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Best of "McHale's Navy"

J

johnbasalla

Since we have a thread tributing Andy Griffith with a question about your favorite episode of "The Andy Griffith Show", it only seems right to do the same for Ernest Borgnine. However, it dawned on me that "McHales Navy" may not be the type of show that garners favorite episodes like Griffith's show. Nevertheless...

My favorite episode of "McHale's Navy" is the one where they are in a courtroom and there's an alligator or crocodile involved that escapes and trys to bite cast members a few times. It's out-of-control, wild slapstick that is reminiscent of the best of wild slapstick done in two-reel comedies of the teens, 1920s through the 1940s and even a bit through the 1950s. In fact, I would say further that "McHale's Navy" was the very last, totally successful purveyor's of the style of original filmed slapstick comedy as done during the "golden era's".
 
We have Antenna TV in Miami, where "McHale" is on daily....I was never really into that show as a kid; only now am i checking it out, when nothing else is on....

I just saw that alligator episode.....I thought it was too silly, only because (1) everybody & their mother knew how fake that gator was, with only the hind legs touching the ground; (2) the gator never swallowed the wallet ("exhibit A"), unlikely behavior for a gator (maybe it was an alligator-skin wallet?)

I suppose that episode was well-written, aside from the slapstick....

cd
 
My favorite episode is the one where Capt. Binghamton (old Leadbottom)had Ensign Parker come up with public relations scheme to get him promoted. They came up with "Jolly Wally Binghamton - the man that laughs in the face of danger." Very funny episode.
 
Note that in both "The Andy Griffith Show" and "McHale's Navy", the lead actors, Griffith and Borgnine, played the straight man to everyone else's comic, yet they were the important glue that held the shows together. However, there was the full-length movie "McHale's Navy in The Air Force" (or some title like that) that didn't have Borgnine, and the other actors and characters in "The Andy Griffith Show" were strong enough to allow the show to continue as "Mayberry R.F.D." without Andy.
 
I watched McHale's Navy for many years in reruns. But I don't think I could come up with the plot
of a single episode if you put a gun to my head.

Which is strange because I can recite the plot lines of many other episodes of classic shows in detail.
 
I watched McHale's Navy for many years in reruns. But I don't think I could come up with the plot of a single episode if you put a gun to my head.
Click to expand...

I've been thinking the exact same thing! I know there was an episode where the PT73 crew did a fake radio broadcast announcing the war was over, which consisted mainly of Parker imitating some old radio newscasters and FDR. There were also some where the crew had to deal with some sort of native chieftain, but I'm at a loss, too. Maybe it's because the show has been out of rerun circulation for so long, as has just about every military sictom except "M*A*S*H".
 
The problem experienced by the past two posters may be caused by so many episodes being just another version of the same plot that they all run together in ones mind. In other words, no one can say with a straight face, that his/her favorite episode is the one where Capt. Bighamton tries to catch and bust McHale and his "band of pirates" (as Binghampton would say) because that's what most of them were about... one way or another.
 
I watched "McHale's Navy" reruns when I was a kid....the plots I seem to remember tend on hindsight to be pretty damned stupid. In one episode, Parker (Tim Conway) had to pretend to be the son of Paul Gauguin ... He had to paint a portrait of Binghamton, who was somehow fooled by Parker's disguise; all he managed to paint was the letter G ("Do you know how hard it is to make a G?").
It seems that in every other episode, McHale's crew was doing things to Leadbottom in his sleep... they put a speaker under his pillow and played a record (an LP ... and LPs didn't come out till after the war) of "Japanese sleep-teaching" so when he woke he spoke in random bursts of Japanese; another episode had them putting old age makeup on Binghamton in some sort of Rip van Winkle scheme.
 
Corky Marlowe said:
(McHale's Navy)...maybe it's because the show has been out of rerun circulation for so long,
as has just about every military sitcom except "M*A*S*H".
Click to expand...

Gomer's Pyle was on in the early morning on Me-TV, but I think it's now on hiatus.

Do the 35mm originals of Ensign O'Toole (NBC, '62-'63, Sun 7/6) still exist? There's
only 32 episodes, but it would be nice to see them again. Though I don't want to
put up with crummy 16mm prints. Paging Four Star, or its successor.
 
Or even the TV version of "Mister Roberts" with Roger Smith....

