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Two female cops, Christine Cagney and Mary Beth Lacey, fight crime in New York City. It was groundbreaking in its time (The Eighties); for that matter, you don't see many series like it today, either.
Tropes used in Cagney and Lacey include:
- Buddy Cop Show
- Cop Show
- Chase Scene
- Dirty Harriet
- The Eighties
- Eighties Hair: Especially obvious in the first season opening, when they go undercover as hookers.
- Emmy Award: For six years running, one of the two lead actresses won the Emmy for Best Lead Actress in a Drama (four wins for Daly, two for Gless).
- Hide Your Lesbians: A constant worry of CBS was that the two female characters would be perceived as lesbians — as a result Mary Beth Lacey was married, and actress Meg Foster (playing Cagney) was replaced by Sharon Gless because she was "too aggressive and likely to be perceived as a lesbian by viewers". CBS hoped Sharon would be a more 'high-class' and 'feminine' Cagney, but fortunately the producers resisted this Executive Meddling and kept Cagney's tough working-class character.
- Lovely Angels
- Made for TV Movie: The pilot and four sequels (aired in the mid-1990s).
- Meaningful Names: See Tomboy and Girly Girl below.
- Name and Name
- Police Procedural
- Pretty in Mink: Cagney wears a fox fur coat in the second opening.
- Shirtless Scene: Given this show was for the ladies, Fan Service for them was only fair. Plus it was the best kind that TV standards at the time would allow.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Less extreme than other examples, but deliberately invoked by the show's creative team — and Lampshaded with reversed/ironic Meaningful Names — the tough one is named "Lacey" and the feminine one is named "Cagney".