The Nanny

The Nanny
"The Tv Series, The Nanny Logo"
Format	Sitcom
Created by	Fran Drescher Peter Marc Jacobson
Developed by	Prudence Fraser Robert Sternin
Written by	Various
Directed by	Dorothy Lyman Lee Shallat
Starring	Fran Drescher Charles Shaughnessy Daniel Davis Lauren Lane Nicholle Tom Benjamin Salisbury Madeline Zima Renee Taylor Ann Guilbert Rachel Chagall
Opening theme	"The Nanny Named Fran" by Ann Hampton Callaway
Country of origin	United States
No. of seasons	6
No. of episodes	146 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive producer(s)	Fran Drescher Prudence Fraser Peter Marc Jacobson Frank Lombardi Caryn Lucas Robert Sternin Diane Wilk
Producer(s)	Produced by: Dorothy Lyman Writing producers: Kathy Landsberg Fran Drescher
Running time	est. 23 minutes
Distributor	TriStar Television (1994-1999) Columbia TriStar Television (1999-2002 syndication) Sony Pictures Television (2002-present, reruns only) (Currently on Nick at Nite)
Broadcast
Original channel	CBS
Picture format	4:3
Audio format	Stereo
Original run	November 3, 1993 – June 23, 1999
Status	syndicated on Nick at Nite

The Nanny is an American situation comedy, co-produced by Sternin & Fraser Ink, Inc. and Highschool Sweethearts Productions in association with TriStar Television for the CBS network. It first aired from November 3, 1993, to June 23, 1999, and starred actress Fran Drescher as Fran Fine, a charming and bubbly Jewish Queens native who casually becomes the nanny of three children from the New York upper class. The show's theme song was written and performed by Ann Hampton Callaway.

Created and executive produced by Drescher and her then-husband Peter Marc Jacobson, The Nanny took much of its inspiration from Drescher's personal life, involving names and characteristics based on near relatives and friends.^[1] The show earned a Rose d'Or and one Emmy Award, out of a total of 13 nominations, and Drescher was twice nominated for a Golden Globe^[1]. Since the early 2000s the sitcom has also spawned several foreign adaptations, loosely inspired by the original scripts.

Plot

The Nanny is primarily based upon the story of nasal-voiced Fran Fine (played by Fran Drescher) who is from Flushing, Queens. Fine appears at the doorstep of a wealthy widowed Englishman, Broadway theatrical producer Maxwell Sheffield (played by former Days of Our Lives star Charles Shaughnessy), while selling cosmetics. Fran has just been fired from her job as a bridal consultant by her ex-boyfriend, Danny, and Maxwell mistakenly believes that she has been sent by a nanny agency and quickly hires her to be nanny to his three kids. Fran, with her nontraditional nurturing style and no-nonsense honesty, soon becomes a favorite with the kids as well as Maxwell, as they come to respect her opinions and love her as a person. It is a situation of blue collar meets blue blood, as Fran gives the prim-and-proper Maxwell and his children a dose of "Queens logic," helping them to become a healthy, happy family.

Proudly running the Sheffield household is the butler, Niles (Daniel Davis), who watches all events with a bemused eye and levels problems with his quick wit. Niles quickly recognizes Fran's gift for bringing warmth into the family and becomes fast friends with her. He does his best to undermine Maxwell's socialite business partner, C. C. Babcock (Lauren Lane), in their ongoing game of one-upmanship. C. C. views Fran with a mixture of skepticism and jealousy, as they both have designs on the very available Mr. Sheffield.

Perpetually hovering close by are Fran's typically obsessive and food-loving "Jewish mother" Sylvia (Renée Taylor); her rarely-seen but often-mentioned father Morty; her cigarette-addicted senile grandmother Yetta (Ann Guilbert), dispensing nonsensical advice and often erroneously believing Mr.Sheffield to already be Fran's husband and his children to be hers as well (a belief she does not keep to herself); and Fran's dim-witted best friend Val (Rachel Chagall), keeping her company on the perpetual quest for a husband and constantly reminding Fran how things can always get worse (as Val has much less luck than Fran).

Cast

Regular

For a full list of characters with articles, see the individual character articles.

The Nanny maintained an ensemble cast, keeping the same set of characters for its entire six-season run. Numerous secondary characters and love interests for these characters appeared intermittently to complement storylines that generally revolved around this core group.

