36 NEW SHOWS OF THE HELLISH MID-SEASON TV OF 1979
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- čas přidán 23. 06. 2017
- An unprecedented 36 new series premiered in the winter and spring (January-May) of 1979 on ABC, CBS and NBC, the most over a mid-season period since the early 1950s when there existed a fourth network, Du Mont. The driving force behind this new series glut was NBC’s legendary strategically aggressive programmer Fred Silverman. After solidifying CBS’s top-rated status earlier in the decade, then propelling ABC to overtake CBS and have it reign in the top spot for the first time in its history, Silverman moved in on hapless NBC to once more work his ratings magic on that network for a perfect trifecta victory. ABC and CBS, however, were determined to not allow that to happen and so churned out multiple new shows of their own. After all three networks launched their barrage of mostly terrible series, the prime-time battlefield by the summer had become littered with the slaughtered bodies of 26 of them.
In the fall of 1978 NBC debuted 10 new series, including a pair of quick early replacements, after which Silverman introduced 16 more new shows through the mid-season stretch, of which only 3 survived the cancellation ax, Real People and BJ and the Bear, Hello Larry and a fourth, Mrs. Columbo (a.k.a. Kate Columbo, Kate the Detective, Kate Loves a Mystery) barely inched its way into the first month of a second season before being swiftly yanked off the schedule. ABC and CBS saw 6 of their combined 20 new series slip into at least a partial or full second season, The Ropers, Angie, The Dukes of Hazzard, The Bad News Bears, The Chisolms and Stockard Channing in Just Friends (a.k.a. The Stockard Channing Show). The end result found ABC becoming again the top-rated network champ for a third consecutive year in 1979, CBS a runner-up second, and NBC having fared worse in last place than it did in the 1977-78 season. The third time proved to be not the charm for Silverman’s magic and he would struggle for three seasons to turn the network’s woeful numbers around, but never gained traction at it and ultimately failed before becoming replaced himself in 1981.
To Note:
CBS’s Co-ed Fever had a single special airing in the post-Super Bowl slot but rated so poorly that it never continued as an intended weekly series in what was to have been its Monday time slot. Also, this video excludes a quartet of NBC limited-run series, being the two-hour length mini-series From Here to Eternity and Studs Lonigan, both under the NBC Novels for Television title, and, separately, Backstairs at the White House, along with the irregularly scheduled Centennial maxi-series, which aired in 2-hour as well as 3-hour installments. NBC’s irreverent newsmagazine program Weekend was also omitted, since while it may have been new to prime time (as a monthly series) in the fall of 1978, it had actually shifted over from its original late-night Saturday 11:30 pm-1 am berth where it had aired monthly since 1974 and in lieu of Saturday Night Live since 1975, and so by that definition it can’t really be considered as a new series. But if one wanted to factor in the limited-run series and even Weekend, the total number of new shows that appeared through this hellish mid-season period of 1979 would then be 41, with only From Here to Eternity returning the following mid-season as a short-lived hour-long weekly series. Whichever way one looks at it, to say that the mid-season of 1979 proved to be underwhelming, especially in terms of quality and the ratings of its new shows, would be greatly understating the fact. - Zábava
A year later, Angie's boyfriend became a hero when he landed an airplane safely after the pilot, co-pilot and navigator all fell sick from food poisoning.
All that in spite of his drinking problem. Amazing!
Yep, and not being the "real" FATHER of "Hyde" from That 70's show
He got over Casa Grande?
Surely you can’t be serious
John Field Show DONT call me Shirley
Boy did the 1970's love their sweeping overhead shots of freeways during their sitcom intros.
LOL....I know. Dallas probably helped start the trend when it came on in 1978. Knots Landing did it with the ocean highway view in 1979.
"Goodtimes", "WKRP in Cincinnati", and "The Bob Newhart Show" come to mind without even taxing my memory. The industry really did just copy what everyone else was doing.
One Day at a Time is guilty of the overhead interstate shots too.
Don't forget about people showing up in round holes turning to the camera and smiling.
NepperCat Don’t forget CHIPS. That one was all about freeways due to the namesake. LOL
I was 8 years old in 79. You put a monkey in a truck and drive it through a billboard. You've created my favorite new show.
Not only that, but they drive town to town while solving small crimes along the way.
@@theholymackerel072 Um, that would be Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp 1971
@@archangel_one BJ did that too, dude. You just have to outrun the deputy to the state line before the credits roll.
@@theholymackerel072 1973 "Battle for the Planet of the Apes" probably did it too.
Incidentally, that was a Bear.
Now the title of that show sounds like gay porn: Blow Job and the Large Hairy Gay Man. How times have changed.
I'm a child of the 70's and I'm sorry, but I love it all... The good, the bad & the ugly... I love it all. This all brings back memories of watching TV on a 19" portable black & white TV in my parents' TV room on suburban NJ & I'm longing for those carefree days again...📺📺📺
I was getting ready to go to college in 1979, so I didn’t really pay attention to the new TV shows (dorms didn’t have TVs). However, ten years earlier, ALL TV seemed great to me, so I totally understand.
The coolest TV year for me was 1974(?), with The Six Million Dollar Man, The Night Stalker and Star Trek and Hogan’s Heroes reruns! I was a happy kid!
@@thetooginator153
Me too.... I graduated High School in '79
I'm a child of the 80s, myself, but I do often get that "nostalgia for a time I never knew" thing with the 70s. It was close enough to my decade that I caught echoes of it as a kid. It's interesting.
