The late seventies sitcom Soap is a perfect parody of soap operas, produced in the golden age of TV soaps. I re-enjoyed this hilarious, star-filled series more now as an adult than when it originally aired in 1977.
The award-winning, ground-breaking comedy ran on ABC from 1977-1981. It still makes me laugh so hard that my sides literally ache. The theme music alone takes me back. Sending up the ultra-popular daily soap opera, this serial tells the ridiculous stories of the Tate and Campbell families. It covers all the hot-button social topics of that era, and today, we see raucous send ups of sexuality, fidelity, incest, inter-racial dating and good old sibling rivalry. I’m sure a good portion of this show was improvised, but the writers were fearless.
The Tates, Jessica and Chester, are played by Katherine Helmond and Robert Mandan, and are tremendously, over-the-top genre perfect. A young Billy Crystal appears as Jody Dallas, the son of Cathryn Damon’s Mary Campbell from a previous marriage. Crystal plays a fantastic, openly gay single father raising his child after the mother ran off to join the rodeo. The wonderful Robert Guillaume portrays Benson, the Tate’s family butler, and is later spun off into his own well loved series! There are so many fantastic actors in this sitcom, you will constantly be seeing familiar faces.
I found a few spotty episodes via YouTube, the DVDs are far nicer quality. Soap is certainly worth watching, or watching again.
Soap – The Complete Series (Season 1, 2, 3, 4) via Amazon