Green Acres

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Green Acres

Aerial photo featured in the opening sequence
Genre Sitcom
Running time 30 minutes per episode
Creator(s) Jay Sommers
Executive producer(s) Paul Henning
Starring Eddie Albert
Eva Gabor
Country of origin Flag of United States United States
Original channel CBS
Original run September 15, 1965–September 7, 1971
No. of episodes 170
This article is about the television series. For other uses, see Green Acres (disambiguation).

Green Acres was an American television series that was produced by Filmways, Inc. and originally broadcast on CBS from 1965 to 1971. Today Sony Pictures Television owns the rights to the series (unlike its progenitor, Petticoat Junction, which is syndicated by CBS Paramount Television). The show has one unusual condition for a television program, in that every single episode of the series was directed by the same person, Richard L. Bare.

Contents

[edit] Background

After the tremendous success of The Beverly Hillbillies and Petticoat Junction, CBS offered producer Paul Henning another half-hour on the schedule with no pilot required. Lacking the time to commit to another project himself, he encouraged colleague Jay Sommers to create the series. Sommers used his 1950 radio series, Granby's Green Acres, as the basis for the new television series. The 13-episode radio series had starred Gale Gordon and Bea Benaderet as a big-city family who move to the country, where their hired hand (a man in his late 40s) is named Eb, and the general store is run by a Mr. Kimball.[1]

Green Acres featured Eddie Albert as Oliver Wendell Douglas, an accomplished/ erudite and rich New York attorney who was acting on his lifelong dream to be a farmer, and Eva Gabor as Lisa Douglas, his glamorously bejeweled Hungarian wife, dragged unwillingly from the privileged city life she adored to a bucolic life on a ramshackle farm.

Ostensibly a reverse The Beverly Hillbillies, after the first few episodes the series shifted from a run-of-the-mill rural comedy and developed an absurdist world of its own. Though there were still many episodes that were standard 1960s sitcom fare, the show became notable for its surreal aspects that frequently included satire. They also had an appeal to children due to the slapstick, silliness and schtick, though adults are able to appreciate it on a different level. Its premise is sometimes compared to that of Newhart, though Newhart had no slapstick and was more cerebral. [citation needed]

It was set in the same fictional universe as Henning's other rural television comedies Petticoat Junction and The Beverly Hillbillies, featuring such picturesque towns as Hooterville, Pixley, Crabwell Corners and Stankwell Falls. The shows even shared characters on occasion.

Much of the humor of the series derived from easily-frustrated, obsessive and short-fused Oliver's attempts to make sense of the largely insane world around him.

Although still reasonably popular, the show was canceled in 1971 when CBS decided to shift its schedule to more urban, contemporary-themed shows, which drew the younger audiences desired by advertisers. (Nearly the entire Green Acres cast was middle-aged or older.) The Beverly Hillbillies and other shows with rural settings, including Hee Haw and Mayberry R.F.D., were also dropped at the same time.

Popular western film actor Smiley Burnette (also a regular on Petticoat Junction) guested several times in the role of railway engineer Charley Pratt during the 1965 and 1966 seasons but Burnette's ill health ended the role.

An urban legend says that the pig who played Arnold was cooked and eaten by the cast after the show ended. In reality, several different pigs were used during the show's run, none of which was ever eaten by the cast. Trainer Frank Inn used a smaller, female pig in later seasons, giving Arnold some obvious mammary ducts. The pig actors were dissimilar in more ways than one (as with the two actresses who played Doris)- for example, one Arnold had tufts of grey hair behind his ears, giving him an aged look. Yet another Arnold has spots that others lack. This may have been an intentional goof by producers for comedic effect.

Arnold, it is revealed in the 1990 reunion TV movie Return to Green Acres, survived his "parents", and subsequently bunks with his "cousin", the Ziffel's comely niece. The film was made and set two decades after the series (as Haney's latest product is a Russian miracle fertilizer called "Gorby Grow")...but in reality a pig life span averages 12-15 years, similar to a dog. In the reunion movie, Oliver and Lisa had moved back to New York but are miserable there and are implored by the Hootervillians to return and save the town from a scheme to destroy it which has been cooked up between Haney and a wealthy, dishonest developer (Henry Gibson).

In the US and Canada, the first, second and third seasons of the show are available on DVD. A book containing detailed information on the creation and history of the show has been written, titled The Hooterville Handbook : A Viewer's Guide To Green Acres (ISBN 0-312-08811-6). The first season of the show is due for release for Region 2 (Europe and UK) during January 2007.

