AllMovie

Andy Griffith shed a bit of his nice-guy image in this made-for-TV movie, in which he plays Jack McGruder, the elderly father of Clarke McGruder (John Ritter), a successful lawyer. Jack has been missing for years, and Clarke has spent some time trying to track down his father's whereabouts; after the death of Clarke's mother, Jack reappears, and Clarke goes out of his way to reintegrate him with his family, allowing him to move in with his wife and son. But while Jack seems genial on the surface, there's a dark and troubling undercurrent to his personality, and in time Clarke realizes his father isn't just cranky, but dangerous. Gramps first aired in 1995, and its initial broadcast ran opposite the much-anticipated wedding episode of the popular TV series Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. Dr. Quinn won a decisive victory in the ratings that night, leading Andy Griffith to quip to a reporter, "It's hard to beat a 39-year-old virgin getting married."