Before Ferris Bueller, before Parker Lewis, before Doogie Howser, there was…Dobie Gillis. Dobie was an average teenager who faced average teenage problems: never having enough dough, never getting the beautiful girl, never getting along with the square adults. Except Dobie wasn’t that average after all, but a smart, insightful, sensitive and funny guy with a unique outlook on life.

Starting in 1959 and airing on CBS for four years, Dwayne Hickman portrayed Dobie with verve and boyish charm. Dobie had the habit of speaking directly to the camera, which made the audience feel like his intimate friends and privy to whatever was going on inside that blond head. Most of Dobie’s tribulations arose from the fact that he was neither popular nor rich and the girls he chased after valued those qualities more highly than a sparkling personality. Working hard at his father’s grocery store didn’t exactly make Dobie a chick magnet. When the sun is shining and the girls are cruising down the street in their convertibles, no guy wants to be pushing a broom in the canned goods aisle.

Dobie’s partner in crime was fellow teenager Maynard G. Krebs, a bona fide beatnik, played to hip, goateed perfection by a pre-Gilligan’s Island Bob Denver. Maynard believed in the pleasures of life and always espoused a carefree and careless philosophy. The fancy-free existence Dobie and Maynard aspired to conflicted with the outlook preached by Dobie’s father, Herbert, who believed in hard work and conformity. However, many episodes revolved around Herbert changing his mind about that after Dobie and Maynard gave him a glimpse of the cooler side of life.

Throughout the series there was a stream of ‘perfect’ girls for Dobie to chase after, even though he never glanced twice at young smarty-pants Zelda who nursed a hopeless crush for the protagonist. Luckily for Zelda, Dobie finally came around to her way of thinking and proposed to her in Whatever Happened to Dobie Gillis?, a TV special reuniting characters from the show.

The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis was offbeat and kooky enough to attract faithful fans who appreciated its subversive wit and clever writing. Consider yourselves blessed if you’re lucky enough to catch a late night rerun of Dobie and his many loves.