At the 2005 Emmy Awards, the theme song to Green Acres was performed by Donald Trump of the reality show The Apprentice, and Megan Mullally of Will & Grace, who dressed up for the rendition in appropriate costumes.

[edit] Cast

Green Acres starred Eddie Albert & Eva Gabor
Enlarge
Green Acres starred Eddie Albert & Eva Gabor

In addition, there were crossovers from Petticoat Junction cast members, most frequently:

[edit] Surreal Humor

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The series was notable for its often surreal and Goon-ish humour, and it was one of the first American TV series which transgressed the traditional diegetic or fourth wall 'borders' of TV presentation for deliberately humorous effect -- characters addressed the audience directly and were somehow able to perceive and react to post-production elements such as the music soundtrack and the superimposed program credits.

Some of the more noteworthy surreal aspects of the show's humour included:

  • There seemed to be a dual perspective of reality. One was that of the Hootervillians, which inexplicably included Lisa, the other was Oliver's. But there were times when it appeared that Oliver wasn't entirely sane either, such as renting a rooster and climbing a telephone pole to make or accept calls.
  • While general store owner Sam Drucker is a reliable Dutch uncle in Petticoat Junction his character is bent a bit here (keeping plastic pickels in a barrel to appease city-folk).
  • Oliver's affluent mother (Eleanor Audley) lampoons him and mollifies Lisa.
  • The Douglas' elderly childless neighbors, Fred and Doris Ziffel, 'adopted' a pig/son named Arnold Ziffel. Arnold understands English, lives indoors, and is pampered by everyone. Like all 1960s children, Arnold is an avid TV watcher and a big Western fan. Only Oliver seems cognizant that Arnold is just livestock, although he frequently slips and begins treating him as a boy. Arnold makes regular appearances throughout the series, often visiting the Douglas farm to watch their TV. In one episode Arnold even wins a competition and goes to Hollywood in an (unsuccessful) attempt to break into movies, although how he has been able to enter the competition is never explained. In another episode Arnold is drafted into the Army
  • Oliver and Lisa's live-in farmhand Eb Dawson, played by Tom Lester, habitually addresses them as "Dad" and "Mom", much to Oliver's irritation.
  • In a slap to government bureaucrats and civil service employees, Alvy Moore plays spacey agricultural agent Hank Kimball, who never really seems to know which end is up.
  • The dishonest and oily salesman Mr. Haney, who sold Oliver Green Acres, continues to con his easy "mark" in most episodes. Haney, along with farmhand Eb, scatterbrained county agent Hank Kimball, and grocer Sam Drucker, make up the main supporting cast. Sometimes the Petticoat Junction characters are seen in "cross-over" episodes and visa versa.
  • Oliver always farms wearing an expensive three-piece suit, just as he had done when practicing law.
  • Lisa's utter domestic ignorance provides fertile ground for recurring gags -- her 'coffee' is brewed sans water and oozes from the pot in a thick, tar-like sludge; her infamous hotcakes (which she calls "hotscakes") are so tough and inedible that in one episode Oliver is able to repair his truck's head-gasket using Lisa's hotcake recipe. Instead of washing dishes, Lisa tosses them away as though they were disposable paper plates.
  • A pair of recurring characters were two quarrelsome carpenters known as the Monroe Brothers, Alf and Ralph. Despite her name and her status as one of the brothers, Ralph was in fact a woman, played by Mary Grace Canfield. Alf was played by Sid Melton of Make Room for Daddy. In general, only Oliver seems to notice or care about this bizarre contradiction. Nothing the Monroe brothers ever did was either finished (such as the Douglas's bedroom) or ever turned out right -- Ralph once sawed through Sam Drucker's phone line and then spliced it together backwards so that Drucker had to talk into the ear receiver and listen at the mouthpiece.
  • Whenever Oliver makes a rousing speech about the American farmer, a fife can be heard playing Yankee Doodle in the background. (Lisa called this the "shoosting speech" as Oliver always included a reference to the "crops shooting up out of the ground".) The other characters would frequently look around to try to find the source of the music. The other farmers also hated his speeches lionizing farmers.
  • Despite the Douglas' apparent wealth, the dilapidated farm house is never repaired, but the run-down condition of the home is in stark contrast to the opulent furnishings they have brought with them from New York. Oliver also is unable to get the phone company to properly install their telephone when they run out of wire; as a result it remains perched atop a high wooden telegraph pole just outside the house, which they are obliged to climb every time they need to use or answer the phone. Even when the Monroe Brothers install a telephone in the kitchen, the Douglases still have to go outside to answer the phone.
