November 23: This Day in TV History

[Stanislav]

Just a few random TV related events that happened on November 23. Discuss or comment as you please……

1912: Actor and voice artist George O’Hanlon (The Jetsons) is born in Brooklyn, New York.

1951: Actor David Rappaport is born in London, England. He would become one of the best-known and most successful dwarf actors (3’ 11”) in TV and film, but would sadly commit suicide in 1990 at the age of 38. (His death necessitated recasting for an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation for which he had already filmed some scenes.)

1953: WJBF-TV (channel 6) signs on in Augusta, Georgia.

1960: Journalist Robin Roberts (Good Morning America) is born in Alabama.

1963: That Was The Week That Was broadcasts its moving, non-satirical tribute to John F. Kennedy on the BBC. A telerecording (kinescope) of the show is flown to New York, and airs several times on NBC over the course of the weekend. The cast and the BBC garner praise and respect for their gesture. However, domestically the BBC also earns some brickbats in the U.K. for airing the premiere episode of Doctor Who the same evening, a program considered by some to be frivolous and inappropriate in light of the continuing world focus on the assassination of JFK.

1964: Actor Boyd Kestner (The Outsiders, Knots Landing) is born in Virginia.

1970: Rodgers and Hammerstein's “Oklahoma!” makes its network TV debut as CBS telecasts the 1955 film version as a three-hour Thanksgiving special.

1970: KNCT (channel 46) begins broadcasting from Central Texas College in Belton.

1975: NBC can’t win – as a result of the tumult over the infamous “Heidi Bowl” the previous Sunday, the network carries an NFL game that runs into overtime to its conclusion, then joins the scheduled Sunday night movie (“Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”) late, already in progress. This earns them some nasty phone calls and telegrams from NON-football fans (although nothing close to the scale of the previous week’s complaints).

1984: College football fans recall this day well (with delight in Boston, and dismay in Miami): the CBS broadcast of the Boston College-Miami (FL) game ends with Doug Flutie’s now legendary last-second “Hail Mary” pass to give the Eagles an improbable victory.

1986: Artist/writer/director/producer Norman Maurer dies in Los Angeles, aged 60. The son-in-law of The Three Stooges’ Moe Howard, he produced and directed most of the trio’s 1960’s theatrical films, as well as two unsold television pilots: Three Stooges Scrapbook (footage from which would be incorporated into the theatrical film “The Three Stooges in Orbit”) and Kook’s Tour (a project which was aborted when Larry Fine suffered a debilitating stroke in 1970).

1992: Singer/actress Miley Cyrus (Hannah Montana) is born (as Destiny Hope Cyrus) in Nashville, Tennessee.

(Just a little featurette I hope to do as time permits. It’s an entirely random selection based on a quick Net search, and is not meant to be comprehensive. So, don’t post nasty messages about “you forgot THIS” or “how could you not mention THAT?” Do so, and I’ll just take my keyboard and go home…..)

 

[azumanga]

1975: NBC can’t win – as a result of the tumult over the infamous “Heidi Bowl” the previous Sunday, the network carries an NFL game that runs into overtime to its conclusion, then joins the scheduled Sunday night movie (“Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”) late, already in progress. This earns them some nasty phone calls and telegrams from NON-football fans (although nothing close to the scale of the previous week’s complaints).

Though with good reason -- that was supposed to be a television premiere of Willie Wonka, and, as I read, NBC opted to join the film in progress, so the kids wouldn't stay up late.

 

[landtuna]

I've always thought That Was The Week That Was (with hostess Linda Ellerbee) aired on US TV in the early 70's. Was surprised to find it listed here a decade earlier. Were there two shows of the same name or is my memory in worse shape than I thought?

 

[bpatrick]

I don't remember any "TW3" in the early '70s,
but in January 1964 NBC started an American
version, hosted first by Elliott Reid, then (in its
second season) by David Frost, who commuted
back and forth between New York and London
to do both shows. Originally airing on Friday night,
in the fall of '64 NBC moved it to Tuesdays against
"Peyton Place" and "Petticoat Junction," and during
the '64 election campaign Barry Goldwater (a frequent
target of "TW3"'s humor) pre-empted the show with
30-minute ads as often as possible. (On Tuesday
after the election, one of the cast members said,
"The regularly scheduled political advertisement will
not be seen tonight.") But by then, viewers had
committed to either ABC or CBS, and "TW3" never
regained its audience; it was canceled in 1965.

 

[landtuna]

I was overseas in the Far East from mid-64 through mid-66 and didn't see any U.S. based TV during that time so don't have any recollection of the original TW3.

 

[LKellerIII]

I was overseas in the Far East from mid-64 through mid-66 and didn't see any U.S. based TV during that time so don't have any recollection of the original TW3.

The original TW3 only lasted one season in 1965 - perhaps only a half season - on NBC in 1965. Probably the most enduring thing from the original TW3 was the best selling comedy album by Tom Lehrer - a Harvard mathematics professor and songwriter-satirist. Unlike the later but similar Mark Rusell - a PBS television staple in the 1980s, Lehrer was actually funny.


http://www.tomlehrer.org/tl.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Lehrer

 

[Ultimajock]

I've always thought That Was The Week That Was (with hostess Linda Ellerbee) aired on US TV in the early 70's. Was surprised to find it listed here a decade earlier. Were there two shows of the same name or is my memory in worse shape than I thought?

