Title: The Baby Broker
Directed by: Noam Pitlik
Written by: Tony Sheehan
Air Date: October 5, 1978
Previous: Dog Days
Next: The Accusation
Guest Starring: Ivor Francis, Phoebe Dorin, Frederic Cook, Gisela Getty, Michael Durrell
"The Baby Broker" is the fourth episode of the fifth season of Barney Miller.
As usual, the 12th has two wacky cases. In the first, Wojo was at the bus terminal seeing his girlfriend of the week off, when he witnessed a middle-aged couple dragging a woman off a bus. The couple, Mr. and Mrs. Adelman, initially refuse to say anything, while the young woman, Miss Schlesinger, speaks only German. Eventually Mrs. Adelman cracks and admits the truth: Miss Schelesinger is pregnant, and the Adelmans paid her $5000 for the baby. Wojo investigates and drags in one Philip Kubrick, an extremely unethical attorney who maintains an apartment complex where young pregnant women live in dorms, "waiting to hatch." Miss Schlesinger was attempting to escape and go home to Germany.
In the second case a man is arrested for yelling obscenities at a woman in the park. It turns out that he is Professor Henry McDowell, a PhD. who is compiling a comprehensive dictionary on swear words, and he was just trying some of them out.
Meanwhile, Barney needles Harris about Harris's mustache, still growing in after he had to shave it two episodes ago. Officer Levitt is literally falling asleep on his feet. Levitt, the hard charger who wants to make detective, admits that he has been working for 37 straight hours. Worse, when he comes back to the squad room he is unnaturally hyperactive and energetic, having obviously taken an amphetamine.
Gisela Getty, billed in the credits as Martine Getty, played Miss Schlesinger. She had a very interesting life
.
Tropes:
- Accidental Pervert: The professor was arrested for being a public nuisance by making lewd comments in a park, but he was actually doing research for a detailed dictionary and history of obscenities.Prof. McDowell: She called me a pervert. I'm a scholar.Dietrich: There's no reason you can't be both.
- Amoral Attorney: A slimy lawyer houses pregnant women in his apartment building, sells their babies, takes $5K per baby, and pretends the money is for paperwork and processing.
- Argentina Is Nazi-Land: A subtle joke when the squad wonders where they can get a German-speaker to talk to Miss Schlesinger, and Yemana suggests going to "Little Argentina". (In the end it turns out that Dietrich, not in the squad room when Miss Schlesinger was brought in, speaks German.)
- Artistic License – Linguistics: The professor, supposedly an expert on languages, mispronounces "Celtic" as "Selltic". (The only time you pronounce it Selltic instead of Keltic is when you're talking about the Boston basketball team.)
- Comforting Comforter: Barney goes into his office only to find Levitt, who has crashed after taking amphetamines, asleep in his chair, snoring loudly. Barney puts a blanket on Levitt before retrieving some papers and walking back out.
- Continuity Nod: The third episode in a row mentioning Harris's mustache, which he shaved off in "The Search" and was growing back in "Dog Days".
- The Dandy: Harris, a Running Gag. When Barney says he'll just have to resign himself to "looking grubby" for a while until the mustache comes back in, Harris says "Oh Barney, I'm not capable of looking grubby." It seems that once he tried, but he just couldn't do it.
- Distinction Without a Difference: Mr. Kubrick says that he wasn't selling babies to adoptive parents. That would be illegal! No, he took $5000 as payment "for services rendered." Paperwork and such.
- Double Entendre: A depressed Mrs. Adelman says "We tried for 15 years to have our own baby. It was a waste of time." Mr. Adelman throws her a Double Take.
- The Ghost: Miss Fontana, the woman who reported Prof. McDowell for shouting obscenities. Harris keeps trying to get her to come in and make a statement, but apparently she's at home in the tub. Eventually Barney has Harris cut the professor loose.
- Noodle Incident: When the professor says he's never been able to find a single swear word that starts with Z, Yemana cackles with laughter and says "Zelda".Yemana: I guess you had to be there.
- Promotion to Opening Titles: Inverted. James Gregory was promoted to the opening titles for Season 4 (complete with And Starring credit) but appeared in less than half of the episodes. As of this episode his credit disappeared and he would remain "Special Guest Star" for the rest of the run.
