift to await her return. Jessica goes to meet Mrs. Walker just to see the woman having the affair with her son Billy. She is concerned that Billy could get hurt, and Mrs. Walker reminds her that Billy could fall for a cheerleader and hurt her just as easily. Jessica agrees to lay back and see what happens between them. Chuck and Bob come over to see Wendy, and much to Jodie’s surprise, Bob really likes the baby and offers to babysit. While Chuck and Bob go to the bathroom, Jodie is visited by Harlen Wisser (Renny Temple) from the Child Welfare agency. He had received a report that Jodie, a homosexual, was raising a baby on his own. He wants to make sure the baby isn’t in any danger. Jodie assures him that he is bringing up Wendy in a wholesome environment and that any of his friend are wholesome and perfectly normal. When Wisser gets wind of Chuck and Bob, he is convinced that Jodie and his friends are all weirdos. Jodie gets angry and throws him out of the apartment, and in return Wisser tells Jodie he’ll be sorry for that. As Jodie thinks of all of the strange family members who could vouch for him, he realizes he might just be in trouble at that. 11/29/22
• 058. Episode #3.11 – 12/20/1979
  • Jessica has locked herself in the bedroom and won’t come out until Chester is gone. Corinne says he’s just sitting on the couch, and anytime someone walks by, he grabs their arm and starts crying. Chester eventually climbs up a ladder outside the window to talk to Jessica. He pleads with her to understand he has a sex addiction and wants to get help. She agrees to let him stay while he gets help, as long as he sleeps in the guest room. Jodie has been interviewing for potential nannies to watch Wendy, and after another unsuccessful one named Miss Page (Nora Denney), Mary volunteers to have Jodie back home where she can take care of the baby and he can return to work. Burt also joins in trying to persuade him to come back. Jodie doesn’t think it is a good idea to go back home but tells her that he will consider it. Burt and Mary make love, but Burt can’t stop himself from asking about how the alien Burt was in bed… and wants to be convinced that he is better than him. When he wants to know something that the alien did right, so she tells him about how he nibbled on her ear. Burt tries to do this as well. The family all gets together for Billy’s eighteenth birthday. Jessica tries to maintain the illusion that there’s nothing going on between her and Chester, but she won’t let him touch her. Dutch can’t take his eyes off of Eunice after he caught her with another man, and since she is still seeing Erik, he has good reason. Jodie agrees to move back home. Leslie shows up and tells Billy that his birthday present is that she is quitting her job at the school now that she got another job at the university. This means Billy is now legal, and Leslie has no conflict of interest in dating him. When Dutch and Eunice have a big blow-up, and he tries to attack her, and then Chester and Jessica put on a spectacle when Chester latches onto her and begs her not to leave him, Billy and Leslie sneak out of the house so he can get his ‘birthday gift’. 11/30/22
• 059. Episode #3.12 – 1/3/1980
  • Jodie and the baby move back home and Danny is excited to have Jodie back in his room. Bob, however, isn’t so crazy about having to give up his room for the baby’s nursery and laments having to live in the room with Chuck again. Danny gets two tickets to the Knicks/Lakers game, while Mary wants to make dinner and go to Coney Island, and Burt wants the whole family to bowling. Jodie would rather just have the dinner and stay home, so Burt and Chuck and Bob head to the basketball game, and Danny and Mary head to Coney Island, leaving Jodie alone. Chester and Jessica go to talk to a minister (John Hillerman) about Chester’s sex addiction. Chester can’t keep his eyes off of the minister’s daughter Gloria (Colleen Riley), while the minister spends most of his time hitting on Jessica, and then he invites Chester to return for a group therapy class of men with the same issue. Danny tracks down Polly and goes to her house to visit. He gets intense pushback form her brother Eddie Coleman (Kene Holliday) but a bit warmer reception from Polly’s mother Rose (Royce Wallace). Polly is surprised, but delighted, to see him, and they head out on a date, much to Eddie’s annoyance. Burt goes in to see the doctor for his test results, and he shares with Burt that Mary is pregnant. He also delivers the bad news that Burt has Mylar’s Syndrome and only five months to live. 5/15/23
• 060. Episode #3.13 – 1/10/1980
