Let's be LA Law!

I'm the 1980s.

Susan Dey is not acknowledging you now or ever.

Oh gawd, EVERYONE is going to be the faulty elevator.

I'm the partner who is found dead in the first episode. Other partners' names come and go in the firm's name, but mine remains.

I'm the two seasons in which Susan Ruttan was thin.

I am the crush Roxanne had on Arnie

I am the stupid plot line where hottie Arnie has sex with Roxanne.

I'm the gorilla suit.

I'm the pencil skirts

I’m Benny!!!

Arnie, I’m done making your copies!!!!!!!!!

I'm the venus butterfly.

I’m Corbin’s furry chest. I plan to stick around a lot longer than the hair on his head!

I'm the copious amounts of oatmeal that Susan Ruttan always seemed to have in her mouth when saying her lines.

I'm the car trunk that is slammed shut in the opening credits.

I’m the fleas in Susan Dey’s cunt.

I'm Amanda Plummer. I come in as Bennie's developmentally challenged girlfriend when LA Law was trying to prove they were more than a night soap opera and really a DRAMA.

I’m Susan Ruttan and I’ve just gotten a tiny guest role in Mom.

I'm Alan Rachins. I appeared nude on Broadway in the original cast of Oh! Calcutta! There are even pictures of me from the original cast.

I am Hill Street Blues -- irritated that this flashy show replacing me is getting the ratings I always wanted.

Me again! I was also a recent episode of 9-1-1!

I'm the lesbian kiss between Abby Perkins and CJ Lamb that whipped the fraus in to a tizzy.

I watched this show fairly regularly until the last few seasons. Reading this thread made me realize how many of these characters really annoyed me.

I’m Michele Greene whose character got partnership at the end of the season 5 but whose contract wasn’t renewed because the new producer didn’t like me. I didn’t want to show up for few episodes on season 6 because I was practically fired and that’s why they had to write me out in a ridiculous way. I didn’t want to leave the show but that’s what happened.

I'm Sheila Kelley playing Gwen Taylor. The writers have absolutely no idea what to do with me. They introduce me as an aspiring actress in LA and then a few episodes later convert me to a born again Christian who rebuffs Arnie's advances. I was the indicator that LA Law was swirling down the drain.

I’m the opening credits with sax solo.

We're Harry Hamlin and Jimmy Smits. Our only function in the show is to demonstrate who has the bigger dick and can grab more of the female viewers attention.

I'm the sixth box of donuts Susan Ruttan ate daily.

I'm Harry Hamlin's stalker that followed him wherever he filmed

I'm the German motor works client upon learning of Rosalind Shays' demise: "Ach, sie ist herunter gefallen!"

I never watched the show, and I'm still the faulty elevator.

I'm Elaine Stritch. They should have cast me to play Roz Shays. Instead, I got stuck with a 3 episode recurring on The Cosby Show and the pilot for the Steel Magnolas tv show that never got picked up.

I'm Rose Nylund! I'm a regular viewer of La Law!

I'm 2018 DL, fixated on Susan Ruttan's weight.

Susan this summer

We are still here!

I’m here, too!

r36 Jill is aging well

OT but Alan looks fragile. Blair looks as hot as ever!

I'm Susan Dey's American accent.

I’m the jury member that almost laughs when SMOKIN HOT Blair Underwood walks away from his Tourette’s Syndrome client testifying shouts out “Coo&” I can’t type it.. I remember laughing so hard.. I totally adored the show and would race back from choir rehearsal to watch with my parents

I'm KNOTS LANDING smiling that we kick LA LAW's butt in the ratings each week.

Corbin has gone full-on deplorable, making shitty, conservative Christian movies.

I'm Roxanne's direct-mail millionaire suitor. Sure, I'm obnoxious, but you'll be happy to see me again when I turn up on Law & Order as a lieutenant.

I'm Sheila Brackman... I hate Douglas' bald head and hairy back. And his three piece suits and his fathers pocket-watch.

