Hill Street Blues, S1 E3
January 22, 1981
Note: Like last week, NBC is showing TWO new episodes of HSB twice this week, 10PM ET Thursday and Saturday. So here’s the weekly news review for both, and the episode summary for only Thursday’s E3
Week in Review
The big news this week is clear - Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as the 40th President on Tuesday. The weather was pleasant. The mood was festive and hopeful. And wealthy.
The other big news was that the Iran hostages were finally released. Their captivity lasted 444 days, and there was a reason, throughout their ordeal, that the media used “days” instead of months or weeks, to emphasize the urgency and peril.
The Algerian government (believe it or not) was the arbiter and intermediary between the US and Iran on negotiations. The deal was primarily financial - an agreement that the US would release about $8B of IRAN’s money that had been seized and frozen, much of which was supposed to be used to pay down Iran’s debt. Kind of like Iran’s own ransom.
Down to the wire there was some tension - would they be released before or after Carter’s presidency officially ended? The main points of the deal were struck on Saturday and Carter hoped to jet to West Germany to greet the freed hostages, chalk it up to his term, then fly back for the inaugural. It didn’t happen that way - the Iranians deliberately waited until Reagan was in office
Reagan became the oldest President ever elected, just 2 weeks shy of 70 years old. Since the 18th-century, only Truman and Eisenhower were over 60 when elected President. Trump broke the record at 70 1/2, and then Biden reverse-dunk shattered it again at 78.
Carter was already being side-eyed for mediocrity, I mean, imagine getting this headline as your sendoff - your best accomplishment as President was becoming president:
The national mood seemed very optimistic. The hostage release was truly cathartic, and directly or indirectly breathed fresh honeymoon air into Reagan’s start. For days, the NYT had pages and pages of homecomings and elation.
Reagan promised he’d honor Carter’s deal with the Iranians, although there were some second thoughts after we quickly found out via debrief interviews how terribly the hostages had been treated, with torture and lies and solitude.
Reagan’s economic plan is to slash income taxes by 30% and to cut government, assured that will boost the economy. He started on Day One, withdrawing 27 nominations, dismissing over 200 Carter administration appointees, including, notably, 15 inspector generals whose job is oversight, and enacting a complete government hiring freeze. The theme of his inaugural address was that government sucks. And now he’s in charge of it:
In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government IS the problem. - Reagan
Other news
In Poland, Lech Walesa’s Solidarity movement is gaining traction. It’s a labor union in country with a Soviet-controlled government. They are coordinating strikes in several major cities, including one this Saturday to fight for a 5-day work week.
Soviet troops are staged on the Polish border. This would be one of the first signs of the Soviet breakdown in Eastern Europe. Walesa would get the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983 and be elected President in 1990, after the USSR dissolved.
Ferdinand Marcos just officially rescinded martial law in the Philippines after 9 years, though his authoritarian rule would remain for a few more years. We remember his wife's shoes more faithfully than we remember the extrajudicial killings and political prisoners. The US supported Marcos’s power grab during the Nixon years because his opponents were “communists.” And we were still a little antsy over Communists in 1972.
On Thursday nights, where Hill Street Blues will settle into a 10PM ET slot, there are other fairly familiar shows. The ABC primetime lineup includes Mork & Mindy, Tom Hanks’s breakout guys-in-drag show Bosom Buddies, and cop comedy Barney Miller. CBS shows are The Waltons, the first season of Magnum P.I., and prime time soap Knots Landing. And HSB’s slot is right after Buck Rogers in the 25th Century on NBC.
I remember having the Buck Rogers and Mork conflict at 8. Because in 1981, if two shows were on at the same time, you were just screwed. You had to choose! Forever! Unless you had $788 dollars ($2,200 in 2022 dollars.)
Speaking of Caruso, here’s some fun footage of a new Irish band from this weekend. They’ve just released their first studio album and have kicked off their first-ever tour of Europe and the U.S. The album is called Boy and the band is called U2. This is a small club show in Belfast.
I include it here because a) the video and audio quality is pro and fantastic, b) this is U2 before they knew any “U2” songs - even Sunday Bloody Sunday hasn’t arrived. So they’re very much the post-punk, folk-ska, Joy Division-influenced sound of the early 80s, and c) Bono has always been very Bono.
I recommend a quick scan to 11:00 for the big closer “Out of Control.” He loses a couple shirts and crowd dives.
There was an early review of Hill Street Blues in the NYT this week. I have to include a quote from the first paragraph, check it out:
“Assist writers,” ha. Assist them to find room for their Emmys I guess.
Hill Street Blues, S1 E3: Politics as Usual
Roll Call
SGT ESTERHAUS says:
because of the upcoming Presidential visit, everyone’s vacation days are canceled
there’s too much graffiti in the station bathrooms, and
the guy Belker caught was actually NOT the serial rapist, because there were 3 more daylight attacks yesterday.