  • Chester meets with Mary and tries to tell her about his terminal disease, and then is puzzled when she tells him about how wonderful the news from the doctor is. He realizes that she is talking about the fact that he is pregnant. He then expresses how happy he is about the baby, but then sends mixed messages due to the news about his impending death. He suggests that he start smoking and eating horribly and also that they take a trip to Africa. Naturally, she doesn’t want to travel while pregnant. Burt prays to God that he take care of them after he is gone, and a secondary prayer that a cure is found for his disease. Danny and Holly get caught in the rain while visiting the zoo and duck into a laundromat as they try to figure out how to dry their clothes. Danny feels paranoid that everyone is staring at him because they are seeing a black and white couple kissing each other. Danny gets confrontational with one customer (Kurtwood Smith) who stares him down, but it is because Danny has put on the man’s shirt. Billy basks in the afterglow of finally sleeping with Leslie. She explains to him that there has to be a lot more between them than just sex, but he says that it is just icing on the cake to him. As Mary gorges herself on pregnancy food, Danny comes to see her and ask what she thinks of him dating a black woman. Mary tells him that it doesn’t bother her, but she worries about how others will see it and how they will react. Jodie and Chuck and Bob get ready to go roller skating. Jodie advises Danny to follow his heart and never give up the woman he loves because it will be very hard to find her again. Mary agrees that it is Danny’s life and that the best choices are the ones he makes for himself. Mary goes to see Jessica to give her the news about her pregnancy. Jessica guesses exactly what it is when Mary tells her that she’ll never guess. Mary is worried that she’ll be able to raise a baby, but Jessica offers her help and encouragement. Jessica updates Mary on Chester’s work on the minister’s counseling sessions, which he attends quite frequently. As they chat, Mary suddenly remembers that she conceived at the time that the alien Burt was with her. Jessica thinks it will be find because the alien looked just like Burt, but Mary reminds her that the real alien was a little silver man. 5/15/23
• 061. Episode #3.14 – 1/17/1980
  • Danny finds Burt reading the book Die Without Fear, so Burt admits that he had five months to live. Danny is devastated and agrees to keep the secret from Mary and offers to do whatever Burt needs. Burt would like to seal his legacy for his unborn baby by getting into the Guinness World Records book, so they float some ideas he could try. Meanwhile, while Corinne is looking after her baby Timmy, Eunice asks her if she could use her as an excuse to step out on Dutch with a new guy named Jerry. She wants to tell Dutch that Corinne is having a tryst, and she needs to deliver a note for her, so Eunice reluctantly agrees. Chester goes to see his minister for one of his group therapy classes, but the minister’s daughter Gloria admits that she called to tell Chester about the meeting and that she and Chester are the only ones there. She wants to have an affair with Chester, and though he tries to stave off her advances, she finally gets the better of him and attacks him on the bed. Danny and the family prepare for Polly and her family to come to dinner and to meet his family. Chester has settled on trying to keep a balloon bouncing from hand to hand and has been going for 26 hours straight. Polly’s father Walter (Mel Stewart), mother Rose, and brother Eddie all show up. Between Burt’s balloon bounding and Chuck and Bob’s insulting humor, the Colemans think the family is crazy. Walter ‘accidentally’ pops Burt’s balloon. Later, Chester returns from his new affair to Jessica, who is so proud of Chester for the hard work that she thinks Chester has been putting into his fidelity that she wants to take him to Europe or the Caribbean. Chester feels overwhelming guilty and admits to Jessica that he is in love with Gloria and can’t bear the thought of losing her. Jessica feels foolish yet again and throws him out of the house, telling him that she will never take him back under any circumstances. 9/18/23
• 062. Episode #3.15 – 1/24/1980
  • Burt continues to search for a record that he could break to get him into the Guinness World Records. His annoying and strange behavior finally raises flags with Mary, who pleads for him to tell her what is wrong with him. However, Burt keeps the secret of his impending death. Dutch comes to see Corinne, admitting he is suspicious of Eunice but has now one to talk to. When he asks Corinne if she sees him as being dumb, she tells him that he’s one of the nicest guys she’s ever had the pleasure to know and that he isn’t dumb at all. Jessica goes to see George, who has been married to a woman named Shirley Slotnick for exactly one hour. With Shirley out of the room, Jessica doesn’t realize that she is there and runs to George to tell him that they can finally be together. He is hugely tempted, but when Shirley re-enters the room and Jessica finds out that he has gotten married, Jessica says she is going to bow out. She congratulates them and tells Shirley that she has landed a fine man. Even though Shirley offers to let them talk alone, Jessica says she’s going to leave. She visits Mary, who is lamenting the relationship between Danny and Polly with Polly’s mother Rose. Jessica is so depressed that she can’t talk, leading Rose to think she is deaf and dumb. Eventually Mary sets her straight, and tells her that Jessica, like always, will have more of a reason to be depressed than they are. That night, Dutch enters the Tate house and finds Eunice in the kitchen and confronts her about her date with Jerry to the Hong Kong Gardens. Eunice tries to deny it, and then screams at Dutch about not giving her any breathing room and following her around and spying. Dutch wants to remain calm, but winds up ripping the refrigerator door of its hinges and throwing it out the window. He finally apologizes for making her so jealous, while she tells him that she really loves him, but she feels suffocated and trapped by him. She breaks down into tears and embraces him, but secretly rolls her eyes when he tells her that everything will be all right. 9/18/23