I’m Roxanne’s voice coach helping her get her voice production out of her nose!!!!

[quote]I'm KNOTS LANDING smiling that we kick LA LAW's butt in the ratings each week.

I liked Knots, and in retrospect it was a better show for a longer period of time, but think LA Law had better ratings.

I'm Roxanne's insider-trading boyfriend.

I'm the snake who eats the pot-bellied pig while the music video is being taped.

I'm Roxanne's moving rendition of "I Just Called To Say I Love You"

That's disappointing R42, he was hot back in the day.

Harry Hamlin and Jimmy Smits too, that show had a lot of eye candy. HH and JS still look pretty good.

Oh, almost forgot. I'm Susan Ruttan's index finger used to vomit up the donuts during her two thin seasons.

-R50

I'm the Venus Butterfly.

r52 meet r11

[quote]I liked Knots, and in retrospect it was a better show for a longer period of time, but think LA Law had better ratings.

Knots never beat LA Law in the ratings.

I'm Susan Dey capitalizing on my independent feature "Echo Park" comeback a year or two earlier.

I'm the prenuptial agreement Stuart gets Ann to sign, then tears up. Big mistake, Stuart.

I'm Susan Dey trying to make everyone forget that 12 years before, I was playing Laurie Partridge.

[quote] Blair Underwood walks away from his Tourette’s Syndrome client testifying shouts out “Coo&”

Huh?

I'm the clip that R40 was referring to...

I’m the farty/fainty guy

I'm Richard Dysart. I was the ONLY person to appear in every single episode, yet no one remembers me.

I’m Courtney Thorne Smith playing a cheerleader. But soon I will be a real lawyer on another DEK show.

I'm "That's What Friends Are For" as sung by the secretary at a karaoke bar after she lost a bunch of weight.

R41, here.

My bad. It was critically acclaimed Hill Street Blues that was beaten regularly by Knots Landing.

In fairness, KNOTS was in season 7 by the time LA LAW came along. Soon, Laura was gone, the Williams family had moved in, and by 1989, Abby left.

there were some weeks KNOTS beat LA LAW

I'm a fellow performer from "Oh, Calcutta!" who knows that Alan Rachins with his toupee looked like and almost as gorgeous as Louis Jourdan. Yes, there are pictures of Rachins fully naked with "Maude" 's tv husband Walter, both fully frontally naked. Alan is the hairy one. No back hair is evident, but his front is hairy in all the right places.

Bill Macy was Walter, that is.

I’m Susan Dey’s constipated look, evident in every scene in the series. I know that everyone is thinking Laurie Partridge every time they see me, so I’ll make sure they know I’m hate them for it.

I'm the sex Roxanne and Arnie had in the ceiling. I signalled, loud and clear, that LA Law had jumped the shark.

R66 ain't lyin':

I'm the soap opera the show turned into after the great first season.

I'm Abby Dalton from Falcon Crest, and I often wonder who had the more vicious overbite: me or Susan Dey.

I’m Michelle Greene, who was not truly comfortable with the lesbian storyline and wondered if producers did that to hasten her departure.

OMG I hated that whiny little bitch, Abby! Such a waste of a role.

I'm the psychic telling Susan Dey that her man would return.

How did Abby leave ?

I'm the cover of GQ that featured Corbin Bernsen and was then publicly derided with a "What were we thinking?" recap from the mag a few years later.

Useless without a photo, r77!

I'm Catherine Chancellor sitting on my dusty sofa with my maid/best friend/flight attendant Esther Valentine watching the show. We NEVER miss an episode.

r78, there was nothing special about the cover with Corbin. It's just that only a few years later he and the show had fallen off the cultural radar so much that the mag was questioning why they had ever chosen him for cover status.

[quote]the mag was questioning why they had ever chosen him for cover status.

Because he was sexy for a hot LA minute.

I’m the actress who plays Alan Rachins’ sexual surrogate in a weird storyline.