I probably saw some of these shows but remember none of them - the equivalent of being blackout drunk
@@tomriekse 😂🤣😂
Some of these shows theme songs lasted longer than the show aired
Yeah, I was just singing Hello Larry in the shower this morning
You think that may have been a problem? Getting audiences bored before the first scene?
True! They were awful
The 'Angie' theme, 'Different Worlds' by Maureen McGovern.
😂😂😂😂
Me: "Hellish TV season how bad could it be?"
Me 10 minutes later: "Thou hath forsaken me for I have been cast into the lake of fire."
LOL
25 minutes later: the meat and sinew has been rent thoroughly from my crackling bones, yet i still sit here mortified in this lake of lava, watching...
lol damn yt algorithm
Me too. I couldn't finish this vlog
👏😂🕊️✝️🕊️
‘Angie’ may not have lasted long, but the theme song is beautiful and will always be one of my faves. The series itself really wasn’t all that bad. Donna Pescow and Robert Hayes had cute chemistry. 💞
Angie was one of my favorite shows.
I LOVED that song! I asked for Maureen McGovern’s album for Christmas just for that song.
I don’t remember that Andy Griffith one … Salvage 1 at all!
Doris Roberts (who played Angie's mother) went on to great success with Remington Steele, Everybody Loves Raymond. Yet when people came up to meet her she said that all they asked her about was her role in Angie. ABC didn't give Angie enough time to really fine a solid audience.
Angie got the kiss of death when she got married on the show
Always feel so bad for the stars of The Ropers, getting talked into a spinoff and then not getting to go back to Three's Company when they were cancelled. ABC sucked.
😂😆🤣
“Smile! Look into the camera, cross your arms and smirk knowingly! Trust me! America loves this!”
And tilt your head
Breaking the 4th wall on every intro, that's some rebellious film making.
Make sure to make an obligatory mess with the can of Reddi whip!
@@deerfish3000
*Caution* Zanyness ahead.
@@monkeywkeys3916 😄
It's like a bunch of TV show ideas generated by an AI
Or it's why A.I. will wipe us all out. : )
Today... not much better.
I’m pretty sure “Making It” is a parody....right?
@@nslouka90 I wish I could reassure you that it was a parody, but unfortunately I can't.
The AI clearly thinks that people getting sprayed in the face is the most hilarious thing ever. I'm not even half way through and that gag is in 3 of them so far.
Based on these teasers, both the Mary Tyler Moore Hour and Van Dyke and Company pretty clearly (and quickly) hit the emergency "Dick van Dyke show reunion!" button in an attempt to stay alive
"Real People" was a moderately successful programme. I believe it lasted three or four seasons. This was one of the first true reality shows. I was a teenager when "Real People" aired on television. I had an enormous crush for Sarah Purcell! She was so beautiful and cute! ❤❤❤
Five and a half seasons, through 1984.
Yes I did to and Erin Grey from buck Roger's
THAT’S INCREDIBLE!
The only thing I can remember from Real People is somebody saying “Skip Stephenson” backwards.
@adrianboyko,
I was just thinking where’s
“That’s Incrdible”?!
Thank you for posting. Made me realize that getting high 3 times a day and working a deadend job was definitely not the worst thing i could have been doing in 1979.
VK Ratliff But how was the SEX?!😛
Heaven have mercy on the people who made these shows. You sir were a good citizen by comparison.
@@joshuaoha I loved Salvage 1. I am surprised that anybody else remembers it though. I actually miss the seventies.
Maureen McGovern with the strong vocal.
I'm still doing that ! 😵
Hearing Winnie the Pooh explain how a magical cursed statue caused disassociative personality disorder in a married couple was definitely the highlight for me.
And of course Stephen Bochco was involved.
@@RichardX1 Of course! Who else? LOL
That guy voiced lots of things in 70s and early 80s, and was on Star Trek too
That famous voice belong to the late great Lorenzo Music.
@@zo3019 Don't be an imbecile, it's Sterling Holloway, who sounds nothing like Lorenzo Music.
If they could have only combined David Naughton, Robert Hayes and Adrian Zmed into one show, they would have had a hit!
I still can’t figure out why David Naughton didn’t have much of a career post AAWIL - he was excellent in that movie. 🐺
Same w Robert Hayes. ✈️
Maybe they were just all style no substance.
May not have been a good show, but the the hair flow would be off the charts
That co-ed show theme song was so ridiculous that I can't imagine even one human being making it through the theme, let alone wanting to watch the show.
Freaking made my ears get infected.
It sounds like they were trying to imitate the classic “Hello Mudda, hello Faddah” song.
These show we’re trying to hide the fact that they’re woke they done it for years and now they’re not hiding it.
You must have a very limited imagination!
Me: I have an idea for a sh...
1979 TV execs: Yes.
You: ...itty sitcom with no redeeming features.
1979 TV execs: Again, YES!
It's almost as if they were all on drugs.
Similar to Netflix basically
@@mipmipmipmipmip --Similar to almost everything today.
SUPERTRAIN proved that beyond all doubt. Although Andy Griffith in space looks kinda fun.
I remember this season as a kid.... it was so bad I actually started watching PBS by June 1979... and found Doctor Who. That changed my entire perception of television.
"... Out of their evil must come something good." :D
LOL, me too. I also was introduced to Monty Python.