  • Also, in contrast to the basic transportation owned by the citizens of Hooterville (pickup trucks, battered sedans), the Douglases tooled around in a glamorous Lincoln Continental 4-door convertible, shiny and clean, always with its top down.
  • The episode titled "A Square is Not a Round" featured both a chicken that lays square eggs, which Oliver is desperate to locate, and a toaster that only works when you say "five" to it. In the end it is revealed that it has all been a dream of Oliver's, which he rushes back to bed to see how it finishes. At the very end, Lisa is muttering to herself, "Hmph, square eggs, talking to toasters..." and approaches the refrigerator and says clearly, "Mabel!" and the fridge opens by itself. Lisa is also evidently able to coax the chickens into laying on demand, simply by talking to them.
  • One running joke was that Oliver had a pronounced tendency to mangle words, especially when his wife, Lisa, mangled them first, as she frequently did, since English was not her native language. Oddly, the other residents of Hooterville would often inexplicably share Lisa's mangled vocabulary. Another aspect of this gag was that Lisa would often seem to mangle words or phrases, but Oliver would then discover that Lisa's supposedly 'wrong' version is correct - e.g. the title of a fictional TV series Lisa watches in one episode, entitled "Run For Your Wife". She also refers to an automatic-transmission car as a "Pernerndle" (a joke derived from the P-R-N-D-L lettering on the gear-lever) and a popular board game as "Monotony" (which turns out to the actual name of the game as sold in Hooterville).
  • The series parodies the age-old truism that country folk all know each other's business -- the local telephone operator routinely monitors every conversation and in several episodes, the content of conversations and arguments between Oliver and Lisa in their home mysteriously and instantly become common knowledge all over the valley.
  • In some episodes, the opening credits appear to be visible to Lisa, but not Oliver. Sometimes, they appear on Lisa's rubbery hotcakes. In another instance, they are written on the eggs laid by the Douglas' hens. Another episode opens with the characters arguing, then realizing the credits are running, and sitting down and waiting for the credits to finish on the grounds that no one was paying attention to what they were saying. Another episode opens with Lisa herself first waking up, then waking up Oliver to ask if he wanted to read "the names" with her; on another occasion she calls them "the written-by's". This practice of inserting opening credits in unusual ways was also used in The Beverly Hillbillies.
  • Oliver is the only person who does not realize that he is a terrible farmer, his farmland is worthless, his Hoyt-Clagwell tractor is an antique relic, and his farmhouse a dilapidated shack.
  • The Pilot episode shows Oliver as such a fanatic farmer wannabe that during World War II, while strafing a battlefield in a P-38, he keeps talking on about the vegetables on the ground. When he is shot down over Hungary, he first meets Lisa who helps him escape. A later episode shows Oliver as a Air Force Reserve Officer when the Hooterville townspeople try to get him to fly a World War I-era plane to Chicago.
  • Oliver has always dreamed of becoming a farmer, but he lives in complete denial of the fact that he is virtually incapable of growing anything. Lisa, who always longs to go back to New York, actually adjusts quite well and seems quite at home in Hooterville. Despite Lisa's blatantly urban, sophisticated socialite manner, the local people like her, yet find Oliver weird and make constant references to his supposed "drinking problem".
  • Lisa claimed in one episode to be from New Jersey but went to boarding school in Hungary, thereby explaining both her accent and her lack of ability to speak Hungarian. However, in some episodes, she is seen to converse with other Hungarians in fluent Hungarian. She also has a wide variety of stories involving how her father became the King of Hungary.
  • Another running joke is Oliver's use of sarcasm and Lisa taking his comments literally. This is usually followed by Oliver shaking his head or a puzzled look on his face. He occasionally tried to explain what he meant to his wife but usually gave up.
  • In-jokes about how Hooterville is so remote:
    • In one episode Hooterville can only be found on a map if a fly isn't standing on it.
    • That the only way a high ranking Air Force Officer can get to Hooterville is by parachute. (Technically, this is a continuity error, since Hooterville has an airport (as well as Pixley International Airport). Once, Lisa and Douglas tried to go by Hooterville airplane to Washington D.C, but they ended up in Paris. There is also a railroad crossing at Sam Drucker's store and Petticoat Junction, and there are county roads for the Douglas car and Mr. Haney's truck.)

[edit] Reruns

Reruns of Green Acres have aired in syndication in the past, and also on Nick at Nite. Since 2004, TV Land has aired episodes.

[edit] References

  • Cox, Stephen (1993). The Hooterville Handbook : A Viewer's Guide To Green Acres. St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-08811-6.

[edit] External links

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