Who’s the Boss? was a sitcom turned on its head. Sure, there was a mom, a dad, two cute kids, a house in the suburbs… and a live studio audience. But Angela Bower (Judith Light) was a single advertising exec with a son (Danny Pintauro) and Tony Micelli (Tony Danza) was a widowed ex-ballplayer with a daughter (future Charmed star Alyssa Milano). The Connecticut mansion belonged to Angela (along with the big ’80s hair and shoulder pads) and Tony wasn’t her boyfriend, but rather her housekeeper. Then there was her mother, Mona (the incomparable Katherine Helmond). The sexed-up, slightly cracked grandmother is a primetime staple, but in the former Soap matriarch’s hands, the character was a cut above (and usually got the best lines). As Angela complains to her in the pilot, “You’ve sent me a man for a housekeeper!” “Oh, don’t be sexist,” Mona replies. “A man can do meaningless, unproductive work just as well as a woman.”
