The Stars On TV: The Doris Day Show

When I started doing this stars on TV series I thought it would show that movie stars don’t make the transition very well. However, I have seen in my research and writings that there are just as many successes as there are failures.
It was just a coincidence that Henry Fonda followed his good friend James Stewart in this series. It is also a coincidence that Doris Day follows her friend Rock Hudson in today’s posting.
Many people credit Mary Tyler Moore to show what life is like for the single professional woman. It is true that her show was the most popular of that type of show. However, she was really beat to the punch by Marlo Thomas on That Girl in 1966 and Doris Day in The Doris Day Show in 1968. Now Miss Moore and Miss Thomas played never married career women. Miss. Day played Doris Martin a widow with two young sons. In the first season of the series she had to move back to the farm from the city where she had been raising her sons. Her Dad, played by Denver Pyle, and his farm hand Leroy, played by James Hampton, tried to help her to adjust to life back on the farm. In the second season Doris decided to commute back to the city as she took a job working as a secretary at a magazine publisher. Rose Marie, MacLean Stevenson and Paul Smith joined the cast as her friends and co-workers.
Why make changes to bring people from the city onto the show? Since CBS was the network that broadcast the series that might be the reason. CBS at that time was trying to get rid of all series with a rural setting. While most of their popular shows were based in the country those shows didn’t attract advertisers. Most of the people who lived in the country didn’t have the big money to spend that advertisers were looking for. Perhaps the producers of the series saw this coming and tried to get their viewers use to the stories taking place in the city.
Another change took place in the fourth season. The Mary Tyler Moore Show was a huge hit and changes were made to make it look more like that series. Miss. Marie, Mr. Stevenson and Mr. Smith were gone. John Dehner and Jackie Joseph were brought in to replace them. Doris Martin still worked for the magazine but was now a writer. However, her sons had magically disappeared. If her name had not been in the title Miss Day might be gone as well.
The series can be considered a hit since it lasted from September 24, 1968 to September 10, 1973. However, so many changes occurred that in the end it didn’t remotely look like the series that it started out to be. Like most shows the first season was the best. In trying to look like another show the series lost the appeal that it had to begin with. Even the popular Doris Day could not save the series.
I have read that Miss. Day really didn’t want to do the series to begin with. Her husband was her manager and he tried to convince his wife that she should do a TV series. Miss Day said she wanted to continue to do movies. He still tired to get her to do a series telling her that the movies she wanted to do were on the way out and TV was the best way for her to continue acting. She still said no. Not too long after this her husband passed away. While gathering his things together Miss. Day came across some paperwork that showed he had committed her to a sit-com called The Doris Day Show and had not been able to tell her before his death. Since the series was set to shoot in a few days it was too late to back out. She also needed the work to keep her mind off her husband’s death. Ironically, just as she played a widow on her show, she had just become one in real life.

It seems odd to me that the older covers of TV Guide seemed to just jump out and capture your attention like this one did to me. The new TV Guide covers don't do that to me today. Oh well it is just an observation.