Category Archives: The Little Screen (Television)

Coyote and Road Runner

All Twilight Zone Episodes in One Image

Artist Jordan Monsell has created a poster containing references to all 156 episodes of the iconic series. Can you identify all of them?

Happy Birthday, George Lucas

George Lucas

George Walton Lucas, Jr. (May 14, 1944 – )

George Lucas is an Academy Award-nominated American film producer, screenwriter, director and chairman of Lucasfilm Ltd. He is best known for being the creator of the epic Sci-Fi franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones.

Wikipedia Link

Office Supply Company makes a Paper Dragon

Read the story over here.

(Update 12/19/23, sorry, video was removed from YouTube.)

Airplane! vs Zero Hour!

It turns out the 1980 movie Airplane! was a remake of the 1957 movie Zero Hour! I didn’t know that. So, here’s a 15 minute side by side comparison of the two:

RIP Jan-Michael Vincent


Jan-Michael Vincent (July 15, 1945 – February 10, 2019)

Jan-Michael Vincent was an American screen actor. He is best known for having played an attack helicopter pilot Stringfellow Hawke on the television series Airwolf (1984–86).

Wikipedia Article

Anniversary of Sound of Music

On this day in 1965, The Sound of Music was released in the United States.

March 2, 1965

March 2, 1965

Anniversary of the final episode of M*A*S*H

M*A*S*H

The series premiered on September 17, 1972, and ended on February 28, 1983, with the finale becoming the most-watched television episode in U.S. television history at the time.

“Goodbye, Farewell and Amen” was the final episode of M*A*S*H. Special television sets were placed in PX parking lots, auditoriums, and dayrooms of the US Army in Korea so that military personnel could watch that episode; this in spite of 14 hours’ time zone difference with the east coast of the US. The episode aired on February 28, 1983, and was 2½ hours long.

Wikipedia Link

RIP Laverne (Penny Marshall)

Carole Penny Marshall (October 15, 1943 – December 17, 2018)

Penny Marshall was an American actress, director and producer. She was the daughter of Marjorie Marshall, a tap dance teacher, and Tony Marshall, a film director and producer. Her parents’ background in entertainment, along with her brother, Garry Marshall’s, background as a comedy writer and her sister’s background as a casting director and producer, gave rise to Marshall’s career in the industry. She came to notice in the 1970s for her role as Laverne DeFazio on the television sitcom Laverne & Shirley (1976–1983), receiving three nominations for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Television Series Musical or Comedy for her portrayal.

Marshall progressed to directing films in the 1980s, making her directorial debut with Jumpin’ Jack Flash (1986) before directing Big (1988), which became the first film directed by a woman to gross more than $100 million at the U.S. box office. Her subsequent directing credits included Awakenings (1990), which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, A League of Their Own (1992), Renaissance Man (1994), The Preacher’s Wife (1996), and Riding in Cars with Boys (2001). She also produced Cinderella Man (2005) and Bewitched (2005), as well as episodes of the sitcom According to Jim.

Read her Wikipedia Article here.

No man is a failure…

Dear George:—
Remember no man is a failure who has friends.
Thanks for the wings!
Love
Clarence.

I survived…

RIP Roy Clark

Roy Linwood Clark (April 15, 1933 – November 15, 2018)

Roy Clark, the legendary guitarist and singer, Country Music Hall of Fame and Grand Ole Opry member, Grammy, ACM and CMA award winner and co-host of the “Hee Haw” television series, died today at the age of 85 due to complications from pneumonia at home in Tulsa, Okla.

He can get back to Pickin’ and a Grinnin’ with Buck Owens now.

Munster’s Theme – Reaper Lullaby – Original Song

https://youtu.be/bwKMUgURnlY

Link to lyrics page

White Christmas

White Christmas

The film was released in theaters October 14, 1954.

White Christmas is a 1954 movie starring Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye that featured the songs of Irving Berlin, including the titular White Christmas.

Wikipedia Link

Anniversary of The Flintstones

The Flintstones

The Flintstones is an animated American television sitcom that ran from September 30, 1960 to April 1, 1966 on ABC. Produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions, The Flintstones is about a working class Stone Age man’s life with his family and his next door neighbor and best friend. It has since been re-released on both DVD and VHS.