Same here. About a month into the school year English class was reading Idylls of the King and I saw a listing in tv guide for something about the Holy Graal. I tuned in to the PBS station expecting a documentary about Arthurian lore presented by someone named Monty. I was totally blown away. A comedy about King Arthur. Connecticut Yankee by Mark Twain had it's humorous moments, but the idea of straight up farce was a big surprise.
Within a few weeks, Fawlty Towers, Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin, Wodehouse Playhouse, The Prisoner, and several others. Much better than tv in the US that year... 1979.
Benny Hill was on PBS too.
Masterpiece Theater and Mystery!
I hadn't heard the Angie theme song since the show came out and don't remember ever watching the show, yet I knew all the words. What a beautiful theme song❤
12:39 You can't miss the unmistakable voice of Sterling Holloway narrating the intro to Turnabout. Considering the custom animation and narration, a lot was spent on that sitcom for it to bomb with only 7 episodes.
It was actually based on a 1940s movie starring Carole Landis. I didn't remember the show at all, but I remember the movie.
My God. I forced myself to watch the whole thing and now I'm depressed.
Your comment is why I'm going to pass. 😂
Now i gotta we must let tha heeaviness kick in. *king R. D.
I think it melancholy, even too depressed to feel depressed, just tired and bored.
Same here! This is the fourth or fifth of these videos I’ve watched and it’s the first one that brought me down. Good night that was rough to get through.
Yea, i hear you, getting old, slowly getting oooollddd!.
Was Jeffrey Tambor always 45 years old?! I was eight in 1979, thanks for the nostalgia and love all the feathered hair.
Yes, absolutely😃
Weird that I actually had feathered hair at 45 years old... and that was just 10 years ago!
More like 55
I loved David McNaughton’s hit song “Makin’ It”. 🎶 It had a real disco feel to it.
I promoted a party at that club it was a small space
Ah yes, back when tv intros took up to 57% of a show's runtime.
No they're all just so bad tha they seem super long
Yeah but a 30 min show had exactly two commercial breaks of no more than one minute each.
You "B" exa"J"erating (and the Bear.)
@stevedavis785 Yes, but when shows reduced them and began airing credits over the actual show, it just allowed more time for commercials. The change was purely driven by economics.
I generally stopped watching TV 40 years ago, and after a time could not remember why.
I have been reminded.
Generally huh?
I think I could stop now.
Even as a kid I burned out real quick on the Dukes of Hazard ........ always jumping that same dirt pile ...
You guys have no idea what TV has turned into. The quality is through the roof.
😂😂😂
So apparently fake-smiling heads inside of circles was a very important component of 70's sitcom intros.
And shots of expressways.
Gilligans Island, Brady Bunch, Happy Days, Love Boat, Love American Style, and and many others had used that look. There were likely only a handful of companies who specialized in creating title sequences and they no doubt just re-hashed what had worked for them in the past.
Just like the Love Boat.
@@responsiblejerk2328 or there was some device that made the effect inexpensive.
@@joemedley195 They used optical printers in those days.
This compilation is a great antidote to nostalgia, because we usually only remember the good stuff. But it's always good to remember that for every "M.A.S.H.", there were 20 flops like these. Not to mention half of our shows getting pre-empted for "Major League Baseball!", only to be never aired and thrown in a vault for 30 years until someone invents the internet, so I can *finally* see the ending to that cliffhanger episode of "Alice", where we see if Mel and Vera actually kissed!
I was thinking the same thing. Finally a response to all the throwback videos where people overwhelmingly comment "So much better then, I wish I could go back. Everything now is garbage." Oh really? Watch this video and then tell me you wanna' go back!
This is when the Networks went to crap. Execs were hired to follow trends, make deals with the studios to make spin offs of great iconic films like Animal House etc. use the name and a few of the original actors and write up some predictable scenarios. More channels, Cable tv meant more time slots to compete and it became evident that great ideas and good writers don’t grow on trees so follow the trend or spin off an idea! or better yet COPY another show from another network and hope it sticks! This trend continued through the 80’s. For Every Cheers or Magnum PI there were 5 or 6 shows or sitcoms that were unwatchable.
There’s a reason there’s hardly any mention of these - obviously, they didn’t last.
I’ve watched a few of these “New TV Shows” videos, and I totally agree with your ratio of one winner for every twenty flops. I actually feel sorry for writers and network execs having to watch the carnage as 20 TV shows are cancelled for every survivor.
If this stuff interests you, there’s a book called “Hello, He Lied” about movie producers and how brutal life is in that business. However, I had more respect for producers after I read it because MANY of them want to make good movies, but they have to pay for them with reboots, sequels and fluff.
I know that most of these shows weren’t Emmy worthy, but these clips bring back some nice childhood memories. ❤
Next time your parents say, "They don't make tv like they used to!" show them this dumpster fire.
...the acrid stench is burning my nostrils!
The Ropers wasn’t half bad.
I love how CZcams auto erases my comments but then sends me notifications from the very thread they erased me from. Hilarious.
@Kissa Deff CZcams thinks of itself as its own sovereign state, wherein no one has any rights, except to be frustrated, agitated, depressed, and eliminated.
@Taco Conch
To most of those old sitcoms with those cheesy intros; you may have a point.
However; some of them sitcoms had compelling, promising actors with intriguing plots that paved the way into what it is today in television, sure, it may be ‘dumpster fire’ to you but to somebody else in the world, it was exceptional, not to mention that in those days television had dignity with sign-offs.
