Henry and Muriel Rush are owners of a two-unit house at 171–173 Buena Vista Avenue East
San Francisco, California. Henry is a conservative cartoonist who authors a comic strip called
Cosmic Cow with a hand-puppet version of "Cosmic Cow." Muriel is a freelance photographer. They have two adult daughters, Jackie and Sara. Additional characters include Sara's friend, Monroe Ficus, and Henry's boss, Arthur Wainwright, who was head of Wainwright Publishing. The character of Monroe was originally intended to be used for only a single episode but producers added the character to the series. A running gag throughout the series was Henry’s wardrobe consisting of a sweatshirt representing a specific college. After the
University of Michigan appeared in the pilot episode, students began sending in shirts from their school for Knight to wear on the program. 107 schools in all were included, with
Oregon State University and
Northwestern University tying for the most appearances.
Seasons 2 and 3 During its second season, the series' principal stories were focused around Muriel's pregnancy. Henry's niece April comes from
Delaware to live with the Rush family. The season concludes with Muriel giving birth to a son, Andrew (later played regularly by twins William and Michael Cannon from 1983 to 1984). In the fall of 1982, ABC moved the series to Thursday nights, which proved to be disastrous and the show saw its ratings fall drastically. The network canceled the series at the conclusion of the season after falling from #6 for the 1981–82 season to #38 for the 1982–83 season.
First-run syndication During the early 1980s, TV station owner
Metromedia was expanding its portfolio of original
syndicated programming through its production subsidiary, Metromedia Producers Corporation. When
Too Close for Comfort was canceled by ABC, Metromedia Producers Corporation elected to pick up the series and began producing all-new episodes to run on various stations throughout the country. Starting in April 1984, a total of 23 new episodes were broadcast for the show's fourth season, featuring the same cast as seen on the ABC episodes. The show's ratings improved in syndication and Metromedia ordered an additional 30 episodes, airing through November 1985. When the fifth season began, a single child actor, Joshua Goodwin, played the role of Andrew Rush.
The Ted Knight Show In late 1985, several changes were made before production started for Season 6. The show's title was changed to
The Ted Knight Show (not to be confused with the 1978
CBS show of the same name), and the premise and setting were altered. Henry retires from drawing Cosmic Cow and, along with Muriel and Andrew, moves to
Marin County where he buys a share of a local newspaper and becomes its editor. Monroe joins the Rushes and takes a job with Henry's paper as a reporter.
Pat Carroll played the role of Hope Stinson, who owns the majority share of the newspaper and serves as a foil for Henry. In addition, the Rushes hire a live-in nanny, played by Lisa Antille. The characters of Jackie, Sara and Muriel's mother Iris were not included in the retooled show. First-run episodes of
The Ted Knight Show were broadcast starting in April 1986. Twenty-two episodes were produced prior to the summer of 1986 and 12 had aired by mid-July. The revamped show was scheduled to resume production when Knight, who had been battling
colon cancer since 1985, died on August 26, 1986. The ten remaining first-run episodes were broadcast from September 1986 to February 1987, and those episodes were added to the
Too Close for Comfort syndicated rerun package with the original show's title. All 22 episodes were repackaged under the original
Ted Knight Show banner in January 2026, when American classic television network
Antenna TV began airing the retooled sixth season as a separate package of episodes from the main
Too Close for Comfort series. ==Cast==