Two of my favourite American TV sitcoms of the 1970s that were screened here in the UK were CBS's Rhoda (a highly successful Mary Tyler Moore Show spin-off and starring Valerie Harper in the title role), which was often repeated here after its original run, and NBC's Chico and the Man, which wasn't. In fact, I never remember seeing Chico and the Man on TV here again after its initial four-season run during the mid-to-late 1970s.
This may be due to the tragic fact that its bright, up-and-coming, and extremely likeable young star Freddie Prinze, who played Chico (with Jack Albertson as the Man), committed suicide at the age of only 22, after launching his TV career in brilliant style and to immense acclaim just 3 years earlier at the tender age of 19 via a superb stand-up debut performance on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show (click here to watch it on YouTube).
Created and co-directed by James Komack, and launched in September 1974, Chico and the Man focuses upon a youthful and perpetually buoyant but highly-skilled Latino car mechanic, Chico Rodriguez, who doggedly persuades an old, intensely grouchy, crabby garage owner in downtown East Los Angeles named Ed Brown (the Man) to employ him and allow him to spruce up Ed's ramshackle garage, in which, like life itself, Ed has lost all interest since the passing of his beloved wife Margaret.
Their diametrically opposite characteristics and very frequent
altercations provide much humour, as does the effervescence of Scatman Crothers
playing regular supporting character Louie the garbage collector, plus Della Reese
as Ed's neighbour and landlady Della Rogers who debuts in the third season. The
show also sports a very catchy, upbeat theme song written and performed by José
Feliciano (click here to listen to the full-length version
on YouTube).
However, Freddie's untimely death on 29 January 1977, having shot himself just a few hours previously after filming the 18th of Season 3's 21 episodes, meant that suddenly one of this show's two title characters was gone.
Rather than attempt to replace Freddie by casting another actor as Chico, it was written into the storyline of the 19th episode in Season 3 that Chico had gone off on a visit to Mexico. A fourth season, still with the same title despite no longer having Chico in it, was launched in September 1977, five months after the end of the third season in April of that year. It introduced a swathe of new characters to fill the huge chasm created by Freddie's passing (in one episode, Ed discloses that Chico has died, yet does not divulge any details), but without his ready charm it failed to interact with the audience. So in July 1978, at the end of that same season, the show was cancelled.
Apart from a single very expensive and hard to find Chico and the Man DVD released a while ago by Warner Bros that contains just a random handful of the 88 episodes in total that were screened on TV, this fine show, which is a wonderful showcase for Freddie's colossal talent for comedy, both sitcom and stand-up, has never been made available in home viewing format. Happily, just over 20 episodes are currently available to watch on YouTube, but I've long wanted to own and watch the full three seasons starring Freddie (the fourth is of little interest to me as without him it is virtually a completely different show).
Imagine my delight, therefore, when on 8 April 2023 I discovered not only that all 88 episodes are available to watch for free online at Archive.org but also that they can all be legally downloaded for personal viewing. So after more than 40 years I could finally rewatch Chico and the Man, which is precisely what I've been doing ever since, viewing at least one episode of those first three seasons whenever I've had a free evening to do so.
Naturally, I've been watching them in chronological order, beginning with the very first, pilot one, which sets up the entire scenario of the show, when Chico arrives at Ed's garage in search of employment, and it was just as engaging as I remembered it from four decades ago, making me very grateful that I can now finally revisit this superb show, and whenever I want to, after waiting to do so for such a very long time.
There is no doubt in my mind that had he lived, Freddie would have become one of the greatest entertainers of all time. But just as we do with James Dean and his trio of iconic movies (click here for my biographical review of Jimmy's all-too-brief but stellar on-screen career), thankfully we do still have various taped performances of Freddie's stand-up genius (including his Tonight Show appearances) readily available to view on YouTube and elsewhere. Moreover, I'm truly happy to have discovered and to report here that we can now also watch his peerless TV sitcom show Chico and the Man in its entirety at Archive.org (beginning with: https://archive.org/details/chico-the-man/Chico+%26+Man+S1E01+(Pilot).mp4).
But come on, NBC, isn't it high time that you made Freddie's one and only starring role in a TV series fully available commercially on DVD and/or Blu-Ray? You know it makes sense, and it would be a fitting, lasting tribute to a uniquely talented star whose incandescence illuminated our world for far too short a period.
Finally: to view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film/TV reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.
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