About This Quiz
Take one busy working mom, throw in a live-in housekeeper with a feisty teen daughter, and you've got "Who's the Boss?" Think you know all there is to know about this classic '80s series? Take our quiz to find out!Alyssa Milano played young Samantha Micelli -- daughter of Tony Micelli -- who was played by Tony Danza. Milano became a teen idol during her time on the show, growing up before the eyes of viewers.
"Who's the Boss?" takes place in suburban Connecticut, fairly close to New York City. Some scenes feature Tony's hometown of Brooklyn.
Tony was a professional baseball player for the St. Louis Cardinals before a shoulder injury ended his career. He took a job as a live-in housekeeper for Angela in an attempt to move his daughter out of Brooklyn.
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Angela Bower is a single mom to son Jonathan. She works as an advertising executive and has trouble balancing her home and career until Tony comes to help her shoulder the workload.
Angela and husband Michael separate before Tony comes into the picture. When he stops by the house in season one to have Angela sign divorce papers, the two almost reconcile before realizing that they really are better off apart.
The tension between Angela and Tony starts early in the series. In the season one finale, the pair share a kiss when both are drunk, setting up a "will they or won't they?" drama that lasts for the duration of the series.
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During the season two episode, "The Anniversary Show," Angela plans a special dinner to celebrate Tony's two years of working for her. The night ends badly when Tony is rushed to the hospital with a burst appendix. He ends up telling Angela he loves her in his woozy state.
Nicole Eggert -- who went on to star on "Baywatch" and "Charles in Charge," played Sam's friend Marci Ferguson. Marci's father was a doctor who made a lot more money than Tony, which means the Micellis struggled to afford things like ski trips and prep schools that Marci took for granted.
The tightly-wound Angela finally cuts loose during a vacation to Mexico in the season three premiere -- only to lose an important client, and then lose her job entirely. When she can't find a new position, her family urges her to start her own business.
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Angela is ready for boyfriend Geoffrey Wells to propose to her during a trip to the mountains in season three, but when he does propose, she ultimately turns him down.
Coco plays Tony's father-in-law and Sam's grandfather, Nick Milano. He starts off the series in jail, but eventually escapes to come visit his granddaughter. He later moves to Florida and passes away, leaving Sam to come to terms with his death.
The season three finale was meant as a back-door pilot for a new show, starring Mona. In the proposed series, Mona would move to Manhattan to help her brother Cornelius run a motel. The concept of a spin-off was nixed when producers decided Mona should stay on "Who's the Boss?" instead.
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Mrs. Rossini was one of Tony's old friends from Brooklyn. She ran a fish market with her husband and seemed to never make peace with Mona, who took every opportunity she could to shoot catty remarks at Mrs. Rossini.
Sam spent many of her high school years dating Jesse Nash, played by Scott Bloom, so it's no surprise that he is the one to invite her to the big dance.
In season four, Tony gets the band back together to save his old Brooklyn school from being demolished. Unfortunately, things don't go well for Tony and the Dreamtones when Tony fights to have Angela join the group.
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Angela and Mason are close friends throughout the series, and he even ends up serving as one of Tony's teachers when Tony goes back to school to get his college degree.
A client offers Angela a trip to Jamaica in the season six premiere episode. While there, Angela almost drowns while skinny-dipping. She and Tony talk about a future together -- and the possibility of marriage.
Jonathan is such a great student that he often ignores extra-curricular activities. To make himself more attractive to colleges, he joins the school orchestra in season six, but is frustrated when he is assigned to play the accordion. Tony helps him out by hooking him up with an old buddy who's a master accordion player.
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Sam takes a job at a dude ranch in New Mexico for the summer, then announces that she is going to put off college so she can stay at the ranch. Tony and Angela come to talk some sense into her and manage to convince her to go to college as planned.
When some folks from his old neighborhood couldn't take care of little Billy anymore, Tony brought the child to live with him and Angela. By the next season, Billy was gone so producers could focus on the relationship between Angela and Tony more thoroughly.
After spending some time as a student teacher, Tony decided that teaching was the right career for him. After graduation, he took a job teaching science.
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After seeing a retired baseball star struggle in his old age, Tony takes up the cause of health care rights for seniors. Eventually, he gets the opportunity to testify before the U.S. Senate and takes the entire family on a trip to Washington, D.C., in the season seven finale.
After a friend of his dies, Tony decides to seize the day and propose to Angela on a trip to a ski resort. She turns him down, however, arguing that he is proposing for all the wrong reasons.
Sam marries boyfriend Hank -- who was in medical school but decides he'd rather be a puppeteer -- in season eight.
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In the three-part series finale, "Savor the Veal," Tony takes a teaching contract in Iowa. Angela decides to leave her job for a year to be with him, but eventually decides that living in Iowa isn't for her.
The series increasingly focused on the relationship between Angela and Tony as the seasons progressed, but the pair don't end up married by the end. Instead, the ending is left up in the air, though the pair are still in love by the series finale.
In her memoir, Alyssa Milano writes about auditioning for a show called "You're the Boss." Producers decided to focus more on the tension between Tony and Angela by changing the title to a question instead of a statement.
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It's hard to imagine "Who's the Boss," without Angela's crazy mother Mona around, but the character was originally supposed to be an older sister, not a mother. Casting issues and the strength of Katherine Helmond's audition convinced producers that making Mona the mother was the way to go.
The show "Living Dolls" featured Leah Remini as one of Sam Micelli's friends who began a modeling career. The 1989 series also featured a young Halle Berry.
"Who's the Boss?" ran for 196 episodes over eight seasons, from 1984 to 1992, and left viewers guessing on the fate of the Tony-Angela love story.
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