...your memory is shot. ;-) Ellerbee worked at KHOU-TV Houston in '72-'73 and WCBS-TV New York in '73-'76, so unless you were in those markets you wouldn't have seen her on TV at all in the early or mid-'70s. She was NBC's Senate reporter starting in '76 and co-anchor (with Lloyd Dobyns) of Weekend, a once-monthly newsmagazine on NBC starting in '78. No connection whatsoever to any version of TW3...

 

[landtuna]

Well, maybe not totally shot.

I remember Lloyd Dobyns although not the program Weekend but that must have been what I was watching.

 

[bpatrick]

I was overseas in the Far East from mid-64 through mid-66 and didn't see any U.S. based TV during that time so don't have any recollection of the original TW3.

The original TW3 only lasted one season in 1965 - perhaps only a half season - on NBC in 1965. Probably the most enduring thing from the original TW3 was the best selling comedy album by Tom Lehrer - a Harvard mathematics professor and songwriter-satirist. Unlike the later but similar Mark Rusell - a PBS television staple in the 1980s, Lehrer was actually funny.

If I were you I'd check my start/end dates through either Brooks and Marsh or
Castleman and Podrazik. "TW3" was a midseason replacement for a short-lived
sitcom, "Harry's Girls," and was scheduled against "The Price Is Right" on ABC
and "The Twilight Zone" on CBS Fridays at 9:30. The ratings were fairly good,
but Jack Benny got the time slot in the fall of 1964, and "TW3" moved to
Tuesdays, with the disastrous results I mentioned above.

BTW, NBC showed a "pilot" with Henry Fonda as host on "The DuPont Show
Of The Week," November 10, 1963, less than two weeks before JFK was killed.


http://www.tomlehrer.org/tl.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Lehrer

 

[Ultimajock]

I don't remember any "TW3" in the early '70s,
but in January 1964 NBC started an American
version, hosted first by Elliott Reid, then (in its
second season) by David Frost, who commuted
back and forth between New York and London
to do both shows. Originally airing on Friday night,
in the fall of '64

...the Friday night scheduling led to a mock feud with Jack Paar, whose program appeared right after TW3; Dick Noel, the TW3 announcer, would read a sign-off announcement claiming NBC was leaving the air for the night and would return with Ruff & Reddy the following morning, thereby slighting both Paar and Johnny Carson, while Paar would refer to TW3 as "Henry Morgan's Amateur Hour"...

...and the British version of TW3 ended in December 1963, before the American series debuted; the program Frost flew back to London to host in the winter of '64-'65 was Not So Much a Programme, More a Way of Life...

 

[mleach]

1975: NBC can’t win – as a result of the tumult over the infamous “Heidi Bowl” the previous Sunday, the network carries an NFL game that runs into overtime to its conclusion, then joins the scheduled Sunday night movie (“Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”) late, already in progress. This earns them some nasty phone calls and telegrams from NON-football fans (although nothing close to the scale of the previous week’s complaints).

Though with good reason -- that was supposed to be a television premiere of Willie Wonka, and, as I read, NBC opted to join the film in progress, so the kids wouldn't stay up late.

I could be wrong here but the main ADULT stars of Willie Wonka ( Jack Albertson & Gene Wilder ), over the years I have heard neither weren't exactly fans of the movie. I wonder how true that is? If it is true I assume they were paid quite well to do the movie even though Willie Wonka when it first came out was hardly a blockbuster.

It is common knowledge though that Sammy Davis Jr. HATED WITH A PASSION, the tune he did "The Candy Man" even though it was a number one hit. In one of my rock trivia books Davis called the tune "White bread". I have to wonder if it was Davis' hatred of that song why it wasn't featured in the flick?

 

[RicoGregg]

It is common knowledge though that Sammy Davis Jr. HATED WITH A PASSION, the tune he did "The Candy Man" even though it was a number one hit. In one of my rock trivia books Davis called the tune "White bread". I have to wonder if it was Davis' hatred of that song why it wasn't featured in the flick?

I'm not sure if you meant that Davis' hatred of "The Candy Man" song was because his version wasn't featured in the film, or that the song wasn't featured at all.

If the latter, the song was in the film, sung by Gene Wilder. If the former, I think it would have been understood by the time of the recording session that this was for pop chart consumption, and not an actual part of the movie soundtrack. The record biz has done that many times over the years.

It's nice to know that Mr. Entertainment hated the song. So do I.

"...You can even eat the dishes..." Brutal. Absolutely brutal.

 

[mleach]

It is common knowledge though that Sammy Davis Jr. HATED WITH A PASSION, the tune he did "The Candy Man" even though it was a number one hit. In one of my rock trivia books Davis called the tune "White bread". I have to wonder if it was Davis' hatred of that song why it wasn't featured in the flick?