• 063. Episode #3.16 – 1/31/1980
  • With the baby Wendy crying, everyone in the Campbell household wakes up early in the morning. Burt starts over with his ball bouncing effort for the Guinness Book of Records. Carol stops by the house and tells Jodie that she is in town with her cowboy boyfriend for the rodeo. Jod iedoes not give her a warm reception after all that she’s put him through. However, he does give her permission to stop by and see Wendy during her visit until the end of the month. Jessica goes to see psychiatrist Dr. Alan Posner (Allan Miller) at the request of her children since she is feeling depressed over Chester. He tells her that it is a natural reaction to being abandoned. He shows her the punching bag in his office and tells her how he used it often as wife repeatedly cheated on him with multiple men. Jessica takes a turn at punching it and puts a hole right through it. Burt visits Dr. Saxon, who gleefully tells him about another patient named Cookie who passed away suddenly. It turns out that he had the same illness at Burt, but this is only because the computer mistakenly applied Cookie’s information to Burt. While the news is great for Burt, Dr. Saxon warns him that the computer has shared this information with other computers, so Burt’s credit might be affected. Over at the Tate’s, as Corinne makes baby food for Timmy and laments how difficult it is for single mother to re-enter the dating world. Jessica agrees and says that she has children and isn’t dating either. Billy stops by and expresses his lack of interest in an intimate relationship with Leslie, which Corinne finds ironic since this is seeking an intimate relationship. Dutch tells them that Eunice has left him a letter, but he is afraid to read it. Jessica agrees to read it for him, and it turns out to be a breakup letter in which she says she is running off with another man. Both Jessica and Corinne tell him that he can continue to live with them since he has now become the man of the house. Dutch is barely able to cry, but Corinne offers to hold and comfort him. The Major looks for his pigeon Irv, who has taken his prescriptions over ‘enemy lines’. 1/18/24
• 064. Episode #3.17 – 2/7/1980
  • While Danny and Mary are painting the attic, Burt comes home and through squealing happy tears, tells them both the good news about the fact that he’s not dying. This is all news to Mary since she hasn’t known, but Danny is very happy for him. Danny also has to cancel an order for a massive number of bananas that he had ordered for Burt to go for another world record. Burt tells Mary how excited he is to meet the baby and confesses that this is a good thing that has made him appreciate being alive and will make him more present in his family’s life. Meanwhile, Chester waits for his new girlfriend Gloria to return after leaving their hotel room two days earlier to go and get movie magazines. When she finally comes back, she beings packing, and tells Chester that she is leaving him because she’s met someone younger and better than him. He tells her that without her, he will have nothing, and she tells him that is exactly her point. Danny and Polly visit a real estate agent named Mr. Rosen (Joshua Shelley) to see about getting an apartment so they can move in together. They are both a little sensitive to people staring at them since they are a bi-racial couple. Danny yells at wone man, but it turns out to be his own dentist, Dr. Stegman (Paul Avery) who has come over to say hello. Mr. Rosen tells them that they are crazy to attempt to be together but confesses that his daughter is also in a mixed relationship with a black man. He manages to come up with one option as a place for them to move, and they snap it up quickly. Corinne and Dutch wake up in bed together, and although they know they should feel bad since Dutch was Corinne’s sister’s lover, they do not. Jessica comes in and finds them in bed but decides to pretend she never saw it. Jessica returns to see Dr. Posner, who tells her upon arrival that she will no longer be coming to see him because there’s nothing wrong with her. He also would like to date her, but she is nervous about dating a psychologist since he’d be able to read her every move.  Jodie comes to see Carol and her cowboy boyfriend R.C. (Ted Shackelford), who doesn’t think that a ‘fairy’ like Jodie could sire a kid and pick up Wendy. Carol tells Jodie that she wants custody of Wendy and is getting a lawyer to take him to court. NOTE: Dr. Stegman is named as Dr. Carlton in the credits. 1/18/23
