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Q: I enjoyed a couple of comedies back in the early '70s that I was wondering about. One was called "On the Rocks," about a prison. The other show was "The Corner Bar." Both, I think, were on CBS. I can't find anyone else who remembers them. Did I imagine

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Author: 
Adam Thomlison / TV Media

Your memory is perfect on everything but the network. You're right that "On the Rocks" and "The Corner Bar" were 1970s sitcoms. You're even right that they were on the same network. However, the network was ABC.

Your feat of remembrance is even more impressive considering that neither show was on for very long, nor did either one feature a major star.

"On the Rocks" lasted just one season in 1975. It starred Rick Hurst, four years before he debuted in his best-known role -- Deputy Cletus Hogg on "The Dukes of Hazzard."

"The Corner Bar" actually lasted for two seasons, but they were both quite short, and so it only aired 16 episodes in total, from 1972 to 1973. In that time, however, the show's titular bar changed ownership (suggesting the network knew the show had problems from the start).

As a result, the two seasons had different stars. The first season starred Gabriel Dell, whose best-known role came back when he was a teenager in the 1938 film "Angels with Dirty Faces." The second season starred Eugene Roche and the late Anne Meara as husband-and-wife owners Mae and Frank Flynn.

Roche is a longtime TV supporting man whose longest-running role was as Bill Parker on the '80s sitcom "Webster." Meara is another TV mainstay who starred in "Archie Bunker's Place" (the spinoff of "All in the Family") and a number of other shows, but is probably best known for being film star Ben Stiller's mom.

 

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