Frasier Crane, still listening

In the opening episode of Frasier-first telecast in September 1993-we see radio psychiatrist Dr Frasier Crane in his Seattle home, a gorgeously bedecked apartment with a view of the Space Needle, where his father is unimpressed by the Eames chair or the Corbu lamp.

- RAJA SEN

"Nothing matches," says Martin Crane, a retired policeman far removed from the pretentious protagonist. Here Frasier patronisingly explains "eclectic" style. "The theory behind it is if you've got really fine pieces of furniture, it doesn't matter if they match, they will go together."

Martin then brings in his recliner, a rattily upholstered BarcaLounger that jars violently against the cultured decor. Frasier is appalled. Cue the laughter.

Thus kicked off ll seasons of a television classic-that won 37 Emmy awardswhere the comedy was unapologetically highbrow yet defiantly slapstick.

Frasier made bookish gags about Kurt Vonnegut, yet its best episodes were bedroom farces. As the shrink said, Eclectic.

Frasier was a spinoff of Cheers, an even more iconic comedy. Set around a Boston bar, the show consistently, and casually, subverted television tropes.

In its third season (circa 1984) we met the character Frasier Crane, a psychiatrist in love with Cheers 'pseudo-intellectual heroine Diane. The uppity psychiatrist proved a sharp contrast to the show's barflies, and became a regular cast-member, helping characters with troubles, confronting his own, and making friends along the way. It was on Cheers that Frasier fell in love, married, became a father.