Like Father, like Daughter

Taxi's very first episode gets under way as would-be art dealer Elaine Nardo (Marilu Henner) strolls into the offices of New York's Sunshine Cab company, looking for a job. After a typically hostile "screening" by dispatcher Louie DePalma (Danny DeVito), Elaine is introduced to her co-workers: Alex Reiger (Judd Hirsch), the garage's "father confessor" and the only full-time cabbie in the bunch; aspiring actor Bobby Wheeler (Jeff Conaway); wannabe boxing champ Tony Banta (Tony Danza); shy, clumsy college student John Burns (Randall Carver); and mechanic Latka Gravas, a thickly accented foreigner from an unpronounceable country. Elaine also joins the cabbies' efforts to reunite Alex with his long-estranged teenage daughter, Cathy (Talia Balsam), who is returning from Brazil after a 15-year separation -- but only long enough to change planes.