The Ropers

Just finished a month-long nostalgia kick: all eight seasons of Three's Company, two seasons of The Ropers, and the sole season of Three's a Crowd.

The Ropers is too often maligned, often making Internet lists for "Worst Spin-Off" or "Top Ten Terrible Spin-Offs." Make no mistake. The Ropers is no disaster like Joanie Loves Chachi or AfterMASH. In fact, The Ropers is quite palatable; often, it is hilarious. Norman Fell and Audra Lindley are terrific as always, and Jeffrey Tambor shines (thanks to his bald crown, of course) as the Ropers' uptight, upward-obsessed neighbor.

As others have stated, The Ropers may not be great. The couple are stronger in small doses. Still, the fact that this show lasted only a season plus six (season one is only six episodes) is a shame. The Ropers was a ratings smash for that first mini-season but tanked once it was switched to Saturday nights opposite CHiPS (why do television programmers do this?). It's a shame.

Concerns? As stated, Stanley/Fell and Helen/Lindley struggle to carry the weight of entire show, but what's really missing is a stronger supporting cast. Tambor is fantastic--don't get me wrong--but there's little else. Patricia McCormack is perfectly acceptable as Tambor's wife, and Evan Cohen is likable as the little boy, but Three's Company always boasted at least five strong characters, while The Ropers at times can feel claustrophobic: the two neighboring couples and not much else.

I don't know much about the history of The Ropers' ratings, but my guess is the addition of Stephanie Vallance as Jenny in the last ten episodes or so was a desperate attempt to inject a new storyline. This gambit is understandable, but Jenny, a young adult runaway with a heart of gold who moves in with the Ropers as their surrogate child of sorts, makes for an odd addition. Jenny is perfectly anodyne, and that's the problem. The show desperately needs another character or three, but only if that character is A) interesting and B) funny.

The Ropers deserved a better fate. It's certainly a good enough show to last four or five seasons. It's equally as good as, and often better than, other sitcoms that enjoyed healthy runs. And who knows? Given a chance to grow, The Ropers might have blossomed into something beyond its surface pleasures. Oh well.

This is a pretty good spin-off from Three's Company, where the kids' landlords, Stanley and Helen Roper, sold their apartment building and moved into a new house.

The Ropers have the same dynamic as they had in Three's Company, and it was fun seeing them deal with their neighbors and visiting relatives. Not too keen on Jeffrey Tambor's character though - seems only a one dimensional character with no redeeming qualities.

I do enjoy the guest appearances of the Three's Company characters - makes you feel like you're watching that show again. Quite an entertaining show - too bad it didn't last longer.

Grade B

Decent at most, "The Ropers" is a spin off to the ABC hit sitcom "Three's Company". The show is based off the British series "George & Mildred", which itself is a spin off of the series " Man About the House" the series "Three's" is based off of.

Stanley and Helen Roper have sold their apartment and move to a townhouse in upscale Cheviot Hills. Their neighbor the pompous stuffed shirt Jeffrey P. Brooks is also their real estate agent. Played to hilarious perfection by Jeffrey Tambor. Brooks is a married man with a child, at times his personality clashes with Stanley's and it's up to his wife Anne (Patty McCormack) and Helen to calm their spouses down. At the same time Helen deals with her snobbish sibling Ethel and her forgetful mother.

Some of the episodes are exact copies of the "George & Mildred" story lines. Much like "Three's" the series had special guest stars, and even introduced a certain actress named Stevie"Louise"Vallance who would later be one of the pioneers in Canadian animation. Unfortunately just as the series had finally found its footing ABC pulled the plug, citing bad ratings. Audra Lindley and Norman Fell both were hesitant to do this series, in fact Norman would only agree if the show flopped and he could return to "Three's", the producers decided to make the show go a season and a half and resulting in the agreement being null and void. Overall, the series was a valiant attempt but it proved that sometimes supporting cast members can not make it on their own.

The British did a series called Man About The House which in the USA became Three's Company ,there were two spin-offs from Man About The House,one was called Robin's Nest which in the USA became Three's A Crowd and the other was called George and Mildred which in the USA became this show The Ropers.

The premise-Helen and Stanley selling the apt building and moving into an upper class neighborhood with snooty neighbors. I know I watched this show when I was a young teen in 1979 but hardly remembered it since it didn't last very long however this past weekend during TVLAND's Three's Company marathon they showed a few episodes of the short lived series.The show did have a few laughs ,however it was quite evident that the main characters could not keep this show afloat.While the British spin off had much more background and substance the Ropers did not.Helen's love starved landlady and her bickering with Stanley worked great on Three's Company as a supporting act but you couldn't continue to play that gag as a main act.So they started having Stanley and Helen get along better and become more sympathetic to each other.This obviously turned off audiences who had grown to love the zingers between the two. According to IMDb trivia even the stars Norman Fell and Audra Lindley didn't feel good about doing this spin off. They should have heeded their feelings. Making a deal with the network that they could return to Three's Company full time if the show didn't last a season was a curse. The show lasted a season and a half and after a guest appearance on Three's Company they were gone for good. I will always remember them as The Ropers on Three's Company where they should have stayed.

Back in the good old days, when "Three's Company" had just come on the air, there were plenty of laughs around for Jack, Janet and Chrissy. But it was the crotchety, nosy landlords Stanley and Helen Roper (Fell and Lindley) who got the big guffaws for their live-action version of "the Lockhorns". They were a riot.

So, naturally, they got their own series titled, logically, "The Ropers". Having moved out of the apartment complex, they move into a duplex owned by the EXTREMELY stuffy Jeffrey P. Brooks III (Tambor, who was terrific) and his not-as-stuffy wife (McCormack). Eventually, it was the Ropers' turn to be spied on by a suspicious neighbor.

The first few episodes of this series were great, as Fell and Lindley expanded on their corrosive repartee from the original series. Then, adding Tambor as a humorless foil to their slobbery and the double-entendres that occurred when guests would drop by (usually, Jack, Janet or Crissy) every so often, made things even more hilarious.

But it was too good to last; the writing kind of slacked off as they attempted to make the ever-bickering Ropers more understanding and sensitive to each other. This, of course, entirely missed to point to their appeal; the constant bickering was their only form of communication and, by and large, the only way they could possibly stay together. Take that away, and what do you have left? Not too much else.

A conversation I'll always remember is when Stanley (Fell) is complaining that something Helen (Lindley) was doing was effeminate. Her comeback - "I AM effeminate - just like you're emasculate." Cue laugh track.

Well, I'll always remember the good parts of "The Ropers", anyway.

Six stars for "The Ropers" - the best neighbors you could ever have - move away, that is.