Recurring

Guest Starring

Guest stars

Although largely operating around that main ensemble cast, The Nanny featured an enormous number of guest stars over the years. Notable repeat guests included Pamela Anderson as Fran's nemesis Heather Biblow, Ray Charles as Yetta's fiancé Sammy, Lainie Kazan as Fran's paternal aunt Freida, and Spalding Gray as Dr. Jack Miller. Most celebrities guest-starred in single episodes as themselves, primarily appearing in connection with Maxwell's business relations, such as actors and actresses Chevy Chase, Billy Ray Cyrus, Lesley-Anne Down, Erik Estrada, Dan Aykroyd, Joe Lando, Shari Lewis, Bette Midler, Jane Seymour, Cloris Leachman, Elizabeth Taylor, Jason Alexander, Lynn Redgrave and Hunter Tylo; media personalities Roger Clinton, Jr., Jay Leno, David Letterman, and Donald Trump; and musicians such as Lisa Loeb, Celine Dion, Cher, Elton John, Eartha Kitt, Patti LaBelle and Brian Setzer among many others. Actress and model Twiggy appeared in a 1994 episode. Rapper Coolio, Whoopi Goldberg, Steve Lawrence and Rosie O'Donnell, however, guest starred as both characters and themselves in different episodes. Two-time "Survivor" Jonathan Penner appeared as Fran's former fiance, Danny Imperialli. James Marsden appeared as Maggie's boyfriend, Eddie, and Telma Hopkins appeared as Fran's "mother" in the episode Fran's Roots.

While starring, Fran Drescher also reprised her role of Bobbi Fleckman from the 1984 film This Is Spinal Tap and made a cameo appearance as herself in the second last episode; Charles Shaughnessy followed with a double role as a foreign sultan in a special episode. Drescher's real-life parents, Morty and Sylvia Drescher made appearances as Fran's Uncle Stanley and Aunt Rose; her Pomeranian Chester appeared as C.C.'s pet in more than a dozen episodes. Renee Taylor's husband, Joe Bologna, and their son Gabriel also had minor roles as doctors on the show. Ray Romano made a crossover as Ray Barone, Fran's former fellow student, linking The Nanny with his comedy Everybody Loves Raymond. Tom Bergeron starred as himself in an episode where Maxwell was a star on Hollywood Squares, as a replacement for Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Episode Overview

The Nanny: Reunion Special

Production

It was not until 1991 - the same year Drescher decided to visit friend Twiggy Lawson and her family in London, England^[1] that the pair came up with early drafts for The Nanny. Inspired by a culture-clashy shopping tour with Lawson's teenage daughter which saw Drescher actually functioning in a less parental but "humorous [...] kind of Queens logic, self-serving advice" mode,^[2] she convinced her husband starting work of what she called "doing a spin on [the 1965 film] The Sound of Music."^[2] However, it was not until a transatlantic flight to Paris that Drescher persuaded fellow passenger Jeff Sagansky, at the time president of CBS Corporation, for whom she had starred in the short-lived TV series Princesses, to meet with her and Jacobson when Drescher returned to Los Angeles, California.^[1]

Back in Los Angeles, the pair pitched their idea to Tim Flack and Joe Voci, both in comedy development at CBS.^[2] Sagansky brought in experienced producers Robert Sternin and Prudence Fraser,^[2] another husband-and-wife team with whom Drescher had worked before during guesting on Who's the Boss? in 1985 and 1986. Interested, both couples teamed up to write the script for the pilot together, creating a character with the intention to build off Drescher's image. "Our business strategy was to create a show that was going to complement our writing, complement me as a talent,"^[2] Drescher said in an 1997 interview with the Hollywood Reporter. As a result, the characters draw deeply on the Drescher family, including Fran Fine's parents, Sylvia and Morty, and grandmother Yetta, who all were named after Drescher's real-life counterparts.

Crew

Most of all early The Nanny episodes were shot in front of a live studio audience on Stage 6 at the Culver Studios (during later seasons the taping was no longer performed before an audience due to the complexities of the fantasy sequences, costume changes etc.), generally on Friday nights.^[3] Scripts for a new episode were issued the Monday before for a read-through; Wednesday was rehearsal and network run-through day, and final scripts were issued on Thursday.^[3]

Nearly 100 crew members were involved in the shooting of a single episode.^[4] Although Drescher, Fraser, Jacobson and Sternin, the show's only executive producers for the first four seasons, coordinated "pretty much everything" at the beginning,^[4] according to Sternin, they eventually found their niche and in the following years, Drescher and Sternin decided to focus on writing story outlines, while Jacobson presided over the writing team, and Fraser observed the run-throughs.^[4] The four of them were later joined by Frank Lombardi, Caryn Lucas and Diane Wilk.