It seems a little mean spirited to question putting a good looking guy who was on a popular tv show on your cover, a few years after the fact. Mark Harmon was a similar case to Bernsen, with his People Magazine Sexiest Man Alive thing in the '80s and then he disappeared in the '90s only to have his career resurrected with NCIS in the 2000s, but there are very few male (or female) tv 'sex symbols' who have much staying power.

He had the quintessential "1980s male" look.

I'm those weird later seasons where actors including John Spencer, Conchata Ferrell, A Martinez and Alan Rosenberg all became main cast members. And didn't Susan Dey leave and then come back???

I'm the nudist party that Susan Dey and Harry Hamlin went to.

I'm the gorilla suit.

I'm Victor SiFUENtes, the minority hire.

r87 meet r8

I'm the horrible 1980s hair.

I'm Alan Rachins' body hair, patiently waiting for them to film a nude scene or any scene where I could show some skin and hair.

I'm the viewing audience, wondering why the boring, grating, homely Susan Ruttan was cast.

Alan Rachins would have been such a hot daddy if he had buzzed his hair and grown a beard.

I'm Benny, dating another mentally challenged adult and having sex. More sex than I was having at the time.

I'm Jimmy Smits, who at least I think we got to see his butt on "NYPD Blue" finally; maybe we saw him and Harry Hamlin shirtless on "LA Law".

Who knew Susan Ruttan was a DL icon ...

Her last name always reminded me of a wicker sofa or something.

SEE ME.

I'm the elevator. But I'm not faulty, I'm Karma.

I’m Benny’s referred to but never seen father. Little known fact, I am also the father in Glass Menagerie.

I'm Benny's ginormous cock.

I'm the banana.

I'm the episode where a couple is accused of killing their child and then accuse each other of doing it. Then they both get off but Victor sees them secretly touch fingers in the elevator when leaving. I'm then stolen by Law and Order: SVU and used as an ending in one of their episodes.

I'm the direct mail sent to you by Dave Meyer.

I am the dull, repetitive "trying to have it all" problems the boring married couple have as they work together in the same office and just see each other so gawd damned much.

I'm Abby's trembly little chin.

I'm the fruitless hopes of millions of homely, middle-aged men that there was such a thing as the Venus Butterfly move that would have enabled them to fuck the brains out of that beautiful but snotty bitch at the office who never gave them the time of day.

I'm Rosalind Shays' broken body at the bottom of the elevator shaft.

I’m the bizarre set design of Rosalind Shays office! Over the top wallpaper - a bust of Maria Muldaur’s head and shoulders - the whole thing looks more like the office of a successful brothel madame rather than a successful lawyer. Still unclear what sort of shorthand it was supposed to telegraph to the audience? Femininity behind the hard, corporate exterior? Superior taste? A need to impress her aesthetic onto a bland, corporate space? And yet it didn’t really succeed in any of this - it was just really, really odd.

I occasionally wonder if it influenced the design choices of any other high-achieving corporate women at the time - or still? Does somewhere in a skyscraper in Des Moines there exist an homage to the legacy of Rosalind Shays? (and does it’s inhabitant always use the fire stairs? Ostensibly to keep fit - but everyone who works there knows the real reason!)

I am an even more bizarre character/plotline than Rosalind Shays.

I'm the half-eaten Chef's salad that Susan Dey pukes into the toilet on set.

R109 here! Diana Muldauer! Not Maria! Where did that come from? Wasn’t Maria the midnight at the oasis girl? Sheesh! I’m losing it!

I'm Susan Ruttan, getting dieting tips from Susan Dey. (For two seasons, as least.)

I’m Harry Hamlin’s dashed dreams of a movie career.

I'm Arnie Becker's lack of a backbone.

I'm Betty Lynn's two-episode guest star appearance.

I'm Arnie Becker's mobile hairline.

The elevator is all people will ever remember about this show.

People still remember the gorilla suit.

and the retard.

Well, R109/R112, seeing as how Diana Muldaur PLAYED THE ROLE of Rosalind Shays . . .

I'm 444 South Flower Street.

