The Nanny Reviews

While never truly a great show, The Nanny turned The Sound of Music-like premise on its head and added a deliciously tacky Queens, New York sheen. Much of the show was rooted in the fact that Fran Fine was a Jewish American princess was dropped into a world of emotionally restrained and stiff-upper-lipped WASPs and English blue bloods. We all knew that it was only a matter of time before Fran and her boss ended up together, the kids would eventually love her and think of her as their mother, and so on and so forth. But The Nanny was designed as comfort food, like most sitcoms.

One’s tolerance for the show depends entirely on how one takes to Fran Drescher. I find her I Love Lucy-esque antics to be endearing, her nasal whine to be a bit of character in an otherwise bland setting, and her personality to be lovably goofy, tacky and flashy. She’s essentially playing a fictionalized version of herself, but there’s enough of a character there to say that she truly sparkles in the role. And why shouldn’t see? She created, wrote and executive produced the show.

The Nanny isn’t just a one woman show, and towards the end of the run the title becomes a misnomer as more and more episodes deal less and less with the concept of the show and more with Fran becoming a wife and nouveau riche. It has a fantastic ensemble to always perform each of their parts perfectly and bring a unique chemistry to the series. Although why Renee Taylor, Ann Guilbert and Rachel Chagall were considered guest stars when they appear constantly throughout the show is anyone’s guess.