''Bridget Loves Bernie'' is an American

sitcom A sitcom, a portmanteau of situation comedy, or situational comedy, is a genre of comedy centered on a fixed set of characters who mostly carry over from episode to episode. Sitcoms can be contrasted with sketch comedy, where a troupe may use ...

created by

Bernard Slade Bernard Slade Newbound (May 2, 1930 – October 30, 2019) was a Canadian playwright and screenwriter. As a screenwriter, he created the sitcoms ''The Flying Nun'' and ''The Partridge Family''. As a playwright, he wrote '' Same Time, Next Year'', ...

. Depicting an interfaith marriage between a Catholic woman and a Jewish man, ''Bridget Loves Bernie'' was based loosely on the premise of the 1920s Broadway play and 1940s radio show ''

Abie's Irish Rose ''Abie's Irish Rose'' is a popular comedy by Anne Nichols, which premiered in 1922. Initially a Broadway play, it has become familiar through repeated stage productions, films and radio programs. The basic premise involves an Irish Catholic g ...

''. It stars

Meredith Baxter Meredith Ann Baxter (born June 21, 1947) is an American actress and producer. She is known for her roles on the CBS sitcom '' Bridget Loves Bernie'' (1972–73), ABC drama series ''Family'' (1976–80) and the NBC sitcom ''Family Ties'' (1982 ...

and

David Birney David Edwin Birney (April 23, 1939 – April 27, 2022) was an American actor and director whose career included performances in both contemporary and classical roles in theatre, film, and television. He is noted for having played the title role ...

as the title characters.

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

canceled the show after only one season, despite high ratings. Baxter and Birney married in real life after the program had left the air.

Overview

Robert Sampson Bridget Loves Bernie 1972

The series depicts an interfaith marriage between an

Irish Catholic Irish Catholics are an ethnoreligious group native to Ireland whose members are both Catholic and Irish. They have a large diaspora, which includes over 36 million American citizens and over 14 million British citizens (a quarter of the Briti ...

teacher (Bridget Fitzgerald) from a wealthy family and a

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

cab driver who aspires to be a playwright (Bernie Steinberg), whom she had met at a bus stop. With a primetime slot between ''

All in the Family ''All in the Family'' is an American television sitcom that aired on CBS for nine seasons, from January 12, 1971, to April 8, 1979. Afterwards, it was continued with the spin-off series ''Archie Bunker's Place'', which picked up where ''All in ...

'' and ''

The Mary Tyler Moore Show ''The Mary Tyler Moore Show'' (also known simply as ''Mary Tyler Moore'') is an American television sitcom created by James L. Brooks and Allan Burns and starring actress Mary Tyler Moore. The show originally aired on CBS from 1970 to 1977. Mo ...

'' on Saturday nights, the situation comedy was #5 in the ratings among all shows for the 1972-73 television season and obtained a 24.2 rating, tying '' The NBC Sunday Mystery Movie.'' However, CBS executives canceled the show in response to negative reactions to the characters' marriage, the show thus being the highest-rated television program to be canceled after only one season."'Live From Baghdad': The Cameras of War"
by Tom Shales, ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'', December 7, 2002. Retrieved 2007-11-12. Supporting cast members included

Audra Lindley Audra Marie Lindley (September 24, 1918 – October 16, 1997) was an American actress, most famous for her role as landlady Helen Roper on the sitcom ''Three's Company'' and its spin-off ''The Ropers''. Life and career Audra Lindley was born ...

, David Doyle, Harold J. Stone,

Ned Glass Nusyn "Ned" Glass (April 1, 1906 – June 15, 1984) was a Polish-born American character actor who appeared in more than eighty films and on television more than one hundred times, frequently playing nervous, cowardly, or deceitful characters ...

and

Bibi Osterwald Margaret Virginia "Bibi" Osterwald (February 3, 1920 – January 2, 2002) was an American actress. Life and career Osterwald was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, the daughter of Dagmar (Kvastad) and Rudolf August Osterwald, a hotel own ...

