‘Raymond,’ thankfully, moved to Mondays

Doris Roberts vividly remembers her reaction when told in 1996 that CBS had scheduled her new show, “Everybody Loves Raymond,” Fridays after “Dave’s World.”

“Friday night at 8:30 on CBS? It’s a death slot. The last success they had in that hour on Friday was ‘Gomer Pyle.’”

Of course, her skepticism was based on experience. Three years earlier she co-starred in “The Boys,” a sitcom starring Chris Meloni as a young writer who befriends three older men. The cast included Ned Beatty as a retired fireman and Roberts as his wife, Doris.

The show lasted four weeks.

Meloni currently stars in “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” while the actor who he ended up replacing at the last minute in “The Boys” also did OK for himself. Anthony Edwards was cast a year later as one of the leads on a new series, “ER.”