I almost hate myself for watching this all the way through, yet I can't turn away...
Everyone loves a train wreck.
@@litlgrey *No lie! I remember '79 being god-awful, even though I had almost no time to actually watch the TV (my first year of medical school). This is almost unbearably bad television!*
@@measl Hee hee... YUP!!
Yeah, I didn't make it.
I don't hate myself... I just wanted to see what I missed since I was busy with school and sports too much to watch any of these shows. '79 is Fine!
Thank you, fellow viewers, for taking one for me.
Not horrific but really bad pitches to test audiences and producers.
After 10 minutes I could not take it anymore. Such schmaltz!
The best things to come out of 1979 where the dukes and facts of life in the 1979-1980 season. Facts had a slow start but became an amazing show
This is exactly why "punk rock" was invented.
Punk rock was mid '70s, and earlier if including the Stooges and Dolls.
@@hd-xc2lz Everything between the fall of Saigon and the Iranian revolution was just boring as hell. It was just one endless ride in the metallic mustard colored malaise mobile from one disco ball to the next.
Sheer boredom
@A S You'd imagine very wrong.
@A S golden girls existed around then so I'd disagree
Norman Fell dancing with a plunger is one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen.
I liked that show they cancelled it.
Oh no...Not the Ropers!!!!!
@@Hillers62 I was young.
Jeffery Tambor was on that show. What kind of an off year was he having?
@@rickmayer4002 It was based on the British show, "George and Mildred".
"How many aerial shots do you want?"
Every 1979 Producer: "Yes"
Compared to what's available in 2021, I'd watch some of these. Again.
I don’t know what planet you’re watching tv on. It’s better than it’s ever been.
I have suffered 40+ years of PTSD from repeated exposure to the "Hello Larry" theme as a teen in 1979
I demand a Congressional Investigation and appropriate Reparations
(Thanks B Pan for grammar ;) )
It is pretty catchy....I might be cursed for the next 40 years. I was 7 or so when that show was on the air. I think it usually came on after Diiff'rent Strokes, and even at that age I knew Hello Larry was a a stinker.
Reparations.
makes you wonder; why didn't they ever make a tv sitcom based on "one flew over the cookoo's nest?" it would've been a laugh riot.
And the intro just kept going on. After awhile, I thought to myself, just how many people are in this show about nothing?
@@benotto44 have you seen Too Many Cooks?
I lived through this era and sometimes feel nostalgic for life in the 70's. I think this video may have cured me of that.
I was thinking something similar...
Life is not television.
SAME!
People have a bad habit of forgetting the actual ratio of bad to good whenever they get nostalgic for "the good old days."
One thing I won't forget was the reality of the '70s - growing up back then being told how bad things were. I mean the economy ("stagflation"), energy crisis, world's gonna end - that kind of lousy future. The decade seemed to start with some promise but ended on a pretty low note when you add that Iranian hostage crisis on top of the economic doldrums and maybe toss in the partial nuclear meltdown at Three Mile Island. And we didn't even have climate change to throw around as the culprit (in fact, it was the coming ice age we were being warned about, too).
The establishing whip zoom on some midsize American cityscape was a staple of 70s sitcom intros.
I remember these shows well. Lol. Being a teenager in the late 70,s was awesome and then a metalhead in the 70,s and 80,s was even better
All the old shows had ridiculously long theme songs that took like 5 minutes away from the show lol.
Their only hope was to minimize the amount of time the awful shows were on the air.
Back then, the commercial breaks were shorter, so they had more time to fill X)
@@daffers2345 true, true. Commercials now are out of hand.
When you could dance to "makin' It," who cares?
@Superluminal or reuse certain bits for cheapness
I was not prepared for Winnie the Pooh to tell me about a married couple getting Freaky Friday'd into eachother's bodies.
Sterling Holloway. I knew I recognized that voice!
And even he didn't sound terribly excited about the idea either
I wanted to watch Turnabout but everyone else wanted to watch Dukes of Hazzard. I never got a chance to see it.
What I want to know is - did Sharon Gless and John Schuck ever swap back, or did they stay in each other's bodies forever?
and produced by steven bochco ..!
Absolutely no-one:
Every 70's producer ever: "Poofy, marigold credits with a dark shadow, let's gooooo!!!"
Norman Fell of the Ropers (1:27) had played Stanley Roper on Three's Company and was pressured by ABC to do a Ropers' spin-off. Fell didn't want to do it as he loved working on Three's Company. However he was assured by ABC that if the Ropers failed he could come back to Three's Company. However Don Knots who portrayed "Mr. Furley" was so well received that when the Ropers was canceled Fell didn't get to come back
What's so funny is that both actors were absolutely *perfect* for that role, yet in completely different ways. Mr. Furley and Mr. Roper have lived rent-free in my head for 4 decades and counting.
In that TV movie about Three's Company, they make you feel really sorry for Norman. There's a scene where Norman goes to the Three's Company set after The Ropers is canceled after 28 episodes and asks to come back, reminding the producer about the promise in the contract. The producer blows him off by saying, "Oh, no no no....the contract said you could come back if your show lasted less than one season. The Ropers went 28 episodes, which is more than one TV season, so...." And then the fatcat producer just turns his back on Norman and walks away from him, barking orders at the staff. It's supposed to be a funny moment in that movie, but you can't help feeling bad for Norman and Audra Lindley because (and I can't remember if they just implied this in the movie or outright stated it) they deliberately kept The Ropers on TV for just over one season so they wouldn't have to honor that clause in their contract and bring Stanley and Helen Roper back to be regular characters again on Three's Company. Norman and Audra really got screwed late in their lives and never enjoyed the same level of success again. And all you can do as the viewer is shake your head and say, "That's showbiz."