I'm not sure if you meant that Davis' hatred of "The Candy Man" song was because his version wasn't featured in the film, or that the song wasn't featured at all.

If the latter, the song was in the film, sung by Gene Wilder. If the former, I think it would have been understood by the time of the recording session that this was for pop chart consumption, and not an actual part of the movie soundtrack. The record biz has done that many times over the years.

It's nice to know that Mr. Entertainment hated the song. So do I.

"...You can even eat the dishes..." Brutal. Absolutely brutal.

I knew The Candy Man was in the movie but for some reason I always believed it was due to Davis' hated of the song why that version wasn't in the movie. Another good question..if Davis hated the song..wonder why did he do it in the first place? Since I assume he hated the song then unless he pulled a 180 over the years. Kinda like Clint Holmes who gave us that..ah "classic" tune "Playground In My Mind". From what I understand at first he loved that tune but actually grew to hate it over the years and today I have heard gets quite "testy" whenever someone brings up that tune to him.

Yeah "The Candy Man" was quite brutal LOL...just like Davis' follow up (?) tune "The People Tree". NOW I am showing my age LOL.

 

[Ultimajock]

...on top of all that, the film was a Paramount release of 1971 and Davis' record was an MGM Records release of 1972. Davis' real objection to doing the tune was because it certainly wasn't the kind of thing he would normally do in his Vegas/nightclub act. He eventually consented to only one take of the record, entirely as a favor to his friend Anthony Newly (who'd co-wriiten the thing), and thought that would be the end of his association with the song...

 

[wbhist]

I don't remember any "TW3" in the early '70s, but in January 1964 NBC started an American version, hosted first by Elliott Reid, then (in its second season) by David Frost, who commuted back and forth between New York and London to do both shows. Originally airing on Friday night, in the fall of '64

...the Friday night scheduling led to a mock feud with Jack Paar, whose program appeared right after TW3; Dick Noel, the TW3 announcer, would read a sign-off announcement claiming NBC was leaving the air for the night and would return with Ruff & Reddy the following morning, thereby slighting both Paar and Johnny Carson, while Paar would refer to TW3 as "Henry Morgan's Amateur Hour"...

...and the British version of TW3 ended in December 1963, before the American series debuted; the program Frost flew back to London to host in the winter of '64-'65 was Not So Much a Programme, More a Way of Life...

Mr. Noel was not the only person to announce for the U.S. TW3. Wally King, later to become a CBS staff announcer, also handled such duties for a time, as did NBC staffer Jerry Damon. Unfortunately, due to Mr. Damon's involvement with TW3, reference books and some Web pages to this day mention him as a comedian, even though he had been a staff announcer for NBC in New York from the mid-1950's until his death in early 1979. (Mr. Damon also did the opening sponsor bumper for Episode #19 of the ill-fated Karen series in early 1965, as up on YouTube in some areas.)

P.S. As for that program Ms. Ellerbee and Mr. Dobyns hosted - you're probably thinking of the short-lived NBC News Overnight which ran from 1982 to about 1983 or '84 (Mr. Dobyns would later be replaced by Bill Schechner).

 

[Ultimajock]

As for that program Ms. Ellerbee and Mr. Dobyns hosted - you're probably thinking of the short-lived NBC News Overnight which ran from 1982 to about 1983 or '84 (Mr. Dobyns would later be replaced by Bill Schechner).

...Ellerbee and Dobyns worked together on Weekend years before the premiere of NBC News Overnight...

 

[wbhist]

...Ellerbee and Dobyns worked together on Weekend years before the premiere of NBC News Overnight...

And I.I.N.M., Weekend aired once every three or four weeks, alternating with Saturday Night Live. Wonder if this was the genesis for the title of the mock "Weekend Update" newscasts?

 

[Tim from Springfield IL]

1975[/b]: NBC can’t win – as a result of the tumult over the infamous “Heidi Bowl” the previous Sunday, the network carries an NFL game that runs into overtime to its conclusion, then joins the scheduled Sunday night movie (“Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”) late, already in progress. This earns them some nasty phone calls and telegrams from NON-football fans (although nothing close to the scale of the previous week’s complaints).

The "Heidi Bowl" was actually 7 years and 6 days earlier--Nov. 17, 1968--but the memory and lessons of that day still were vivid particularly among NBC executives.

 

[Tim from Springfield IL]

1971: Former MAD TV cast member and TBS "Dinner and a Movie" co-host (2002-05) Lisa Arch is born in LA.

 

[davalvideo]

The episode of "That Was The Week That Was" that was shown on the NBC Television Network the weekend of the Kennedy assassination was not a kinescope recording of the program, but a videotaped recording. I have the NBC coverage (as well as the CBS coverage...purchased directly from the archives) and it is definitely videotape and not kinescope. The tape was hand carried to New York by BBC commentator Richard Dimbleby, who both introduced it and spoke about it afterward, along with Frank McGee during its first airing on Sunday night. It was a superb broadcast, hosted by among others, David Frost, and prepared with only a few hours notice. NBC aired it twice that weekend.