My Mother the Car

You have to wonder at times why people would sign on to appear in a show like My Mother The Car. What could possibly have attracted someone like Ann Sothern to have in her resume the role of the voice of an antique car?

This TV show which actually ran for a full season has Sothern recently dying and coming back to earth as the voice of a 1928 Porter which her Jerry Van Dyke owns. The family name was Crabtree and not only did the car with his mother's voice speak to Van Dyke, but it spoke to no one else. I guess we didn't want word to get out that the Crabtree Family owned a talking car.

Someone knew something was fishy with this car. The villain of the show was Avery Schreiber who was hatching schemes every episode to get the Porter. But he was as effective as Mr. Bluster on the old Howdy Doody Show. Who wouldn't want a talking car?

In fact the show was 10 years ahead of its time. When Knight Rider premiered we had a talking car with William Daniels's voice. But it was a state of the art futuristic new car which housed a computer which could do all.

So the concept was bought with different packaging.

Did anyone EVER ask Ann Sothern how she got into this show.

VERY far from the worst TV show of all time. Granted that the ideas for stories probably would have grown thin had this series lasted any longer than three years or so. It did have it's moments of humor and it did last for 30 episodes which is a lot more than a lot of other real Turkeys!

There's been scores of bad TV sitcoms (due to bad writing, bad acting, bad production values), but this is not really one of them. The premise (a man's mother is rein-CAR-nated) can hardly be considered out of the norm in a world of Jeannie, Samantha, the Flying Nun, Herman Munster, Lost in Space's robot, and Gilligan. Jerry Van Dyke (who chose this role over the Gilligan role) does the same humor he always does and Ann Sothern's voice as "Mother" adds class and talent. Wacky premise, wacky character, wacky car...should have worked. Nick at Nite should put this on the air where it belongs.

I admittedly was VERY young when My Mother the Car was on (about 5), but I remember EVERY episode I watched. It's the only show from that era aside from Star Trek that I can remember watching with my dad. I think this show may be the reason I turned out to be a real 'gearhead' in later life! It took me YEARS to realize that there was no such car company as PORTER, and I actually spent years trying to find one! (I only found out it was a Barris Custom when I was 16.) I think if given the chance today, the concept would work (look how long Knight Rider lasted!) Jerry Van Dyke always gets a bad rap when this show is brought up...if I were shown a script for This show and Gilligan's Island, I would have chosen My Mother the Car also--it was more believable!

I was 12, and know I liked the show, but don't really remember much of the detail... however, it's one of the few television theme songs that I still remember the lyrics too (go figure)...

"Everybody knows, in the the second life we all come back sooner or later.."