Caroline in the City
American television sitcom (1995–1999) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
American television sitcom (1995–1999) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Caroline in the City is an American television sitcom that ran on NBC from 1995 until 1999. It stars Lea Thompson as cartoonist Caroline Duffy, who lives in Manhattan. The rest of the cast includes Eric Lutes, Malcolm Gets, Amy Pietz, and Andy Lauer.[1] The series premiered on September 21, 1995, in the "Must See TV" Thursday night block between Seinfeld and ER and ran for 97 episodes over four seasons before it was cancelled; the final episode was broadcast on April 26, 1999. The series' rights are currently held by CBS Media Ventures.
| Caroline in the City | |
|---|---|
.svg) | |
| Genre | Sitcom |
| Created by |
|
| Starring | |
| Theme music composer | Jonathan Wolff |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language | English |
| No. of seasons | 4 |
| No. of episodes | 97 (1 unaired) (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producers |
|
| Producer | Faye Oshima Belyeu |
| Camera setup | Multi-camera |
| Running time | 20–22 minutes |
| Production companies | |
| Original release | |
| Network | NBC |
| Release | September 21, 1995 – April 26, 1999 |
Caroline Duffy (Lea Thompson), a cartoonist who lives in Manhattan, spends a lot of time with dates and lovers, and meddles in the lives of her friends and neighbors. In the pilot episode, she has broken up with Del Cassidy (Eric Lutes), who quickly finds another date. She hires Richard Karinsky (Malcolm Gets) to be her new colorist, and he pretends to be her new boyfriend during a dinner to prevent her from being embarrassed over Del's moving on. During the first season, Richard develops feelings for Caroline.
Caroline's success as a cartoonist is displayed throughout the first season; her cartoon character gets a balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, she has a park dedicated to her in her native Peshtigo, Wisconsin, and she even has an offer for a cereal brand.[2] When she was a child, she drew violent pictures of her brother Chris, and after dropping out of college, she started doodling at a copywriting job. It took less than five years for her cartoon to become nationally syndicated, and she even appeared on The Today Show.
Towards the end of season one, Del proposes to Caroline. Richard is distressed by this, and searches for a new job. Although Richard has kept his feelings secret, their friends Annie Spadaro (Amy Pietz) and Remo (Tom La Grua) figure out that he loves Caroline. The day before the wedding, Richard writes her a love letter where he asks Caroline to meet him at Remo's if she loves him. He leaves the letter in a pile of wedding thank-you cards. Caroline arrives at Remo's but does not mention the letter, and continues with the wedding plans. Richard decides to leave Manhattan. When Caroline and Del call off the wedding, Caroline visits Richard's apartment but he has left.
In the second season, Richard returns to Manhattan after having been in Paris where he had tried to sell paintings. Caroline gives the thank-you cards to a friend; Richard tries to find and destroy the love letter; he tosses it out of the window, only to have Annie find it. He resumes his old job as Caroline's colorist. Later, Caroline discovers that she has feelings for Richard; however, Richard has reunited with his former girlfriend Julia, whom he met in Manhattan. Caroline leaves a message on his answering machine telling him that she loves him, but Julia discovers it and erases it.
Richard and Julia get married which prompts a bitter love triangle among the three. Richard eventually splits with Julia.
Caroline and Richard eventually become a couple. However, they split after arguing over whether to have children; Richard learned that Julia had a child. In the final episode, which ends on an unresolved cliffhanger, Annie and Del are now in a new relationship, while Caroline is about to marry another man—her childhood friend Randy—when Richard shows up at the wedding.
This is a list of the notable guest stars in the series. Some of them appear as their characters from related NBC series that aired around the same time.
| Actor | Character | Episode | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Marvin Hamlisch | Himself | "Caroline and the Bitter Beast" | |
| Matthew Perry | Chandler Bing | "Caroline and the Folks" | Crossover appearance. Annie meets Chandler at the video store.[2] The same night, Thompson appeared as Caroline in the November 2, 1995, Friends episode "The One with the Baby on the Bus". |
| Jonathan Silverman | Jonathan Eliot | "Caroline and the Folks" | Appears briefly as his character from his sitcom The Single Guy. |
| Jean Stapleton | Mary Kosky | "Caroline and the Opera" | Stapleton plays Caroline's aunt in the episode.[2] |
| Jane Leeves | Daphne Moon | "Caroline and the Bad Back" | Frasier cameo crossover appearance at the end of the episode,[5] as Daphne and Niles read a Caroline In The City comic in Frasier's Seattle apartment. |
| David Hyde Pierce | Niles Crane | "Caroline and the Bad Back" | Frasier cameo crossover appearance at the end of the episode.[5] |
| Jimmy Callahan | "Caroline and the Cat Dancer" | Pierce plays an IRS agent who hopes to win a role alongside Annie in Broadway's Cats.[6] Appearances were also made by Frasier actors Dan Butler, Harriet Sansom Harris, and Edward Hibbert, but none of them appeared as their characters from the show. | |
| Sharon Lawrence | Maddie | "Caroline and the Proposal" | |
| John Landis | Himself | "Caroline and the Movie" | |
| Florence Henderson[2] | Herself | "Caroline and the Balloon" | |
| Elizabeth Ashley | Natalie Karinsky | "Caroline and Richard's Mom" "Caroline and the Bad Trip" |
Ashley plays Richard's mother in these episodes. |
