We continue our countdown of my favorite 1970s Christmas TV episodes with 1979’s “Jennifer’s Home For Christmas” from WKRP In Cincinnati.
One of the more intriguing characters on WKRP in Cincinnati was Jennifer (Loni Anderson), who was a beautiful woman who worked as a receiptionist at the station, but she really ran the office. While her beauty led everyone to underestimate her intelligence, she was a kind and very smart woman.
She was also beloved by her colleagues, which we saw in action in Season 2’s “Jennifer’s Home for Christmas,” where all of the workers at WKRP begin to come to the same realization that although Jennifer is beautiful, and often goes on a number of dates, that she doesn’t seem to have any specific plans for Christmas. They all fear that she is home alone.
Now, to be fair, it seems that lasciviousness drove at least SOME of her guy friends who go to her place to check on her. The recurring gag is that they each “Surprise” her with a Christmas tree, to the point where when Herb (Frank Bonner) enters WITHOUT a tree, everyone makes fun of him for it.
It’s a very cute sight gag seeing all of the trees showing up at her fancy apartment, and, of course, the twist, that Jennifer DOES have plans for the holidays, and in fact, her rich boyfriend (the great George Gaynes, getting to show off his amazing language skills, as he spoke something like five languages fluently) is taking her on a private plane to the Middle East to visit the literal Bethlehem for Christmas.
As I note, some of the guys seem to be showing up because they thought that they might get lucky with Jennifer if she feeling lonely, but there will still some who clearly showed up just because she is their friend and they feel bad for her, so it was a very sweet story. A bit on the slight side of things, hence it not being any higher than #21, but it’s still a nice episode.
It’s on YouTube for now…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=8VFPh8ZUUuI
For me “Bah, Humbug!” with Carlson trapped in “one of those Christmas Carol things” because he ate so much of Johnny’s (probably loaded) brownies, is a Christmas perennial. But I know you’re not down with Christmas Carol episodes and any episode of this show is going to be good.
Check the date of that episode. 😉