I bought my wife the DVDs for Season 1 of Hill Street Blues, and have been watching some of them with her.
One thing I’ve noticed - the acting mostly sucks! Other than Travanti and Hamel, everyone is obviously reading lines from a script. Shatner could outact most of these. I’m figuring the acting MUST improve later on; wasn’t this considered the best drama on TV through the 1980s?
The writing is pretty melodramatic; most current shows seem to have much better scripts.
Also, it’s interesting to see all the smoking, drinking, and sexual harassment that occurred onscreen. Those days are gone.
I used to be able to see the Police Department building (the one that supplied the exterior shots, anyway) out of my office window at UIC. Sadly, it is lost to “progress” these days. Great show, though!..TRM
BTW, in the “Roll Call,” they use some of the same extras for pretty much the run of the series. There’s one large-boned blonde in particular who stands out–but she’s not the only one. Have no idea what her name is, and I don’t think she ever got an onscreen credit, but she does show up prominently in some background scenes outside “Roll Call” in some eps.
And if you like comics/superheroes, please note that the Shakespeare of Graphic Novels, Alan Moore - author of Watchmen, V for Vendetta, Miracle/Marvelman, and so many others - absolutely adores the show. He used its multi-plot approach in much of his writing, but the 20-or-so issue series Top Tenis a direct homage
Heh… from the same era, my wife and I watched the first season of St. Elsewhere on DVD and felt the same about most of the acting. We still liked watching it and thought it was a “good show” but I couldn’t really recommend it based on the acting chops.
Well, it was a cast of mostly-unknowns and it took them a while to find their footing. I can forgive that.
Plus Veronica Hamel circa 1982 was extremely doable.
Plus, heh, I named one of my cats “Whitney”, after a character played by Kay Lenz, also doable.
And keep your eye on the pickpocket that Belker is constantly busting. Usually he shows up in one scene at the beginning of the ep, and he gives Belker a fake punny name.
Also, pay attention to the tall black guy Belker arrests in the first episode.
The show was a big jump forward in TV, most notably for its use of story arcs*. Before Hill Street, every show was a self-contained unit. Characters rarely changed. Sometimes there were two-parters, but that was about it.
Hill Street introduced the concept (outside of soap opera). They used four-episode arcs (which was a big jump over shows of the time). The result – and the multiple plot lines – were revolutionary.
Neat bit of trivia: Michael Warren (Bobby Hill) played with Lou Alcindor/Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in UCLA and won two NCAA championships as the team’s starting guard.
Later, Ed Marinaro joined the cast; Marinaro finished second to Pat Sullivan in voting for the Heisman trophy.
Yeah, not even 20 minutes into the pilot and the amount of sexual commentary and touching used as humor is a bit…well, disturbing. I grew up with that, and that way, and I’m just glad it’s not considered ok now for a perfect stranger to come up and fondle you, that’s all.
Hill Street Blues is a perfect example of the idea that today’s gritty and edgy is always tomorrow’s dated and hokey. Not that it wasn’t a good and truly groundbreaking show (except near the end) its just that it won’t seem so by today’s standards.
Before Hill Street 70s cop shows were things like Starsky & Hutch, Baretta, SWAT, Hawaii 5-0 etc. Shows which had their charms but seemed utterly ridiculous and laughably stupid by the 80s. Of course those same 70s shows were very edgy and gritty compared to 60s shows like Dragnet or The F.B.I. which seemed the same way (silly) by the 70s (its hard to believe anyone actually took Jack Webb’s Joe Friday seriously!)
So of course by the 90s shows like Law & Order, NYPD Blue and Homocide:Life on the Street did the same thing to Hill Street.
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