Whoops. Little brain fart on my behalf. Got the actress’ name mixed up with the character. Marilyn Whirlwind was played by Elaine Miles.
Go ahead. Mock me.
:: Points at Trion ::
Ha Ha.
Northern Exposure was definitely my favorite TV show ever. I think what made it special was that each episode seemed to have a deeper meaning than other shows. There was always some philosophical, moral or ethical point(s) to each story. It was also humerous and entertaining. And finally, there always seemed to be an irrational aspect to each show. There was an undeniable force that made Maggie fall in love with a bear, that killed Maggie’s boyfriends, that caused Joel to find the old man who told him the story of Cicely, that brought in the ill wind or “cohoes”, etc.
Loved that show. It’s rerun here at 8am, so I only see it on my way out the door some mornings. My roommate can lay around and watch good TV in the mornings, but I work day shifts.
I loved it when the won the Emmy award for Best Drama in their first year. In the acceptance speech, one of the producers said something like, “I guess we can let out our secret now: Northern Exposure is a comedy, not a drama.”
Here in the State of Washington, you still run into people proud of playing an extra on the show. I had a boss once that was a first-generation Mexican-American and who played one of the natives in a couple of the town-hall scenes. She became good friends with Elaine Miles (an actual Native American), and was coaching her on how to land Latina parts.
John Corbett still owns an interest in one of the rock bars in downtown Seattle. You see him from time to time.
NBC’s new show “Ed” seems to be an attempt at the same sort of quirky hometown comedy. Too soon to tell if they’ll capture it, but it’s got potential.
Eilyn, my roommate in 1991-92, and I adored that show. We expressed (quite often), our unconditional love for Joel and Maggie. We lived very separate lives (she was in art school and busy training how to starve) and I was working and heavily involved with someone out of town, but every Monday night you could find us in the living room, I on my big person’s couch, and she on her little person’s couch, in time for Northern Exposure at 10 P.M. Our furnace broke down many times that winter, so we would compete for the cat’s attention during the show, for the extra body heat.
Of course, as time went on, we started arriving on our couches earlier and earlier, so as to not miss a minute. By the time spring rolled around, we were on our couches by 7:30, in time for Studs.
Sua
I didn’t think that anyone (else) actually like that show…I never watched it when it was actually on, but now i watch the reruns on A&E whenever i can. Chris rocks!!!
Like blastfurnace, I also am into Picket fences. (FYI Ray Walston, the judge, just died)
In fact, my mom turned me on to both shows a year or two ago (i’m 16) after they were taken off production, and the reruns were on saturday morning
yes. my fav. is marilyn. i would move to alaska in a heartbeat.
Too awesome! I catch reruns as often as possible.
Northern Exposure was an excellent show, IMHO.
I think the thing which made the show so great was that the characters had such interesting quirks.
Joel sometimes got on my nerves, mainly because I would give almost anything to live in a small town in Alaska (or any small remote town, for that matter), but yet he was always complaining about it.
I always liked Ed, because he had such a simple, innocent outlook on life and Chris because he would always wax philosophic about this and that.
Marilyn was the best wisest funniest person in Cicely. She could say more with a riased eyebrow than that whining prat of a DJ could on a 24 hour talk marathon.
I was always a big Northern Exposure fan when it was on and still am when I can catch the reruns on A&E. The great thing about it was that it was once of the few shows, maybe the only network show that not only didn’t try to bring viewers down to a LCD stage, but actually demanded intelligence from the viewer. What network show today would attempt to reference Jung, Freud, Hegalian dialectic, Franz Kafka, American Indian myth, and Maurice Sendak.
The reason the show started to stink after Morrow left was because they didn’t really let the new doctor or his wife have any character. The whole town was eccentric in one way or another and even though Fleischmann was there to play off against them, he was a bit eccentric in his own way as well. The new doctor was so bland, there was nothing to do with him. I would have preferrred that they didn;t bring in a replacement at all.
Another thing I enjoyed about it was that it featured older people in mature romantic relationships. Most network shows (especially sitcoms) if they do feature older romance at all make them more like older horny teenagers. (The worst example being “The Golden Girls.” Ugh.) But in the later years, NE featured a small romance between Ruth-Anne and another older gentleman from the town. (I forget his name, but he was played by Moultrie Patten.) It was never strictly stated, but more implied that it was a sexual relationship, but it was played with a sweetness that you normally don’t find on network TV.
FWIW, my father was also once almost in one episode. He was a fan too and visited the set when they were filming a crowd scene. But he was too far over to make the shot. However, he looks almost exactly like Roberts Blossom, who played the old man in the “Cicely” episode.
Absolutely loves Northern Exposure. Although the relationship between Holling and Shelly creeped me out, mainly because I couldn’t stand Shelly.
Barry Corbin (Maurice) does promos for 99.5 The Wolf here in Dallas. It’s kind of cool to hear him every now and then.
My sister and I really got into the whole Chris/Bernard thing. Say “Kaysho” to either of us and we’ll know just what you mean. John Corbett is a good actor. Just a shame he hasn’t gotten anymore work. His stint on Sex & The City was pretty good.
I’m not heartbroken that Fleichmann hasn’t been in more. He was good in that part, but overall, I find him grating.
I still want to ride a motorcycle up the trans-Alaskan hwy. like Bernard did. That would be something.
This is the one area where I thought the writers/producers displayed cowardice. While they did have a kid, they never allowed Holling and Shelly to be sexual. All you ever saw of the two was an occasional chaste kiss.
I’m not saying we should have seen them in the clinch. After all, it was broadcast TV. But they never portrayed the two as having a healthy, normal, and yes physical, relationship.
For some reason I never watched the show when it first aired. Just didn’t interest me. But now that it’s on A&E, I watch it whenever it’s on. I’m not addicted, but close. Though, I may use it to come down off of my addiction of Law & Order re-runs. Ooooo…I wonder if it’s on right now…