In 1970, Mary Tyler Moore returned to television in a role that would surpass her defining role as Laura Petrie on The Dick Van Dyke Show.
The Mary Tyler Moore Show premiered on CBS on Sept. 19, 1970, introducing viewers to Mary Richards, a 30-year-old single woman who moved to Minneapolis after a broken engagement and began a new life working as an associate producer at fictional television station WJM. CBS records confirm the series premiered on Sept. 19 and remained on the network until 1977.
Fifty-six years later, the sitcom is still routinely counted among the greatest television series ever made.
Rolling Stone ranked The Mary Tyler Moore Show No. 10 on its 2022 list of the 100 greatest TV shows, while Variety placed it even higher, at No. 9, the following year.
Those honors are hardly outliers. TV Guide ranks it at No. 7 of the greatest TV shows ever, the Writers Guild of America previously ranked it the sixth-best-written television series of all time and Entertainment Weekly placed it at No. 4 on its 2013 ranking of the best series ever
“Only the greatest, most detailed portrayal of a single career woman in TV history. With laughs and guts, MTM established the paradigm of ‘the workplace family,'” wrote EW. “Moore proved to be one of the medium’s finest straight-women as well as one of its most beautiful comedians.”
But before all those accolades, Moore wasn’t even sure she wanted to do the show.
Moore was initially reluctant to commit to another series because she feared any new character would inevitably be compared to Laura Petrie, her beloved role on The Dick Van Dyke Show.
Even Mary Richards nearly looked very different. The character was originally envisioned as a divorcée, but divorce remained controversial on television at the time. CBS was also reportedly concerned viewers might somehow conclude that Moore’s new character had divorced Van Dyke’s Rob Petrie, so Mary instead arrived in Minneapolis after ending a long-term relationship.
That seemingly simple premise proved significant.
Mary Richards was an unmarried woman building a career and an independent life, rather than a sitcom heroine defined primarily as someone’s wife or mother. The show eventually tackled subjects including workplace discrimination, equal pay, premarital sex, divorce and homosexuality within its comedy.
Moore was surrounded by an extraordinary ensemble. Ed Asner played gruff news producer Lou Grant, Gavin MacLeod was writer Murray Slaughter, Ted Knight portrayed pompous anchorman Ted Baxter, Valerie Harper played Mary’s best friend Rhoda Morgenstern, Cloris Leachman was her landlady and friend Phyllis Lindstrom and Betty White later joined the cast as Sue Ann Nivens.
The sitcom ultimately ran seven seasons and 168 episodes, ending in 1977. Along the way, it launched three spinoffs: Rhoda, Phyllis and Lou Grant.
Its awards haul was equally formidable. The Mary Tyler Moore Show won 29 Emmys, a television record that stood until Frasier earned its 30th in 2002.
The influence extended far beyond awards. Tina Fey has cited the series as an inspiration for 30 Rock, particularly its focus on workplace relationships, while Friends co-creator Marta Kauffman called the Mary Tyler Moore Show finale the “gold standard” as the writers prepared to end their own series.
Even individual moments have become television landmarks. In 1997, TV Guide named “Chuckles Bites the Dust” the greatest television episode of all time, while Mary’s famous hat toss from the opening credits was later ranked by Entertainment Weekly as the second-greatest television moment of the 1970s.
Not bad for a show its star initially wasn’t sure she wanted to make.
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