I remember this show fondly because it was filmed in New York City on location without a laugh track or studio audience which was quite a departure for a sitcom about a single woman in the thirties played by the wonderful Blair Brown as Molly Dodd. She must deal with her mother played by the equally wonderful Allyn Ann McLerie. I don't remember ever seeing Molly's brother and sister twins, Mamie and Dwight Dodds who lived in the suburbs. Molly's single life is far from the Sex in the City girls. It was more realistic and believable about Molly trying to find the right man and job. I remember it first on network later on lifetime before it ceased completely from television. The cast and crew were first rate and the writing was simply wonderful just like Molly's life.

Molly's life was a collage of bits and pieces that never really made any sense!! She perennially engages in a personal synopses vindication analysis every time she wants to switch brands of coffee!! She will spend her last $300.00 on a dress at MACY*S, but,if she wants to tell a friend of hers off, she will call them collect!! This show thrived on the unconventional! Moving to cable after being on NBC for two years, and having a largely female audience, it was anything but estrogen laden sap!! Molly Dodd's priorities dictated that, on a caprice, she should be more concerned about what happened to her when she was 12 years old, than she should be about constructing her precarious future! Molly Dodd was impervious with regards to matters such as her career and/or her relationships, or, shall I say, lack of them!! A potpourri of emotional misconfiguration is what gave this show its identity!! NBC's attempt at dialog driven programing for the esoteric, in the late 1980's, did not catch on the way they wanted it to!! Nevertheless, "The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd" was a definite cut above your average run of the mill television show!!

Molly Dodd was NBC's attempt to recreate the success of Mary Tyler Moore. That attempt has been made over and over and over again but usually with little success. Ally McBeal is Fox's attempt and it's working. It takes a single career woman and a cool ensemble cast, add the quirks that MTM actually brushed on at times (and Molly Dodd totally did in a not unsimilar way) and you have the modern day MTM.Molly Dodd was on the air I believe two years on NBC before Lifetime picked it up. It was in the first years of Lifetime becoming a women's network so getting ratings had to be tough.In the NBC years of Molly Dodd, it was just awesome. I will never forget David Strathairn giving her his shoe as a present when he came back from Alaska or somewhere.... very nuts. The show had a lot of quirk.And let me tell you something. Don't let the camera fool you regarding Blair Brown. I've met her and she is one of the most beautiful women you can imagine. Cameras sometimes do odd things to facial features... believe me, she's not hurting. :)

The show started on NBC, which foolishly cancelled it, then the Lifetime cable network picked it up. Molly Dodd was similar to Ally McBeal, but she was not as neurotic. She was just a single woman trying to make it out in the world, and helped (and sometimes hindered) by the quirky characters surrounding her. My favorite was her doorman, who apparently had lived quite a life before he took the job in her building. My other favorite character was her crazy boss at the publishing company she worked at right before the series ended for good. There have been very few good shows with good women characters, and this is one of the best.