Paff

Yes, because he's making money off of every drink, unlike Woody who only gets his regular hourly salary. If I made Woody work that hard, then I would tip him every round. Sam makes the money in the volume of the drinks he's selling. And, if I did tip Sam, I'd expect him to put the money in the tip jar and then that money goes to Woody and whatever other unseen bartender is working that shift.

Back to the comedic timing of the late Kirstie Alley though, there were huge laughs when Robin called her from the Concorde en route to Boston, and Rebecca was sure the call was to break up with her. Woody is confused, because if the Concorde flies faster than the speed of sound, wouldn't Robin arrive before the phone call came in? And so begins a discussion of the speed of various technologies one uses in order to break up with Rebecca Howe. And when Cliff applies Einstein's Theory of Relativity to twin babies who want to break up with Rebecca but one is launched into space, Rebecca just goes "shut up shut up shut up shut up!"

I think it was responses like that to the mundane bar conversations that makes me favor Alley's Rebecca over Long's Diane. I can't see Diane delivering the same line, she'd want to interject some other response instead.

T-bone22

Also, table service was not necessary at Cheer's. People could certainly walk up to the bar and order their drinks themselves. Most bars don't have table service unless they also serve food. Carla probably just worked evenings and there was no table service during the day. There was no "day crew" IMO

T-bone22

Sam broke poor Ruben the bus boy's heart.

GoldenJCJ

The day crew probably spent their entire shift bitching about Sam and crew for spending all their time goofing around and not getting shit done.

T-bone22

The real question is... how many beers did Norm drink per night?

Coral

Yeah, there were no other staff at Cheers. This is a small bar - no way there would be other staff that we never saw... even though the show takes place during all different hours of the day and evening.
There'd be overlapping shifts and at least one iota of mention of other staff - even if no names were given.

I think Sam and Coach/Woody rotated who opens the bar at noon and Carla's shift starts at around 3 or 4pm and works until midnight.
There are no waiters/waitresses for a few hours after it opens.

Kirstie Alley was great as Rebecca (just to get this back on topic). Oh, back off topic again... Rebecca running Cheers (when it was owned by a corporation) had to be a very minimal amount of work. I think I recall her doing other non-Cheers related work for the corporation, no?

I don't think he drank as much as they joke about. Every time I see him, he's nursing his beer big time.

T-bone22

Sam is constantly refilling his beer. There was an episode early on where he had a meeting with his boss at the bar. He made Coach promise to only give him 1 beer for the night. He drank the whole mug in 1 quick gulp.

movieguru

That would still have them working seven days a week, with no days off and no coverage for when anyone got sick. Sam would not have had the time to bang all the ladies and take them on trips/ drives up the coast.

I figured Sam would maybe have temps from an agency fill in certain days or times of the week. None of the temps stayed long enough for the regulars at the bar to remember their names or even bother to mention them in any of their conversations on screen.

Coral

^ It's obviously a sitcom and we're not supposed to take most of the stuff realistically, but I really think the show is pretty much telling the audience that the Cheers staff is all there is - as unrealistic is that may be.

Kinda funny that the new show Blockbuster went the other way with 6 employees who seem to work every day... in a video rental store... in 2022.
And Sunny in Philly has the worst run bar in the world. So often the whole gang is away from the bar in the middle of the day or evening doing something or other that the bar is closed half the time. There doesn't even seem to be a consistent time/day that it's closed - it's just whenever they feel like it.

movieguru

It's just fun for people to speculate on tv shows like that. It's like when people debate why they had suitcases full of clothes, money, and books when they were going on a three hour tour on Gilligan's Island. Same thing can be said for something like Star Trek: TNG. Whenever something interesting was about to happen at the beginning of the episode, there was always at least two senior members of the crew on the bridge at that time. Nothing major ever happened when whatever was considered the "overnight" bridge crew were in charge. It was like Picard, Riker, and Data were on the bridge nearly 24 hours a day. Data could have done it, but the others were human and would have required rest.

