Title: Sex Surrogate
Directed by: Noam Pitlik
Written by: Jerry Ross and Tony Sheehan (story), Tony Sheehan, Larry Balmagia, and Dennis Koenig (teleplay)
Air Date: February 10, 1977
Previous: Abduction
Next: Moonlighting
Guest Starring: Doris Roberts, Billy Barty, Eugene Elman, Marilyn Sokol
"Sex Surrogate" is the 17th episode of the third season of Barney Miller.
Wojo and Fish are called out to a shooting. It seems that one Louise Kaufmann (Doris Roberts) took a shot at her husband out in broad daylight, grazing his "inseam". Louise screeches that her husband was going to a whorehouse, while Mr. Kaufman insists that he was going to a clinic.
It turns out that it's hard to differentiate between the two. Mr. Kaufman was going to the New York Institute of Sexual Dysfunction. The director, Dr. Lorraine Dooley (Marilyn Sokol, who voiced Ma Otter in Emmet Otters Jugband Christmas), insists that she is a legitimate therapist helping people, mainly men, get past problems like erectile dysfunction. But she admits that she and the women on her staff do in fact perform sex acts on their clients and Wojo says that when he got there, there were a bunch of men waiting to be serviced. Meanwhile Fish, who is a little unnerved at a case of a frustrated housewife shooting at her husband, considers engaging Dr. Dooley's services.
Harris is busy with his own case, specifically, a report of a burglary. A witness described the burglar as a child, which leads Harris to comb the files for reports of juvenile criminals. He's surprised when the person caught fencing the stolen goods isn't a child, but rather a little person, Mr. Resnick (Billy Barty).
Tropes:
- Acoustic License: Mr. Kaufman says he isn't going to press charges, but Barney explains that a shooting is out of his hands and the case will have to go to the grand jury. Mr. Kaufman then turns to his wife and delivers the bad news that she's going to have to be in jail for a while. Despite being maybe three feet behind him in the cage, somehow Louise didn't hear this exchange.
- Continuity Nod: Wojo, despite loudly and vocally objecting to prostitution, finds himself attracted to a hooker (or quasi-hooker). Basically the same thing happened back in Season 1 and "The Courtesans", in which Wojo loudly and rudely insulted a pretty young prostitute, only to ask her out by the end of the episode.
- Death Glare: Barney has to badger the perpetually lazy Yemana to get a file for him. Finally Yemana does, and hands Barney the file...except that it's just the file, namely the manila folder, with no documents inside. Barney's already irritated but when Yemana reaches for the folder and says "You through with this?", Barney delivers an impressive Death Glare.
- Did You Just Have Sex?: Wojo's late for work, because as it turns out, the clocks were set forward an hour over the weekend. Barney says that the time change was all over the TV, and the radio, and the newspaper...but Wojo says he didn't watch any TV and didn't listen to the radio and didn't read the paper and didn't really go out over the weekend. Throughtout this whole conversation the goofy grin on his face gets steadily goofier. Finally Barney rolls his eyes at the obvious impilcation and says that Wojo can stay an hour late.
- Height Angst: Levitt says that he's quitting the police; he's fed up over not being able to advance to detective due to his short stature. Meeting Mr. Resnick and contemplating the problems of someone who's a lot shorter than he is causes Levitt to change his mind.
- High-Class Call Girl: Dr. Dooley says that she's not a high class call girl and her establishment isn't a brothel, but instead she's a therapist and it's a clinic. It sounds like she's a high class call girl, though.
- Insistent Terminology: Mr. Resnick objects to Harris calling him a "midget" and insists that he is a "little person". ("Midget" was still in wide use in the 1970s but around that time was starting to be categorized as a slur.)
- Little People Are Surreal: Harris investigates a report of a child burglar, and is surprised to find out that the burglar is actually an elderly little person.
- The Loins Sleep Tonight: Dr. Dooley insists that she is not a whore and says that she helps people with sexual problems like, say, impotence. She sizes up Wojo and says that if the stress of the job or failure to pass the sergeant's exam ever makes him unable to perform, he can stop by and see her. Then she leaves her card.
