Charles in Charge

"Charles in Charge, of our days and our nights!"

Charles In Charge was a Dom Com from 1984-5 and 1987-90 starring Scott Baio as a college-age "nanny" to the children of the families he lived with—first the Pembrokes and later the Powells (after the show moved to syndication and the Pembrokes "moved to Seattle").

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Tropes used in Charles in Charge include:

• Attractive Bent Gender: Averted in "Still at Large." A female teacher tells Charles that he's "a good looking man," but "an ugly woman."
• Beautiful All Along: Enid in the episode "A Date with Enid".
• Can-Crushing Cranium: Buddy bragged about crushing a number of cans in a row, and could have done more if they were empty.
• Channel Hop: Moved to Syndication after a season on CBS.
• Credit Card Plot: In one episode Charles got a credit card with a low limit, intending to use it responsibly. However, the kids get hold of it and run up a large bill, causing Charles to be embarrassed when his card is rejected during a date.
• Disguised in Drag: Charles and Buddy in "Still at Large."
• Dumbass Has a Point: Buddy, who does this to himself.
• Expository Theme Song: The tune very finely summarizes the show itself, and the feelings of the children he looks after, saving many a fan from having to explain the program, so much as just show a friend the intro.
• First Gray Hair: Buddy reacts disastrously to spotting a single grey hair.
• Flanderization: Buddy Lembeck. He started out as a girl-crazy guy who had no interest in academics but wasn't stupid at all. As the series progressed, he became progressively more stupid and eventually insane.
• Identity Amnesia: During a bout of amnesia, Charles' personality changes and he becomes "Chaz".
• It's a Wonderful Plot: Without Charles, the Powell family (and Charles's mother) end up with a lot more money, but they've all turned into spoiled jerks.
• Ivy League for Everyone: Late in the series, Charles gets accepted as a graduate student to Princeton.
• Joisey: After the move to syndication the show was explicitly set in New Brunswick, NJ.
  • Rutgers students at the time jokingly identified one of the real restaurants on Easton Avenue as that owned by Charles' mother in later seasons.
• Never Learned to Read: One of Charles' friends is revealed to be illiterate when a fire breaks out and he can't read the instructions for a fire extinguisher.
• No Name Given: Charles and his mother. This was lampshaded in the final episode ("Did you ever wonder why he had no last name?").
• Old Hero, New Pals: When it moved from network to first run syndication the only characters carried over were Charles and Buddy. Mrs. Pembroke was there as a Spinoff Sendoff, showing the house to the new family moving in.
• Oven Logic: One episode of had a multi-tiered example; Charles and Buddy don't know what temperature to bake the cake at, so Buddy surmises that if a baked potato cooks at 350 degrees, a cake, which is approximately 10 times as big, should cook at 3,000. Since the oven only goes up to 500, they decide to compensate by cooking it for 6 times as long.
• Poorly-Disguised Pilot: Had three episodes in the final season which were failed attempts at a pilot for a new series. In each a character would visit somewhere where there would be a character that looked suspiciously like one of the regular cast members. Ellen Travolta, who played Charles' mom, had an identical twin sister who ran a car wash in New York. Willie Aames' character Buddy had an identical cousin working in a hotel in Hawaii. Nicole Eggert's character had an identical cousin living in New Mexico.
• Radio Contest: Charles is not only a great babysitter, but he also knows exactly when to call the radio station to be the tenth caller.
• Retool: Upon moving to syndication, Charles' employers the Pembrokes were replaced by the Powells. Also, a prominent recurring role was added for Charles' mother Louisa, as portrayed by Ellen Travolta.
• Slumber Party: In the first season the daughter has a slumber party, and all the girls end up talking to Charles about what boys are really like.
• Special Guest: Olympic gymnast Julianne McNamara and Samantha Smith, the girl who wrote to Yuri Andropov, in "Slumber Party".
• Sweater Girl: Some of the girls Charles dates.
• Where the Hell Is Springfield?: Initially played straight during its network run, but averted after the Retool, when the Pembroke/Powell home was explicitly located in New Brunswick, NJ not far from Rutgers University.
• Why Do You Keep Changing Jobs?: Ben Stein pops up as an Obstructive Bureaucrat in various settings.