Soap - Season One

Soap is a rare thing. A US sitcom that was actually good. It was witty, funny, clever, absurd and didn't rely solely on sight gags that Blind Freddy could spot coming three lines away. Neither did it need to have every joke explained in simple terms. It was still distinctly American in its look and general vibe, but it did what few other comedies did until recently - pushed boundaries, albeit sometimes naively and with a complete lack of respect.

Soap is essentially a melodramatic send-up of American soap operas a la Dynasty and Dallas filled with larger than life characters that were all glam and glitz with little real substance. Soap, however, also had some genuinely oddball characters that would not have been too out of place in an institution.

It is also the story of two families, the wealthy Tates and the not-so-wealthy Campbells. The two respective wives, Jessica (Katherine Helmond) and Mary (Cathryn Damon) as sisters, were the link between the two worlds. The families may be worlds apart financially, but as far as skeletons in the closet go, well it's a toss up.

"Confused? You won't be after this week's episode of Soap"

When the first series starts, Jessica is having an affair with her tennis coach, Peter (Robert Urich), and so is her daughter, Corinne (Diana Canova) because the man she really loves, Tim (Sal Viscuso) is a Catholic priest, but neither mother nor daughter knows about the other’s affair. Jessica's husband, Chester (Robert Mandan), is having several affairs but Jessica is in acute denial. Their other daughter, Eunice (Jennifer Salt), is having an affair with a married senator. Their butler, Benson (Robert Guillaume), is as rude as any butler can be, their son Billy (Jimmy Baio) is growing up fast, and Jessica's father, The Major (Arthur Peterson) thinks he's still in the war.

Across town at the Campbell’s, Mary is trying to keep her family together. Her new husband, Bert (Richard Mulligan), is impotent and can't 'make love' to her due to his guilt over killing her first husband. Her youngest son, Jody, (Billy Crystal) is gay, dating a closeted footballer, and wants a sex change. Her other son, Danny (Ted Wass), thinks he's Italian and is trying to break away from the mob but can't until he kills his stepfather. Bert's own two sons have come back into his life, but one is the promiscuous tennis coach, Peter, and the other, Chuck, (Jay Johnson) carries his dummy, Bob, with him at all times and is convinced he is real. Confused? You won't be after watching an episode or two of Soap.

The cast of Soap contains a number of well-known faces that went on to other things, including Robert Guillaume (Benson) who earned his own show. The storylines are deliberately crazy and involved, though not confusing. Naturally they just get crazier very fast, and the more absurd they become, the funnier they become. The acting swings from hammy to suitably melodramatic. The humour is often decidedly politically incorrect, especially Billy Crystal’s gay character, Jody. After all it was 1977 and there were many lessons yet to be learned.

All 25 crazy and frantic episodes from Series One are spread over three discs, thought not evenly. This is very addictive stuff, so be warned.

Ah the beauty of 1970s television - all full frame and wavering in quality like a... well, like a sick, wavering thing. It is also an NTSC release so it’s uphill from the word go, really. Thankfully the show is fast-paced and funny for it will distract you from the general lack of sharp detail, and will minimise your chances of noticing the colouring that varies from good to quite pale, and is affected by banding and cross-colourisation frequently. There are issues with noise and bleeding and by now you should have realised that this is a rather poor looking release. There are also some minor comets, flares and trails as the camera pans across the action. When this occurs, the detail becomes quite poor, almost blurry, and gets a little frustrating.

Black levels are quite ordinary and shadow detail is likewise unimpressive. There are a few instances of shimmer, especially on some of the awful ‘70s fashions, and while grain is a minor though constant addition, at least the print seems fairly clean and mark free.

The layer change is placed between episodes.

While the video transfer may be ordinary, the audio track is a superb DTS 5.1 – not! Had you interested for a minute though, be honest! It is actually a boring old Dolby Digital mono as should have been surmised. As such there is nothing to write home about. It is a little on the quiet side and offers nothing for audiophiles. There are no issues with synchronisation and no dropouts or significant background hiss. Naturally, there is nothing in the way of separation, but as this is essentially a dialogue-driven drama, so it is no great loss. The laugh track is a constant, but never overly intrusive. Everything is audible, clear and well synchronised – ‘nuff said.

Hardly a bonus are the four trailers included for other US television shows of the same era, but of varying quality. None are particularly brilliant or interesting, unless you are permanently stuck in the 1970s.

It seems we have had the Region 1 Soap release simply dumped on us so don’t bother going overseas unless you get a hot deal. The Region 4 set is reasonably priced thankfully, but shop around anyway. If you liked it then, you’ll still appreciate much of it now, even if the ‘poof’ jokes and the “priest and the single woman� jokes are repetitious, outdated and were not particularly funny to begin with. If you can switch yourself off to some of those ‘funny’ moments, then the rest is still likely to have some appeal.