''High Society'' is an American

sitcom A sitcom, a portmanteau of situation comedy, or situational comedy, is a genre of comedy centered on a fixed set of characters who mostly carry over from episode to episode. Sitcoms can be contrasted with sketch comedy, where a troupe may use ne ...

television series starring

Jean Smart Jean Elizabeth Smart (born September 13, 1951) is an American actress. After beginning her career in regional theater in the Pacific Northwest, she appeared on Broadway in 1981 as Marlene Dietrich in the biographical play '' Piaf''. Smart was l ...

and

Mary McDonnell Mary Eileen McDonnell (born April 28, 1952) is an American film, stage, and television actress. She received Academy Award nominations for her roles as Stands With A Fist in ''Dances with Wolves'' and May-Alice Culhane in ''Passion Fish''. McD ...

that aired Monday nights on

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainmen ...

from October 30, 1995, to February 26, 1996; it was entered into the CBS schedule as a replacement for ''

If Not for You "If Not for You" is a song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan from his October 1970 album ''New Morning''. It was also issued as the A-side of a single in Europe in early 1971. The song is a love song to Dylan's first wife, Sara Dylan. He ...

,'' a sitcom that was quickly canceled by the network. The theme song was " The Lady Is a Tramp" sung by

Chaka Khan Yvette Marie Stevens (born March 23, 1953), better known by her stage name Chaka Khan (), is an American singer. Her career has spanned more than five decades, beginning in the 1970s as the lead vocalist of the funk band Rufus. Known as the " Qu ...

. Its premise was similar to the

campy Camp is an aesthetic style and sensibility that regards something as appealing because of its bad taste and ironic value. Camp aesthetics disrupt many of modernism's notions of what art is and what can be classified as high art by inverting aes ...

British comedy series ''

Absolutely Fabulous ''Absolutely Fabulous'' (also known as ''Ab Fab'') is a British television sitcom based on the ''French and Saunders'' sketch, "Modern Mother and Daughter", created by Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders. The show was created and written by Saund ...

''.

Storyline

The series revolves around two

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

women who acted in an outrageous, campy, and

decadent The word decadence, which at first meant simply "decline" in an abstract sense, is now most often used to refer to a perceived decay in social norm, standards, morality, morals, dignity, religion, religious faith, honor, discipline, or competen ...

manner. Ellie Walker (

) is a successful author of trashy

romantic novel A romance novel or romantic novel generally refers to a type of genre fiction novel which places its primary focus on the relationship and romantic love between two people, and usually has an "emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending." Pre ...

s, and her best friend and publisher is Dorothy 'Dott' Emerson (

). Emerson is a divorced mother with a

preppie Preppy (also spelled preppie) or prep (all abbreviations of the word ''preparatory'') is a subculture in the United States associated with the alumni of old private Northeastern college preparatory schools. The terms are used to denote a perso ...

college-aged son, Brendan Emerson (

Dan O'Donahue Dan or DAN may refer to: People * Dan (name), including a list of people with the name ** Dan (king), several kings of Denmark * Dan people, an ethnic group located in West Africa **Dan language, a Mande language spoken primarily in Côte d'Ivoir ...

), a

College Republican College Republicans are college and university students who support the Republican Party of the United States. Many members belong to the organization College Republican National Committee (CRNC), College Republicans United (CRU), or various ind ...

, who resists Ellie's relentless sexual advances. At the publishing house, the women worked with a flamboyant

gay ''Gay'' is a term that primarily refers to a homosexual person or the trait of being homosexual. The term originally meant 'carefree', 'cheerful', or 'bright and showy'. While scant usage referring to male homosexuality dates to the late 1 ...

male secretary named Stephano (

Luigi Amodeo is a fictional character featured in video games and related media released by Nintendo. Created by Japanese video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto, Luigi is portrayed as the younger fraternal twin brother and sidekick of Mario, Nintendo's masc ...

) and a sleazy publisher partner named Peter Thomas (

David Rasche David Rasche ( ; born August 7, 1944) is an American theater, film and television actor who is best known for his portrayal of the title character in the 1980s satirical police sitcom ''Sledge Hammer!'' Since then he has often played characters ...

) In the

pilot An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its directional flight controls. Some other aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are also considered aviators, because they a ...

episode, the women's small-town former college friend, Val Brumberg (

Faith Prince Faith Prince (born August 6, 1957) is an American actress and singer, best known for her work on Broadway in musical theatre. She won the Tony Award as Best Actress in ''Guys and Dolls'' in 1992, and received three other Tony nominations. Life ...

), arrives after she decides to leave her philandering husband, Mitchell, one of Ellie's many exes. Val moves in with Dott, much to Ellie's chagrin who stops speaking to Dott because of this. Val later reveals the other reason she came to Dott is because she's pregnant and needs someone to help her through her pregnancy. Aside from the situational comedy that arose from Ellie and Dott's campy antics, the storylines often centered on the notion of family. Val started to become something of a mother figure to Brendan. However, she was written out of the series without explanation after the sixth episode of the series. The series then centered more on the campy lifestyle and antics of Ellie and Dott.

Cancellation

Despite garnering decent ratings, the series was canceled after 13 episodes and replaced with '' Good Company.''

Cast

Main

as Ellie Walker *

as Dorothy "Dott" Emerson * Dan O'Donahue as Brendan Emerson *

as Peter Thomas *

as Valerie "Val" Brumberg (episodes 1–6) * Luigi Amodeo as Stephano

Recurring

Jayne Meadows Jayne Meadows (born Jane Cotter; September 27, 1919 – April 26, 2015), also known as Jayne Meadows Allen, was an American stage, film and television actress, as well as an author and lecturer. She was nominated for three Emmy Awards dur ...

as Alice Morgan-DuPont-Sutton-Cushing-Ferruke

Guest stars

Barry Bostwick Barry Knapp Bostwick (born February 24, 1945) is an American actor. He is best known for portraying Brad Majors in the musical comedy horror film ''The Rocky Horror Picture Show'' (1975) and Mayor Randall Winston in the sitcom ''Spin City'' (199 ...

as Michael *

Bronson Pinchot Bronson Alcott Pinchot (; born May 20, 1959) is an American actor. He is best known for playing Balki Bartokomous on the ABC sitcom '' Perfect Strangers'' (1986–93). He also performed in films, such as ''Risky Business'' (1983), ''Beverly Hill ...

as Fred *

Doris Roberts Doris May Roberts ( Green; November 4, 1925 – April 17, 2016) was an American actress whose career spanned seven decades of television and film. She received five Emmy Awards and a Screen Actors Guild award during her acting career, which bega ...

as Maggie *

Paul Dooley Paul Dooley (born Paul Brown; February 22, 1928) is an American character actor, writer and comedian. He is known for his roles in ''Breaking Away'', ''Sixteen Candles'', and ''Popeye''. Early life Dooley was born Paul Brown on February 22, 1 ...

as Harry *

Tom Arnold Tom Arnold may refer to: * Tom Arnold (actor) (born 1959), American actor * Tom Arnold (economist) (born 1948), Irish CEO of Concern Worldwide * Tom Arnold (footballer) (1878–?), English footballer * Tom Arnold (literary scholar) (1823–1900), ...

as Tony

Episodes

Award nominations

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:High Society (Tv Series) 1995 American television series debuts 1996 American television series endings 1990s American sitcoms CBS original programming English-language television shows Television series by Warner Bros. Television Studios Television shows set in New York City