The Success Story

Written by Gerald Gardner, Dee Caruso& Bernie Orenstein

Directed by James Frawley

Produced by Robert Rafelson& Bert Schneider

Songs: “I Wanna Be Free” by Tommy Boyce& Bobby Hart “Sweet Young Thing” by Michael Nesmith, Gerry Goffin & Carole King

Guest Appearances

                                        

                                            The Grandfather               Ben Wright                                              The Messenger                 Ray Ballard

            Rolls Owner                  Donald Foster   

                                             Ice Cream Man             Charles Callas  

                                            The Lady                             Ceil Cabot         

Premiered on October 17, 1966

Summary

While the guys are playing cards, a messenger arrives at their pad about a letter for Davy.  When the messenger demands $1.80 for his services, Mike quickly instructs him over to Mr. Schneider, their pet dummy “since he’s the only one working”.  After reading the letter, Davy is upset because it’s from his grandfather who is coming over to America for a visit since he had told him that he’s a huge star and very rich.  Davy's  afraid that if his grandfather learns the truth he'll be so dissappointed in him that he'll take him back to England.  That’s not their only problem when the guys look on as the messenger is arguing with Mr. Schneider over his pay!

The guys decide to help Davy masquerade as a rich celebrity with Micky duping a wealthy old man into taking his Rolls Royce and conning the messenger into switching outfits.  Mike then gets hired and then fired as a chef at an Italian restaurant leaving with the chef’s uniform.  Peter approaches an ice cream man and ends up leaving with the shirt off his back(literally).  Now masquerading as Davy’s chauffer, chef and houseboy, they meet his grandfather outside where Mike and Peter take turns disguising themselves as a fan asking for an autograph and a photographer taking pictures.  A middle-aged lady observes and convicnced Davy is a celebrety approachest too for an autograph.  However, Davy thinking its Mike in disguise ends up offending her.  Back at the pad, Davy and the grandfather are being served dinner but Davy learns his food is rubber and the fruit is plastic since they could only afford one serving.  After dinner, Davy mentions he’s so hungry he could eat a horse and almost literally gets his wish!  The grandfather is quite impressed with Davy’s success and it seems like the guys pulled it off until a girl next door barges in to borrow some hot dogs.  Then the messenger, the Rolls Royce owner, the Italian restaurant owner and the ice cream man all show up one by one to claim their possessions and soon all chaos is loose in the apartment.  Finally quieting the crowd down, Davy’s grandfather is angered by Davy’s deception and announces his plans to take him back to England with him.

Later, Mike tries to explain to Davy's grandfather that Davy only pretended in order to make him proud but when that’s no use he accuses the grandfather of only wanting Davy back more for himself than for Davy but it’s still to no avail.  Meanwhile, a saddened Davy takes a stroll along the beach reminiscing about all the times with his friends to the song “I Wanna Be Free”.  Back at the pad, Davy all dressed up and packed gives a sad farewell to his friends before leaving with his grandfather.  At the airport, Davy still depressed tells his grandfather he’ll meet him on the plane and goes in alone.  The other guys  soon start bawling in their pad over Davy's departure until they come up with an idea to make Davy miss his flight and leave for the airport too.  At the airport, the guys are all disguised as airline personnel with Peter as an passage handler, and Micky, a ticket clerk dubbing a German accent.  Their hilarious attempts to sabotage the grandfather’s flight results with Mike driving the grandfather all around the airport in a freeway while a winged Peter and Micky are in pursuit causing a whole lot of chaos in their wake!  The grandfather finally catches up to Davy nearly missing his plane and tells him he’s not taking him back to England with him after all.  Having seen through their disguises, he is impressed with the loyalty of Davy’s friends and feels he can trust him safely in their hands.  But he doesn’t leave alone since he’s soon accompanied by the same middle-age lady who asked Davy for an autograph on the plane.

Later on a park bench, Micky mentions instead of doing all those things to impress Davy's grandfather they should of just played for him and with that they're all soon romping around with a crowd of elderly people to the song “Sweet Young Thing”.

This episode ends with an interview of Davy about his first trip back to England since the series aired.  Click here____ for transcripts.

Trivia Notes:

In the May 29, 1967 repeat, the song “Shades of Grey” by

Barry Mann& Cynthia Weil replaces “I Wanna Be Free”. 

This song is also used during when it airs on the cable

channel Nickelodeon during the 1986 reruns.

On October 29, 1967 and June 13, 1970 during the

CBS Saturday afternoon re-runs “Shades of Grey” is

replaced by Bill Chadwick’s “The French Song”

Actor Donald Foster(Rolls Owner) appeared in two other

episodes "The Prince and The Paupers" and  "The Picture

Frame".