@@gspendlove ABC and Taffner Productions only had to pay Don Knotts' salary-why bring back Norman Fell and Audrey Lindley and have to pay 2 salaries
@@bufnyfan1 Why indeed? I never said the producers should've been forced to take Norman and Audra back. I said the producers did them dirty. They never had any intention of bringing them back to the show once they were dumped, but they put that clause into their contract under false pretenses. They promised them something they had no intention of delivering, and then worked things so they wouldn't have to deliver it, which was their plan all along. Fred Allen once wrote, "You can take all the sincerity in Hollywood, place it in the navel of a fruit fly and still have room enough for three caraway seeds and a producer’s heart." He was 100% right. If you have sympathy for executives over working people, your attitude needs adjustment.
@@gspendlove I heard this same story also, but with less detail. What is also 'Showbiz' is that some other producer took that horrible story and made money off of it with that TV movie, again leaving Fell and Lindley in the dust (or they were already dead). The three young stars of that show competed to be the 'Break Out Star" Ritter, DeWitt and Somers, but the real breakout star was Norman Fell.
Oh, the crazy antics of those 34 year old fraternity brothers!!!
TV producer in 1979: "Flatbush got a 15.2 rating after 3 episodes? CANCEL IT!!!"
TV producer in 2021: "Batwoman season finale got a 0.1 rating? Eh, let's give it a third season."
I hope the full 3-episode run of “Flatbush” exists. I have not seen this since I was a wee one. The only video they got is the intro, and the promo too.
Six episodes were produced; only the first three were scheduled. They're in the Warner Bros. vaults *somewhere.*
Like buying a pack of random baseball cards and discovering the rookie card of a future hall of famer, it's fun to see which of these shows had great actors in the early stages of their careers. My personal favorite is the Bad News Bears, with an extremely young Corey Feldman, Catherine Hicks (who later was the lead actress in Star Trek IV), and a prime Jack Warden.
Catherine Hicks also played on the soap opera Ryan’s Hope and later in the series 7thHeaven.
Speaking of soaps, both Tricia Cast and the late Kristoff St John went on to both play on Y&R
Nah, the best was Michelle Pfeiffer in Delta House--didn't even get her name in the opening but one look and you KNEW it was her!
Who?
Yup, I caught Pfeiffer too!
Yet Still better than most shows on tv today.
I'd rather see an entire season of SWEEPSTAKES than a single episode of Welcome To Flatch. 😩
I guess whipped cream was hard to control back in the 70's. Who knew?
It was a metaphor for free love.
Oh it was a big problem
I noticed that also.
A lot of pressure in that can, man.
Now I know why it was never in the house
I love that the theme for Hello Larry is just the synopsis for the show; which appears to be a beta version of Frasier
Only on Frasier, the 2 deadwood daughters & fat comic relief were replaced by his mincing brother, a typecast British housekeeper & their grouchy ex-cop father. 😅
Fred Silverman was heading NBC, after succeses with CBS and ABC throughout the 70s, at the time. As it turned out, NBC was his Achilles heel as he had many failures with the network. NBC 's fortunes turned around in the 80's due to Brandon Tartikoff replacing Silverman, and had shows such as Hill Street Blues, Cheers, Cosby, LA Law, and Family Ties that eventually kicked off NBC's dominance for 20 years.
Don't forget that NBC killed their Peacock mascot under Silverman's watch, and its carcass hung like an albatross around the network's neck. The network spent over a million dollars on that horrid "N" logo; then had to settle out-of-court with Nebraska Public Television for stealing a logo that Nebrasa had been using for a number of years already (and IIRC cost them about $500 to create).
Once they resurrected their Peacock mascot, NBC became successful again with the programmes you mentioned.
I love the ‘Hello Larry’ theme, and the ‘Flatbush’ song, and the themes in general make this appear like an alternate reality, particularly as a UK viewer. One show uses Prokofiev, another has Beethoven. At the time we were getting “Taxi”, ‘Soap’, ‘Happy Days’, ‘Rhoda’ and of course ‘MASH’. Before the Simpsons or Family Guy, we had ‘Wait Till Your Father Gets Home’, the John Schuck intro reminded me of that.
When you see all these together, you are overpowered with desire to get on, do the best you can, raise a family and bring prosperity to this great nation of ours. Sorry, I’m getting a bit confused.
That was NOT Flatbush! I don't know what part of NYC they thought would LOOK like Flatbush, but Brownsville and the East side of Manhattan wasn't it. Growing up in EAST Flatbush, you saw single family homes, not Brownstones.!
Yes. Also Offenbach.
"Angie" was actually a good show and a modest hit that suffered time slot shuffle and unnecessary re-tooling!
It actually did get some daytime and cable reruns in the 1980s and 1990s. I still know the theme song by heart. They made the same mistake as RHODA: they got married too soon.
I am reminded of just how beautiful Donna Pescow was.
Some good cast...Doris Roberts Debralee Scott...The intro song was a hit at the time.
Well if it was successful, we may never have had Robert Hays as Ted Striker, ( Airplane )
True, very true!
