‘It explored the spectrum of humanity’: the enduring pleasures of Northern Exposure

The quirky early 90s drama ran for 110 episodes, had fans in Joni Mitchell and Bon Iver, and showed one of TV’s first gay weddings. Now, having been forgotten for years, its warm-hearted charms are being discovered by a new generation

A blond waitress called Shelly is giving a long, strange monologue about an egg sandwich called One Eyed Jack. She works in a diner in the woods in the Pacific north-west, in a town populated by a host of quirky characters: sensitive young men in leather jackets; strong-and-silent types with hearts of gold; and wise, aphoristic members of the local Indigenous community. An intellectual big-city outsider is transplanted into the scene, resulting in various fish-out-of-water encounters and misunderstandings; a will-they-won’t-they flirtation with a glamorous local brunette ensues.

Two separate TV shows, both wildly successful in their own ways, fit the above description. Both debuted in 1990, and both were shot about the same time in the mountainous area near Seattle, Washington. One, of course, was Twin Peaks, David Lynch’s era-defining cult series that ran for two series, followed by a 1992 feature film and 2017’s magisterial Twin Peaks: The Return. The other show was Northern Exposure, which ran for& six seasons until 1995, making stars& of its two leads, Rob Morrow, who& starred as sardonic Brooklyn doctor Joel Fleischman, furious at having been stationed in rural Alaska, and Janine Turner, the feisty, independent small-plane pilot Maggie O’Connell, whose boyfriends keep dying in tragic accidents.