Dixie McCall RN smokes
She should know better.
shareWell, looks like I'm not the only one who watched 905-WILD today! Yeah, I was a bit disppointed in her.
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MovieChat Forums > Emergency! (1972) Discussion > Dixie McCall RN smokes
It was the '70s. A LOT of people smoked then. Most jarring to me was the scene of Dixie smoking IN the hospital, at the base station.
shareWas she smoking at the base station, or in the breakroom while watching the TV news report about Emil Gower? 📺
shareEven though the breakroom would make tons more sense, I think Dixie was in the corner of the base station. You can see that little door back there, and the edge of the medicine cabinet on the left.
Here she is in 905-Wild.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4Mf9ke3x8R9NWhKTGxnektQckU/view?usp=sharing
And here's a pic from the episode Insomnia. Other than Johnny falling asleep and totally ignoring the hottie standing a foot away from him, check the corner on the right. You can see the edge of the medicine cabinet, the file holder on the wall, and of course the mystery door that we never see utilized.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4Mf9ke3x8R9Q1A1MlNYaFUxTlU/view?usp=sharing
I'm sure there are better pics of this particular corner, but this is the only one I could think of at the moment.
Back in the early 80's, I worked in Radiation Therapy and puffed away. It was allowed back then. Thankfully, I have given up that awful habit.
shareYeah, I see it now. I never noticed that portable TV before. And, like you said, if she wanted to smoke and watch TV you'd think she would go into the breakroom instead of sitting at the base station in front of everybody.
shareLots of nurses still smoke and most I've dealt with are awful.
shareYes they do. I am a former nurse, and non-smoker. I often had to take care of the nurses who smoked patients while they went outside on smoke breaks.
shareWow. I just saw your screenshot of Dixie smoking at the Base Station Slakersmom. Good call. I haven't seen any episode where she smokes. I'll be on the lookout for it.
But I wanted to chime in here about Julie London & Jack Webb. They were of the old school thought where smoking like a chimney & drinking like a fish was the norm. That's what they did back in their day before all that smoke got to London's singing voice.
So it could be that Webb directed London to smoke, or London told her ex hubby, she would be smoking and reading a magazine at the base Station. And he nodded ok. Or something like that.
"Your Ignorance Makes Me Ill & Angry"
The episode in that screen pic is 905-Wild, at the end of season 4.
You're right that "back in the day" everyone seemed to smoke, and it was nothing to have a "highball" before dinner, and another drink (or three) afterward. But in this case, I don't think Jack Webb had anything to do with Julie's smoking on camera. He was long gone from any involvement with Emergency! by the time this episode was filmed. In fact, he wasn't involved after the first season.
I don't think Jack Webb had anything to do with Julie's smoking on camera.He was long gone from any involvement with Emergency! by the time this episode was filmed.
Actually, Webb directed this episode. That may explain the stilted dialogue, culminating in Dixie's oh-so-defiant (and oh-so-cheesy) stand where she says, "If you don't treat this little animal, I will". 😵 share
Yikes, you're exactly right, I had forgotten which episode we were talking about. Duh to me! With that in mind, maybe Webb's directing this episode is WHY she's smoking, and maybe there's a little "something" in that cup of hers besides coffee.
shareThat's funny. We just posted at the same time Slakersmom. I certainly don't know for sure. Plus, Gator just posted a few minutes ago, and he said just about the same thing you did.
Thank you very much Gator. I didn't see this episode you, slakersmom, and I are talking about. But I'll be on the lookout for it when MeTV airs it again.
shareThank you for your input Slakersmom.
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It really is something watching retro TV where they smoke everywhere. Even in hospitals and a Dr. will light a cig for someone as Dr. Early did in a recent episode.
shareI was alive during the smoking era and grew up around it. My Dad and Grandparents smoked, all in the house. I always think about how bad everyone must have smelled. My Dad still smokes and I can't stand the smell of his car. I hate even getting in it because I feel like it sticks to me, and I actually enjoy a cigarette every once in a while. However after I smoke one I have to shower that evening because I won't even lay on my pillow with a hint of smoke in my hair.
It's not so odd to me when I see people smoking in public places on tv because I remember what it was like. What I do find so odd is people smoking on planes. The pilots were even allowed to smoke.
It took me three hours to figure out that FU was Felix Ungar.
