Nine Sitcom Credits With Lessons About New York
NIGHT COURT Show Concept: Unorthodox judge gives unorthodox judgments in a city of Orthodox Jews. What We Learn About New York: The city is clearly most dangerous after the sun goes down, as evident from the nogoodniks wearing leather jackets who huddle together to smoke a cigarette. Illegal games of Three Card Monty appear to be another tick on the seedy underbelly of New York City. Yes, danger is everywhere! From the zooming subway cars two feet away from your face to the taxi driver who doesn't give a fuck if his cab crashes into the steam rising from a manhole cover. Floor it, Jamushamna! Just when a sixteenth lock on apartment doors seemed imminent, the credits reveal our salvation: Night Court. The downtown courthouse has an eerie purple glow. Does a neon sign factory reside next door, or did it take a while to clean up Three Mile Island? Either way, you can rest assured knowing that the New York Judicial System (with a little help from Rudy Giuliani) will clean up the riff raff of this town. Phase Two: Disney Store in Times Square.
FRIENDS Show Concept: A group of six friends are there for each other when the rain starts to fall. America pulls trigger. What We Learn About New York: Not much except that the "friends" are bat-shit crazy. The credits start off promising with a view of skyscrapers at night, but then things take an unfortunate turn when the insular “friends” play in a fountain all night long instead of taking us on a tour of their fair city. Apparently having a New York state of mind means dragging your sofa and floor lamp to the fountain outside of your apartment and splashing each other until you get prune hands. From where I'm sitting, that floor lamp isn't close enough to the water. The “friends” eventually get tuckered out from doing all of those Vaudevillian hand shuffles and the sequence ends with them staring at their apartment building while the City rightly shuts off their power.
SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE Show Concept: Celebrity pushing a new movie performs in skits that help America realize that they needed to go to bed early anyway. What We Learn About New York: Did someone say rooftop parties?! New York is crawling with them. You can't even randomly point your voyeuristic telescope without seeing a group of young, attractive hipsters loitering on a rooftop. They're drinking, dancing, roasting wienies, and now that I think about it, why am I watching TV when I can be out on a NY rooftop?! They've got everything up there: ping-pong tables, endless views of taxicabs… even a creepy half-naked guy standing in a kiddie pool with a garden hose.
SEX AND THE CITY Show Concept: Sex columnist and her three friends aren't so great at sex or friendship. What We Learn About New York: Steam can come out of manhole covers in the daytime, too. And boy are those high-rise buildings shiny. The sun rises and sets very quickly in New York, which might explain why New Yorkers are shown walking in slow motion. It's like when Superman went back in time by reversing the earth's rotation. Carrie Bradshaw (played by Sarah Jessica Parker) walks through bustling Manhattan as the cameraman shoots buildings angled just above her four-foot stature. By the way, that's not make-up on Sarah Jessica's face; it's thirty years of cigarette tar. Carrie seems contemplative while people gawk at her. I think the lesson here is that if you are over thirty and want people to stare at you, then wear your tutu out in public. The credits end with a city bus (featuring an ad for Carrie's own sex column) splashing a puddle of water onto Ms. Bradshaw's fairy outfit, proving that New York mass transportation is as rude as it is ironic.
THE JEFFERSONS Show Concept: Dry clean mogul George Jefferson can finally provide his wife with an East Side apartment and a slave. What We Learn About New York: Steam makes its third appearance coming out of a manhole cover. What the hell is going on under the streets of New York anyway? Is the City constantly smoking out sewer rats and gators? The opening credits of The Jeffersons would actually make a nice tourism advertisement. Love blossoms in the form of hand-holding as the Jeffersons ride in a taxicab through the streets of New York which, little known fact, don't have any traffic congestion. The Jeffersons point at questionable landmarks (a building with a flag, a small park) as they follow a moving van to their deluxe apartments in the sky-y-y. I never saw the piece of pie the singers kept referring to, but I did appreciate how George and Louise failed to pay their taxi driver. That is so New York.
WELCOME BACK KOTTER Show Concept: Patient Bronx Zoo teacher punishes problem students with four years worth of bad puns. What We Learn About New York: Right off the bat, we learn that Brooklyn is the fourth largest city in America. I did not know that. See, mom and dad; you should have bought me a TV for Christmas instead of wasting your money on Encyclopedia Britannica. This is the "real" New York where subway cars have graffiti and unmentionables hang on clotheslines in between buildings. These are the “mean streets.” It's like a jungle sometimes. It makes you wonder how you keep from going under (huh huh huh huh). he credits end with a lone pigeon thinking, "Good point," and then flying the hell out of there.
CSI: NY Show Concept: NYPD forensics department solves homicides by asking What Would Mr. Wizard Do? What We Learn About New York: Be warned, tourists! Pedestrian Gary Sinise will stop walking on the sidewalk and then turn around to stare into your eyes. There appears to be a trend in credits that NYC looks best when filmed from a bridge. Clouds move fast. Taxis move fast. The Statue of Liberty somehow appears to move fast. Everything is go, go, go because science waits for no city. That smoke you blow from your cigarette? Science. The Naked Cowboy's shrinking package during the winter? Science. The cast of CSI: NY appears intense, but can you blame them? They're practically playing God in one of the world's biggest metropolises, picking up test tubes and dropping enzymes into liquids to defeat that urine smell. And another cast member just turned around on the sidewalk to stare at you. Stop doing that! I'm just trying to find Ray's Original Pizza.
FELICITY Show Concept: Small town girl adapts to big city life while two million Manhattanites play the world's smallest violins. What We Learn About New York: A studio backlot can pass for New York if shot in black and white. The set needs more steam, though. Watching the opening credits' progression of still images is like looking through a View-Master: Felicity smiles in front of a brick wall. Felicity waits for a train. Felicity looks at the ground too much when she walks. A struggling musician plays acoustic guitar on the steps of a building. Felicity may or may not give the musician a dollar. Felicity decides, yeah, screw you. I'm going to keep this dollar.
DIFF'RENT STROKES Show Concept: Rich white bachelor lets maid look after two black boys he found.
What We Learn About New York: New Yorkers don't have the time to fully spell out words. Substituting an E with an apostrophe to form diff'rent may seem like ridiculous ghetto slang, but the reward of pronouncing two syllables instead of three is monumental. It provides ample time to go cruising through the projects in your limousine. While you're there, you may just spot black kids in their natural setting on a basketball court. The group appears to be playing by Globetrotter standards, as seen when Willis literally lifts Arnold a foot off of the ground so Arnold can make the winning basket. The two boys celebrate with a native New Yorker hand jive that goes high-five, high-five, point a finger gun at each other. And the finger pointing doesn't end there. Our rich whitey New Yorker is known around these parts for his humanitarian efforts, so when he simply points to the inside of his limo, you better believe Arnold and Willis jump inside no questions asked. The boys are in luck, because the destination of whitey's limo is Easy Street. Arnold is in awe at the high-rise in front of him. You see, despite all of the time that he's lived in New York, Arnold has never stood in front of a twenty-story building. The sugar daddy and two boys enter the building together, but not before acknowledging us, the viewers, still in the back seat of the car. Aw man, c'mon! We want to live in a penthouse with your impressionable teenage daughter, too! We can be poor! Look! [ shoots basket and misses ] |