Everybody Loves Finale

Everybody Loves Raymond was one of those shows which drew me in about halfway through its run. My mom loved it from the beginning, but her tastes are not my own. It was one of those Monday night shows on CBS for the over-60 crowd, or at least that was my perception. As with most successful sitcoms, it became syndicated and I started catching episodes. As an Italian-American, many of the relationships resonated strongly with me, though the shows appeal went beyond their nationality. EVERY family is nuts. EVERYBODY has relatives like that, or has gotten in to arguments like they did, and it was both real and hilarious. Not surprisingly, the writers revealed in a one hour special last night that many of their ideas came from things that actually happened to them. Fights with spouses. Dealing with parents. Taping over one's wedding video. Whereas Ray inadvertently taped football over his video, writer Aaron Shure taped an episode of the SHOW over his, while doing research to apply for the job as a writer. Series creator Phil Rosenthal quipped that they HAD to give him the job after that.

After nine seasons, the show aired its final episode last night. Read no further if you haven't seen it and don't want to be utterly spoiled. I'm not going to bother citing specific examples of other finales, but none would have been appropriate for this show. Many sitcoms end with life changing events after which the show can't possibly go on. Someone dies, or moves, or takes a job offer, or wakes up to find it was all a dream. In the last decade or so, finales have been an hour and sometimes ninety minutes. Sometimes a show may transplant the cast away from familiar surroundings, to some exotic locale. This show did that at the start of its fifth season, a two-part trip to Italy that I first saw in syndication while lying in a hospital bed recovering from major abdominal surgery. It was a memorable episode, with beautiful countryside and music. That night was the last night before I would be allowed home after an 11 day ordeal, and I'll never forget it, especially when the phone rang and a doctor I'd never heard of told me more tests were needed based on some results and I'd have to be taken to the fourth floor. The caller sounded nothing like my own real-life Rey, but the fact that I was on the third floor, the TOP floor, made me suspicious seconds before he lost it completely and broke out in laughter. Between a good sitcom and a funny call from a good friend, I found myself laughing for the first time in over two weeks.

How do you end a show about family and real life? In this season's premiere, Ray's parents finally move out of their house across the street from him where they had lived for the duration of the series. I agreed with a friend of mine that they'd potentially squandered a good ending to the show, especially when the following week had the parents returning after being too obnoxious to the retirement community to which they had moved.

The situation around which the comedy revolved was intact. How could they end it? They already had a a wedding for Ray's long-divorced brother, so that option was out. Early in the finale, while Ray is in the hospital having his adenoids removed, his family receives heartstopping news. His wife breaks down to hear that they're having trouble bringing him out of anesthesia and as his brother, with whom he's always squabbled, is the first to step up and ask if he can give blood or do anything to save him, I didn't know WHERE it was going. The show has always been able to throw a sudden serious moment in at anytime, and this was one of them. What if he died? If the show revolved around this man and his relationship with his parents, his wife, his brother and his children, then there would be no need for a show anymore. It would be a conclusive, albeit depressing ending but May is known for shows pulling such stunts.

Of course, thirty seconds later the doctor comes out to tell everyone the crisis has passed and he's awake. The family is relieved, but his wife quickly realizes that he shouldn't find out. His father adds that his mother, who had stepped away to visit the bathroom during the incident, should also be kept in the dark. After the commercial break, Ray is home and happily eating ice cream in bed, but his wife no longer seems to mind the mess he's making. Across the street, his father is contemplative rather than gruff, and so appreciative of his wife that she becomes suspicious, and he confesses the truth. This sends a hysterical mother running across the street to her “baby boy” where she leaps in to his bed as he's about to be amorous with his wife. As Ray wonders why he's in such a nightmare, the truth comes out and he reacts with his trademark hypochondria, wondering if he has brain damage and asking anyone if they think he's “walking funny”. As his brother and his wife appear to find out what the commotion is, a typical family shouting match is broken by Ray's father, who silences everyone by telling them how distraught his wife was, and how he never wants to see her like that again. Families may bicker and squabble and get on each other's nerves, but at the heart of it all, they love each other.

The show concludes the following morning with the entire family gathering in the kitchen for breakfast and Ray commenting that they “need a bigger table”. The camera pulls back as everyone is talking and the screen fades to black as life goes on in the Barone household, even if we're no longer watching them. For nine years the show's credits have concluded with a “Where's Lunch? Productions” logo and a different plate of food. My mom is obsessed with that logo. When she's watching the reruns at 7:30, no one is allowed to change the channel at 8 until she sees what dish is being “served”. Last night, there was no dish, only a plastic platter with the check which simply read: “No charge, thank you.” And so, there's one less good show on television, but I suspect it will live on in reruns for some time to come.