TV Listings from 10/14/83

[autowasherfreak]

I was a big night time soap addict back then Dallas, Dynasty, Knots Landing,and Falcon Crest. I love to watch Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie which are shown on WGN from Chicago.

I love True Blood and just started watching Hung and like it so far.

 

[mielabor]

OK, so the numbers in the black ellipses are channels. But here in the Netherlands, which is a very small country, we already needed several transmitters to cover the whole area and each transmitter used different channels to avoid interference. Thus the same programme was transmitted over several channels simultaneously and you had to choose the one with the best reception. How was this done then in the USA?

 

[jeffg]

Theo, the U.S. is divided into regional broadcast areas, each with one or more sets of transmitters. So program guides published in each of these areas need to cover just one set of channels.

So if you were to travel e.g. from Los Angeles to San Francisco, there would be a different channel lineup with a different program guide for each of these two areas.

Cable and satellite operate differently (obviously), but it still works this way for local stations and over-the-air broadcasts.

 

[mielabor]

Aha, so there is no nationwide television in the USA. Well, that's different from what I am accustomed to. Programme schedules are the same throughout the country with some local broadcasting stations that are listed separately.

 

[jeffg]

> Aha, so there is no nationwide television in the USA. <

No nationwide broadcasting. The country is way too big.

The major networks (CBS, NBC and ABC) have networks of affiliates across the U.S., and much programming is broadcast across these affiliate networks, so the end effect is nationwide broadcasting. Most of this programming is time-shifted according to time zone.

 

[strongenough78]

OH MY GOD!!

The Great Space Coaster!! I used to watch that all the time when I was a kid! And of course, my 3 personal favorites, The Muppet Show, The Pink Panther, and Bugs Bunny. Wow talk about a walk down memory lane, Thanks Jeff!

 

[jeffg]

Yeah Vern, what I miss most of all is waking up to Bugs Bunny, The Flintstones, at 9AM we usually watched Pyramid, followed by three hours of Bewitched/Adam-12/Twilight Zone.

Programs like Hawaii Five-O, Love American Style etc are largely forgotten classics IMO. I rarely saw a bad episode.

 

[perc-o-prince]

numbers...

Thanks Jeff, I forgot about that! Duh!

C

 

[mattl]

I wonder if there is any value in old TV guides. I probably have 2 or 3 decades worth stashed in the attic.

 

[jeffg]

Matt, YES they have value. A check on eBay brought up 64 pages of TV Guides, a few (Lucy & Desi from 1953) can fetch quite a bit of money.

 

[mattl]

Hmmm, too bad mine are from the late 60s, 70s, 80s and early 90s.

 

[danemodsandy]

MattL:

Check your TV Guides out on eBay before you throw any away - some from the '60s and '70s are worth some money, like Brady Bunch stuff.

 

[frigilux]

I have a book somewhere that lists network nighttime programming from 1946 to sometime in the '70s. I haven't seen it (or thought about it) since I moved into my house. I'll have to look for it.

Programming was understandably thin during the first couple of years. The book includes the DuMont network, which I think was gone by the time I was born in '59.

Of COURSE there is a lot of garbage on current TV, but there are also hundreds of channels. I think we have many more programs of quality and distinction to choose from today than we did back in the 1970s.

It's great having channels like Bravo, Turner Classic Movies, The Food Network, The History Channel, National Geographic, Independent Film Channel, The Sundance Channel, HGTV.... I would never want to go back to having only CBS, NBC, ABC and PBS.

You have to remember that while we look back fondly at shows like The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, I Dream Of Jeannie, Bewitched, The Brady Bunch, etc., they were panned as dreck by most critics in their day.

 

[jeffg]

Eugene, the shows were panned as dreck in their day, because they were dreck, compared to prime time programming at the time. But the fact that all of these shows are still making millions in syndication, 30 and 40 and sometimes 50 years after they were made, speaks for itself.

Also, to get your list of cable channels we'd have to pay nearly $80/month. Compared to no charge at all back then.

 

[frigilux]

Jeff, if you aren't stealing cable...well, there's just no hope for you, LOL!


