The Last Show (Mary Tyler Moore Show episode)
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| “The Last Show” | |||||||
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| The Mary Tyler Moore Show episode | |||||||
 The final scene of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. |
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| Episode no. | Season 7 Episode 24 |
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| Written by | Allan Burns, James L. Brooks, Ed Weinberger, Stan Daniels, David Lloyd and Bob Ellison | ||||||
| Directed by | Jay Sandrich | ||||||
| Guest stars | Valerie Harper (Rhoda Morgenstern Gerard), Cloris Leachman (Phyllis Lindstrom), Robbie Rist (David Baxter), Vincent Gardenia (Mr. Coleman) | ||||||
| Original airdate | March 19, 1977 | ||||||
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| List of The Mary Tyler Moore Show episodes | |||||||
The Last Show is the 168th and final episode of the sitcom The Mary Tyler Moore Show and was written by Allan Burns, James L. Brooks, Ed Weinberger, Stan Daniels, David Lloyd and Bob Ellison. It was first broadcast on CBS on March 19, 1977.
[edit] Plot summary
WJM-TV is sold to new owners who want WJM to become the Twin Cities' most-watched television station. As a result, the entire newsroom staff is fired. Everyone but Ted Baxter, ironically the cause for WJM's low ratings, loses their job.
Mary takes the news particularly hard. To cheer her up, Lou arranges for old friends Rhoda and Phyllis to fly to Minneapolis for a visit.
After their final broadcast together, the WJM staff staff say goodbye to each other by huddling together and crying. Nobody wants to let go, so the gang, together, goes to Mary Richards' desk to get a box of tissues. Mary says goodbye to her fellow coworkers, after which Lou Grant (who will eventually find a job in Los Angeles as a newspaper editor in the spinoff series Lou Grant) tells everyone that he treasures them. The episode ends with everyone exiting the newsroom and singing "It's a Long Way to Tipperary" to the applause of the studio audience. Upon leaving, Mary turns off the lights.
[edit] Life after The Mary Tyler Moore Show
- Executive producer Allan Burns' Outstanding Comedy Series acceptance speech at the 29th annual primetime Emmy Awards made a reference to the series finale: "We kept putting off writing that last show; we frankly didn't want to do it. I think it said what we wanted it to say. It was poignant, and I believe 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show' was, in the long run, important for many women."
- Viewers subsequently learn on Lou Grant that Lou relocates to Los Angeles to take a job as a newspaper editor; Mary and Rhoda reconnect in 2000 (in the ABC made-for-TV movie Mary and Rhoda), and it is learned that Mary later took a job as a news producer with ABC, while Rhoda remarried, and both women had daughters. No mention is made of what became of any of the other characters.