Decker

Or on Taxi where the guys never sat around a table the right way.

movieguru

I never watched Taxi much. I always assumed these scenes were before or after their shifts started/ended, but I could be wrong.

Decker

Oh yeah, I have no issues with everyone hanging out, but no matter how many people were sitting around a table, they always left one side unoccupied (for the camera) and it drove me nuts.

movieguru

I was thinking about this for Cheers the other night. I don't think they ever show the wall on the right side of the bar (right side if you are entering the bar) except for that elevated little part right next to the entrance door. You can sometimes see a few tables to Norm's left, but I don't think the wall is ever seen. I'm sure that's where the cameras and the audience are located, but I don't think the bar has ever been seen from that angle before.

Decker

It was a trip going to the filming and seeing the bar all spread out, Sam's office and the pool room to the right of the bar, then to the left was the other location (a hotel room in my case). I guess I kind of thought it would be different sets brought in and out in front of the audience like in a play, but it's all just built out in front of the audience and extending to both sides instead.

Also there was a whole "C" subplot with Carla that was kind of funny but was totally excised when the episode aired on TV -- the first time. There were even more edits in syndication.

Double_Oh_7

I saw an interview with one of the Cheers producers and he said it was so bad early in Kirstie's first season, all they did was figure out how to get her from the front door into the office. They had no idea what to do with the character.

Paff

Well, not a Kirstie Alley bit, but her first season did feature the "'I' on Sports" episode. There's not a Cheers fan in existence who is watching sports and when a player goes down with a groin injury, doesn't say "G-G-G-G-Groin injury! I said a groin injury!"

ETA: Now that I think about it, there were several great moments in Alley's first season. I liked Tom Skerritt as Evan Drake, Rebecca's crush. That led to the great episode where Rebecca was stuck in Drake's home while Norm was painting it, and all the efforts to get her out when Drake came home early. The episode where Drake brought his hot daughter (niece?) to work in the bar but didn't tell anyone they were related so Rebecca assumed they were sleeping together.

Rebecca: You must be the slut
Drake's daughter: WHAT?
Rebecca: Slot. You must be here to fill the slot.

Rebecca: Let's play guessing games. I like guessing games. Why is Evan Drake giving this girl a job at the bar? Anyone?
Norm: Young go-getter on her way up in the corporation?
Cliff: Helping out a family friend?
Sam: They're sleeping together?
Rebecca: OF COURSE THEY'RE SLEEPING TOGETHER!

And I believe it was the season finale where Rebecca was crying her heart out to Sam, but he just kept getting turned on. So in an effort to just be a friend, he goes down to the lobby of her apartment building so they can just talk on the phone instead.
Rebecca: Sam, this is dumb, just come up here. I trust you.
Sam: Yeah? Check your bra
Rebecca (looks to see she's no longer wearing one): How did you do that?

Abob Teff

Forgot about that. Off to rename my pathetic excuse of a fantasy football team ... I was going to rename them the 4077th. G-G-G-Groin Injury it is.

story

Mod Note: There's an excellent thread celebrating and remembering Kristie Alley who recently passed away at age 71. This thread is starting with posts spun out of that thread.

GuessWho

Does the staircase to the restaurant count?

GuessWho

Some bars are closed Mondays and/or Tuesdays, esp post-pandemic.

Paff

Harry the Hat knew an entrance into the pool room.

But in all seriousness, one could just go to the Bull & Finch (except I think they've dropped the charade and just call it Cheers now) and see how the exits are laid out.

Coral

I don't think the interior of the real Cheers has the same layout as the show.

GoldenJCJ

I listened to the extended theme song the other day when Kirsten Alley passed. It’s such a nostalgic song that brings me right back to childhood watching Cheers on Thursday nights.

Although, in current times there’s a, umm, problematic line about halfway through the song that I don’t remember catching my attention before. The line in question starts at 1:16.

Paff

Yeah, another problematic 80s song. There's a lot more.

And of course, when I think of the Cheers theme, and Kirstie Alley of course, this comes to mind: