I Married Dora

Okay, I was only 7 when this show came out. But I remember watching it every Friday night. Juliette Lewis really stuck out to me and years later when I saw her in some movie I knew I had seen her before somewhere, but could not think of the name of the show she was in. Being that I was only 7, I didn't know what the plot of the show was, I just enjoyed watching it and listening to the Hispanic woman's accent. One of "Dora"'s trademarks in the show was that she had this junk drawer in the kitchen. The husband would get so frustrated when he would try to find something in the drawer and start yelling at her. She'd go over to the drawer, pull it out, shake her hip up against the drawer and wah-la... there was the item he'd been looking for. Of course, I thought this was just hilarious.

This was an otherwise forgettable exercise in inter-ethnic comedy. Just like in "The Nanny", the WASP is the well-off, supposedly in command male, which made mainstream America comfortable as the maid/nanny shows that her colorful Salvadorian/Jewish relatives are actually nicer than some of his grasping relatives or associates; before he gets around to noticing that the 'ethnic' hired help is hot stuff. (It helps, in this case, that they already have a paper marriage.)

Two things are worth mentioning about it, however; first, it was the introduction of Elizabeth Pena, she with the facially large nose, slightly closed eyes, and superbly sexy voice -- sort of a throaty drawl with a very slight Cuban undertone. Catch her in "Lone Star" or "Tortilla Soup" if you want to see her at her best. The second, as I recall, was the way the show acknowledged its poor ratings. At one point Dora made a virtual pistol shot at a TV Nintendo game, and stated that she wished she could zap "Beauty and the Beast" in the same manner. And at the end the someone in the cast announced that the series had been canned - and came out for a bow in front of the studio audience. A nice touch, when most canceled sitcoms just disappear into the ether without a by-your-leave.

This is a truly, truly worthless piece of junk starring daniel hugh kelly as a man who has to marry an illegal alien to keep her from being deported and all mayhem, this silly idiotic plot has no laughs, only a chuckle or two and the only reason this piece of trash is lower on my list of the very worst tv shows of all time is the finale itself, the finale is far more hilarious then ths piece of trashy junk, it's hard to believe that reeves entertainment the successor to the alan landsberg productions is the same company that did great stuff like bill, adam, gimme a break and kate and allie, reduced to garbage filth like this saddens me and the audience and daniel hugh kelly who was great in hardcastle and mccormick is wasted here, luckily brian keith was smart not to appear in this shlock, this is a real failure and a big disappointment for those involved and what are two days of our lives stars (peggy mcckay and allison sweeney) doing in this mess saddens me?

This is junk.

I still have a Betamax recording of "I Married Dora" from the night that Baby Jessica was rescued from that well. Right in the middle of the show they broke away to the rescue and I never did see the rest of that particular episode. Now while I can't recall chapter and verse of the series, I do remember that I did like the show enough to tune in every week. I liked it. Just a nice, quiet little show. If it were to show up on TV Land somehow, which I highly doubt, I'd gladly watch it again. And maybe this time I'll make it through that episode without Baby Jessica getting in on the act! I'll have to look through my collection, but I just might have the final episode as well. Not really the most ground breaking way for a show to end its run, but unique in its own way.

"I Remember Dora" was one of those great shows that nobody watched. Elizabeth Pena was funny and beautiful. I also remember the last episode having an extremely jarring ending. It had one of the characters leaving the family to take a job in another country. He goes through the door to the plane, leaving the family in tears. He comes back a moment later. "what's wrong?", he is asked. "It was canceled," he replies. "What, the flight?" "No, our series!" At which point the camera pulls back, revealing the sets, lights and crew, and everyone turned and waved good-bye to the camera. I was 13 and remember this being EXTREMELY disturbing, but a brave wink to the few fans the show had.