I was reading on Wikipedia today that Julie London had been chain smoking since she was sixteen years old. Like other people have said, this was the norm for the 40s and 50s, because people didn't know how dangerous it was back then. If someone has been smoking for 50 years, it catches up with them. Ten years ago, I lost a paternal aunt to throat cancer, shortly before her 73rd birthday. We had been after her for years to quit, but her attitude was like, "Leave me the hell alone! I'll do whatever I damn well please!"
shareSmoking is disgusting. I'm highly allergic to cigarette and cigar smoke. If I'm near someone who had a cigarette and the smell is on there clothes, instant asthma attack, sometimes so bad I had to be bought to the emergency room. The problem for most smokers, especially long term smokers, they've lost their sense of smell and taste. So most have no idea that they have that horrible stanch in their hair and clothes. If they smoke in their homes it's in the fabric of curtains,rugs, furniture and even on the walls. When my aunt passed away from cancer (who smoked like a chimney) the walls of her house had a dark tint to them from years of smoking. It was so gross. If smoking does that to the walls and furniture I'd hate to see their lungs. We know more about smoking now but in the 70's it was thought of as being "hip" and "cool."
Don't get me started on the fashion. Ugliest period in fashion. Looking at Robert Fuller's cloths, the polyester coats, ties and pants. I laughed for 10 minutes.
Years ago, an office I worked in, there were some smokers, who of course had to go outside the building to have their cigarettes. I assume both women smoked relatively equal number of cigarettes. One always smelled like cigarettes, no matter how long it had been since she'd last smoked. The other one never smelled of smoke. Maybe she just found a better place to stand?
Don't get me started on the fashion. Ugliest period in fashion.
I have to admit I can't stand anything about the years from about 1967 through 1972. I hate the music, I hate the terrible world events/politics of the time, and I also hate the clothing. Nothing good came from those years. A lot of TV sucked during that time also. (But not all, like Adam-12, although I probably enjoy it better now than I did then.) share
I've never understood singers who smoked. I know the rat pack all did but it does strange things to your vocal cords.
Sorry I was still a kid in elementary school, but I have a strange recollection of being in the third grade, first day of school wearing a flower power mini skirt with daisy's on it. I remember more from the late 70's pleasant blouses,no bra's tunics, culottes, leather scandals, hip huggers, platform shoes and bell bottoms with big flares, tied dyed t-shirts, long dresses and skirts, bright colors and polyester everything for men. I've always hated polyester and how it felt on my skin. I don't remember Adam-12 too much, if it was on after 9 I was in bed. I vaguely remember a lot of cops shows in the 1970's. I remember they had a Saturday morning cartoon of Emergency. I liked Emergency because it was different and I thought Randolph Mantooth was so cute. I had posters of him on my walls.
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shareDon't get me started on the fashion. Ugliest period in fashion. Looking at Robert Fuller's cloths, the polyester coats, ties and pants. I laughed for 10 minutes.
I think "The Brady Bunch" totally epitomizes this. When I watch that show now, I am appalled at how ugly all of their clothing and hairstyles were. Mrs. Brady's iconic "flippy long shag" hairstyle, Mr. Brady's curly perm, the boys' long, unruly hair...ugh.
There was an episode or two during the later seasons where Mr. Brady actually wore a floral print shirt with plaid pants. They weren't even the same colors. The girls wore those hideous high-waisted bell bottoms and platform shoes, and Mrs. Brady wore those pantsuits with the thigh-length tops...again, ugh.
I sometimes think, when I see someone who was at the peak of their youth and beauty during that period like Susan Dey or Peggy Lipton, what a bummer it would be to be young and beautiful and yet wear such ugly fashions.
In terms of "Emergency!", this era did those actors no favors either. Kevin Tighe is a very handsome man, but that hair and those sideburns...uh-uh. Made him look much older than he was, IMHO. I've seen Tim Donnelly in some old "Dragnet" episodes and he was actually quite attractive minus the '70s 'fro and huge mustache. On "Emergency!" he reminds me of a clown. Johnny Gage, well, other than those times when his hair looked like it was cut with a machete, it would be hard to make him look bad, no matter the time frame. share
Johnny Gage, well, other than those times when his hair looked like it was cut with a machete, it would be hard to make him look bad, no matter the time frame.
The machete cut wouldn't have even been so bad if he had at least run a comb or even just a salad fork through it occasionally (like right before the camera was aimed at him).
Say what you will about Gage/Mantooth, spending all his time primping in front of a mirror admiring himself was/is evidently not one of his faults. share
To defend Chet's mustache, firefighters are required to be clean shaven as far as beards go, therefore the big mustache is a sort of tradition in the fire service. I don't know if he grew it that way because he wanted to, or if he did it for the show.
Training probies:
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/70/a6/be/70a6bebc526a1a28740ef66f12fb2e25.jpg
Speaking of '70s fashion (or even late '60s)....