• 065. Episode #3.18 – 2/28/1980
  • After Burt’s near-death experience, he decides to give back to the community by running for sheriff. He dresses in a cowboy and tin star like an old cowboy and shows Danny how to make a traffic stop. Both Danny and Bob seem interested in being his deputy. Mary doesn’t like the idea since it will be so dangerous, but he tries to show how he would disarm a crazy man with a knife by having Danny play one… and chasing him out of the room. Jessica and Mary both have check-ups at the dentist, and they meet there and chat after they’ve both been given Novocain. Mary has been to the obstetrician, and although everything seems fine with her unborn baby, she is worried that she’ll give birth to an alien. Jessica tells Mary about how she likes her psychiatrist Dr. Posner but is afraid to have sex with him until she knows she can do it perfectly. As they are both affected by the Novocain, Jessica considers leaving before her checkup. Jodie goes to see the family lawyer Mr. Mallou, who is not excited about working with their crazy family again. He doesn’t want to take the case because fathers generally lose custody cases. However, he still can’t take his mind off of Jessica. Jodie eventually talks him into taking the case, even though it won’t be easy. Jessica plans to have Dr. Posner over for dinner with Dutch doing the cooking. Things seem rather chaotic when Mr. Teshamado (John Fujioka) from the Tokyo Gardens shows up to retrieve his kitchen workers, all of whom the Major has taken prisoner. The Burt shows up to show off his campaign posters and stickers to everyone. Leslie then shows up looking for Billy, collapsing in tears at the prospect that he has left her. Finally, Chester comes over and tells Jessica that he has left his girlfriend Gloria and wants Jessica back. Jessica throws him out, but Chester warns her and Dr. Posner that he will put up a fight to get her back. Jessica is worried that Posner thinks they are all crazy, but he says that she should be worrying about him because he thinks he has already fallen in love with her. The Major comes downstairs with Leslie, honored to be having dinner with her, although he thinks that she is Eleanor Roosevelt. 5/20/24
• 066. Episode #3.19 – 3/6/1980
  • Mary and Burt have dinner over at Danny and Polly’s new apartment, but it is constantly interrupted by angry neighbors throwing rocks through the windows and setting their spare room on fire. Mary invites them to come back and live with them, but they are insistent on not backing down from bigotry. A pair of neighbors, Mr. Pfeiffer (John Clavin) and his wife Helen (Madelyn Cates) stop by to bring them a cake, welcome them to the neighborhood, and tells them that not all of the neighbors are against them. After Burt destroys the cake to make sure it is okay, he determines that it is quite good. Billy takes Leslie out for a nice dinner, and she tells him that she is ready to advance their relationship and has told her parents about him. However, Billy tells her that she doesn’t think they should see each other any longer, and Leslie has a meltdown, begins pouring food and drink all over herself, and tells him that she is going to kill herself. Chuck and Bob are joined by Burt and Mary to look over the baby Wendy to tell her how much they want her to stay. After they leave the room, Jodie then also tells her that he will do anything necessary to keep her because his life means nothing without her. Jessica introduces the new haughty butler, Saunders (Roscoe Lee Browne), and he is faced with almost no one eating his eggs Florentine, and then the Major dresses up like a giant fern and calls him ‘boy’. Chester shows up begging Jessica to come back, but when Leslie tries to cut her throat with a spoon, he decides to leave. However, Jessica pleads with him to stay, and he agrees to do so on a temporary basis. That night, Jessica hosts an election night party for Burt. Saunders lays down the law about Dutch staying out of the kitchen. Saunders gets an even larger taste of the craziness when Chuck and Bob show up, and Burt asks for a drink and immediately pours it on the floor since he doesn’t want to get caught drinking and driving on election night. He also is upset that he missed the poll deadline so didn’t get to vote for himself. The Major is nicer to Saunders, but only because he thinks that he is Jesse Owens. Sanders questions Polly as to why she would want to be part of this crazy family. Burt immediately panics when he gets behind in one district by one vote, believing that he may have cost himself the election. Suddenly, Jessica faints dead away, and Dr. Posner advises someone to call an ambulance, while Chester watches on from outside the window. John Medici is the waiter. 5/23/24
• 067. Episode #3.20 – 3/13/1980
