The Mrs. Hufnagel Chronicles, Part 5

Dr. Auschlander's new assistant is touring the hospital when she gets the inside scoop from Mrs. Hufnagel.

Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) warns a new hire
about life at St. Eligius.

At the beginning of season three, Chief of Services Dr. Daniel Auschlander (Norman Lloyd) has his hands full with a rather contentious nurses' strike on top of his ongoing battle with liver cancer. He decides to hire an assistant to help him better manage his duties, and in "My Aim Is True", he has found a suitable candidate, Sandra Eff (Kate Randolph Burns), and gives her the "cook's tour" of the hospital.

I've decided to leave in the scene that establishes the assistant character, who has spent the last five years as an administrator at an upscale hospital in Minnesota whose husband's transfer to Boston left her in need of a job. Auschlander warns her that the pay is lower, the hours are longer, and the neighborhood is "considerably less pastoral." When Dr. Auschlander gets paged, Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) takes it upon herself to give the new employee the uncensored version of what happens at St. Eligius. The stories she tells--sex in the morgue, Legionnaires' Disease, the rapist stalking the hospital--are all storylines from the first two seasons (plus a few episodes) of St. Elsewhere.

I enjoy the reference to Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, the 1962 film starring Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, about an deranged former child star (Davis) who "cares for" her wheelchair-bound sister (Crawford).

Here's Boomer!

The story behind Jack "Boomer" Morrison's nickname, which was inspired by NBC network executives.

Clancy (Helen Hunt) meets Boomer (David Morse).

In "Hello, Goodbye", the finale of season two, recently-widowed Dr. Jack Morrison (David Morse), having just barely managed to qualify for the second year of the residency program at St. Eligius, spends a day on the town with his son, Pete. While out and about, he meets a pretty and charming college student named Clancy Williams (Helen Hunt), who is gathering signatures on a petition for nuclear disarmament. Jack asks, "What is this?", and Clancy replies, "What does it look like, Boomer? It's a petition." They begin a relationship that carries into season three, with a brief re-connection in season four. When Clancy meets the other doctors, she refers to Jack by her pet name for him, "Boomer". The staff picks up on it, and Jack gets referred to as Boomer on and off throughout the rest of the series.

In season three's "My Aim is True", repeat patient Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) introduces herself to a candidate for the position of Dr. Auschlander's assistant, and gives her the lowdown on what really goes on at St. Eligius. "Sodom and Gomorrah. You name it, the doctors at St. Eligius do it. That bleach-blond, Ehrlich, he used to get his jollies by tying up his ex-wife. There's no shame around here. They've even got a doctor here named 'Boomer'." The implication is that Clancy gave him the nickname because of his prowess in the sack. However, we've seen that she started calling him that before they knew each other in the biblical sense.

There's a behind-the-scenes explanation though, and it turns out "Boomer" is an inside joke. From the DVD commentary for "Cora and Arnie", with producer Mark Tinker and Emmy-winning guest star Doris Roberts: