Soap: Episode 1

Soap: Episode 1
ABC
September 13, 1977
Dramedy
DVD
B-

Some housekeeping we need to get out of the way:

• This was a controversial show even before it premiered, and putting it on after the "jiggle comedy" of Three's Company added to the controversy,
• The ABC Tuesday night line-up that season was (from 8 to 10 p.m.) Happy Days (#2 in the ratings), Laverne & Shirley (topping its parent show and everything else), (Three's Company #3 by the end of the season), and Soap (#13).
• I was 9 and turned off the TV at 9:30.  3'sC was suggestive but basically innocent, while Soap covered much more "adult topics."
• I caught up with Soap in '82 when it hit syndication, somewhat edited but still pretty out there.  I was 14 and I remember that seeing gay characters on TV, especially sympathetic ones was still pretty rare.  I was enough of a fan that I taped the show, on audiocassettes.  (I did this for other shows, but to a lesser extent.)
• When I got the series on DVD, I found that I didn't enjoy it as much as I did in adolescence, although there are still some good moments and aspects.
• It was hard for me to decide on a genre today, but I guess if regular characters are murdered, then it's a dramedy rather than a sitcom.
• There are a very large number of regulars, even more than on The Brady Bunch, so I'll list them below, with stars next to the ones who I'm tagging because they appear on other shows of mine.

This first episode, written by creator Susan Harris and directed for the first of 51 times by Jay Sandrich, covers one morning, starting with the Tate household (three different rooms), switching over to the Campbell kitchen, returning to the Tates, and ending in Peter the Tennis Player's very busy bedroom.  It has to establish the characters and some of their relationships quickly, so perhaps things like Jodie's stereotypical behavior can be excused.  Maybe not surprisingly, Benson comes off the best, Guillaume getting a lot of the memorable lines and reactions.  The best scene is probably the one between Jessica and Peter, where she feels a mix of wonder and guilt and he just wants her to clear out for his next "tennis lesson."

Soap regulars:

• Jimmy Baio* as Billy Tate (he was in the first Love Boat movie)
• Diana Canova as Corinne Tate
• Billy Crystal as Jodie Dallas
• Cathryn Damon as Mary Campbell
• Robert Guillaume as Benson DuBois
• Katherine Helmond* as Jessica Tate
• Robert Mandan* as Chester Tate
• Richard Mulligan as Burt Campbell
• Arthur Peterson* as the Major (he had appeared on Gilligan's Island) 
• Rod Roddy as the Announcer
• Jennifer Salt as Eunice Tate
• Robert Urich as Peter (he's on only seven episodes but he becomes more important to the show in his absence) 
• Ted Wass as Danny Dallas