RENKO and HILL say they don’t want to be partners. Hill calls Renko “cowboy” but Renko says I’m from Jersey and I’ve never been west of Chicago my whole life
Howard in the bathroom
HOWARD, the SWAT team guy, confronts FRANK the captain in the bathroom again. This time it’s about the POTUS visit and how Frank isn’t ready enough
HOWARD: You’re inviting any misfit with a sniper’s mentality to take a whack at the chief executive. Half the people in this precinct aren’t even American citizens. They’re illegal, foreign perverts and malcontents. They don’t even use our language.
FRANK: Howard, could you sum this up for me? I’m running late.
Frank explains that he can’t evacuate the precinct if the whole point is to meet the public. It’s politics.
Larue’s drug bust
DETECTIVE LARUE, the handsy guy, and his partner WASHINGTON are undercover on a street corner, shadowing a target wearing sweater and khakis, who they follow into a parking garage
They hide behind a car and spring out to catch the target buying drugs from a guy. The dealer flees, Larue nabs him, but it turns out he’s an UNDERCOVER COP too, “from division”
The cop offers Larue cash from the deal and tries to convince him to get in on some corruption among division cops. We don’t know what Larue said in response, but he comes out to meet Washington and claims he lost the guy.
Back at the station, Larue sneaks to his locker and stashes a big wad of cash. Uh-oh.
Gang treaty
Frank is briefing some gang leaders. It’s a treaty about the President and which “turf” he will visit. It’s the Irish gang and the Black gang.
Here are the terms they agree on. (For real.) If the Irish will give The Bloods the entire park basketball court for a month, the Bloods will let the President walk through their turf to visit the Catholics
You might recognize the “Irish gang” leader - it’s David Caruso
Belker time
BELKER, the growling cop, is booking a pickpocket at his desk. He gets a call from his Mother and does a funny bit about some peeping tom bothering her, who it turns out is actually his father. He hunts and pecks at the typewriter as the pickpocket laughs at him
Renko and Hill
Renko and Hill come across a residential fender bender that has attracted a crowd. Renko is writing the accident report. The drivers, both Black, are arguing and threatening each other. Renko flips out, shoves one of them and walks away, taking shame from the crowd
RENKO: They don’t PAY me enough to deal with animals like this. The first thing they see is a white face, and all they wanna do is do ‘em in!
HILL: You listen to me, Renko. It was a white finger that pulled the trigger, not a black one!
Dinner with Joyce
Frank’s ex-wife Fay is suing him for more money, her lawyer says they’ll garnish his wages.
He’s at a restaurant with JOYCE talking about it. She convinces him to talk to Fay face to face instead of fighting via expensive attorneys. He’s already broke. He said he hasn’t had a raise in years. (You may recall the inflation woes)
She pulls off her bracelet and reminisces about when he had given it to her, then actually offers it back to him to sell for money (!!) Yeesh. He says no, but says “I love you, moneybags”
Hill and Renko - not going well
The two are outside another apartment door. They’re responding to a domestic abuse call, a woman is screaming inside. They’re both very clearly nervous. They break down the door. The man has opened the window and climbs to the roof on the fire escape.
Renko stays with the woman, Hill chases the man all over the building with action cops music.
As we follow a sweaty Hill, he nearly shoots a couple of innocent people and is simply jittery. And when Renko finds him in a basement, he almost shoots Hill. Hill starts crying and beating on him.
Back at the station, Frank is trying to sort out why Renko is freaking out. He says they don’t have to be partners anymore but they need to get their act together.
FRANK: I’ve seen this before. Don’t think you’re the only ones. You walked in the wrong doorway and got smacked. You both oughta be dead. Not because you screwed up, not because you’re bad cops. You’re not, as a matter of fact, you’re exceptionally good. But it happens. And if you survive, it’s never like it was.
Frank leaves and they both start sobbing and laughing and then they hug.
Larue gets busted
Larue is having lunch with the bad cop. He says he wants nothing to do with it puts the dirty money on the table and says he’s giving it back. But the cop makes a signal and suddenly Larue is arrested for bribery, it was a trap.
Frank gets beeped
Frank is mega-relaxing in a bubble bath with naked Joyce, who offers him a “prolonged body massage” and his buzzer suddenly goes off again..
PHIL: It’s Fay
FRANK: What about Fay?
PHIL: She’s been arrested
So Frank has to leave again. Joyce is very frustrated with Frank’s unavailability. “Is this it, Frank? Is this the best we can hope for?”
Frank gets Fay out of jail. She’s very angry. She says she was just naked with some friends in a hot tub, she complains of false arrest and brutality. The arresting officer says they found marijuana and didn’t know who she was. Frank thanks him sincerely.
He tells her he can clear her record, but only if they can talk in good faith about the alimony. He’s taking Joyce’s advice. It works. They end up nice to each other and he drives her home.