Seth McFarland is lurking on here as we speak.
He could get 5 seasons worth of cutaway jokes from this un-mined material
I had the same thought.
This was worse than the time I was the baby blanket for the Son on Miss Winslow and Son.
Some studio exec should have had a meeting with the writers and said, "You know you can set your sitcom in any place in America, it doesn't have to be in New York City."
With a few notable exceptions, the 1979 mid-season lineup appears to have been a career killer.
That Dear Mom And Dad song from Co-Ed Fever was brutal
THANK YOU
SUPER CRINGEY
Was there any song here that wasn't brutal?
i mean talk about really wanting teenage girls in the 1980s to hit the college and get pregnant.
don't worry bout doing much else ladies. understanding the matrices of a sandwich is all you gotta do.
crazy lol
Nails on a chalkboard!
I used to watch “Angie”. It was good - very charming show. Robert Hays achieved immortality the following year in “Airplane!”
I remember watching Angie too, and Just Friends with Stockard Channing.
I too enjoyed that show. I was very disappointed when it wasn't renewed.
I remember that too. I was 8 even.
The Ropers. I remember. LMAO. Jeffery Tambor irritated me. Patty McCormick "The Bad Seed".
I would have watched anything that Debra Lee Scott was in.
It's amazing. Back in the 70s I knew these shows existed, but I swear that 95% of them I never watched a single minute of.
Pretty formulaic: Happy song, people smiling and doing goofy things, and footage of a major city.
No wonder kids spent most of their time playing outside in the 70's... THIS was the crap on TV!
When I was little, I thought that the word 'crap' was the name of a 1970s musical instrument; Giggle❣
at 10 minutes the song used was a cover of ELO's version of "roll over beethoven" arranged by jeff lynn, that included bits of beethoven's 9th symphany. i bring this up because i never heard a cover version of this version before. the original, which appered on ELO's second album, i believe, is a 9 minute blast of pure r&r. lynn's guitar works is just excellent throughout. if you haven't heard it, check it out. ITS GREAT!
According to my dad, televisions took forever for the screens to warm up and anytime a plane flew over the house or someone was making mashed potatoes, the screen would also have a lot of static.
All part of the plan.
@@PearlFirexx It was the electric mixer. Also, the blender and vacuum cleaner caused that as well.
I was 17 and watched a lot of TV, but I honestly don’t remember a lot of these shows. A truly craptastic collection. However, before we hate on TV in 1979 too much, remember there was also Taxi, WKRP In Cincinnati, Barney Miller, Soap, and Monday Night Football.
and MASH
"Soap" was a weird show, but I liked "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman" better.
The Dukes of Hazzard
@@eucliduschaumeau8813I bought the box set now if we could only get fern wood tonight
Key word being "mid-season." Most of them are usually the least-awful shows the networks didn't buy as pilots at the beginning of the season. They put them in to replace the turkeys they DID buy. Such shows very often don't make it to a second season.
These shows are virtually unknown, even to those of us old enough to have may have seen them; and blessedly forgot them.
I think I have a pretty good memory; however, I couldn't remember 75% of these sitcoms, and probably 50% of the actors/actresses. Really enjoyed this video, good job!
Now you can understand why everyone got cable TV in the eighties.
Yeah, not a fan of most the TV shows released in the 70s. Not sure what happened but they got better in the 80s, a higher percent being appealing and not as dull. Same with the intros, more appealing theme songs and not as many were so long in the 80s.
And CNN had real news.
@Frank Silvers Yeah, that's why they got cable. It was where the better stuff was at.
Unless you're family was broke ass like mine, then you had NO choice. The only time I got to see cable as a kid in the 80's was when my mom took me over to her rich friend's house.
Actually late 70’s but knock yourself out on the dates.
I literally lived in front of the tube as a kid , it was my babysitter , and I don't even remember some of these shows. Talk about crash and burn.
Me too Frank, I thought I remembered everything and then I got the nostalgia bug in my middle age and realized I missed a whole bunch of TV. .
I only remember Angie, Hello Larry, and Dukes of Hazard out of all 39.
I remember far too many. Sadly.
I remember Dukes of Hazzard, BJ and the Bear, The Roper's and Angie.
@@chryslerelectronicleanburn1676 I loved Angie!
"You know what will really sell this comedy? Elevator music, nothing says funny like elevator music"
I actually remember watching Turnabout and liking it….. The only thing I remembered about the show was the “body switching” concept and that Winnie The Pooh narrated it…. Finally, after 30 years I have the answer to the name of the show!
Thank you for helping me understand what the hell everybody was talking about regarding Winnie-the-Pooh narrating the body switch show. Now I finally get the what they mean is that all they could think when they heard the actor narrating was it was the same voice as Winnie the Pooh.
I like how the “hello Larry” intro song is just 100% exposition.
It's also about 25% greeting
And Portland really IS a long way from L.A. Almost 15 hours, in fact. Was Larry supposed to be commuting back and forth every day? Heh. I honestly can't remember.
@@AmyLSacks, worked like a charm until that one day he spun into the sea of Japan.
I don't think it's too surprising, wasn't the theme to _Gilligan's Island_ basically the same?
Yes, indeed.
"A young girl with the passions of a woman"
Did I hear that right?
One of the biggest hits of 1979 was "My Sharona."
Which show?
@@robgronotte1 The Chisholms…. 22:25
it was a different time...
everybody was loose in the caboose...
