Mary Tyler Moore

Writer Tom Koch and artist Angelo Torres actually got two cracks at The Mary Tyler Moore Show in 1972. The duo bundled a shorter version of "The Mary Tailor-Made Show," along with mini-spoofs of four other series, into "Truly 'Relevant' TV Shows," which originally ran in MAD #149 (March '72). That set the stage for the classic six-page spoof spotlighted here, also titled "The Mary Tailor-Made Show." It originally ran in MAD #155 (December '72) and has been reprinted several times over the following decades.

Mary Tyler Moore, seen here with on-screen husband Donald Sutherland, was nominated for the Best Actress Oscar for her role in 1980's Ordinary People, but lost to Coal Miner's Daughter star Sissy Spacek. Artist Angelo Torres, who had parodied Moore's classic TV series twice for MAD in 1972, teamed up with writer Stan Hart for the parody "Extraordinary People," which originally ran in MAD #223 (June '81).

The morons behind "Extraordinary People," writer Stan Hart and artist Angelo Torres, found an extraordinary way to zing several early-'80s movies within the splash panel for their spoof of the Paul Newman legal drama The Verdict. Mary Tyler Moore and her Six Weeks co-star Dudley Moore (no relation) were among the special guest stars on the opening page of "The Verdiccch," which originally appeared in MAD #239 (June '83).

The failure of Mary Tyler Moore's 1986 CBS sitcom Mary (co-starring a young Katey Segal) led Frank Jacobs to rework her classic sitcom theme as part of four "TV Theme Songs" given a MAD spin in the magazine's "Hot TV Issue," #266 (October '86). Illustrated by Sam Viviano, "TV Theme Songs" is still a delight over three decades later.

It's quite possible that the real-life reunion movie The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited inspired this portion of "MAD's 50 Worst Things About Comedy," featuring Mary Tyler Moore, Dick Van Dyke, Rose Marie and Carl Reiner revisiting Dick's traditional "klutzy entrance" opening sequence to the original series. Hermann Mejia illustrated Scott Maiko's text for "MAD's 50 Worst Things About Comedy," which ran in MAD #445 (September '04).