Who’s funnier than the late great David Lander, the actor who played Squiggy on Laverne & Shirley, and his comedy partner Michael McKean (Spinal Tap, Best In Show) who played his best friend Lenny? They were the hilarious upstairs neighbors, whose comedic entrances were as funny as their simple, though brilliant, take on the English language.
Never are Lenny & Squiggy more hilarious than in the season 6 episode “The Dating Game”, where they’re both contestants on the classic game show. We’ve seen TV characters appear on game shows before. Most famously, Ralph Kramden appeared on The $99,000 Answer in a famous episode of The Honeymooners. Lander and McKeon bring the goods just as strongly as Jackie Gleason, as they fumble and tumble, trying to impress a woman, while also battling the smarmy douchebag Bob Gatenby who’s also competing for her affections.
The crux of the episode is focused on Lenny & Squiggy (Occasionally they cut to Laverne & Shirley watching at home), culminating in one sharply written, comedic fuckin’ romp. The episode is directed by Penny Marshall, who played Laverne (Duh!) and also went on to direct popular movies like Big and A League of Her Own.
By the end of season 5, Laverne & Shirley was getting pretty fuckin’ stale, so in what was clearly a desperate attempt to save the show, the writers moved the setting from Milwaukee to California (Big deal!). The move didn’t make a lick of difference, with the exception of this incredibly funny episode, which, in my opinion, goes down in history with the greatest episodes of television ever.
Here are some of the hilarious gems that came out of the mouths of Lenny & Squiggy and the situations in which they were spoken while on the Dating Game:
“Bosco and Squiggy”
We all know Lenny loves the chocolaty syrup Bosco. In the season 4 episode “Supermarke Sweep”, Laverne & Shirley win five minutes to fill an entire shopping cart at their local supermarket. As they take orders from friends, they’re constantly reminded by Lenny & Squiggy to grab some Bosco. It’s a joke that resonates so much so, the writers were smart enough to bring it back two season later for “The Dating Game”.
But what’s really fuckin’ funny about this line isn’t just Bosco. It’s that when asked what his interests are, Lenny hilariously answers “Squiggy”. Lenny & Squiggy no doubt love each other. Rarely are there scenes in which one appears without the other. They were the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern of Laverne & Shirley, finishing each other’s sentences and laughing at each other’s jokes like a couple of lunatics. So when asked his interests, of course Lenny is going to reply “Squiggy”. What else? .
“He thinks you drink with your eyes”
Lenny and Squiggy are pitted against Bob Gatenby, a sharply dressed blonde smooth-talking jerk, who’s the obvious choice for the former Playboy playmate Monique. When Monique weirdly asks Bob what type of vegetable he would be and why, he replies, “I would be a potato, so that I would have many eyes with which to drink in your beauty.”
This cracks Squiggy up, who comments to Lenny, “What a jerk. He thinks you drink with your eyes.”
The two goofballs get a good laugh out of that and manage to knock Gatenby down a few notches. It’s a jab for all of us who aren’t self assured, arrogant smooth-talking jerks. Gatenby sucks!
“I would be a sauerkraut. It was my only toy as a child.”
Monique asks Lenny the same weird question about his favorite vegetable. Lenny comically responses he would be a sauerkraut and that it was his only toy as a child. What?! His answer is disturbing, surreal and priceless. First of all, is sauerkraut even a vegetable? And if it is, what type of parent would give it to a child to play with? Lenny‘s childhood was no doubt less fortunate than someone like Bob Gatenby’s, and in real life we’d be troubled by this answer, as we’d imagine a smaller Leonard Kosnowski with his hands buried in a plate full of sauerkraut. But in the world of situation comedy, this line is a homerun. Comedy, thy name is Lenny.
“This guy looks like his pet monkey, Cheetos.”
Monique asks Squiggy to describe Gatenby. Big fuckin’ mistake. Squiggy already has it out for this chump. At first we get the impression he’s going to describe him like he’s Tarzan or something, but then, ZING! He jabs him with the monkey line. So funny. Lenny and Squiggy have always been known for their malapropism and this episode is rich with them. “Cheetos” is as good as they get.
“I’m afraid it’s dead, Jim”“
Where’s the old Dating Game courtesy?” host Jim Lange asks, after a fight breaks out between Lenny, Squiggy and Bob Gatenby. “I’m afraid it’s dead” is what we say when a woman asks “What ever happened to chivalry?”. When these words come out of Squiggy’s mouth, the hilarity flies through your television and into the cosmos where they resonate for all eternity with all the other great lines in the history of comedy.
“Lint”
When Monique asks Lenny what’s the most romantic word he can think of, he replies “Lint”. The looks of confusion on the faces of Jim Lange and Monique are hilarious.What’s even funnier is when she asks him to explain himself, he replies, “Have you never been in love?”, forcing Monique to pretend to understand what he means. “Oh, THAT lint!”, she says, confusing Lenny right back. It’s a hysterical exchange with pretty subtle nuances, particularly in regards to the faces everyone makes when trying to figure out what the other one is saying.
“Number Two she used to call me.”
Monique surprisingly chooses Bachelor Number Three, Squiggy. Bachelor Number Two, Lenny, internalizes the rejection like the man child he is. And even though he won, Squiggy’s more concerned with his friend’s feelings than he is with the beautiful Monique. It’s a hilarious and even touching scene, as we watch a grown man console another grown man over a woman he’s never met before.
“She couldn’t see the trees through the faucets”
Earlier in the episode, Lenny & Squiggy dish out two brilliant malapropisms: “There’s a whole pot at the end of this tunnel” and “To make a long story great, Edna. You are looking at the next two edible bachelor to be on the Dating Game.” These are no doubt clever linguistic mess ups, but “She couldn’t see the trees through the faucet” is the king malapropism. The boys have always gotten their signals crossed, mixing sayings and cliches, coming up with their own unique take on the English language, but this one comes towards the end of the episode and punctuates what has already been twenty of the funniest fuckin’ minutes of television.
“I don’t even have a turtle!”
After some encouragement, Lenny accepts defeat and faces Monique, which ends with him literally groveling at her feet. Host Jim Lange pulls him off her while informing him he’s won a year’s supply of Turtle Wax. Lenny hilariously replies, “I don’t even have a turtle!” He also wonders what he’s going to do with all this wax when the last turtle he had killed himself as he tried to scrape his name off his back.
“We’re going to France!”
Lenny & Squiggy were not the brightest lamps in the chandelier. Like Homer Simpson, their simple-minded confusion makes for comedy gold. After Squiggy frightens Monique by scolding her for not choosing Lenny, he’s given the option to take Lenny with him on the trip he won to Acapulco. Excitedly, the boys exclaim “We’re going to France!”
What a hilarious episode.
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