The BEST episodes written by Les Charles

#1 - Of Mice and Tony

Taxi - Season 4 - Episode 9

Tony becomes the manager of a promising young heavyweight boxer at his gym, but after the boxer wins a major fight, the "syndicate" (which turns out to be some doctors looking for an investment, rather than the mob) makes Tony an offer he can't refuse and takes over the boxer's management.

#2 - I Wanna Be Around

Taxi - Season 4 - Episode 11

Louie becomes scared of nuclear war after hearing someone talk on Donahue, and he sets up a bomb shelter in the garage. He schedules a weekend drill with Jeff and Tony in tow, but finds he's too "soft" to survive if war really broke out, since he is unwilling to throw Jim (who has stowed away in a radiation suit) out of the shelter.

#3 - Home is the Sailor

Cheers - Season 6 - Episode 1

Sam returns to Cheers six months after he sold it to a large corporation to pursue a life of leisure on board a new boat. Now the boat has sunk and he's looking for a job.

#4 - I Do, Adieu

Cheers - Season 5 - Episode 26

Dr. Sumner Sloane returns to Cheers on Diane and Sam's wedding day to tell her that a publisher is interested in one of her class manuscripts if she can go to work immediately on rewrites.

#5 - Mary and the Sexagenarian

The Mary Tyler Moore Show - Season 7 - Episode 19

Mary happily accepts a date from a charming older man without realizing that he's Murray's father, but everyone else has difficulty coming to terms with the difference in their ages.

#6 - Latka's Cookies

Taxi - Season 3 - Episode 8

When Latka's grandmother dies, he is pleased that she has left him her famous cookie recipe, complete with a supply of the secret ingredients. He bakes up some for the cabbies to enjoy, but the cabbies don't enjoy them. Nonetheless, Latka begins his own cookie business. In the days to come, the cabbies find that they are indeed starting to inexplicably like the cookies, and are also unusually happy and energetic. When Jim samples one, he determines that the secret ingredient is cocaine—which accounts for why everyone's behavior. Upon learning this, Alex visits Latka (busy baking cookies to fill supermarket orders) to tell him the bad news. Latka is noticeably high from the cookies, and hallucinates that Famous Amos tells him to do whatever it takes to be successful. Although Latka can no longer sell the drugged cookies, he is excited at the taste of capitalism because it means he's now a true American.

#7 - Reverend Jim: A Space Odyssey

Taxi - Season 2 - Episode 3

At Mario's, the cabbies run into the spaced-out derelict minister, Reverend Jim, who officiated at Latka's wedding. Charmed by him, yet taking pity on him, they make it their mission to get him a job as a cabbie. Louie is adverse to this at first, but Jim seems to slip a sedative into Louie's coffee and he then changes his tune. The next hurdle is getting Jim a driver's license, which is a challenge as he not only has trouble with his written exam, but his application, as well. Nonetheless, he gets the license and begins work at the garage.

#8 - Showdown (2)

Cheers - Season 1 - Episode 22

#9 - Art Work

Taxi - Season 2 - Episode 22

The cabbies are faring poorly at various gambling schemes, but Elaine alerts the gang about a moneymaking tip for an art auction. It seems a terminally ill artist's painting is up for auction, and when an artist dies, the value of his paintings goes up considerably. She estimates that they need to pool $2,000 to win the auction and the gang, including Louie, barely scrapes up enough. At the auction, Louie attempts various dirty tricks to ensure a successful bid, but the bidding quickly goes above $2,000 and another bidder snares the painting. It is then announced that the artist has passed away, which rubs salt in the wounds of the already dejected cabbies.

#10 - Going Home

Taxi - Season 3 - Episode 5

Jim is sought out by a detective, hired by his wealthy father to locate him and give him plane tickets to come visit him in Boston. Jim explains to the gang that he has been estranged from his family after dropping out of Harvard in the 1960's and changed his name from Caldwell to Ignatowski. Jim agrees to go to visit his father and brings Alex with him, who is curious about what Jim's family must be like. At his father's mansion, Jim's oddness upsets his father and they get into an argument during dinner. Jim is asked to leave, but Alex speaks to Jim's father privately to try to smooth things over. It turns out Jim's father still thinks of Jim as his favorite child, but it hurts him to see him wasting his life when he had so much potential. Jim comes in and convinces his father that he's got a happy life and doesn't need his father's money and they share a moment before Jim leaves.

#11 - Bob's Change of Life

The Bob Newhart Show - Season 6 - Episode 1

Bob's well-ordered life turns topsy-turvy when he and Emily move to a new Chicago residence.

#12 - Sugar Mama

Taxi - Season 1 - Episode 14

Alex befriends a wealthy elderly lady who pays him to take her around the city.

#13 - Zen and the Art of Cab Driving

Taxi - Season 3 - Episode 13

Jim picks up two men in his cab and overhear them talking about the secret to success: dynamic perfectionism. Jim takes it to heart and decides to use the technique to reach his goal, which he won't reveal to the cabbies. Soon, Jim becomes the perfect cab driver, setting company records on every shift. After a few weeks, Jim gives up, announcing that he's reached his goal and can no longer stand to work so hard. He invites the gang over to his apartment to reveal what he's been working so hard for. Upon arrival, they see that his goal was a room full of televisions, with satellites, cable, VCRs, and video games - his ticket to the global village. The gang is unimpressed at first, until each of them gets sucked into watching exciting things on the various televisions.

