This Day in TV History: A mini-mystery proves the fallibility of online TV listings?

Don'cha hate it when archival online TV listings are inaccurate or unclear?

Until the day when there is a single reliable day-by-day TV listings database, we have to cobble together airdates and what-aired-this-days through a variety of sources. One recent find was bothering me:  An Andy Rooney original special appearing in the listings in an original TV Guide for June 24, 1975.

According to the Guide, 45 years ago today, on a night dominated by reruns, CBS premiered Mr. Rooney Goes to Dinner, a humorous look at the pastime of dining out from "Andrew Rooney. " Note that this "close up" does not mention 60 Minutes.  Well, that's because he didn't join that show until 1978. He had been producing TV specials for CBS for several years at this point.

 However, researching the special yielded conflicting info.  The IMDB page says the show premiered April 20, 1976.  The 6/25/74 grid at Ultimate 70s does list the special, but it says it's a repeat. TV Tango is blank for prime time on that night! Wikipedia dates the special as 1978, though from context it appears to be a typo for 1976.

So I wondered, when did this air? Could THE GUIDE be wrong?  Well, my guess is that the Guide showed us what was scheduled that night, but not necessarily what aired, which points out an issue with old magazines as sources.  As for online sources, I think they are drawing from contemporary listings sources like TV Guide and may be subject to the same potential limitations. The spotlight from the time, though, does not have that standard "(Repeat)" designation.

Maybe the show was pre-empted and didn't air until April 1976?  Ah, I looked up what else happened on the date, and here the story takes a sad turn.  On June 24, 1975, the nation witnessed the largest number of casualties in a passenger aircraft disaster to that point when 113 died after Eastern Airlines Flight 66 crashed just before hitting the runway.  I don't know if coverage pre-empted the Rooney show on CBS, but on a summer night, it doesn't seem outlandish to think they might have gone with breaking news instead of the regular non-essential programming.

Below is some coverage from the local NBC station featuring Tom Snyder:




I still don't know the whole story behind Mr. Rooney Goes to Dinner, but my theory is that the special got bumped due to coverage of the horrible tragedy but then aired the next year.  Perhaps it's considered a repeat on Ultimate 70s due to the confusion over the original airdate, or maybe it did actually run in some markets.

ABC's The Happy Days of Garry Marshall

I finally had a chance to watch last week's ABC special, The Happy Days of Garry Marshall. It's a pleasant, sentimental way to spend a couple hours.  It's tempting to make a comparison to the movies of a certain director.producer, but that's too easy. So I won't.

For classic TV fans, it's maybe a little disappointing that half the special is devoted to the feature films. Let's face it, Marshall's TV work will never be as esteemed as Norman Lear's, but he had a distinguished record of creating hits, and the special had to tear through the TV portion of the resume. Worse to my eyes, it blew right past The Odd Couple and only focused on three sitcoms: Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley, and Mork and Mindy. I'm not saying I expect 10 minutes on Blansky's Beauties--OK, part of me hoped for that--but more on Odd Couple, or at least more detail on the process of Marshall the producer, would have been nice.


Of course, there is one grim factor surely influencing the decision to focus on the shows the special focuses on: People aren't around from The Odd Couple anymore. The 3 shows that are spotlighted have representatives who can talk on camera (it's still jarring to realize Robin Williams isn't here, though).

The special glosses over unpleasant issues like the notorious discord on Laverne and Shirley, and it feels very shallow, but it's a nice way to relive childhood memories if you grew up on Marshall sitcoms.  The movies, to me, don't get the benefit of nostalgia, and so I'm not as interested. Credit, though, to the production for getting the likes of Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway, and Richard Gere to share memories and appreciations. For that matter, there aren't too many of the performers on the TV side who aren't represented.  It's a well-made look at the prolific writer/director/producer, and at the risk of sounding like a curmudgeon, I'd rather see clips and bloopers from 40-year-old series than most of what ABC is showing nowadays, so I approve. I would prefer to see clips from something like this (even if Marshall didn't have a whole lot to do with it)...

 

 than the same old stories about Happy Days, but I realize I'm in the minority.

RetroFan magazine looks at Saturday morning!

I give my strongest recommendation to RetroFan magazine, now a bi-monthly publication that offers a great blast of nostalgia in a visually appealing package.  Originally I wanted to spotlight the latest issue's cover story this week, but since it's Saturday morning, let me highlight a different piece: Part 1 of a look at network Saturday morning preview shows!

Andy Mangels is a prolific writer, producer, and historian whose Retro Saturday Morning column appears in each issue. This time, he covers those half-hour or hour specials the networks used to spotlight the new and returning programs kids would see on the Fall network Saturday schedule. Often airing on Friday nights, these extravaganzas might combine animation with live action, Saturday stars with special guest stars, music with comedy--in short, all kinds of goofy stuff might happen, as Mangels shows in his article.


(Remember that Mike looked in depth at one of these specials right here on the website!)

The only frustrating thing about reading the story is how little of the subject matter is readily available, or even available, period. Mangels states at the beginning most of these programs are rare and that they are licensing nightmares that will never see legit home video release. Therefore we have to rely on clips for most of these (some are intact online), and Mangels' excellent research uncovers a lot of cool details.

I won't give away those details here, but I think my biggest takeaway is the awesomeness of the year 1977. Not only did ABC, CBS, and NBC all have preview specials. but Darth Vader appeared in two of them.  On ABC he apparently introduces some clips from shows like Captain Caveman and the Teen Angels. On CBS, however, he force-strangles Jim Backus!

Not to be outdone, NBC's C'mon, Saturday! features the gimmick of a kid (the then-star of Annie on Broadway) programming the network's weekend mornings. Her special advisor is Mister Wister, played by Leonard Nimoy, who, Mangels reports, sings "Turn, turn, turn your dial, right to NBC," to the tune of Row Your Boat!

There are tons of fun tidbits like that in this lengthy story, and it's illustrated with vintage ads, screenshots, and promo pics. So if you want to go back in time and see how the networks promoted their Saturday morning lineups--and why wouldn't you--and want to revisit Kaptain Kool and the Kongs, Jimmy Osmond, and the Banana Splits, pick up this issue of RetroFan.

This Day in TV History: Fantastic Funnies on CBS

40 years ago today, CBS led off its Thursday night with Fantastic Funnies, a charming look at the comic strips.




Why did CBS do this special? I don't know. But it seems like back then, networks did that more often: just run specials on interesting topics for prime-time programming.  Loni Anderson, who would voice Blondie in a 1987 animated special, is an enthusiastic host, and she puts in the work, doing multiple hair style and wardrobe costumes to introduce each segment. Often her look is designed to match the particular strip she introduces.

The special, co-produced by longtime Peanuts animation figure Bill Melendez, uses some interesting techniques to adapt a print medium for a TV special. There are multiple animated segments, for one thing, including the screen debut of Marmaduke. We see cool footage of the cartoonists talking about and, even better, drawing their characters.

 

 Perhaps the biggest takeaway, though, is the sheer amount of music in this special. There are original songs like a musical video about reading "the funnies." There is a number from the stage play Annie. Anderson herself even sings various theme songs associated with comic strip characters like Popeye.


There is even a segment from CBS show WKRP  with Johnny Fever reading Flash Gordon during a Cincinnati newspaper strike. A little something for everyone! I am not sure it's the most coherent special, but it sure is entertaining and an outstanding watch for any comic strip fan.