'The Mary Tyler Moore Show' anniversary: 50 ways we still love the classic sitcom

Happy 50th anniversary to "The Mary Tyler Moore Show." Let's hope notorious party killer Mary Richards isn't throwing the celebratory bash.

Mary Tyler Moore's hilarious, TV-changing CBS sitcom premiered on Sept. 19, 1970, introducing viewers to a charming, single working woman and her workplace family, elements that veered from traditional sitcom fare and created a setting for new levels of funny.

Viewers lapped it up, joining Mary, Lou & Co. for a seven-season run that resulted in critical adulation, 29 Emmys and three spin-offs. "MTM" influenced TV that followed, including such comedies as "Cheers," "30 Rock" and "Broad City," and many millions still love it today.

To commemorate the milestone, we compiled 50 things we love about the series, which is available to stream on Hulu or buy on Amazon and iTunes.

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Breaking ground

1. The modern woman: Mary (Moore), who moved to Minneapolis after a long relationship ended, stood out in a TV landscape populated with married homemaker moms. It connected with and influenced a changing culture, where millions of women were entering the workforce.

2. No marriage, no problem: Mary had boyfriends, but marriage and motherhood were not her primary goals, as had been the case for so many TV characters who preceded her. Her fulfilling life delivered a strong message.

3. Serious laughter: After a decade of silly sitcoms featuring hillbillies, castaways and a Martian, "MTM" found comedy in real-life situations and relationships, mining countless laughs from brilliant character development, rather than ridiculous concepts.

4. Home at work: It established a new dynamic, the workplace family, which soon became its own comedy format.

5. Subtle shifts: "MTM" wasn't as rabble-rousing as Norman Lear's "All in the Family," but it had a feminist sensibility and stealthily took aim at cultural stress points, slyly alluding to premarital sex and birth control. Sometimes, it was more direct, as when Mary objected to her male predecessor being paid more or dropped a friend who was anti-Semitic.

6. Inclusion (incrementally): The show was one of the first to feature a gay character, Phyllis Lindstrom's brother, in a 1973 episode, and it wasn't the kind of negative portrayal common at the time.

7. Women write: At the time, "MTM" provided rare behind-the-camera opportunities for women, including writers Pat Nardo, Susan Silver and Emmy winner Treva Silverman. Joan Darling directed the acclaimed "Chuckles Bites the Dust" (written by David Lloyd, father of "Modern Family" co-creator Christopher Lloyd).

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Characters

8. Mary Richards (Moore), a kind, decent person establishing a new life in Minneapolis, where she took a job in a TV newsroom. She learned, sometimes hesitantly, to assert herself, gaining confidence and building her own work/home family.

9. Rhoda Morgenstern (Valerie Harper), the yang to Mary's yin, a brash New Yorker who bonded with her demure Midwestern neighbor. Viewers laughed at her self-deprecating humor but cheered as she overcame her sad-sack identity.

10. Lou Grant (Edward Asner), the crusty WJM newsroom boss with a soft and chewy center.

11. Ted Baxter (Ted Knight), the narcissistic news anchor, owner of a deep voice and a shallow intellect. Originally the most one-dimensional character, he gained depth over time but remained blissfully unaware of his ignorance to the hilarious end.

12. Murray Slaughter (Gavin McLeod), the smart but frustrated news writer who had a crush on Mary and a million insults for Ted.

13. Phyllis Lindstrom (Cloris Leachman), Mary's friend and landlord, whose haughtiness hardly hid her insecurity.

14. Sue Ann Nivens (Betty White), WJM's "Happy Homemaker," who projected domestic serenity but had a naughty sensibility and scheming heart roiling beneath.

15. Georgette Franklin (Georgia Engel), Ted's soft-spoken girlfriend and eventual wife. Her simple goodness more than made up for a lack of worldliness.

Relationships

16. Mary and Rhoda: "MTM" was all about friendship, and these BFFs were the epitome of sisterhood. Fans and succeeding sitcoms aspire to that kind of chemistry to this day.

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17. Mary and "Mr. Grant": Lou hired Mary, who broke through his shell to become a trusted confidante. Their friendship survived an almost-firing, a betrayal of confidence, Mary's inability to call him Lou and even a date, which ended with an awkward kiss and the decision that romance was not to be.

18. Ted and a mirror.

Frenemies

19. Phyllis and Rhoda: Phyllis competed with Rhoda to be Mary's best friend, but never had a chance. She tried to lord her money and marital status over her Bronx-born tenant, but Rhoda always had the last laugh.

20. Murray and Ted: Murray was jealous of Ted's money and fame; Ted would have envied Murray's biting wit had he understood it.

21. Sue Ann and Murray: This was tennis if players volleyed insults. Murray jabbed Sue Ann over her promiscuity (yes, it was a different era), and she hit back with an array of baldness barbs. Mean, but evenly matched.

Episodes

22. "Love Is All Around" (Season 1): The series premiere gets so many things right: Mary parrying Lou's inappropriate job interview questions; Mary and Rhoda bonding after an apartment battle; and Mary, in a series-defining stand, declaring independence from her ex.

