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Green Acres [8.6]

Green Acres Plot Summary

Successful New York lawyer Oliver Wendell Douglas gives up the rat race to fulfil his dream: living the life of the American farmer. Fighting the move to rural life is his glamorous, boa-wearing, city-loving wife, Lisa. This quaint premise, however, doesn't begin to capture the screwball absurdity of Green Acres. After a few episodes that were somewhat rooted in reality, the series' true oddness started to bloom. The characters see the opening credits as they appear on screen (or on chicken eggs); they talk with baseball-playing pigs who become movie stars; fife music accompanies Oliver's patriotic speeches and is heard by everyone but him; a full-sized Eiffel tower is built on the Douglases' lawn. Hooterville is clearly operating in its own bizarre universe where Oliver is the only normal, reasonable person--and that's questionable at times.

The tiny town revolves around Sam Drucker's General Store, where Sam acts as shopkeeper, postmaster, justice of the peace and publisher of the "Hooterville World Guardian". He's one of the more level-headed residents of the valley, but that's relative.

The other locals are considerable more bizarre and are a constant frustration to Oliver. Hank Kimball, the county agricultural agent, is a prime example. His short-term memory is so poor he regularly forgets what he's talking about mid-sentence. Fellow farmer Fred Ziffel is an elderly overalls-wearing man who, with his wife Doris, treats their pig Arnold like an actual child. Arnold attends school, reads, writes, skates, and speaks several languages (though they all sound like oinking). Con man Eustace Haney, who sold Oliver his dump of a farm, is always trying to fleece someone out of their cash. Apparently possessing ESP, he shows up outside of Oliver's door with whatever he and Lisa have just been discussing. The Douglases' farmhand, Eb, lives in their barn and considers Oliver and Lisa to be his parents. Lisa, a stylish Hungarian woman who Oliver met during the war, is hardly cut out for domestic life. Wearing ostrich feathers and diamonds around the farm, she can only cook "hotscakes" (badly) and her mangling of the English language is impressive.

Matt Groening once accurately described Green Acres as "Oliver Douglas in hell". All he wants to do farm, but the constant interruptions from the looney locals, the endless double-talk, the ambitious pig all conspire to make it impossible. Oliver earns his reputation as a "hothead" as his face turns red and he bellows about the latest aggravation. Green Acres began when CBS handed Paul Henning, the very successful producer of The Beverly Hillbillies and Petticoat Junction, a half-hour to do any show he wanted; they didn't even ask for a pilot. With his plate already full, Henning turned over the reins to colleague Jay Sommers who went about reworking a short-lived radio show he'd created (Granby's Green Acres)in 1950.

The series ended not because of bad ratings, but because of CBS' purge of all programs with a rural settings or appeal. Series regular Pat Buttram is credited with a great joke about their demise: CBS canceled every show with a tree.



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