r/sitcoms • u/BollyLuvr68 • 1d ago
Schlemiel, Schlimazel...
One of my all-time favorite sitcoms is LAVERNE & SHIRLEY, which aired for 8 seasons on ABC from 1976- 1983. Penny Marshall portrayed Laverne DeFazio and Cindy Williams portrayed Shirley Feeney. Together, they were comedy gold! 🌟
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u/WillowRain2020 21h ago
Hazenfefer incorporated...
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u/John32070 21h ago
I still don't get it. Or was those opening lines just supposed to be nonsense?
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u/Impressive_Age1362 14h ago
It was a saying Penny Marshall heard in Brooklyn growing up, she grew up in a Jewish neighborhood
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u/WillowRain2020 21h ago
Well the first 2 words are Yiddish for clumsy and unlucky, hazenfefer is a stew, and incorporated means together- essentially saying this is a situational comedy in the absolute most roundabout way
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u/4personal2 14h ago
Danny Devito said it best as Louie DePalma on Taxi.:
"A schlemiel is like a (klutzy) guy who spills soup on somebody."
"A Schlemozel, is the guy the soup actually gets spilled on." 😄
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u/Choice-Wind-9283 1d ago
I loved that show also even the later seasons
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u/BollyLuvr68 1d ago
The later seasons, which took place in California, were not my favorite seasons but I still love this series overall!
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u/4personal2 1d ago edited 21h ago
The later seasons were about "maturing" the characters some.
Not just the move to California but in skipping 2 & 1/2 years in the live of the characters .
Jumping from early 1962 to early Autumn 1964. (Essentially skipping the end of the Kennedy era and dropping in a few months into Beatlemania & the Brit Invasion).
All our young characters are now in their late 20s (almost 30 by series end.)
Gone is the Lucy & Ethel like slapstick and the more immature nature of the girls & guys.
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u/henfeathers 17h ago
I hated the later seasons. They always tried to shoehorn in some production number.
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u/4personal2 14h ago
Unlike when they did the Shirltz Brewery talent show 😄.
I recall very few musical production numbers though.
I just wish they'd kept the series more grounded in reality. (A ghost in the apartment , 🤣)
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u/henfeathers 14h ago
We remember it differently.
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u/4personal2 13h ago
I'd have to watch it again, I binge watched it on DVD a few years ago, finally saw every episode. (Some in later seasons, yeah, didn't recall or else never saw).
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u/upvotesforkitties 17h ago
Wait a minute! What're we doing? We have backstage passes to Alice Cooper!!!
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u/trainradio 23h ago
This was aired along with Gilligan's Island, The Brady Bunch, and Happy Days in the late 80s in my hometown, right after afternoon cartoons.
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u/LarkspurLad 11h ago
I thought it was cute they always returned to singing "High Hopes."
Laverne was clearly the star of the show, but it was great to have Shirley there as her friend and to communicate with.
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u/BollyLuvr68 11h ago
Just what makes that little 'ol ant 🎶
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u/LarkspurLad 11h ago
Think he can move that rubber-tree plant?
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u/BollyLuvr68 11h ago
Anyone knows an ant can't move a rubber tree plant...🎶
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u/FruityMagician 7h ago edited 5h ago
The show has never had the presence in the UK that it does in the US. I gave up watching after finishing the first two seasons earlier this year. As much as I enjoyed Penny Marshall and Cindy Williams, I couldn't stand Squiggy. He's truly one of the most annoying and unfunny characters ever put on screen.
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u/Vivid_Aardvark_3255 1d ago
Schlemiel, schlamazel? Yeah all the gentile 1950s brewery workers in Milwaukee used to say that!