{{short description|1960s CBS TV sitcom character}} {{Infobox character | name = Lisa Douglas | image = Eva Gabor Green Acres 1969.jpg | series = Green Acres | first = | last = | creator = Paul Henning | portrayer = Eva Gabor | occupation = Housewife | spouse = Oliver Wendell Douglas }}
'''Lisa Douglas''' (née Gronyitz) was the leading female character in the 1960s CBS situation comedy ''Green Acres'', which ran for six years, from 1965 to 1971.<ref name="Belanger2005">{{cite book|author=Camyl Sosa Belanger|title=Eva Gabor, an Amazing Woman: 'Unscrupulous'|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H2_wf810890C&pg=PA273|year=2005|publisher=iUniverse|isbn=978-0-595-34160-3|pages=273–}}</ref> The character was reprised in the 1990 film ''Return to Green Acres''.<ref name="Texas">{{cite web |url=https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth309830/m1/35/ |title=Eva Gabor to reprise cooky Green Acres' character|newspaper=The Fort Hood Sentinel |date= April 12, 1990 |author= Thomas, George|access-date= September 13, 2017}}</ref> CNN rated the character as being amongst "The most stylish TV housewives of all time".<ref name="CNN">{{cite web |url=http://edition.cnn.com/2011/SHOWBIZ/TV/04/14/stylish.tv.housewives.instyle/index.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110422062740/http://edition.cnn.com/2011/SHOWBIZ/TV/04/14/stylish.tv.housewives.instyle/index.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=April 22, 2011 |title=The most stylish TV housewives of all time |newspaper=CNN |date= April 14, 2011 |access-date= September 12, 2017}}</ref>
==Character background== Lisa (portrayed by actress Eva Gabor), a glamorous Hungarian immigrant, plays the role of the wife of Oliver Wendell Douglas, a successful New York City attorney who had long harbored the dream of moving to the Midwest and operating a farm.<ref name="Belanger2005"/><ref name="Intellect">{{Cite journal|url=http://docserver.ingentaconnect.com/deliver/connect/intellect/20500726/v1n1/s8.pdf?expires=1505268166&id=91388465&titleid=75008706&accname=Guest+User&checksum=D7237E903B805D301390A4F7B9B6A283 |title=Rural representations in fashion and television|website=Docserver.ingentaconnect.com |author= Kaisar; Bernstein|access-date= September 13, 2017}}</ref> The leitmotif of the character through the years remains her comedic Hungarian accent and naivety, which leads to numerous jocular interactions with the Hooterville locals, who mishear Lisa's statements and are likewise misheard by Lisa.<ref name="Mansour2011"/><ref name="USC Spectator">{{cite web |url=https://cinema.usc.edu/archivedassets/100/16053.pdf |title= The place to be: Green Acres and America 1965–1971|newspaper=USC Spectator |author= Larry A. Karaszewski|access-date= September 13, 2017}}</ref> Both Lisa and Oliver are regularly portrayed as wearing city clothes, which seem misfit in the Hooterville expanse.<ref name="Avery2011">{{cite book|author=Martin Avery|title=Love and Death: Four Zen Novels|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cAg9AwAAQBAJ&pg=PT36|year=2011|publisher=Lulu.com|isbn=978-1-257-82803-6|pages=36–}}</ref> Lisa's penchant for wearing resplendent jewelry, costly dresses and heeled footwear adds to this characterization through the seasons.<ref name="CNN"/><ref name="Avery2011"/><ref name="JSTOR2">{{cite journal |jstor=41402437 |title= The sublime; origins and definitions|journal=The Georgia Review |volume=58 |issue=2 |pages=303–309 |date=2004 |author=David Baker}}</ref>
==Timeline== In the initial episodes, Lisa plays a Manhattan socialite who has no desire to leave the luxuries of her lifestyle in New York,<ref name="Intellect"/> but is forced to do so and move to rural Hooterville, when her husband, whom she loves considerably, decides to undertake farming.<ref name="Mansour2011">{{cite book|author=David Mansour|title=From Abba to Zoom: A Pop Culture Encyclopedia of the Late 20th Century|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7GN0E_diWbAC&pg=PA282|date=1 June 2011|publisher=Andrews McMeel Publishing|isbn=978-0-7407-9307-3|pages=282–}}</ref><ref name="NYT">{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/12/style/california-ojai-golden-hour.html |title=Ojai's Golden Hour |newspaper=The New York Times |date= July 11, 2015 |access-date= September 12, 2017}}</ref> After shifting to Hooterville, she becomes close to many farm animals, especially to the neighboring family's pet piglet Arnold,<ref name="Arnold">{{cite journal |url=https://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/bitstream/handle/1808/6928/vonSchlemmer_ku_0099D_11085_DATA_1.pdf;jsessionid=B37802F3A4FFD952DF67ED7B4DF45211?sequence=1 |title= Cinematic "Pigness": A Discourse Analysis of Pigs in Motion Pictures|journal=Kuscholarworks.ku.edu |author= Schlemmer, Mark von|access-date= September 13, 2017}}</ref> and takes up various cooking activities.<ref name="Washington Post">{{cite web |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1984/02/10/surreal-acres/9fe3a2ab-3168-49d6-876f-43998af77dad/ |title=Surreal 'Acres' |newspaper=The Washington Post |access-date= September 12, 2017}}</ref><ref name="Mansour2011"/> Yet, despite her attempts, Lisa is unable to fit into the Hooterville culture, wishing relentlessly to go back, while her husband sticks resolutely to his philanthropic values of remaining embedded to the rural heartland.<ref name="Greene2007">{{cite book|author=Doyle Greene|title=Politics and the American Television Comedy: A Critical Survey from I Love Lucy through South Park|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9yhzBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA106|date=10 October 2007|publisher=McFarland|isbn=978-0-7864-3235-6|pages=106–}}</ref>
