# Now hear this: Murphy Brown did not have an "Invisible Baby". **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 12, 2004, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752 "2004-05-12T07:03:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/1 "2004-05-12T07:03:09Z")
I’m not angry enough to make a Pit thread about this, but when I read the [thread about worst series closers](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=254959) and saw the twentieth or so reiteration of this: > [@](#): > > Our Miss Brooks, Mary Richards, Rhoda Morgenstern, Laverne De Fazio, Murphy Brown, three of the four Golden Girls and Maddie Hayes all wound up unmarried and (except for the Golden Girls and “Murphy’s Invisible Baby”) childless at the end of their series. I guess that’s a thing of the past: 21st-century sitcom women have to have a husband and child or it’s “too sad an ending.” I decided to put my response in its own thread, since no one ever seems to see it when I respond w/quote. Murphy’s son, **Avery** (yes, he did have a name. And she knew who the father was, too, before anyone claims that), was regularly referred to and regularly appeared after being born. One entire episode centered around Murphy leaving him at the studio while she searched for a last-minute replacement for an interview that had been cancelled. He served as a Freudian psychiatrist as other characters voiced their problems to him. Another episode, a season finale, had to do with Avery’s first-birthday party, and Murphy’s inablity to get back to DC on time. There were plenty of scenes that had Murphy coming home to her townhouse and finding Eldin tending to Avery. She brought Avery with her to the voting booth for the '92 elections. She also brought him, along with Eldin, to the Olympics in Lillehammer. Even when he didn’t appear, he was still acknowledged, as when Frank gave a dinner party and everyone prepared their excuses to leave early: hers was that she had to get home and relieve Eldin, who had some obligation. She was devastated when Avery’s favorite baby food was discontinued. And in the last season, when she had cancer, he became a fully functional character, accepting and dealing with her illness. I don’t know why people keep claiming that “the kid was never seen again until he popped up again in the last season.” Just because it didn’t stop being a show about a news reporter and become a show about a mom? That would have been the real travesty. As it was, they worked the character into the show quite skillfully, TYVM. I can’t help thinking that people who claim otherwise weren’t regular viewers, and as such, aren’t qualified to make that claim. ---
**Author:** ![bienville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@bienville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bienville)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/2 "2004-05-12T07:15:57Z")
> [@Rilchiam](#): > > There were plenty of scenes that had Murphy coming home to her townhouse and finding Eldin tending to Avery. After Eldin’s heroin overdose Murphy found a new babysitter, Chuck Cunningham. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/3 "2004-05-12T07:21:04Z")
> [@bienville](#): > > After Eldin’s heroin overdose Murphy found a new babysitter, Chuck Cunningham. 😛 Nice try. Robert Pastorelli left the show in 1994, four years before the series ended. Eldin’s mom, played by Anne Meara, took over his nanny position. ---
**Author:** ![bienville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@bienville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bienville)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/4 "2004-05-12T07:35:56Z")
> [@Rilchiam](#): > > Nice try. Robert Pastorelli left the show in 1994, four years before the series ended. I didn’t say anything about this Robert Pastorelli person (whoever he is), I was talking about Eldin. Don’t you know the difference between T.V. and real life? I was talking about real life when Eldin and his mom sold Avery for drug money, skipped off to Mexico, rode the dragon for a while until Eldin died and his mom turned to prostitution. When Murphy recovered Avery, she got Chuck Cunningham as the new babysitter. Jeez, maybe you should stop watching so much T.V. and read the paper once in a while. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/5 "2004-05-12T15:10:13Z")
> [@bienville](#): > > I didn’t say anything about this Robert Pastorelli person (whoever he is), I was talking about Eldin. Don’t you know the difference between T.V. and real life? > > I was talking about real life when Eldin and his mom sold Avery for drug money, skipped off to Mexico, rode the dragon for a while until Eldin died and his mom turned to prostitution. > > When Murphy recovered Avery, she got Chuck Cunningham as the new babysitter. > > Jeez, maybe you should stop watching so much T.V. and read the paper once in a while. Dan Quayle? That you? ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/6 "2004-05-12T15:50:17Z")
Did someone really name their son after the crappiest text-editor program in the DOS world? ---
**Author:** ![pepperlandgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pepperlandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pepperlandgirl)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/7 "2004-05-12T16:05:10Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > Did someone really name their son after the crappiest text-editor program in the DOS world? She named her son after her mother, IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![Syntropy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/65b543/32.png) [@Syntropy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Syntropy)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/8 "2004-05-12T16:29:21Z")
It was, indeed, after her mom. I used to say I wanted to be Murphy Brown when I grow up… which is still nowhere in sight… ---
**Author:** ![BlackKnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eb8c5e/32.png) [@BlackKnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackKnight)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/9 "2004-05-12T17:24:39Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > Did someone really name their son after the crappiest text-editor program in the DOS world? I think that was called EDLIN, not ELDIN. It’s been years since I used that program, but I still have nightmares. ---
**Author:** ![Darkhold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@Darkhold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darkhold)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/10 "2004-05-12T17:45:18Z")
Calm down. The simple fact is 99% of the time sitcoms treat a baby as a sight gag not as another character. In fact though even if it was treated as a character people will still think it isn’t on screen enough. Usually however the baby is used pretty rarely (perhaps every other show or less) people assume that after a baby is introduced it should be in every single show for a large portion of the time. This is of course silly and doesn’t work in a sitcom or really any show. Babies don’t do much besides cry, defacate, and cause people to get all teary eyed. Once you run through all that and maybe a couple of babysitter episodes there’s simply no more jokes/scenes. So stick a cradle in the corner or make the kid suddendly be a toddler. Either way people will bitch about the non-existant baby. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/11 "2004-05-12T21:48:19Z")
> [@BlackKnight](#): > > I think that was called EDLIN, not ELDIN. Phew. For a sec, there, I was racking my brain trying to remember a text editor named “Avery”. As for text editors, they were for sissies. Real men used “copy con” and typed every line correctly the first time. ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/12 "2004-05-12T21:55:37Z")
Bah. Even “COPY CON” allowed you to use the backspace key before you pressed Enter at the end of a line. **Real** real men plugged a tape player into the cassette tape port on the back of the original IBM PC, and played a Chuck Mangione cassette while fiddling with the volume control at _just_ the right moments to have the 1’s and 0’s come out the way they want. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/13 "2004-05-12T22:39:01Z")
> [@Darkhold](#): > > Babies don’t do much besides cry, defacate, and cause people to get all teary eyed. Once you run through all that and maybe a couple of babysitter episodes there’s simply no more jokes/scenes. So stick a cradle in the corner or make the kid suddendly be a toddler. Either way people will bitch about the non-existant baby. There’s the standard episode showing the montage of nannies or babysitters being interviewed as you see each undesirable type (the disciplinarian, the drug addict, the ditz, etc.) until the last one, who is as good and sweet as Mary Poppins. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2004, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/14 "2004-05-13T00:09:49Z")
I stick by my opnion that the pregnancy was used as a Plot Point, and the kid pretty much shunted off to one side afterward–and yes, I watched every goddam episode. Till Miles and Corky got married, and I said, “oh, the _hell_ with this cap.” ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2004, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/now-hear-this-murphy-brown-did-not-have-an-invisible-baby/244752/15 "2004-05-13T04:00:40Z")
> [@Darkhold](#): > > Babies don’t do much besides cry, defacate, and cause people to get all teary eyed. Babies don…? Who the _deuce_ do you think [you’re talking about?](http://www.well.com/~phredd/graphics/stewie.jpg)