#14 - Rebound (2)

Cheers - Season 3 - Episode 2

#15 - One for the Road (1)

Cheers - Season 11 - Episode 26

#16 - Bobby Doesn't Live Here Anymore

Taxi - Season 4 - Episode 12

Bobby, who has moved to Hollywood, comes back to the garage for a visit and announces that he's filmed a pilot for a new prime-time soap opera. During his visit, he learns that the pilot has been picked up as a series and Bobby throws a party at the Plaza Hotel to celebrate. He soon learns that although the series is a go, they no longer want Bobby to appear in it. Bobby is upset and entertains the idea of moving back to New York, until Alex convinces him to follow his dream in Hollywood.

#17 - Give Me a Ring Sometime

Cheers - Season 1 - Episode 1

Cheers is a small bar in Boston, MA. As owner Sam Malone opens up, a couple enter the bar. Professor Sumner Sloane and his fiance Diane Chambers are to go to Barbados to be married, but Sumner's ex-wife still has the wedding ring. Sumner asks Sam to keep an eye on Diane for him whilst he goes and fetches it. Sam tries chatting up Diane but she's not interested. The other employees at Cheers arrive for work - waitress and single mom Carla Tortelli, and bartender Ernie "Coach" Pantusso, who was Sam's baseball coach back in the days when Sam was a relief pitcher for the Red Sox. As the bar gets busier and more people wonder who she is, Diane hopes Sumner will return eventually. Sumner comes back a few hours later and says he hasn't got the ring, but then his ex-wife calls and says she's got it, so he once again leaves Diane in Cheers whilst he goes to fetch it. He asks Diane to call the airport and put their flight back a bit. Once again he is gone a long time, and Diane starts to worry t

#18 - Rebound (1)

Cheers - Season 3 - Episode 1

Coach asks Diane to return to Cheers from her self-imposed "vacation" to help Sam, who has fallen off the wagon.

#19 - Mama Gravas

Taxi - Season 1 - Episode 19

Mechanic Latka Gravas' youthful and attractive mother makes her first visit to America, and after she and Alex meet and have an evening love affair, Latka assumes that he will soon be getting a new daddy.

#20 - Sam at Eleven

Cheers - Season 1 - Episode 4

Sam realizes how much he misses his former sports celebrity status when a local newscaster asks to interview him again.

#21 - Honor Thy Father

Taxi - Season 2 - Episode 2

Alex's sister, Charlotte, comes to the garage and leaves a message that their father is ill in the hospital. When Alex finds out, he appears uninterested, and explains that his father ran out on their family and they haven't spoken in almost thirty years. Eventually, Charlotte prevails upon Alex to visit their father and Alex is shocked to see a very frail old man in the hospital. Alex loses his composure and breaks down, telling his father how much he means to him. All of a sudden, Alex realizes he's been baring his soul to the wrong man when his real, healthy-looking father emerges from the bathroom. Alex then again realizes he has nothing really to say to his father and leaves after uttering hardly a word.

#22 - Showdown (1)

Cheers - Season 1 - Episode 21

Diane's fascination with Sam's older brother brings their long simmering relationship to a boil when the sibling asks Diane to go to Paris with him.

#23 - Latka's Revolting

Taxi - Season 2 - Episode 11

Latka is listening to a radio station that broadcasts in his native language and learns that revolution has broken out in his country. Panicking, he is visited by his friend, Baschi, who emigrated to the States with him, and who has come to fetch Latka to go home to fight in the revolution (it turns out Latka has somehow reached the rank of general in his country's army). A farewell party is thrown for Latka at Mario's, and before they have to leave for the airport, Elaine asks Baschi to draw a map of their country, in an effort to learn more about where they will be fighting. Through Baschi's drawing of where the enemy troops will be situated, it becomes clear that the revolutionaries have an impossible task ahead of them, and Latka thinks better of leaving (as do the rest of his fellow countrymen).

#24 - Come as You Aren't

Taxi - Season 1 - Episode 5

Elaine fears the worst when the cabbies invite themselves to her party for her highbrow art world friends who have no clue that she moonlights as a cab driver.

#25 - Who Was That Masked Man?

The Bob Newhart Show - Season 6 - Episode 4

Bob is puzzled when his henpecked patient, Mr. Petersen, asserts himself with far-reaching consequences.

#26 - Power Play

Cheers - Season 2 - Episode 1

The regular gang finds Sam and Diane's romance hard to believe, a view apparently shared by Diane, who throws Sam out of her apartment after only five minutes.

#27 - The Late Captain Pierce

M*A*S*H - Season 4 - Episode 4

When Hawkeye's father is notified that he's dead, he finds it's no easy matter either to get word to him or to establish otherwise.

#28 - Happy Trails to You

The Bob Newhart Show - Season 6 - Episode 22

Bob gives up his psychological practice in Chicago to become a professor at a small college in Oregon.

#29 - Elaine and the Lame Duck

Taxi - Season 1 - Episode 17

Alex feels sympathy for a fare who's a real loser with the women and arranges a date for the man with Elaine, who later discovers that her klutzy companion for the evening is a U.S. Congressman.

#30 - Paper Marriage

Taxi - Season 1 - Episode 8

Mechanic Latka Gravas faces deportation unless he marries an U.S. citizen. The taxi gang comes to his rescue by pitching in and hiring a local "working girl" to be his bride.

#31 - Hollywood Calling

Taxi - Season 1 - Episode 21

The cabbies fall victim to a Hollywood-style roller coaster ride when a production company visits to do a film on taxi drivers.

#32 - I'll Be Seeing You (2)

Cheers - Season 2 - Episode 22

#33 - I'll Be Seeing You (1)

Cheers - Season 2 - Episode 21

Sam commissions a portrait of Diane from an artist so obnoxious that he soon forbids Diane to continue posing for him, an order Diane won't accept.