Video: The Oh Man and the Oddballs

Bob Newhart is the quiet maestro of TV's most unsung hit

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, Newhart's contribution to his second straight hit series began with its origin. After spending four years away from TV (appearing in such forgettable movies as The First Family and Little Miss Marker), he got the idea for a show set in a hotel. "It occurred to me that my first show was successful because of my reactions to crazy people," he says, "and that in a hotel, you have to be nice to the guests no matter how outrageous they are." Newhart continues to make suggestions on scripts and casting. But his major creative impact is simply the force of his familiar comic persona, which Newhart likes to describe as the "last sane man left, reeling against a world of crazies."

The trouble with sanity, of course, is that the crazies usually get more attention. Two of the most inspired on Newhart are Stephanie and Michael, played with satiric brio by Duffy and Scolari. She is a spoiled blue blood; he is the quintessential Yuppie. They are made for each other: the two shallowest people on earth. Michael's conversation is a mix of '80s technospeak ("Dick, access those brain cells") and shameless flattery aimed at his "cupcake." Stephanie laps it up, since she is oblivious to anything unrelated to her looks, her clothes or, well, her. Even a stint as den mother for a troop of Ranger Girls is just another opportunity for self-adoration. "Why don't I tell you a little about me," she says perkily by way of introduction, "and then we can open the floor to compliments." Comments Dick to his wife Joanna (Mary Frann) after one Stephanie-Michael encounter: "Oh, to be young . . . and not them."

Duffy and Scolari are working so well together that Newhart fans should be on the lookout for that nasty word spin-off. But both actors insist they have no plans to remove their characters from the nourishing environment of Newhart. "I couldn't do a better Michael without Bob and Mary," says Scolari, "and I wouldn't want to do it without them." Newhart, as usual, seems happy to share the spotlight. "Jack Benny used to give many of the good lines to Phil Harris or Mary or Rochester," he recalls. "People told him he was giving all the funny things away. 'Yes,' said Jack, 'but I'll be back next week.' " With that sort of attitude, both Newhart and Newhart should be back for lots of weeks to come.

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