Reaction

The show languished its first year. When it was nearly canceled, Sagansky stepped in as its champion. According to Jacobson: "At all those affiliate meetings, he used to say, 'Stick by The Nanny!' He knew it was something special."^[5] The sitcom was the first new show delivered to CBS for the 1993 season and the highest-tested pilot at the network in years.^[2] The series was also hugely successful internationally, especially in Australia,^[5] where it was one of the highest rated programs during the mid-late 1990s.

Although soon emerging as a favorite among the company, sponsors questioned whether the writers had ventured too far in terms of ethnicity and Drescher acted too obviously Jewish.^[2] The actress who experienced pressure to alter her character’s identification, however, declined to change Fran Fine into an Italian American: "On TV, you have to work fast, and the most real, the most rooted in reality to me is Jewish. I wanted to do it closest to what I knew."^[6] By contrast, the producers came to the conclusion that to oppose her should be a family of British origin, so "she wouldn't come across as Jewish so much as the American you were rooting for," Sternin explained. "The idea was to make her the American girl who happens to be Jewish rather than the Jewish girl working for the WASPs."^[2]

Awards

Humor

The comedy in The Nanny was formulated with many running gags, which contributed heavily to the success of the series. Much of this formula was character-based, with all major characters possessing a specific trait or quirks that provided a source of parody for other characters. The conflicting elements of each character's own comedy were often played off against one another (Fran and Maxwell, Niles and C.C., Maggie and Brighton). Occasionally the characters would break the fourth wall and comment on the situations themselves, or Fran would basically comment to the audience or look into the camera.

Other running gags include Fran constantly referring to eccentric family members (some never shown); Fran lying about her age--especially to men; Maxwell fighting through his rivalry with actual Broadway producer Andrew Lloyd Webber; Sylvia loving food in excess; Niles delivering sharp one-liners, often aimed at C.C.; C.C. cold-heartedly reacting to situations that are usually sentimental to others; Gracie psychologically analyzing various situations; Fran and Val lacking intelligence and obsessing with material possessions (i.e. clothes); Yetta making disconnected comments revealing her senility; Fran criticizing Maxwell's and Niles' reserved and inhibited British nature; Brighton morphing into a hopeless dork; Niles' last name never being revealed; C.C. covering her long-unrevealed name (finally given as Chastity Claire in the series finale); C.C. failing to remember the names of the Sheffield children; Niles offering obvious hints to Maxwell and Fran about them realizing they should be together; C.C. pining over her unrequited romantic interest in Maxwell; and Fran obsessing with Barbra Streisand. There was also the occasional tryst between Niles and C.C., contrasting with their typical open disdain for each other.

In addition, there is also a great deal of physical comedy in The Nanny including exaggerated falls and chases. Drescher's facial expressions, when shocked or surprised, can also be seen as reminiscent of Lucille Ball's portrayals of Lucy Ricardo and Lucy Carmichael. The parallels were suggested in one episode, where an exasperated Mr. Sheffield refers to Fran as "Mrs Carmichael". Viewers for Quality Television calls The Nanny "the 90s version of I Love Lucy. It is well written and entertaining"^[7].

Syndication

• The Nanny began in off-network syndication starting in September 1997.
• After CBS ended their reruns of The Nanny, it aired reruns on Fox until 2004.
• The Nanny has previously aired on Lifetime Television and UPN affiliates until 2008.
• Nick at Nite started airing reruns of The Nanny on May 10, 2009.
• After April 2010, the show will no longer be seen on Nickelodeon's nighttime line-up. Nick at Nite's sister channel, TV Land, will then air the series.

DVD releases

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has released seasons 1, 2 & 3 of The Nanny on DVD in regions 1, 2 & 4. Season 3 was released on March 17, 2009 in Region 1, more than 2 years after the release of season 2. [1]

It is not known when the remaining 3 seasons will be released.

Foreign adaptations

Countries with local versions

The Nanny was shown in more than eighty countries worldwide. In addition, several local versions of the show have been produced in other countries. These shows follow the original scripts very closely, but with minor alterations in order to adapt to their respective country's culture. The remake in Russia was so popular that some original American writers were commissioned to write new scripts after all original episodes were remade.^[8]

See also

• List of The Nanny episodes

References

External links

• The Nanny Official site at Sony Pictures Television
• The Nanny at Lifetime Television
• The Nanny at Internet Movie Database
• The Nanny at TV.com

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