Lol it sounded like the announcer said "The Jisms"
Now I see why we all played outside back then
I love how all those “undergrads” are pushing 40 in those Animal House ripoffs.
You really have to admire the cast iron self-assurance of the person who says "now THIS zany sitcom knockoff of "Animal House" is gonna succeed where the other three this season have failed."
Professional students
Josh Mostel was not worthy to play Bluto. Fat pig nerd
To be fair, Delta House was less of a ripoff than it was a bad attempt to reboot the same thing changing mediums, keeping only some of the actors, and losing the edge that made it good as a movie. That OTHER thing though? That one that was "Animal House" but tame from inception and with BOTH a fraternity AND sorority? Yeah. Pretty weak.
I always wondered how you do an Animal House ripoff on Network telivision?
This might be the greatest time capsule of 70’s kitschy TV ever. This is an amazing video you’ve compiled.
As a kid, I practically lived in front of the TV, until right around the time of this TV season. I think it worked to my benefit that I never saw a single episode of any ONE of these shows.
You were living life right.
Gerri Graham from ‘Just Friends’ played Beef in ‘Phantom of the Paradise’. 😂 That’s just awesome! I love this compilation of mostly obscure shows that came out when I was 2!
"Makin It" always amuses me. It was literally a pastiche of Saturday Night Fever awkwardly glued together with Happy Days. If it only had Star Wars it literally would have embodied that whole year in one show.
Great song though lol
It did have John Travolta's sister Ellen.
@Mark Williams He did get a #1 hit song played in every disco and at the top of the charts out of the deal.
@Mark Williams He helped launch Michael J. Fox's career with *Midnight Madness.*
@@shannondore The theme song was a huge hit on adult contemporary radio. When I hear that song in my head it takes me back to the summer of '79. And then just think how Disco was kicked off the hit radio waves a year later.
Why am I listening to Winnie The Pooh narrate a sitcom intro about body swapping?
Dukes of Hazzard... BJ & the Bear... Salvage-1, only ones I watched, & remember, all GREAT shows! I was 20 in 1979.
I was 7 when these came out. I remember maybe a quarter of them. Things that stuck out to me: Captain Janeway and Mrs Colombo, Michael Keaton in the Mary Tyler Moore hour, Dinah Manhoff and Richard Mulligan on the same episode of Sweepstakes.
The one I'm curious about the most is Supertrain, WTF?
I swear Doris Roberts was in every sitcom ever made.
And all of them really sucked
Doris Robert was the eponymous character actress. That's a rare breed.
Not Happy days. Or All in the family. Or Newhart.
Turnabout looked good Plus mrs. Columbo
She was nominated for an Emmy for her guest role on Perfect Strangers.
I watched The Ropers. It actually wasn't terrible but whose idea was it for Stanley to dance with a plunger?? LOL.
Dude, The Ropers was the spin-off.
I couldn’t stand The Ropers, yet I am grateful to it because they got replaced on 3s Company by the much funnier Mr Furley!
@@martinmintman2682 According to the 3's Company movie, the Ropers actors were worried if the spin-off fails, so they were given a 1-year guarantee that if it fails, they would return to 3's C.
After the guarantee expired, The Ropers got cancelled; and they were on their own.
@@JLvatron They said The Ropers would come back after one year; but since the show lasted a year and small change, they couldn't come back.
Right...I liked the Ropers. 🤣
Our youth was the best!🎉❤ Thanks for posting!🎉
Supertrain almost drove NBC into bankruptcy. It was an NBC Studios production, meaning the network was ponying up all the cash for it, and it was the most expensive TV series ever to that date. NBC spent $10 million on the trains alone: one full-sized and two model trains for exterior shots, which constantly derailed (a perfect metaphor for NBC in the late 70s). It lasted 9 episodes, and NBC tried to salvage it by turning it into a sitcom for the last episode or two, which basically involved adding a laugh track to the already preposterous script.
Supertrain was brought up in our college broadcasting classes about how bad ideas get green-lit into being produced. While I don't remember too much about that discussion, what mostly stuck out in my memory was how Supertrain defied the laws of physics...if people were actually diving into the swimming pool onboard, they'd be splattered into the train's walls instead of hitting the water.
@@dashopepper And that's not even considering how you'd have a swimming pool on a train car. If it's designed for diving, it needs to be at least 10 feet deep, and assuming a 10-foot diving board along with overhead room for the leap, you need a train car that's about 3 stories tall.
Also, the whole idea of building a brand-new double-width railroad for one specific cross-country train, when we already have these things called "airplanes" that can go ANYWHERE. Supertrain was just stupid from the get-go.
You can thank Fred Silverman for "SUPERTRAIN". He was desperate for *ANY* kind of hit series on NBC, and decided he'd schedule a "'Love Boat' on the tracks"....right down to a laugh track in the final episodes.
Dick Van Dyke is still alive. 95 years old. Amazing considering he used to call himself an alcoholic. What a legend
During this era he probably wondered if he'd ever have another hit show. But then there was *Diagnosis: Murder* . :)
And still singing and dancing!
@@Glim246 and Still as Spry as Ever ... His Advice : "Just Keep Moving" (Also the Name of His Autobiography(
Seeing Jerry Van Dyke here made me wonder if he was the worst luck actor in Hollywood. Can't think of anything he was ever in that wasn't ether terminated post haste or derided endlessly like My Mother The Car...until he finally got a winner co-starring in Coach alongside Craig T Nelson.
