Topper (TV series)
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Topper was a television situation comedy series based on the 1930s film series Topper.
The thrust of the story is that the sophisticated Cosmo Topper (Leo G. Carroll) is vice-president of a bank. He is married to the sweet but somewhat dumb Henrietta (Lee Patrick). They live in a house that they bought from the estate of a fashionable young couple, George and Marion Kirby (Robert Sterling and Anne Jeffreys), who died after being swept away by an avalanche. Their St. Bernard, Neil, who was unable to rescue them, also died with them. Cosmo finds that his house is haunted by their ghosts and that of their alcoholic St. Bernard. Only Cosmo can see or hear them.
The ghosts try to put some excitement and joy into the life of the somewhat stodgy and conservative Cosmo. In action that would anticipate the later series Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie, the ghosts would cause strange (but very humorous) events to happen, for which Cosmo would have to create some kind of explanation to others who would be baffled, and often even amusingly frightened, by seeing them.
The show ran on CBS from 1953 to 1955. 78 episodes were produced. Both ABC and NBC later aired repeats of these episodes (ABC in 1955 and NBC in 1956). In later decades Topper would be popular in syndication. Some episodes are available on DVD.