Critics and fans alike agree that the show was an animated imitation of The Honeymooners with rock puns thrown in. William Hanna admitted that “At that time “The Honeymooners” was the most popular show on the air, and for my bill, it was the funniest show on the air. The characters, I thought, were terrific. Now, that influenced greatly what we did with “The Flintstones”… “The Honeymooners” was there, and we used that as a kind of basis for the concept.” However Joseph Barbera disavowed these claims in a separate interview, stating that “I don’t remember mentioning “The Honeymooners” when I sold the show, but if people want to compare “The Flintstones” to “The Honeymooners,” then great. It’s a total compliment. “The Honeymooners” was one of the greatest shows ever written.” Its popularity rested heavily on its juxtaposition of modern-day concerns in the Stone Age setting

Anniversary of The Jetsons

Jetsons

On September 23, 1962, the Jetsons premiered on ABC.

The Jetsons is a prime-time animated American sitcom that was produced by Hanna-Barbera, originally airing from 1962–63 and again from 1985–87. It was Hanna-Barbera’s Space Age counterpart to The Flintstones, a half-hour family sitcom projecting contemporary American culture and lifestyle into another time period. While the Flintstones live in a world with machines powered by birds and dinosaurs, the Jetsons live in a futuristic utopia in the year 2062 of elaborate robotic contraptions, aliens, holograms, and whimsical inventions.

The original incarnation of the series aired Sunday nights on ABC from September 23, 1962, to March 3, 1963. It comprised 24 episodes, and was re-run on Saturday morning for decades. At the time of its debut, it was the first program ever to be broadcast in color on ABC-TV (as The Flintstones, while always produced in color, was broadcast in black-and-white for its first two seasons). Its continuing popularity led to further episodes being produced for syndication between 1985 and 1987.

 Wikipedia Link

Mary Poppins Returns

Coming December 19th:

Anniversary of the Debut of M*A*S*H

MASH

The series premiered on September 17, 1972, and ended February 28, 1983, with the finale becoming the most-watched television episode in U.S. television history.

Premier of Hogan’s Heroes

Cast of Hogan's Heroes

Hogan’s Heroes premiered on September 17, 1965, and quickly became the most popular new show of the year. In fact, for several seasons it ranked in TV’s top 20 programs …but it never escaped the controversy it premise engendered: Was it immoral to portray history’s most evil killers as bumbling -even lovable- buffoons week after week, just to make a buck?

It ran for 168 episodes from September 17, 1965, to July 4, 1971, on the CBS network. Bob Crane starred as Colonel Robert E. Hogan, coordinating an international crew of Allied prisoners running a Special Operations group from the camp. Werner Klemperer played Colonel Wilhelm Klink, the incompetent commandant of the camp, and John Banner was the inept sergeant-of-the-guard, Hans Schultz.

168 Episodes, America must have decided it was ok… 🙂

RIP Major Healey (Bill Dailey)

On the series “I Dream of Jeannie,” Bill Daily played Maj. Roger Healey, an astronaut whose best friend falls in love with a blonde genie, played by Barbara Eden, right.

Bill Daily, the television actor known for playing goofily affable and warmhearted pals on “I Dream of Jeannie” and “The Bob Newhart Show,” died on Tuesday (September 4th) at his son’s home in Santa Fe, N.M. He was 91.

Patterson Lundquist, his manager and publicist, announced the death on Saturday.

In “Jeannie,” Mr. Daily played Maj. Roger Healey, an astronaut and best friend of Maj. Anthony Nelson, played by Larry Hagman, whose life changes when he falls in love with a blonde genie, played by Barbara Eden. The show ran from 1965 to 1970, and Mr. Daily was in 131 episodes.

Years later, Mr. Lundquist said, Mr. Daily expressed surprise that people were still watching and that they remembered him.

“When people would ask about him, he was always like ‘Really? They care?’” Mr. Lundquist said on Sunday. “Bill was just as nice as you could ever imagine.”