Ironically, just about every other cast member from "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" managed to land on at least one other hit series EXCEPT Mary herself.
There was Valerie Harper, of course, with "Rhoda." ("Valerie" would've been a hit, too, had she and her husband not fallen out with Team Miller/Boyett).
And there was Betty White with "The Golden Girls" and "Hot in Cleveland." (I don't count "Mama's Family," since NBC cancelled it after two seasons and she never became a regular on the syndicated version. And speaking of GG and "Mama," isn't it ironic that Bea Arthur and Rue McClanahan's two defining roles on TV were on the same two series? I'm talking, of course, about "Maude" and GG. Anyways.)
But there also was Ed Asner ("Lou Grant"), Cloris Leachman ("The Facts of Life" - to a certain extent), Georgia Engel (recurring gigs on "Coach," "Everybody Loves Raymond" and "Cleveland"), Gavin McLeod ("The Love Boat"), Ted Knight ("Too Close for Comfort") and even John Amos ("Good Times").
Mary, however, was just too strongly identified with Mary Richards and Laura Petrie to really break out on another show. (Totally off-subject, but why no one ever thought to reunite Mary and other "Dick Van Dyke Show" cast members on an episode of DVD's later series, "Diagnosis: Murder," is beyond me).
Conversely, it seems like Bob Newhart was the only cast member from "The Bob Newhart Show" to land another, long-running gig (on "Newhart"). Well, Marcia Wallace, too, if you count her work on "The Simpsons," lol.
Two other actors who kept plugging away until they landed another hit series: Tom Selleck ("Blue Bloods," which finally went off the air - and risked giving every 80-year-old who watched the show a coronary in the process) and Julia Louis-Dreyfus (first, "The New Adventures of Old Christine;" then, "Veep"), who might not have broken the so-called "Seinfeld curse," but who's definitely been the most successful since that show ended.
Finally, out of all the actors who appeared regularly on "Cheers" throughout its' 11-year run, it seems like Ted Danson has been the only one to land other, successful TV gigs that didn't involve reviving his "Cheers" regular (the total opposite of Kelsey Grammer, who struggled even with the recent "Frasier" revival). Which is a miracle, because his first post-"Cheers" show, "Ink," did not look promising at all, lol. But he eventually landed "Becker," followed by his run on "C.S.I.," then "The Good Place," and now, "A Man on the Inside."
By
Khan ·
Edited by dragonflies