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Sign-Off References/Gags in TV Shows?

S

Stanislav

I was thinking today about an episode of The Odd Couple in which Felix has insomnia. One scene shows him in his pajamas, standing in front of the TV, hand over heart, singing along with the National Anthem. The TV goes to static or tone (I forget which), and he turns off the set. Oscar comes in to see what's going on, and Felix pleads with him to stay up and talk to him, because "the TV won't be back until 6 a.m."

(Of course, even in the mid-70's in New York, WCBS-TV was 24/7, or very nearly so with their late movies. And other stations ran well into the wee hours, so in reality, poor Felix shouldn't have had to wait long at all for "the TV" to return. Besides, he couldn't just read a book for a couple of hours?) ;)

Any other shows you can think of that had scenes/gags/jokes based on TV stations signing off for the night?
 
Not on a TV show, but about a "TV show"...

In a mid-1960s Bill Cosby comedy album, it was 2am and Cos was
asleep in a chair in front of the TV. On screen, the station had
signed off programming for the night and was transmitting tone
and some unspecified video (test pattern perhaps).

His wife came in and turned the set off. That rousted Bill from his
sleep, which made him remark "no no, leave that on, its Conelrad,
he's a heck of a detective."

You younger posters may wish to look up "Conelrad." ;)

Apparently the station didn't air half-hour Hitchcock reruns late
at night--Cosby would easily have been startled awake by the
"scary Revue tag." ;D
 
I was thinking today about an episode of The Odd Couple in which Felix has insomnia. One scene shows him in his pajamas, standing in front of the TV, hand over heart, singing along with the National Anthem. The TV goes to static or tone (I forget which), and he turns off the set.


Maybe Felix would have preferred the sign off and static over watching Joe Franklin!
 
Car 54, Where Are You...in one episode Gunther Toody didn't want to go home to face his wife over something so after Muldoon went to bed, Toody had turned on the TV just in time to hear the announcer say "Good Night". Toody was like "what am I going to do now?"
 
...That Was The Week That Was had a running "feud" with Jack Paar, whose program followed immediately on Friday nights on NBC during the first half of 1964. One of the gags that TW3 pulled was to have announcer Jerry Damon solemnly "sign off" the NBC Television Network until the following morning's Today show -- 90 seconds before that week's Paar program took the air. (Of course, it was also just over 75 minutes before Johnny Carson, so he got slighted too!)...
 
Ultimajock said:
...That Was The Week That Was had a running "feud" with Jack Paar, whose program followed immediately on Friday nights on NBC during the first half of 1964. One of the gags that TW3 pulled was to have announcer Jerry Damon solemnly "sign off" the NBC Television Network until the following morning's Today show -- 90 seconds before that week's Paar program took the air. (Of course, it was also just over 75 minutes before Johnny Carson, so he got slighted too!)...
Click to expand...

The irony in that gag was that Mr. Damon was one of many NBC announcers in New York who actually held evening to sign-off duty at the network. The TV-signoffs site has an audio sign-off he did of then WRCA-TV in 1958.
 
Billy Joel was "Sleeping with the Television on" on his Glass Houses album back in 1980. Although it always seemed like he was saying "sleeping with the tullavision on." ;D The song began with the last notes of "The Star-Spangled Banner," followed by a tone. Several songs on that album began with sound effects. "You May Be Right" started out with glass breaking, and "Sometimes a Fantasy began with a phone being dialed.

On television, there was this scene on Gimme A Break. One character is watching snow on television. Another character comes in and asks why the first person is watching snow on TV. The answer? "It's either that, or Hawaii 5-0"! ;D (I don't remember which two characters this scene involved.)
 
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