I recall Marion Hargrove was trying to get a TV series launched based on his WW2 memoir "See Here, Private Hargrove," and had a pilot made. And there was a short-lived "No Time for Sergeants" series, but Andy Griffith wasn't in it.
 
True that most plots are more or less variations on the same theme. My favorite episodes are the ones that center on Ensign Parker getting shanghaied into some scheme, particularly if some impersonation is involved. Tim Conway is always a delight to watch, even in the midst of a script with plot holes the size of Texas. There's a very improvisational feel to a lot of his schtick, and I strongly suspect there were often generic script directions of the "Tim does 2 minutes here" variety.
 
I believe (I am not looking now) that Wikipedia has mentioned claims that "McHale" was basically "Bilko in the Navy." As one who has not watched many Sgt. Bilko episodes, from what I *have* seen, there certainly are similarities in the set-up. The only difference is that McHale seems to be an unwilling accomplice, whereas Bilko was the driving force behind any schemes.

Also it mentioned Edward Montagne working on both series, lending possible credence to that.

Comments?

cd
 
The old Don Rickles CPO Sharkey series stole several episodes almost verbatim from Gomer Pyle.
I am guessing the rest were old McHale's Navy scripts.
 
johnbasalla said:
The problem experienced by the past two posters may be caused by so many episodes being just another version of the same plot that they all run together in ones mind. In other words, no one can say with a straight face, that his/her favorite episode is the one where Capt. Bighamton tries to catch and bust McHale and his "band of pirates" (as Binghampton would say) because that's what most of them were about... one way or another.
Click to expand...

This reminds me of when I read somewhere (maybe the old Jump the Shark site) where people listed their favorite episode of "America's Funniest Home Videos," and one wrote, "I liked the one where someone gets hit in the groin".....name me one episode of AFV where that didn't happen!

As to the McHale/Binghamton relationship: What I don't get is, if Wally outranks McHale, why didn't he just decide to ship them all out elsewhere? (In fact I saw an episode where he tried to do just that.) [I know the answer to that question: "If he did, we wouldn't have a show!" :) ]

cd
 
cd637299 said:
johnbasalla said:
The problem experienced by the past two posters may be caused by so many episodes being just another version of the same plot that they all run together in ones mind. In other words, no one can say with a straight face, that his/her favorite episode is the one where Capt. Bighamton tries to catch and bust McHale and his "band of pirates" (as Binghampton would say) because that's what most of them were about... one way or another.
Click to expand...

This reminds me of when I read somewhere (maybe the old Jump the Shark site) where people listed their favorite episode of "America's Funniest Home Videos," and one wrote, "I liked the one where someone gets hit in the groin".....name me one episode of AFV where that didn't happen!
Click to expand...

And let's not forget this famous exchange from Pinky and the Brain:

P: Ohh Brain - I know... while we're waiting, we can sing the "Gilligan's Island" theme song.
B: Please Pinky... besides, I've only seen one episode of that insipid show.
P: Oh, which one was it? I know them all.
B: It was the one where that innocuous dunderhead Gilligan ruined it for everyone.
P: Hmmm... don't think I've seen that one.
 
Sometimes Commander McHale was an unwilling accomplice, forced to join in to save his crew. Other times he was the mastermind that came up with the idea in the first place. Through it all, he was kind of like a father who is more of a "buddy" to his kids then a father who was really in charge.
 
rnigma said:
Or even the TV version of "Mister Roberts" with Roger Smith....
Click to expand...

I saw that series in reruns in the mid-seventies -- a bit surprising, considering that it only ran for a season in 1965-66. I vaguely recall that the series occasionallly did delve into black comedy, which is surprising for the era. But I wonder how accurate that memory is after not having seen the show in probably 35 years?
 
Was McHale's Navy one of the last network shows filmed in black and white? It looks as though all episodes where filmed in black and white, and the last episode airred August 31, 1966.
 
KyDXIn said:
Was McHale's Navy one of the last network shows filmed in black and white? It looks as though all episodes where filmed in black and white, and the last episode airred August 31, 1966.
Click to expand...

Certainly one of the last....this would be for another thread, but were there any B&W series for the 1966-67 season? I just cannot think of one right now.

Around 1990ish, "McHale's Navy" was colorized, but I don't know how many stations carried it OR how many episodes were colorized. It sure did not last long, that way.

BTW re the Pinky/Brain thing above....I am sure we could all think of "every-episode-is-the-same" series; OMWV (our mileage would vary). :)

cd
 
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