I'm the dumpster they threw Alfre Woodard in.

The cover photo of Corbin Bernsen at R84 is terrible. They could have done all kinds of interesting things and instead they, basically a men's fashion magazine, put him in a shapeless, baggy suit and had him do that goofy, slouching "Who me?" gesture? Truly awful.

Oh, and I'm GQ's rightful chagrin when looking at that cover.

I'm the California license plate used as the title card.

I’m Kevin Spacey! I had a memorable guest starring role and a glittering future ahead...

I'm the 1980s.

And I'm fabulous!

Rosalind never made it broken to the bottom of the elevator shaft. Her body became tangled in wires on the way down. (Can we presume cause of death was blunt force trauma hitting her head along the way, or a heart attack on the way down?)

Harry Hamlin, Susan Dey, and Jimmy Smits wanted a lot of money to resign. They wrote that firm internal war story as incendiary as they did knowing that there was a chance any or all of them were leaving, and indeed all three left. Then Susan Dey caved, forcing them to hastily re-write her back into the show.

R128 Poor Michele Greene was coming back for 6th season when the new main producer said no. Abby was already written to the first episodes and writers had to rewrite those scenes. Michele ended making series of tv movies.

How did they write her character out?

R130 Abby? Writers wanted her back for few episodes to write her out but she said no, because she was practically fired. They gave explanation in the first episode of new season. I can’t remember what it was but it was stupid. The producer who didn’t want Michele back told her few years later it was all his fault, he had problems or whatever. The same producer called one actor at the time to his office to hear his anger over whatever. He also came to the set asked to change a jacket of one of the actors because the current one wasn’t suitable for him. It meant the entire scene was forced to film again. Michele for some reason was his main target.

I had “Roz Doyle” on a flight out of Burbank at the time the show was airing. She had an assistant with her who ordered Ms. Doyle’s beverage because Ms. Doyle didn’t talk to the help. I got a chuckle out of that because no one knew who she was.

And Roz Doyle has rightfully gone back to being a nobody. I remember seeing a tabloid item about her back in the day saying she'd had liposuction on her fat knees because she wanted to wear shorter skirts and thinking, "Bitch, nobody is looking at your ugly legs."

R133. I recently saw her make a guest appearance on some show. She had grey hair and was old and obviously never made it big past LA Law.

I thought Roz Doyle was a character on "Frasier."

I'm Susan Dey and I'm now better known on DL for not acknowledging my former co-stars' deaths than fore ever starring on this show.

Are you guys referring to Rosalind Shays, portrayed by Diana Muldaur? I could picture her being cunty, but I would have thought someone acting for so many years with such limited fame would be more down to earth.

R135 Yes, I thought it too and Peri was never regular on LA Law, was she a guest?

We were thinking about Susan Ruttan, who played Arnie's ugly red-haired secretary Roxanne.

R135. Lol, sorry I stand corrected. I’m afraid I’m getting old and confusing characters/programs. Roz Doyle was on Frasier, I meant to say Rox (Roxanne) Melman, played by Susan Ruttan. I should have googled before posting.

Oh no... I wish you had checked, I just tweeted at Peri G. saying I heard she was a real cunt on flights, and that I was going to take her the fuck down. She's gonna be real confused.

Susan Ruttan has not aged well

To be fair, Susan didn't really "youthe" well either.

I'm Vonda Shepard, her vocal stylings, her short-lived concert tour, and her special ability to make every song sound the same.

I’m DL’s collective memory, barely remembering anything about Michele Green’s character but recalling (in conflicting versions) minute details of the behind-the-scenes drama of her exit from the show.

I'm all the other shows, actors, and performers who have gotten mistakenly attached to this thread as if they actually have something to do with LA Law.

Now that I think about it, I guess that makes me Ronald Reagan's senility which was really starting to bloom in the mid to late 80s.

R144 She wasn’t in LA Law.

Susan Ruttan was on a few episodes of "Mom" recently.

"Ally McBeal," fumbduck at R144.

I'm Jeanne Cooper.