  • Jessica is taken to the hospital, and many of her family members go along. While Chester holds one hand, Dr. Posner hold the other, and Dutch can’t stop crying about Jessica’s condition. Dr. Hill (Granville Van Dusen) comes in to see Jessica and tells her that there is nothing to worry about right now but that they would like to do more tests to find out what is wrong with her. After Jessica is taken from the room, Dr. Hill tells Chester that she is a very, very sick woman. Dr. Posner tries to get more out of him, but Hill says that he wants to wait until the tests are conclusive. Meanwhile, after losing by one vote, Burt demands a recount and impatiently waits by the phone to find out the results. When the call comes, Burt learns that his opponent Prentiss was caught stuffing the ballot box, and Burt has consequently been appointed sheriff. Danny and Bob argue over who gets to be Burt’s deputy. Unfortunately, Prentiss has also barricaded himself inside the armory with an arsenal of weapons and claims he will not be moved or taken alive. It is Burt’s first assignment as sheriff to remove him. Danny still offers to be his deputy, while Bob gladly steps aside. Mary, who didn’t want him to have the job in the first place, becomes even more worried. Later, Corrine finds Dutch up at 5:00am making a farewell cake, as he intends to leave because he feels useless. Corinne tells him how much she loves him, so Dutch decides to stay after all. Saunders catches them making the cake and complains that they kept him up for the last three hours with sounds from their bedroom, and now he asks them to vacate the kitchen. Corinne points out that Dutch never said he loved her back, but he points out that he wrote it on her cake. Jodie has his day in court with Carol, but his lawyer Mallu shows up late. However, Mallu is excited because the judge they were appointed is one who loves him. Unfortunately, Carol’s lawyer is a bulldog named F. Peter Haversham (Michael Durrell) who thinks he will destroy Mallu. Then the judge shows up and it is not who he thought it was going to be, but rather a former prosecutor named Judge Betty Small (Rae Allen) whom Mallu had embarrassed in the past. Jodie tries to talk Carol into giving up her effort to take Wendy from him, but she refuses. When she takes the stand, she tells blatant lies about sending Wendy with her mother to visit Jodie, and when Carol tries to retrieve her, Jodie’s group of homosexual friends threatened to kill her if she didn’t let him keep Wendy. Jodie has a meltdown in court about her lies, yelling at the judge for being one-sided since she doesn’t like his lawyer, and trying to convince her that Carol is lying. The judge threatens him with contempt and says that it could make him a criminal, and custody is never awarded to criminals. Mallu gets Jodie calmed down, but then the judge calmly asks Carol to continue with her story. 10/5/24
• 068. Episode #3.21 – 3/20/1980
  • Jodie is depressed because of his situation with Carol and Wendy, so he heads to his family’s house where he finds his mother in the midst of a nervous breakdown. He thinks it is because of Wendy, but she explains the dangerous predicament that Burt is in with Prentiss, so Jodie decides to go help. Before he can get out the door, Burt returns triumphantly, having found the courage to talk Prentiss out of doing anything crazy and inspiring him to surrender on his own will. Bob expresses how sad he will be if they lose Wendy. Mary has different baby worries and confesses to Jodie that her baby might not belong to Burt, but rather his alien lookalike. She is concerned that the baby might come out silver and short. Over at the Tate house, Dutch still cannot stop crying about Jessica. Chester comes home from the hospital to have dinner, but since he is late, Saunders won’t cook anything for him. Chester tries to give the family a pep-talk about coming together and forgiving each other so that they can be strong for Jessica. Corinne and Billy agree. The Major comes in dressed like a fern again, and Leslie comes in with dynamite strapped to her body, threatening to blow them all up. When she touches the two wires together, nothing happens except for a radio starts playing. The Major then takes a look at the wires and detonates the dynamite, blowing his leaves off of himself. That night while Corinne and Dutch are in bed, Eunice comes to the door and says she’s returned to see their mother. Corinne tries to hide Dutch under the covers and says he’s a dog, but Eunice quickly figures it out. Eunice and Corinne argue over him, and Eunice says that she was so in love with him that it scared her, and this is why she had to leave him. They agree to work it out, and they leave to go share a room while Dutch has his own room for the night. Each girl tells Dutch that they will sneak back in the room later. Jessica is awakened by the nurse (Deborah Combs) at 6:00am, and Dr. Hill comes to talk to her. As he compliments her, Jessica realizes that something is wrong, and that she is dying. Dr. Hill admits that she has a new strain of virus that they cannot cure and that she has between a few days and a few weeks to live. The doctor is visibly saddened by having to tell her this since she is so kind and special. She sends him to go see his other patients, ones that he can actually help, leaving her alone in the room, scared for her life. 10/5/24

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