But, let's say I'm going to forego cable and take CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox from the airwaves at no charge. I still contend there are as many or more good-quality major network shows today as there were in the '70s-'80s.

As for syndication, people will even watch anything that had decent ratings in its heyday. People watch The Love Boat and Three's Company, for god's sake! They make The Golden Girls episodes seem penned by Wilde by comparison.

 

[danemodsandy]

Frigilux:

:"You have to remember that while we look back fondly at shows like The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, I Dream Of Jeannie, Bewitched, The Brady Bunch, etc., they were panned as dreck by most critics in their day."

Yes, they were. But they were harmless fun, with a little story that took your mind off life's troubles for half-an-hour. They did not serve up public humiliation in the guise of "entertainment," the way so many reality and newsmagazine shows do today. Even sitcoms have gotten so nasty (I'm referring to civility of tone here) that they're getting hard to watch. I can get plenty of nastiness from real life; I don't have to spend time in front of the tube to get it. So far as the public humiliation factor goes, I know I'm probably one of a handful of people left who is made uncomfortable by it, but I just can't stand to watch it.

Nearly all my viewing now (I'm on broadcast only; Not. Gonna. Pay. for TV signal) is PBS and Retro Television Network. Favourites include:

- MI5 (known as Spooks in the U.K.)
- Last of the Summer Wine
- The Vicar of Dibley
- Alfred Hitchcock Presents
- The Alfred Hitchcock Hour
- The Rockford Files
- Are You Being Served?
- ABC World News Tonight

Note that only one of those choices is current network fare. Says something, doesn't it?

 

[frigilux]

I couldn't agree more about reality shows. They are a mirror to our society's worst tendencies; and they're cheap to produce, so naturally they've bred like rabbits.

I don't watch news magazine programs programs either---Entertainment Tonight, etc. I'm not into pre-fab celebrity, nor do I really care what Ben Affleck does offscreen----although I will say he is a very, very, very, very handsome man, LOL.

As for modern sitcoms having a more serrated edge, you're right. All In The Family through a big brick through the window of civility and manners and harmlessness, and there was no turning back. But given the choice between watching 30 Rock or Laverne & Shirley, I'll take 30 Rock every time.

 

[jeffg]

By the time AITF came around in '71, we's already been through the 1960's counterculture, and a long list of TV shows which reflected this culture clash.. David Frost, Dick Cavett, even comedies like the Smothers Brothers Hour had become politically charged.

All Norman Lear did was finally reflect this cultural divide, which had existed for several years prior, in a prime-time sitcom. It may have been groundbreaking but it was also inevitable.

 

[danemodsandy]

Frigilux:

I agree that Laverne and Shirley has been surpassed by many a sitcom since, LOL.

All in the Family definitely did change what was acceptable or not acceptable in a sitcom. The difference between that show and today's was that the spikiness of All in the Family was there for a reason - exposing bigotry. Many '70s sitcoms had an amount of social content that was downright startling by today's standards - even The Mary Tyler Moore Show dealt with very pertinent issues like prescription drug abuse, racism, Watergate, gays, divorce and more. The zingers on those older shows often exposed a character as someone who was clinging to outdated prejudices or some other damaging construct. One of the biggest laughs ever on The Mary Tyler Moore Show came when Phyllis thought Rhoda was after her brother Ben. Rhoda assured Phyllis she had no interest other than friendship, and in typical fashion, Phyllis reversed course:

PHYLLIS: What do you MEAN you're not interested? He's single! He's successful!

RHODA: He's gay.

Cloris Leachman's look of absolute shock at hearing the truth put so plainly generated one of the longest laughs ever on a sitcom - and the episode presented a gay character as just another person, a TV first.

But today, the zingers seem to exist largely for the purpose of cheap one-upsmanship, to see who on a show can out-nasty the other. It's not the same.

I also find the "cartoon" style of acting seen on many of today's shows very irritating. Ugly Betty is perhaps the leading example. I see mugging and exaggerations on that show that would have gotten you flunked out of high-school drama class when I was younger.

 

[jeffg]

Ah Cloris.. Her "beggahs begging from beggahs" line in History of the World has become a mainstay in our house.