ONE SIGN THAT THE CAST AND CREW ARE READY TO LAUGH AGAIN WOULD BE THE RETURN OF THE LAUGHTRACK.
WHERE do we go from here?
That’s the question confronting the producers of “8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter” as Tuesday night’s special one-hour episode dealing with the death of dad Paul (played by the late John Ritter) racked up the show’s highest-ever ratings.
The episode, airing from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. on ABC, drew 20.5 million viewers, shattering the show’s previous record, according to Nielsen figures released yesterday.
The show was the first episode of “8 Simple Rules” to be filmed without Ritter, who died Sept. 11 at age 54.
The previous record for the series was for the last episode in which Ritter appeared. That show drew 17.7 million viewers Oct. 7.
Tuesday night’s episode began with Paul’s wife, Cate (Katey Sagal), receiving a phone call from a grocery store where Paul had gone to buy a container of milk. She was informed that Paul had collapsed and died.
The rest of the episode showed the Hennessy family reminiscing about Paul and mourning his death.
Family members Cate, daughters Bridget (Kaley Cuoco) and Kerry (Amy Davidson), and son Rory (Martin Spanjers) were joined by Cate’s parents, guest stars Suzanne Pleshette and James Garner.
Friends and neighbors also showed up, including Paul’s addle-brained editor (Patrick Warburton) at the newspaper where Paul was a columnist, caustic sports editor Tommy (Larry Miller) and annoying next-door neighbor Fred Doyle (John Ratzenberger).
The show was taped without a studio audience. A laughtrack was employed in the episode’s first moments, but after Cate got the bad news, the laughtrack was silenced for the rest of the hour, even though some of the one-liners written for the characters were clearly designed for the insertion of laughs.
Just when the show will begin to make its transition back to all-out comedy remains unclear for the foreseeable future as the next two episodes will continue to have the Hennessy family coping with the aftermath of Paul’s death.
Next Tuesday, the kids go back to school for the first time since their dad died. A week later, on Nov. 18, his death continues to affect their lives as mom Cate persuades Rory to try out for the basketball team because “Paul would have been proud,” says a plot description provided by ABC.
In addition, an agreement between the two Hennessy daughter to honor their dad’s memory by ceasing their constant bickering comes apart when older sister Bridget accidentally ruins a collage Kerry made as a tribute to him.
One sign that the cast and crew are ready to laugh again would be the return of the laughtrack. Whether the laughs would be restored either next week or the week after remained an open question yesterday, according to ABC – indicating that the show is still struggling to redefine itself following the loss of its beloved star.