[[File:Eddie Albert Eva Gabor Green Acres 1965.JPG|thumb|180px|Eva Gabor's portrayal of Lisa Douglas, featured above in the 1965 show-premiere publicity image, garnered broad critical acclaim]] As the episodes progress, it is Lisa who becomes comfortably enmeshed with the Hooterville life,<ref name="Yahoo">{{cite web |url=https://in.news.yahoo.com/green-acres-lisa-douglas-proved-203056107.html |title=Green Acres' Lisa Douglas Proved Any City Girl Can Make it in the Country |website=in.news.yahoo.com |access-date= September 12, 2017}}</ref> undertaking various entrepreneurial and philanthropic activities, while Oliver faces numerous challenges, both in his entrepreneurial work and philanthropic orientation.<ref name="Greene2007"/> The final episodes impress the significance of Lisa's rise to prominence in the Hooterville community and the apparent lack of importance that Hooterville residents accord to her husband. The concluding episode of the series, titled ''Lisa the Psychologist'', reemphasizes this portrayal, showcasing Lisa as a psychoanalyst whose services are much sought after by one and all.<ref name="Greene2007"/>
The character of Lisa Douglas is reprised in the 1990 film ''Return to Green Acres'', which shows Lisa and Oliver, after a spate of disappointments, shifting to New York.<ref name="Texas"/> However, subsequent to Hooterville residents reaching out to Lisa and Oliver for support to save their homes from being usurped by a local developer, both Lisa and Oliver realize their significant emotional attachment to Hooterville; and finally decide to move back.<ref name="Texas"/>
==Critical review== The character of Lisa Douglas engendered broad critical acclaim. While CNN rated the character as being amongst ''"The most stylish TV housewives of all time"'',<ref name="CNN"/> Lisa's character has also been critiqued as exemplifying an American housewife of those times who goes as per her husband's views.{{efn|name=fn1|Whitt (1996): ''"The dislocation the Douglases experience makes the viewer identify with Oliver and [...] his "faith in a rational order."''<ref name="JSTOR1">{{cite journal |jstor=41970275 |title= Grits and Yokels Aplenty: Depictions of Southerners on Prime-Time Television|journal=Studies in Popular Culture |volume=19 |issue=2 |pages=141–152|date= October 1996 |author= Whitt, Jan}}</ref>}}{{efn|name=fn2|Delbert (2014): ''"The theme song also explains that Lisa has no input in the decision, as Oliver sings, “You are my wife,” and Lisa responds, “Goodbye, city life!”..."''<ref name="Arizona Univ">{{cite journal |url=http://arizona.openrepository.com/arizona/bitstream/10150/320070/1/azu_etd_mr_2014_0055_sip1_m.pdf |title= The Portrayal of Marriage Through Network Sitcom Television Prograaming from 1950 to 2014|website=Arizona.openrepository.com |date= May 2014|author=Delberte, Danielle Celeste|access-date= September 13, 2017}}</ref>}} At the same time, Lisa's character has been reviewed broadly as being amongst select "familiar and congenial" television characters, those which offered the American audiences an "escape and a sense that order might yet prevail."<ref name="Piacentino2006">{{cite book|author=Edward Piacentino|title=The Enduring Legacy of Old Southwest Humor|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bQKTtmfvBLUC&pg=PA229|date=1 February 2006|publisher=LSU Press|isbn=978-0-8071-3086-5|pages=229–}}</ref>
Larry Karaszewski writes in the ''USC Spectator'': "While Mr. Douglas thinks he is a 'real farmer', Mrs. Douglas has no such pretensions. She simply is what she is and the citizens of Hooterville accept her for being herself [...] Much of ''Green Acres'' is about a communications gap and Lisa is central to the gap."<ref name="USC Spectator"/>
In the book ''Politics and the American Television Comedy'', pop culture author Doyle Greene writes: "Oliver and Lisa were [...] transformed into cultural and political caricatures, even dialectical oppositions: husband versus wife; rural life versus urbanity; Protestant work ethic versus flights of fancy; and, above all, America versus Europe. As the embodiment of Europe in all of its aristocratic glory, Lisa represents the very culture that America explicitly saw itself as being reborn from in the frontiers of the New World."<ref name="Greene2007"/>
==Notes== {{notelist}}
==References== {{Reflist}}
{{Hooterville}} {{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Douglas, Lisa}} Category:Green Acres characters Category:Fictional immigrants to the United States Category:Fictional Hungarian people Category:Television characters introduced in 1965 Category:Female characters in sitcoms