The Ropers

By Happi-Puppi

The Ropers if you haven't already guessed, was the Three's Company spin-off that ran for just over a season. Helen and Stanley Roper were the landlords in the latter show.

The Ropers sell the apartment complex (which never seemed to have a name) to Mr. Furley's brother and move to a somewhat more upscale part of Santa Monica. The Ropers now have their own landlord (played by Larry Sanders Show's Jeffery Tambor). Jeffery is an uptight snob that loathes the idea of The Ropers moving in, especially after seeing them drive up in Stanley's old air polluting clunker!

Helen and Stanley have Jeffrey's free thinking wife on their side, as well as their son who takes a liking to them, and she stops him from making the Roper's think that their Townhouse has been sold to another buyer. So begins a very short series.

The rest of the series consisted largely of plots revolving around innuendo's, misunderstandings, slapstick situations and Stanley's constant wise-cracks about Jeffrey's bald head!

Most notably in one scene where he and Jeffrey try to put on a puppet show for Jeffrey's son and Stanley & he start exchanging insults through the puppets! The critic's actually found this to be worse than "Three's Company" and despite renewal, it was cut short due to low ratings.

Fell and Lindley, some feel, were "conned" into getting their own show, Lindley loved the idea and Fell wasn't so sure. He made a deal with ABC that if the show didn't go past one season, The Ropers could return to the old show. ABC executives apparently said to him when he tried to come back, "Well we're sorry but you went a season & 1/2!" Don Knotts had pretty much taken over his part on Three's Company by then.

Norman Fell "Stanley" passed away in 1997. Audra Lindley "Helen" passed away in 1998. John Ritter "Jack"(2 episode guest spots) died suddenly on September 11th, 2003.

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