| Morey Amsterdam | Vic Stansky | "Caroline and the Watch" | Alumnus from The Dick Van Dyke Show appeared with Stella Dawson as an elderly married couple.[2] Amsterdam died later that year, making the episode his last television appearance. |
| Rose Marie | Stella Dawson | "Caroline and the Watch" "Caroline and the Kept Man" |
Alumna from The Dick Van Dyke Show appeared with Vic Stansky as an elderly married couple.[2] |
| Phil Hartman | Host (uncredited) | "Caroline and the Letter" | In a parody of The Twilight Zone, the host describes the viewers entering the "Caroline Zone" |
| Thomas Gibson | William Stevens | "Caroline and the Nice Jewish Boy" | Gibson plays Caroline's old boyfriend. |
| Julie Andrews | Herself | "Caroline and Victor/Victoria" | Andrews has an audio cameo in this episode.[6] |
| Andrea Bendewald | Leslie | "Caroline and Victor/Victoria" | |
| French Stewart | Stu | "Caroline and the Long Shot" | Stewart plays a reporter who covers Richard in this episode. |
| Debra Jo Rupp | Melody | "Caroline and the Red Sauce" | Rupp plays Richard's boss in this episode. |
| George Segal | Bob Anderson | "Caroline and the Buyer" | |
| Brian George | Mr. Tedescu | "Caroline and the Ombudsman" | George plays Caroline's super in the episode. |
| Shadoe Stevens | Himself | "Caroline and the Wayward Husband" | Stevens inspires Annie to go to Los Angeles to try to become an actress. |
| Judd Hirsch | Ben Karinsky | "Caroline and the Comic" | Hirsch plays Richard's father in the episode.[6] |
| Jay Leno | Himself | "Caroline and the Bad Trip" | |
| J.C. Wendel | Candy | "Caroline and Richard & Julia" | |
| Dan Butler | Kenneth Arabian | "Caroline and the Gay Art Show" "Caroline and the Dearly Departed". | Owner of an art gallery that has dealings with Richard in two episodes. |
| Dan Futterman | Seth | "Caroline and the Cold Sesame Noodles" | Seth is introduced as a new love interest for Annie. Futterman only appears in one episode but the character becomes recurring, being mentioned in a few other episodes and appearing in one more, "Caroline and the Quiz Show", now played by a new actor, David Kriegel. |
| Scott Atkinson | Brett | "Caroline and the Getaway" | |
| Shia LaBeouf | Ethan | "Caroline and the Bar Mitzvah" | First TV appearance; LaBeouf was then aged 12.[7][8] |
The show was filmed at the CBS Studio Center in Los Angeles, California.[9]
Bonnie Timmons drew the illustrations and animations that are supposed to represent Caroline's eponymous in-show comic strip.[10][11]
Though not officially a companion show to Frasier, Caroline in the City exists in the same universe (so likely also connects to both Cheers and Wings as well) with several crossovers and connections. Not only does the end of one early Season 1 episode feature Frasier characters, Daphne and Niles, in Frasier's apartment (filmed on Frasier's set and guest-starring Jane Leeves and David Hyde Pierce as their characters) looking at a Caroline in the City cartoon,[12] but lead Eric Lutes played Frasier's boss Tom Duran in two episodes.[13][14] David Hyde Pierce also appears a second time as another character, this time playing an IRS man who dreams of being in Cats. [15] Dan Butler (Bulldog in Frasier) had a recurring role as a museum owner,[16] plus Frasier actors Harriet Sansom Harris (Bebe) and Edward Hibbert (Gil) appear in the same Season 3 episode as each other, playing different characters (and not sharing any scenes). Additionally, Scott Atkinson (who portrayed Daphne's ex-boyfriend, Clive, in a Frasier episode) also appears playing Caroline's love interest in one episode.[17]
Matthew Perry appears as his Friends character Chandler Bing (not named but implied to be him and advertised by the network as such in their crossover promotions) in the episode "Caroline and the Folks" in a crossover appearance in which Annie meets Chandler at the video store. The same night, Lea Thompson appeared as Caroline Duffy (also never named as such but implied to be - and advertised as - her character) in the November 2, 1995, Friends episode "The One with the Baby on the Bus".[12][18][19]
In the same episode - "Caroline and the Folks" - which featured Chandler from Friends, Jonathan Silverman also appeared, playing his character Jonathan Eliot (again not named but advertised as such) from the sitcom The Single Guy.[18][20]
| Season | Time Slot | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 1 (1995–96) | Thursdays, 9:30 PM | Part of the "Must See TV" lineup. |
| 2 (1996–97) | Tuesdays, 9:30 PM | |
| 3 (1997–98) | Mondays, 9:00 PM | Part of the "Must She TV" lineup which included Suddenly Susan, Fired Up, and The Naked Truth.[21] |
| 4 (1998–99) | Mondays, 8:30 PM |
| Season | Season premiere | Season finale | TV season | Season rank |
Households (in millions) |
Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | September 21, 1995 | May 16, 1996 | 1995–96 | 4[22] | 17.26[22] | — |
| 2 | September 17, 1996 | May 13, 1997 | 1996–97 | 25[23] | 10.67[23] | — |
| 3 | September 22, 1997 | May 18, 1998 | 1997–98 | 47[24] | 8.4[24] | — |
| 4 | September 21, 1998 | April 26, 1999 | 1998–99 | 91[25] | 8.8[25] | — |
CBS DVD (distributed by Paramount) released the first two seasons on DVD in Region 1 in 2008/2009.[26][27] A decade later, the remaining two seasons were both released (though lacking episodes) in Region 1 on August 6, 2019.
In Region 2, Revelation Films released all four seasons on DVD between August 2005 and June 2006.
In Region 4, Visual Entertainment has released the first two seasons on DVD in Australia.[28][29]
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.
Every time you click a link to Wikipedia, Wiktionary or Wikiquote in your browser's search results, it will show the modern Wikiwand interface.
Wikiwand extension is a five stars, simple, with minimum permission required to keep your browsing private, safe and transparent.
