Back to the Time Warp

By Richard Zoglin

They had a wedding in Mayberry last week. Barney Fife (Don Knotts), decked out in his best city-slicker suit, finally walked down the aisle with his longtime heartthrob Thelma Lou. A beaming Andy Taylor (Andy Griffith), Barney's old friend and ex-boss, was the best man. Even Gomer Pyle (Jim Nabors) was on hand to lead the red-robed choir.

Barney's marital status is not the only thing changing in sleepy Mayberry, N.C. Little Opie Taylor (Ron Howard) is all grown up now, editing the town newspaper and about to become a father. Gomer, who left Mayberry in 1964 to join the Marines (and star in his own series, Gomer Pyle--USMC) is back at the old gas station, working alongside his cousin Goober (George Lindsey). And Andy, who married Helen Crump and moved to Ohio 18 years ago, has returned to Mayberry and decided to run for sheriff again. His opponent turns out to be none other than his former deputy, Barney. As Gomer might put it, Gaw-lee!

The predicament will be resolved to everyone's heartwarming satisfaction in Return to Mayberry, an NBC movie currently filming northwest of Los Angeles for a planned telecast in April. The film marks a sentimental reunion, not only for fans of the Andy Griffith Show, which ran on CBS from 1960 to 1968 (when Griffith left, and the show was transmuted into Mayberry R.F.D.) but for the reassembled cast. "It's been wonderful seeing all the old friends," said Nabors, 52, who now tends a macadamia-nut farm in Maui between occasional singing engagements. "It's like a family that we all grew up with." Commented Griffith, 59, who has appeared in numerous series and TV movies since the Mayberry days: "It's like we finished the old show on Friday and started this one on Monday."

Return to Mayberry is the latest example of time-warp television: vintage shows that, after a decade or two in rerunland, have returned as new TV movies. Raymond Burr was back grilling witnesses in last December's Perry Mason Returns. Kung Fu, the early '70s hit starring David Carradine as an Eastern mystic in the American West, resurfaced as a CBS movie early in February. Kojak, Peyton Place and I Dream of Jeannie are among the other series that have been resurrected in the past year.

The stars of these shows are not always enthusiastic about retreading old ground. Larry Hagman, now the kingpin of Dallas, refused to re-create his old supporting role for NBC's I Dream of Jeannie: 15 Years Later. Says Star Barbara Eden: "It's dangerous messing around with something that people really liked, to try to repeat it." Dangerous, perhaps, but also potentially lucrative. Perry Mason Returns was the top-rated TV movie for all of 1985; a follow-up is planned for this spring, and up to three more for next season.

Even on TV's crowded reunion calendar, Return to Mayberry is a special event. The Andy Griffith Show was one of the biggest hits of its era (ranking in the Nielsen Top Ten, remarkably, for all of its eight seasons on the air), and continues to have a devoted following in reruns. With good reason. The show was one of TV's most endearing comedies, a graceful blend of homespun morality and small-town satire. At its core was a touching relationship between Sheriff Taylor and his adoring son Opie; surrounding it, an unforgettable band of local eccentrics, from garrulous Floyd the barber to Otis Campbell, the town drunk who locked himself in jail after every Saturday- night binge.

The Mayberry reunion was masterminded by Griffith himself, who first raised the idea when he and Howard had dinner following an Emmy Awards telecast three years ago. Several of the original creative team were rounded up, including Writers Harvey Bullock and Everett Greenbaum, Director Bob Sweeney and Composer Earle Hagen. Nearly all the show's stars agreed to return, as well as such minor players as Aneta Corsaut (Helen Crump), Betty Lynn (Thelma Lou), Hal Smith (Otis) and Howard Morris (Ernest T. Bass). The only notable absences: Frances Bavier (Aunt Bea), who was too ill to appear, and Howard McNair (Floyd), who died in 1969.

The town of Mayberry was re-created in the three-block-long community of Los Olivos, 21 miles from the Reagan ranch in the hills outside Santa Barbara. The stars have enjoyed the get-together almost as much as the curious townspeople, though the 19-day shooting schedule has been cramped. "We used to make it a point to move slow," said Knotts, 61, who won five Emmy Awards for his portrayal of the nervous, blustering Deputy Fife. "Now they make it a point to move fast."

For Howard, 31, who has blossomed into one of Hollywood's most successful directors (Cocoon, Splash and the upcoming Gung Ho), the prospect of returning to his childhood role caused some apprehension. He and Griffith were quite close during the series, and Howard recalls crying at the end of each season when the cast disbanded. "I can sleep through anything," he said, "but I was tossing and turning because I was nervous about this. I'm so relieved that the feelings are good."

On the set, Griffith could not resist a few sly pokes at grownup Opie's success. "I thought you had to be 50 to get your own name on a chair," he drawled on seeing the seat marked for his co-star. He was touched, however, when Howard at one point asked his advice on a line reading. Later, standing on the front porch of the tiny, whitewashed Baptist church where the wedding was filmed, Mayberry's gray-haired patriarch looked back pensively on the departed show. "Those," he said, "were the best years of my life."

With reporting by Jon D. Hull/Mayberry