User Reviews

Beginning with a character walking down bus steps wearing a hideous mask like something from The Twilight Zone and ending with one of the most surprising character twists of the series, "Love Is a Skinny Kid" is one of the best dramatic episodes of Route 66. Director James Sheldon weaves an interesting storyline among a great cast of actors, including Tuesday Weld, Cloris Leachman, and - instantly recognizable from his grin; smug, in this case - Burt Reynolds. Stirling Silliphant's storytelling and Sheldon's unique mixtures of the past and present on film make "Love Is a Skinny Kid" feel hauntingly sad, similar to the episode "Welcome to Amity." As in that case, Buz and Tod play well-defined secondary characters to, in this case, Weld's angry lead - an anger which is summarized by Buz at the beginning of the episode in fun, Beat Generation-style prose. The fictitious Kilkenny, TX, (actually Seagoville and Lewisville, TX) provided a very sparse and interesting background to match the deadly serious tone of the story, similar to the effect of the small Texas town portrayed in the movie "The Last Picture Show." This is, without question, a compelling episode of Route 66.

This is probably the most far-out episode I've seen. Definitely different,it moves along in fits and starts as it slowly picks up speed. A lot transpired leading up to thís day,and somebody is trying to find closure to a long ago sad secret and all-around raw deal. Weird as can be,you won't forget it !

That spooky mask put me back in touch with 50-years ago when I first saw it. The opening here is about as memorable and jarring as any of the series. Why is the woman shaking up a small Texas town by parading around in a grotesque mask. Seems it has to do with growing up there years ago, and settling certain family scores. I agree with another reviewer that there's enough dramatic material here for a two-part episode.

Anyhow, the series strengths are on display, especially the desolate little town and its clapboard houses. This was a time when Hollywood would rather cut its escapist throat than show an unvarnished America. And, yes, that is Cloris Leachman under a ton of uglifying makeup, a part that I expect recommended her for the Oscar winning rural role in The Last Picture Show (1971). Credit a deglamorized Tuesday Weld too, with a tightly controlled turn as the mysterious stranger. And catch a young Burt Reynolds as a local thug. His facial resemblance to Maharis is, I think, noticeable. My only reservation is with elements of the script. Writer Silliphant was unusual for TV of the time with his literate and at times poetical scripts. Here, however, snatches of dialog flirt with the excessive, calling attention to themselves instead of to the character. Nonetheless, it's a memorable 60-minutes of a highly unusual series.

Tod and Buz are in a small Texas town getting some minor repairs done on the car when a bus pulls up and a young woman wearing a mask steps out. She walks down the street, causing all heads to turn. She starts getting harassed by the local toughs and so naturally the boys have to intervene. They take an interest in her that is not responded to. She marches to the local paper, (run by Harry Towns in a small role for him), and places an ad, inviting everyone to a ceremony where she ties a doll to a tree and burns it. It nearly starts a riot. Somebody says something about a young girl who died years ago. Tod and Buz try to find out the back story but are told it's not their business. The sheriff intervenes and demands the woman take her mask off and identify herself. She does the former and we see it's Tuesday Weld. But she still won't reveal her identity, although she goes to the grave of a girl who lived from 1937-1952. Is she that girl? Does she know that girl? Does she know why she died?

This one reminded me of "Black September", the pilot/premiere, (there's even a tree involved) and also of both "Welcome to Amity" (6/9/61) and "Burning for Burning" (12/29/61), in both of which a pretty blonde woman comes to a small town where she isn't welcome by anybody, (and thus Tod and Buz take her side). I think this is the best of those and when the secret is revealed and they go to the closing credits with a freeze frame of that mask, it leaves quite an impression.

Cloris Leachman, a decade away from "The Last Picture Show" and "Phyllis", plays the mother of the 'deceased' child and has a great breakdown scene at the end. The chief thug is played by Burt Reynolds, between his "Riverboat" and "Gunsmoke" gigs. When George Maharis left this series, Reynolds was offered the chance to replace him but turned it down, preferring to play an original character in Quint Asper. So they gave the job to Glen Corbett instead. (Robert Redford narrowly lost the "Tod" role to Martin Milner: the series could have had two future movie stars in that corvette: but they wouldn't have been better actors than Milner and Maharis). Burt Reynolds was smart guy and a good actor but his manor seems gruffer and more down-to-earth than Maharis, (both of whom were frequently compared to Marlon Brando). It's hard to imagine him speaking Stirling Silliphant's poetic dialog the way Maharis could, (but then Glenn Corbett couldn't either).