MovieChat Forums > Mister Ed (1961) Discussion > How was Wilbur's office kept clean?

How was Wilbur's office kept clean?

posted 11 years ago by Steven_federoff
7 replies | jump to latest

People familiar with barns and their inhabitants must find it surprising that a white-collar worker not only performs his own duties but also entertains clients in a space shared with a pooping horse. Horses cannot be toilet trained. They tend to "go" whenever and wherever they please. I'm sure the show's cast and crew are familiar with this rule.

[–] robertpatasnik 11 years ago

First it was a time when people behind a series didn't want viewers tuning a show off the air seeing poop. Then in 1 case in 1975 on M*A*S*H after Colonel Potter recieve his horse (Sophie) from Radar it poop in the office before everyone left.

[–] 11 years ago

[deleted]

[–] darryl-tahirali 11 years ago

Although maybe he just took his dumps over in Addisons yard and that is why his apple tree had the most amazing apples that Ed could not resist. - amanandhisthoughts

Hilarious! And there is a little scatological recycling going on there if Ed is eating the apples that he has helped to fertilize . . .

What is amusing is how contemporary viewers look back at these classic (vintage?) sitcoms and, with the benefit of the knowledge of two or three generations of viewers, start tearing apart the "logical inconsistencies" of these shows.

Television shows today are taken a lot more seriously than they were 50 or more years ago. This is especially true of comedies, which in the 1950s and 1960s were much more oriented toward the punchline or gag than to notions of realism. That came in the 1970s (e.g., All in the Family, M*A*S*H) as audiences matured in their expectations and programs evolved in response.

My guess is that audiences in the 1960s asked the same questions we do today but their expectation was that the premises of these sitcoms was silly or wacky and were not supposed to conform to literal depictions. That is why later sitcoms such as All in the Family and M*A*S*H had such an impact--they really did have that air of gritty realism about them, as opposed to the gauzy idealism of previous "realistic" sitcoms such as Leave It to Beaver, My Three Sons, and many others.

As for Mister Ed, we'll just have to explain away Ed's waste disposal in the same way Ed explains away to Wilbur how it is that he can talk (paraphrasing here as I don't recall the exact quote): "Forget it, buddy boy--it's bigger than the both of us!"

------------------
"All persons, living and dead, are purely coincidental." - Kurt Vonnegut

[–] memayse1701 10 years ago

People give LEAVE IT TO BEAVER a bad rap but it dealt with alcoholism, divorce and in one episode Beaver even cussed! Seriously, a kid tripped him and he got up and called him a big dumb...cut to the teacher and the bell ringing and a shocked look on her face. She scolded him for using such language.

[–] mwmtampa 11 years ago

I agree with the last poster. Since Mr. Ed essentially had a human-like brain, in addition to his talking skill, the natural progression of that would be that he and Wilbur would have agreed he would do his pooping elsewhere. Like in neighboring fields or woods. It was stated on the show once or twice they lived in a rural area.

[–] snsurone 10 years ago

The bigger question is why did Wilbur have his office in the barn and not the house?

The answer is obvious: for all his intrusions, Wilbur preferred Ed's company over Carol's, who was nothing but "a maid with benefits", as I had said on another thread.

[–] mmmjv 9 years ago

In the first episode when Wilbur and Carol goes into the barn Wilbur says this would be a good place for his office before they even see the horse. So it's not because of the horse
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3iD3ncqEis&list=PLzihwHGfPVa7QAAqUqXIu4vsOl6LNGTrS