Jack Soo

Jack Soo plays Det. Nick Yemana on Barney Miller (ABC, 1975–1982), the 1970s cop sitcom that treats a squad room like the only set that matters. Hal Linden runs the 12th Precinct as a therapist with a badge; Yemana is the deadpan pour — coffee as a running wound, civic absurdity as dialogue, travel replaced by talk.

Soo sells quiet comic architecture. No car-chase fetish. The station is the city.

ABC kept Barney Miller on the clock across 1975–1982. Jack Soo’s Det. Nick Yemana made Barney Miller’s squad room taste like bad coffee and perfect timing — 12th Precinct talk comedy, civic absurdity, a 1970s workplace that barely left the station. Deadpan as a pour. Jack Soo's Det. Nick Yemana is labor inside that weather, not a sticker.

s01e01 is the handshake: Ramon opens Danny Arnold's cop comedy as a station-house conversation. Linden already runs the 12th like a therapist with a badge; no car-chase fetish in sight. Keep s02e01 on the board as the turn — Doomsday is civic absurdity as a title card. The squad room does all the traveling: workplace sitcom architecture built from talk, not sirens or glamour chases. Leave s04e01 as extra filing if you want the run to prove it held: Goodbye, Mr. Fish (1) is the precinct saying farewell in-house. Abe Vigoda deadpan as a seasonal event — the series treating a desk as a character with a sendoff.

On TV Flash he is workplace sitcom craft in a detective’s chair. Abe Vigoda’s deadpan had company; Soo made the coffee a character. We file him as 1970s ensemble gold: the cop who photographs as furniture and plays as timing, still the reason Danny Arnold’s hour feels like people, not a precinct poster.