In various shows of that time (The Brady Bunch, on Adam-12, Emergency, etc.), we've seen little girls wearing what I call a Cindy Brady dress: a dress, usually with frilly collar, that barely covers her butt. Did little girls ever really dress like that? I was a kid at about that time and I never saw a girl dressed like that. EVER. Maybe it was a California thing???
Mr. Brady actually wore a floral print shirt with plaid pants.
Somewhere in my archives (and therefore somewhere in the Screenpic threads on this forum) there's a picture of Dr. Brackett dressed like this.
Oh wait, here are two examples... from the same episode, no less.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4Mf9ke3x8R9MG9fWFNkb0dJc2M/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4Mf9ke3x8R9S0p1RERWLXkzMEE/view?usp=sharing
Johnny Gage, well, other than those times when his hair looked like it was cut with a machete, it would be hard to make him look bad
In the final season of the show, Randy often looked very tired. This was the height of his non-combed-hair look as well (think Santa Rosa County) and the combination of unkempt hair and looking tired and it added up to Randy looking kinda old. Maybe he was working on another project at that time (there are other reasons to think this) or maybe he was just staying out late partying (probably not, lol) but he definitely looked the worse for wear. Later on, during the god-awful Emergency! movies, he looked much better, almost back to his "pretty Johnny" days. share
Yes, miniskirts were in for teens and young adults in the late 60's and early 70's. Short dresses with stockings were normal for little girls, at least on school picture day, to church, etc. IIRC, they were often sleeveless with a shirt of some sort underneath. They usually wore white stockings underneath, with early elementary age kids and younger wearing some sort of lacy puffy panty thingamabobs. At least around here...don't know about other places.
For everyday dress, they usually wore shorts and T's, or some bell bottomed pants or jeans. For us guys, it was T's and Toughskins (Sears) for the young kids and Levi's, Wranglers, etc. with concert T's and "Ass Gas or Grass" or "Keep On Truckin" for older guys. In the mid-late 70's I remember Sedgefield, with the built in edge and Star Wars T's along with Charlie's Angels T's, etc.
I also recall tube tops getting popular in the mid 70's. Elementary age girls even wore them to school, but none of the older kids were allowed to. That was around the time mood rings, CB radios, and Bruce Lee got big in my school. Dynomite! (JJ) too. :)
This is what I'm referring to.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4Mf9ke3x8R9akJBbGhIRGpGd1k/view?usp=sharing
Cindy seemed to be dressed like this very often (if not almost all the time), and as I've mentioned, I've seen other little girls that age (between, say 5-9 years old) dressed like this on TV. And yet, in real life I don't remember seeing a single six-year-old wearing a dress this short. Talk about "I see London, I see France...."
Since I've only ever seen girls this age dressed this way on TV, I'm wondering if it was a California thing. It certainly wasn't a 'New York thing.'
It certainly wasn't an "Ohio thing" either, lol. I am a few years younger than Cindy/Susan and my mother would have never sent me out of the house wearing something that short. The poor kid couldn't even bend over or she risked showing the world her underwear and possibly more!
When I started kindergarten in 1970 all of the girls still wore dresses (we didn't start wearing pants to school until the early'70s where I lived) but they covered us and it seems that we usually wore tights with them, as opposed to little bobby socks like Cindy wore, even when it was warm outside. I kind of wonder if the whole Cindy Brady look was something concocted in Sherwood Schwartz's mind to try to replicate the cuteness of Shirley Temple, because she wore unbelievably short dresses and bobby socks in her movies too, just like Cindy. And then there was that tragic Shirley Temple episode late in the series where they attempted to make twelve year old Cindy in braids and braces into a modern day Curly Top...so odd and so stupid!
It also boggles my mind that it was portrayed on TV back then that parents (albeit fictional sitcom parents) would send their six year old child out the door in dresses that short and revealing to walk to school accompanied only by her seven year old brother and nobody batted an eye. In today's world, they would have almost certainly been approached, if not abducted. Even kids in parkas and long pants aren't safe walking to school alone these days.
There was also the scene in the Christmas episode where Mr. Brady takes Cindy shopping at a department store and he leaves her alone waiting in line to see Santa while he goes off to do some more shopping. Today's parents wonder, was he mad??? Back then it must have been at least semi normal.
In getting back to "Emergency!", though, it does seem that the Bradys lived in some kind of bubble, because the kids who appeared in rescue scenes and hospital scenes in "Emergency!" seemed to be dressed more conservatively. At least their little bums were covered, for heaven's sake!
An amazing amount of nurses still smoke, doctors possibly not so much.
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