My Three Sons

[BD Sullivan]

Many of MTS episodes were directed by Fred De Cordova who only left the show to produce Carson when Johnny moved to Burbank.

Fred went seemlessly from MTS to Carson since Johnny officially announced the move to Burbank in February 1972, during the final month or so of MTS's last year.

 

[chris12]

It seems that once Mike left after the first CBS color episode it seems he was seldom ever mentioned and seemed odd that he wasn't there or his absence explained for other family events they had like weddings and births.

 

[joeybabe25]

Was Tim Considine (Mike) fired, or did he leave of his own accord? It would have been interesting to have seen him as part of the family during the color years.

But then what about Ernie?

Joe

 

[Cincinnati Kid]

I have read that Tim Considine was more interested in doing other things than acting. One of these was said to be working behind the cameras. I wonder if there had been any thought of having him and Meredith MacRae (Sally) become parents on the series the way it was done a couple of years later for Don Grady (Robbie) and Tina Cole (Katie)?

 

[bpatrick]

Tim Considine left by choice, feeling he'd outgrown the role,
although it is to wonder (as Bugs Bunny might say) why he
didn't come back from time to time (as, for example, Vivian
Vance made an annual appearance with Lucy after 1965).

Ernie was an orphan friend of Chip (they are, of course,
brothers in real life) and to re-establish the "three sons"
Steve decided to adopt him.

The idea of Robbie and Katie having triplets (all male) was
a hedge against Fred MacMurray's leaving the show, which
never happened. I'm afraid that had the show gone in that
direction it would not have made it, with shows like "All In
The Family" coming in, and Don Fedderson was not exactly
Norman Lear.

 

[BD Sullivan]

The addition of a widow with a child as new family members in the 10th season was an admission that the show had pretty much run out of storylines, not to mention the fact that all three sons had stopped growing up.

The status of Steve's new wife brings up another thought about how divorced people were still stigmatized on TV shows during this era: I saw an item that stated that during the 1969-70 season, there were 12 shows with either a widow or widower raising children. During that same year, the pilot for "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" was produced. The original plan was to somewhat groundbreaking in that MTM would play a divorcee, but that was scratched since CBS execs said that people would think she divorced Rob Petrie!

 

[joeybabe25]

Back in those days having a baby or getting married was a 26 week insurance plan. Maybe 13 weeks:>)

Joe