23. "Christmas and the Hard Luck Kid II" (Season 1): In perhaps the best Christmas-themed episode ever, too-nice Mary works a Christmas shift after a family man guilts her. Lou, Murray and Ted arrive to cure Mary's loneliness.

24. “Put on a Happy Face” (Season 3): Moore was an immensely talented comic actor who generously gave castmates most of the best lines. In this episode, she shows her range as Mary suffers a stained dress, a sprained foot, a bad cold and a hair bump on her way to winning a Teddy Award. "I usually look much better than this," a plaintive Mary says while accepting.

25. "The Dinner Party” (Season 4): A Mary party disaster is in the offing when dictatorial Sue Ann caters a dinner where there's not enough food and serving is timed to the second. Sue Ann: "Mary, dear, do you have any idea what happens when you let Veal Prince Orloff sit in an oven too long?" Mary: "Noooo. What?" Sue Ann: "He dies."

26. "Chuckles Bites the Dust" (Season 6): The grimly hilarious death of WJM's Chuckles the Clown – a parade elephant tried to shell him when he was dressed as character Peter Peanut – is a wonderful treatise on grief and has been hailed as the best sitcom episode ever. Mary's laughing/crying jag at Chuckles' funeral is genius.

27. "The Last Show" (series finale): As new station management fires the staff – keeping only the incompetent Ted – everyone says goodbye to each other as viewers say goodbye to them. The group-hug shuffle to Mary's tissue box is an indelible highlight of one of TV's best finales.

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Quotables

28. "You've got spunk. I hate spunk!" "MTM" signaled its originality when Lou rejected, rather than embraced, Mary's all-American moxie.

29. "And this is my date, Mr. and Mrs. Armond Lynton." Poor Rhoda performing introductions after making a date with a man she didn't realize was married.

30. “If you can’t stand the heat, dear, get out of my kitchen.” Sue Ann, after using food poisoning to her advantage in this "All About Eve" takeoff, narrated her parting shot to a vanquished younger competitor.

31. "A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down your pants.” Chuckles the Clown's motto-turned-eulogy.

32. "It's a Long Way to Tipperary." Ted inexplicably chose a World War I marching song to salute his fired colleagues in the finale. Then the gang sang it as they left the newsroom for the last time and it all made sense.

33. Ted Baxter's Famous Broadcasters School: Not dialogue, just funny.

Classic images

34. Rhoda's look of exasperation when dealing with her irresistible-force mother, Ida (Nancy Walker), a TV mom hall-of-famer.

35. Mary at her perfectly organized newsroom desk, welcoming viewers to her workplace home.

36. Mary crushing Ted's hat with a hug – then fixing it – after he, Lou and Murray join her for Christmas Eve in the newsroom.

37. Lou, murder in his eyes, catapulting from his office after Ted's regular assaults on journalism and the English language.

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38. Sue Ann's smile: Make that baring of teeth.

39. The anticipatory pause between Murray's insult and Sue Ann's nuclear rejoinder.

40. Farmer Ted: The anchor as commercial pitchman hawking country sausage during his own newscast.

41. The big "M" on Mary's apartment wall: Her first apartment was so much better than her second.

Special guests

42. Fabled TV news anchor Walter Cronkite rightly looking at Ted as if he were a different species.

43. Late-night king Johnny Carson, heard but not seen as a blackout doomed yet another Mary party.

44. Up-and-comers Henry Winkler in his first primetime appearance at the Prince Orloff fiasco; John Ritter as a minister who married Ted and Georgette; and Helen Hunt as Murray's daughter.

Theme song and credits

45. “Love Is All Around”: The theme's memorable lyrics, recorded by Sonny Curtis, evolved from uncertain hope in Season 1 ("How will you make it on your own?"/"You might just make it after all") into an anthem of affirmation (“You’re gonna make it after all”).

46. “Love Is All Around,” Part II: Joan Jett’s tribute cover, which punches the original’s sweet melody in the gut, is even better.

47. The opening-credits shot of Mary flinging her tam into the air is one of TV’s most iconic moments. A Minneapolis statue commemorates the image. Long may she stand.

Legacy

48. MTM Enterprises: Moore created a powerhouse studio with then-husband Grant Tinker and sparked a TV golden age with such illustrious fare as "The Bob Newhart Show," "Hill Street Blues," "St. Elsewhere" and "The White Shadow."

49. Moore's namesake sitcom spawned popular CBS spinoffs "Rhoda," whose TV wedding drew a whopping 52 million viewers; "Lou Grant," a drama that won 13 Emmys as Lou morphed into a Los Angeles newspaper editor; and short-lived "Phyllis." God bless Mother Dexter.

50. Launching pad: "MTM" was a springboard for entertainment auteurs with similar-sounding names. Co-creator James L. Brooks moved on to direct "Terms of Endearment" and "Broadcast News" and produce another TV classic, "The Simpsons." Moore's comedy was the first TV gig for legendary director James Burrows ("Will & Grace," "Cheers"). And it made a star of Mimsie, the logo cat who meowed each episode to a close, becoming the studio's answer to MGM's roaring lion, Leo.

Finally, why not close where the series did, with Lou's tribute to his colleagues in the show's last scene: "I treasure you people."

We feel that way, too.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show': Why we still love the sitcom at 50