The Mayberry Chef

It should be noted that, for the first time since its debut on TV Land, The Andy Griffith Show is not being telecast within the channel’s prime-time lineup. This likely serves as proof that the all-classic-TV-all-the-time channel is moving away from 1950s and 60s programming in favor of 1970s and 80s fare.

This mention of The Andy Griffith Show has helped to spark a memory of my all-time favorite episode of Andy. In true TV Boy fashion, it’s not my favorite because of how good it is, but rather because of how bad it is. Bad. Very bad. Almost outrageously bad. It starts out with one outrageous proposition, and ends with an even more outrageous scenario.

The episode, entitled The Mayberry Chef, is from the series eighth and final season, so perhaps the show’s writers were simply running out of realistic ideas. It’s the only credible explanation for this debacle.

Anyway… in this episode, implausible scenario number one comes early in the episode, with a visit to the Taylor home by the manager of nearby Siler City’s television station (channel 12, for those of you who were wondering). It seems that the station has decided to produce a local cooking show, and they’ve been in the process of looking for a show host. Okay, now here comes the payoff for implausible scenario number one: apparently the TV-station manager had recently read a newspaper article about a cooking contest that Aunt Bee had won (a county-fair kind of thing), and BASED SOLELY ON READING THIS ARTICLE, the station manager decided to drive to Mayberry to offer the cooking-show job to Aunt Bee! Gee, that kind of thing happens ALL THE TIME! Television-station managers ALWAYS offer jobs on LIVE TV to people they’ve never met… to people who have not an ounce of experience in front of a television camera… and to people who haven’t had a job of any kind in forty years.

The station manager told Bee that she’d need to start right away, as the time slot was opening up “this Wednesday.” Yes, because that’s how REAL television schedules work. Time slots just “open up” in the middle of the week, and stations only plan a few days in advance to fill open time-slots. Oh, yeah – that happens every day in the business of television.

At first, Aunt Bee doesn’t want to take the job. You see, with the television station in Siler City, Aunt Bee would be away every evening during the dinner hour, meaning that there wouldn’t be anyone at home to prepare and serve dinner to Andy and Opie. Sounds like a good reason to me to turn down your own daily television show.

However, after much cajoling by Andy and Opie, Aunt Bee agrees to accept the role, contingent upon Andy hiring someone to prepare and serve his and Opie’s dinner each night. Unfortunately, the debut of the show was upon them and Andy hadn’t yet been able to find someone to fill the part-part-part-time job. Not wanting this to stand in Aunt Bee’s path to fame and fortune, Andy lies (well-intentioned, of course!) to Aunt Bee when he informs her that he’s hired “a Mrs. Parkins” to do the cooking and grocery-shopping. In reality, it’s Andy himself who is planning to do the shopping and cooking. Ooooh, you just know that this isn’t going to work out!

Feeling relieved that Andy and Opie have someone to cook for them, Aunt Bee proceeds to jump (figuratively, if not literally) into her car and head off to Siler City. Now, here comes implausible scenario number two: the first day of Aunt Bee’s live cooking show also marks THE FIRST TIME THAT SHE'S SEEING THE STUDIO! Yes, about an hour before she goes on the air for the first time in her life, she’s introduced to the television studio. Oh, sure – that’s certainly the way real-life television production works! No rehearsals, no run-throughs, no preparation whatsoever. Her only stage direction? “Now Miss Taylor, be sure to look into the camera with the red light.” You do have to love the brilliance of understated direction.

Miraculously enough, Aunt Bee manages to successfully make it through her first show (if you don’t count that one incident in which Bee walked off the set in order to find her special wooden mixing spoon; oh, the dangers of live television!).

Back at the Taylor house, though, things aren’t going quite as swimmingly. It seems that Andy is pretty much a bust as a cook (he even managed to burn the corned-beef hash), and Opie has decided to “take extra vitamins” to make up for the lack of nutritious dinnertime food.

With things going well, and after getting several shows under her belt (again, figuratively rather than literally, as I don’t believe that Bee ever actually wore a belt around those frumpy dresses of hers), Aunt Bee began to become suspicious about the existence of that “Mrs. Parkins,” especially after Andy and Opie gave conflicting accounts of Mrs. Parkins’ characteristics. Somehow, someway, Aunt Bee was able to deduce that Mrs. Parkins was a work of fiction. Oh, she may have acted like a stereotypical country bumpkin, but Bee was no slouch. You know, in another day and in another time, Aunt Bee could have been another Murder, She Wrote's Jessica Fletcher.

In what will no doubt go down as one of the most magnanimous gestures of all time (and, as for the purposes of this narrative, this counts as implausible scenario number three), Aunt Bee decides to GIVE UP her glamorous life as a media darling and cooking-show host in order to be able to stay home to “fix” dinner for Andy and Opie. What a grand gesture. What a wonderful woman. There just aren’t many television stars who would give it all up – the glory, the fame, the fortune -- for the culinary good of their family. Hey, isn’t that the same reason why Lucille Ball gave up her sitcom in the mid-1970s?

And there you have it: The Mayberry Chef. It’s must-see viewing for all of you with an appreciation for the worst that television has to offer, and although it may leave a bad taste in your mouth, it can't be any worse than Andy's burned-to-a-crisp corned-beef hash.