I actually first discovered this classic and heartwarming series with this rather uncompromisingly painful episode. I was lying awake in bed very late at night in a most sad and sorry condition and the TV was on but I wasn't even really focusing on it, I just wanted some background noise. Anyway what I was half-hearing sounded like any other typical American sitcom I'd heard many times before, but when it got to the point of the story where the beautifully acted and heartbreaking Geraldine Fitzgerald character says at the bar to Sophia: "I want you to be there tomorrow when I kill myself", that immediately got my full attention as I couldn't quite believe what I'd heard in what seemed like an old-fashioned lighthearted comedy show, it was such an abrupt and complete shift in tone, and the transition from comedy to hard drama was done so well and competently. After that I was totally absorbed in the tense drama of the story and blown away and it had me in tears by the end. Particular upsetting was when it got to the powerful scene where Martha is about to take her fatal dose of pills and Sophia grabs them from her and does the only thing that I personally believe a friend can ever really do for another friend that's in the grip of deep hopeless despair and seriously means to die, letting her know that she'll always be there as a friend if she needs her, and challenging and getting through to her by saying that her tears are proof that there's a part of her that still wants to live. I bet every last one of them does somewhere... I once knew somebody that died this way, a beautiful girl, and that's what really got to and disturbed me about this, the idea that if you could have just had one more chance to stop and talk to someone before it was too late that your words could've somehow done something to change their mind. I feel great sorrow for all the poor lost ones along the way... So it was just incredibly moving to me and I thought a quite daring scene, I mean old people getting suicidal too, you never hear of it in TV or movies, and that perhaps strangely made me sadder than if it were a younger person. Both actresses do an amazing job with the scenes especially Estelle Getty, who while most of the time played the lovably obnoxious old wisecracker and played it well, but when it came to the really big emotional stuff she was more than capable of holding her own and even outdoing the other cast members. The subplot with the girls looking after a sick baby was all comedy and that was a lot of fun, especially when everyone sings Mr. Sandman! And in the closing scene the two stories converge in a very beautiful and moving way because, after all the pain of someone old who's lived their life, here was this brand new pure life, and although she kinda rushes out her lines before the little tyke starts to bawl which he clearly is about to do, what Sophia says sums up the sombre feelings perfectly. We all do start out so innocent and there are so many unexpected twists and turns in life and it's frightening what time can do to us... Afterwards I soon got into the show in earnest after this one episode that I just happened to see one dark night, and it brought me a lot of joy and laughter, and that I considered a gift. It's an utterly brilliant episode that ends on a bittersweet, yet hopeful note. It about destroyed me the first time I saw it, but I love it, it really affected my life. Thank you and goodnight, whoever you are.
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