Chico and the Man: Season 04 (1977)

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Many viewers were astonished (and some were offended!) when the NBC sitcom Chico and the Man returned in the fall of 1977 for its fourth season. After all, how could the show include the name "Chico" in the title when everybody knew that the young comedian who'd played garage mechanic Chico Rodriguez, Freddie Prinze, had killed himself earlier in the year? But both NBC and producer James Komack were grimly determined that the show would go on--even if it meant shoehorning a new and entirely different "Chico" into the proceedings. Filmed at the tail end of the third season but aired as the opening installment of Season Four, the episode "Who's Been Sleeping in My Car" introduces 12-year-old Gabriel Melgar as 11-year-old Mexican orphan Raul Garcia, who stows away in the car of LA garage owner Ed Brown (Jack Albertson) while Ed and his friend Louie (Scatman Crothers) are on a fishing trip in Mexico. Feeling lonely after the death of his former mechanic Chico Rodriguez, the crotchety-but-softhearted Ed decides to adopt Raul--who, fortuitously enough, insists upon being referred to by his nickname "Chico"! Also welcoming Raul with open arms is Ed's landlady Della Rogers (Della Reese), while in a later episode flamboyant South American entertainer Charo joins the cast as Raul's fun-loving Aunt Charo. For the most part, the Ed-Raul teaming doesn't come off, with audiences feeling uncomfortable watching a TV series that, by rights, should have ended with Freddie Prinze's death. Even so, this season yields one of the series' most memorable and moving episodes, the 2-part "Raul Runs Away", which boldly addresses the issue of Gabriel Melgar's inadequacy as a Prinze substitute by having the tearful youngster run back to Mexico when he feels he can't measure up to the memory of the "original" Chico. The episode was not only the only Chico and the Man installment to be filmed rather than videotaped, but was also the only one to be shot on location in Mexico. Despite this high point, Chico and the Man was doomed to extinction at the end of its fourth season, wrapping things up with a finale which finds Ed Brown anxiously preparing for a visit from President Jimmy Carter (not to give anything away, but Carter doesn't appear). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Complete Cast:

Producer(s):

Charles Stewart, Jerry Ross

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