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Good Movies That Became Bad TV Shows

D

dmargalotti

The trend today is to take old tv shows and make them into movies...but I can remember a different trend a couple of decades ago. Can anyone else think of good movies that became bad tv shows? I've got a couple to start with:

Operation Petticoat: great movie with Cary Grant & Tony Curtis...bad tv show with John Aston & a very young Jamie Lee Curtis.

Logan's Run: sci-fi flick from 1976 that became a tv show the following year, only lasting two seasons
 
I can think of 4 shows which would fit that criteria.

Paper Moon which starred Ryan and Tatum O'Neal and the TV show that starred Christopher Connelly and Jodie Foster which lasted only half a season in 1974-1975.

Mister Roberts which starred Jack Lemmon and James Cagney. The TV show lasted only a season in 1962-1963.

Going My Way which starred Bing Crosby but the TV show lasted a season in 1962-1963.

No Time For Sergeants which starred Andy Griffith. The TV show which starred Sammy Jackson lasted for a season from 1964-1965.
 
There are many more but off the top of my head I can think of Dirty Dancing, A League of Their Own, and My Big Fat greek Life.

If I think of more, I'll be sure to post them.
 
Aside from the ones listed already, I know Working Girl was made into a TV show. It starred Sandra Bullock. I also never liked the first go-around with 9 to 5 as a TV series with Rita Moreno; I liked the second with Sally Struthers.
 
"Animal House" spawned 3 bad TV shows, one on each network. One was so bad that it got yanked after only one week! ("Co-Ed Fever" on CBS)
 
Braves2005 said:
I can think of 4 shows which would fit that criteria.

Paper Moon which starred Ryan and Tatum O'Neal and the TV show that starred Christopher Connelly and Jodie Foster which lasted only half a season in 1974-1975.
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The Paper Moon series did not take off but was well done, critically acclaimed and faithful to the original.
 
fred flintstone said:
Braves2005 said:
I can think of 4 shows which would fit that criteria.

Paper Moon which starred Ryan and Tatum O'Neal and the TV show that starred Christopher Connelly and Jodie Foster which lasted only half a season in 1974-1975.
Click to expand...

The Paper Moon series did not take off but was well done, critically acclaimed and faithful to the original.
Click to expand...

..."Paper Moon" was an excellent TV series. Problem was that ABC scheduled it at 8:30 Thursdays, by which time "The Waltons" was creaming the competition over on CBS...
 
...there was a brilliant student short film from about '74 or '75 called WEDNESDAY. Had Jack Lemmon as a Bill Ballance-type sex talk radio host who gets a call from a guy threatening his own wife's life. Choice little suspense item; used to run frequently on Bravo and A&E back in the late '80s. Somehow, that thing became the credited basis for "Hello Larry." The McLean Stevenson sitcom in no way shape or form resembled the Lemmon film. The very definition of xenogenesis ;-) ...
 
Smittian said:
"Animal House" spawned 3 bad TV shows, one on each network. One was so bad that it got yanked after only one week! ("Co-Ed Fever" on CBS)
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ABC had the "official" TV version, "Delta House", which featured some of the same cast members as "Animal House", including John Vernon as Dean Wormer.

As for "Co-Ed Fever" -- the worst part about that that it was yanked after its preview night -- it never even made it to the regular time slot.
 
Braves2005 said:
Mister Roberts which starred Jack Lemmon and James Cagney. The TV show lasted only a season in 1962-1963.
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It ran in the 1965-66 season, not 1962. I saw reruns in the mid-seventies, and recall that it was a pretty decent show, possibly a little bit ahead of its time in that I remember a couple episodes that got pretty dark for a sitcom of that era.
 
What about Fox's many attempts at movie-ripoff shows?

They launched with an officially licensed adaptation of Down and Out in Beverly Hills, which was horrible and didn't make it through the first season.

Hardball was a decent ripoff of Major League, but nothing can compare to the original and it was stuck in the football preemption timeslot anyway.

Space: Above and Beyond wasn't that bad either, but it was no Starship Troopers.

I think there have been a couple more that I can't recall right now as well.
 
clichemoth said:
Hardball was a decent ripoff of Major League, but nothing can compare to the original and it was stuck in the football preemption timeslot anyway.
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Hardball also had the misfortune of premiering in the fall of '94, right on the heels of the MLB players' strike that turned many people off from the sport for years. Personally I thought the show was hilarious.

There seemed to be a LOT of sitcom movie adaptions that failed miserably around 1990....Uncle Buck, Parenthood, Baby Boom to name three.
 
Baby Boom came out in the fall of 1988 on NBC. Following Night Court on Wednesday Nights.
 
You might want to include Private Benjamin. The 1981 pic starring Goldie Hawn which CBS made it a series from 1982-1986 with Lorna Patterson in the title role. Eillen Brennan who was in the original pic took her sargent role to the TV version.

The high school cult classic Fast Times at Ridgemont High from 1981, later became a short-lived CBS series called Fast Times that came out around '83 or '84. That show crashed and burned before being renewed.

The Bad News Bears which spawned three sequels between 1976 and 1980 (the Walter Matthau version was great, the other two went downhill) became a short lived Saturday night fixture at CBS during the 1981-1982 season. The late Jack Warden played the coach in the series.

How about Foul Play? The Chevy Chase/Goldie Hawn vehicle was turned into a series for ABC on Monday nights that starred a couple unknowns that play the Chase/Hawn roles sunk even lower.

Want to talk about the cartoons that spawned worstness? That a whole 'nother topic yet to come.
 
LABreeze said:
You might want to include Private Benjamin. The 1981 pic starring Goldie Hawn which CBS made it a series from 1982-1986 with Lorna Patterson in the title role. Eillen Brennan who was in the original pic took her sargent role to the TV version.

Actually,I thought Private Benjamin was a pretty good show. I watched it on Monday nights when it was on CBS and when it was in reruns during the late 80's. Hal Williams also was on the TV show as well along with Eileen Brennan. The show lasted for 3 seasons(spring 1981,1981-1983)

The Bad News Bears which spawned three sequels between 1976 and 1980 (the Walter Matthau version was great, the other two went downhill) became a short lived Saturday night fixture at CBS during the 1981-1982 season. The late Jack Warden played the coach in the series.

The TV Show version of the Bad News Bears was also pretty good. It was on from 1979 to 1980. I have seen it in reruns when it was on Nickeldeon on Saturday afternoons back in the late 80's and early 90's.
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ultravox said:
Dont forget War of the worlds. Great movie (the original) and fox resurected it and it sucked.
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The "War of the Worlds" TV series had nothing to do with Fox -- it was produced and syndicated by Paramount, and ran on stations affiliated with different (or no) networks in different markets.
 
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