Cozi TV’s Mini ‘Frasier’ Marathon Offers Some Holiday Cheer

TV nostalgia: It’s the gift that keeps on giving, year after year. And few classics come in a more sophisticated, delightful and timelessly funny package than Frasier, which unwraps four vintage Christmas-themed episodes from the 1990s in Monday’s two-hour mini-marathon on Cozi TV.

The opener, airing at 8/7c, is 1993’s “Miracle on Third or Fourth Street.” Ho-ho-ho belly laughs ensue, whether fussy Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer) is spending the holiday spreading erudite cheer at his Seattle radio workplace (above, in 1995’s “Frasier Grinch,” at 8:30/7:30c), slumming in a mall to find a last-minute educational toy for his son or squabbling with down-to-earth ex-cop dad Martin (John Mahoney) over the latter’s kitschy seasonal decorations.

The standout is 1998’s “Merry Christmas, Mrs. Moskowitz” (9:30/8:30c). The episode won an Emmy for Jay Kogen’s farcical script (directed by Grammer), in which the Cranes pretend to be Jewish on Christmas Eve to fool the mom (Carole Shelley) of Frasier’s new girlfriend (a post–NYPD Blue Amy Brenneman).

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Complications include brother Niles (David Hyde Pierce) parading as Jesus, a Christmas tree arriving at precisely the worst time, a nonkosher ham baking in the oven and Eddie (beloved Jack Russell terrier Moose) sporting a Santa costume. As one of the title cards says: “Oy to the World.”

(Credit: NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty Images)

“No Christmas is complete without a bit of tumult,” Frasier observes in 1997’s clever, multiple-POV “Perspectives on Christmas” (9/8c). He speaks from experience, and we tune in with great expectation, knowing that the lousier his Yuletide, the louder our laughs.

Frasier, Monday, December 9, 8/7c, Cozi TV