. Lindley and Doyle played Bridget's wealthy parents, Walter and Amy Fitzgerald, and Stone and Osterwald played Bernie's working class parents, Sam and Sophie Steinberg. The Steinbergs owned a delicatessen above which Bridget and Bernie lived. Glass played Bernie's uncle, Moe Plotnik. Robert Sampson played Bridget's brother, Catholic priest Father Michael Fitzgerald; he was more sympathetic than others to his sister's marriage. Bill Elliott played Otis, Bernie's best friend and fellow cab driver. Nora Marlowe was cast as Aunt Agnes in the 1972 episode "The Little White Lie That Grew and Grew."

Cast

as Bernie Steinberg *

as Sophie Steinberg *

as Bridget Fitzgerald Steinberg * Harold J. Stone as Sam Steinberg *

as Amy Fitzgerald * David Doyle as Walter Fitzgerald *

as Moe Plotnik * Robert Sampson as Father Michael Fitzgerald *Bill Elliott as Otis Foster

Controversy

The series was controversial because of the differing faiths of the married characters. Some Jewish groups charged that the series "mocked the teachings of Judaism." Rabbi

Wolfe Kelman __NOTOC__ Wolfe Kelman (November 27, 1923 – June 26, 1990) was an Austrian-born American rabbi and leader in the Conservative Judaism in the United States who never led a congregation, serving for decades as a mentor to hundreds of rabbis in hi ...

, executive vice-president of the

Rabbinical Assembly The Rabbinical Assembly (RA) is the international association of Conservative rabbis. The RA was founded in 1901 to shape the ideology, programs, and practices of the Conservative movement. It publishes prayerbooks and books of Jewish interest, a ...

of America, called the show "an insult to some of the most sacred values of both the Jewish and Catholic religions."

Rabbi Meir Kahane Meir David HaKohen Kahane (; he, רבי מאיר דוד הכהן כהנא ; born Martin David Kahane; August 1, 1932 – November 5, 1990) was an American-born Israeli ordained Orthodox rabbi, writer, and ultra-nationalist politician who serve ...

wrote an essay on the series.

Orthodox rabbis Orthodox, Orthodoxy, or Orthodoxism may refer to: Religion * Orthodoxy, adherence to accepted norms, more specifically adherence to creeds, especially within Christianity and Judaism, but also less commonly in non-Abrahamic religions like Neo-pa ...

met with CBS officials several times. A Conservative rabbi organized a boycott by advertisers, and Reform rabbis met with CBS staff in secret to have the show canceled. Rabbi Abraham Gross, president of the Rabbinical Alliance of Orthodox Rabbis and Educators, described the show as a "flagrant insult" to Jews, protesting that intermarriage was strictly forbidden under Jewish law. Threats followed; Meredith Baxter said, "We had bomb threats on the show. Some guys from the

Jewish Defense League The Jewish Defense League (JDL) is a Jewish far-right religious-political organization in the United States and Canada, whose stated goal is to "protect Jews from antisemitism by whatever means necessary". It has been classified as "a right wi ...

came to my house to say they wanted to talk with me about changing the show." Threatening phone calls made to the home of producer Ralph Riskin resulted in the arrest of Robert S. Manning, described as a member of the

. Manning was later indicted on unrelated murder charges and fought extradition to the U.S. from Israel, where he had moved.

Episodes

Home media

On December 4, 2012, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment released the complete series as a manufacture-on-demand

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

set in Region 1, available in the U.S. exclusively through

Amazon.com Amazon.com, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational technology company focusing on e-commerce, cloud computing, online advertising, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. It has been referred to as "one of the most influential econo ...

and WBShop.com.

References

External links

* {{IMDb title, id=0068053, name=Bridget Loves Bernie 1970s American sitcoms 1972 American television series debuts 1973 American television series endings CBS original programming English-language television shows Religious comedy television series Television series about Jews and Judaism Television series about marriage Television series by Sony Pictures Television Television shows set in New York City Christian and Jewish interfaith dialogue