The theme songs for MAKING IT and ANGIE were both released as singles that actually got heavy radio exposure and were performanced on American Bandstand and the like.
Both were great songs, that's for sure!
Botwin66 And The greatest american super hero with William Katt and Robett Culp. It was excellent
I heard the songs, but I have the 45 Of “Makin’ It”.
The theme song to "Makin' It lasted longer that the show. Angie should have had more that two seasons.
That's why "Makin' It" lasted just 6 episodes, and David Naughton was an actor and singer, and also did the famous Dr. Pepper commercials including the famous slogan, "Wouldn't You Like to Be a Pepper Too." Like I said, I still have the 45, and it was a big hit in 1979. It was first introduced in the movie "Meatballs" with Bill Murray, and then turned into a TV show and it failed miserably.
As a non American watching this, it's notable how many shows are "personality" driven. Based on one central character and usually named after them. "Angie", "Hello Larry". Other shows from that era like "Maude" and the Mary Tyler Moore Show"
I love how nothing is left to the imagination in the intros! Every character is one dimensional and serves a purpose. You get what you see in the series and NOTHING more. It’s assembly line TV and spoon fed to the 8Os public. Makin It- deserves an exhibit in the Smithsonian.. yep! That time really existed!!
and it has changed how? shows today continually rip each other off as most degrade to craps.....some awesome shows for sure...but most are cut and paste
@@zxccxz164Right? They are so desperate now. They are remaking shows/movies that originally sucked and nobody liked!
Yeah, nothing assembly line or spoon fed in todays media…
And know an entire generation knows the inside joke when Fraiser comes on and everyone says Hello Larry
Thanks for the heads up! All my years in media and I never related the two.
90 percent of these shows were cooked up in a cocaine frenzy--everyone was all tooted up and nothing sounded like a bad idea so long as there was enough Peruvian Marching Powder for another line for everybody....
Edmund Kemper 😂
Whoever came up with Supertrain must have done enough cocaine to satisfy the entire adult population of Belize! 🇧🇿
Fun times.
True!!!!! Lol
Frank Zappa recorded a song about that very thing, called COCAINE DECISION: czcams.com/video/6eyeP-TJlGs/video.html
Why am i both repelled and nostalgic at the same time....?🤔...dont worry Doris Roberts...in a little over decade and a half "Angie" will be a forgotten memory and you' ll KILL IT as Marie on "Everybody Loves Raymond"...
My first introduction to Heather Thomas when I was 12 years old.... Thank God for The Fall Guy a few years later! She'll always be my all-time celebrity crush!
I love how the credits set out the same character types in each series : the pretty one.
, the handsome one, the dumb one, the wisecracking one, the stuffy older person, the outrageous older one, and so on. And am intrigued by Turnaround with Sharon Gless.
*Turnabout
@@Daviticus042 It wasn't as entertaining as it sounds. John Schuck was better in Holmes & Yoyo.
@@ydoomenaud Holmes! Yoyo! Holmes! Yoyo!
Or, in the case of George Memmoli, the fat one.
Don't forget...the black one.
After watching this I had to look up the Magnum PI theme song to cleanse the palate.
Followed by Simon and Simon.
Magnum P.I. premiered a year later.
Simply jumping to 29:45 in this video will have a similar cleansing effect.
I had to go and rewatch the opening credits to my favorite Star Trek series's and the X-Files. Now that was good television.
Nah, ol Weylon with the Dukes theme did it for me. Love that intro.
The Ropers had such an elaborate opening. Norman Fell dancing with a plunger was really very well done.
Our beloved Mom and Dad kept us kids off the TV in 1979. We all went to universities when we grew up. We were lucky.
You still learned a bunch of bullshit at uni.
Plot twist: All these shows have just been optioned by Netflix
Lol nooooooo
@@marcuslloyd8218 I want a refund - Netflix should be free from now on.
One can only hope! :-)
I was fourteen. You'd think with all the TV I watched growing up, I'd remember most of these. No. It just got too depressing recalling how badly the quality of TV had turned by 1979 to watch past the first few 6 minutes of this medley. Two things this reminded me was (a) how Disco-tized every theme song was and (b) how quickly Hollywood was grabbing at the latest glitzed-up 1940s-inspired styles to get away from '70s clothes, etc., on women. They were truly ready for the '80s.
"@70sleftover" interesting perspective. I don't recall most of these shows. Some have an odd set-up as far as characters and their lifestyles, or situations in life or jobs or who their families or friends are etc.
I wasn't even born yet but watching these the music gives me a headache.
BRILLIANT compilation. Even as a 12 year-old back then I remember thinking about the ones I was aware of, "WHY are they even bothering?!".
Say what you will, this crappy season gave us The Dukes of Hazzard! One of the biggest hits of all time. And I for one was a huge fan. Still am.!
Watching Animal House without John Belushi is like drinking non alcoholic beer.
Watching any R rated movie turned into a TV show is like that. This one was pretty good.
Remember Fast Times At Ridgemont High, the tv series in 1986? No Spicoli....👎🏻
makes you wonder; why didn't they ever make a tv sitcom based on "one flew over the cookoo's nest?" it would've been a laugh riot.
Just like making a Blues Brother sequel
@@brianmurphy250 all 3 networks ABC , CBS and NBC tried to cash in on Animal House and make a series. All 3 bombed.