| Date | Event |
|---|
| January 12 | The television series Dynasty began a nine-year run on the ABC network. The prime time soap opera, described by New York Times TV critic Tom Buckley as "An embarrassingly obvious knockoff of Dallas ", [1] starred Joan Collins as Alexis Carrington, who briefly brought back the popularity of women's wear with padded shoulders. Dynasty was the #1 rated TV program in the United States during the 1983–84 television season. [2] |
| January 15 | Hill Street Blues , described as "one of the most innovative and critically acclaimed television shows in recent television history" [3] and a program that "set an entirely new standard for television drama" [4] made its debut on NBC at 10:00 pm EST. |
| January 20 | Former actor and governor Ronald Reagan is sworn in as President of the United States. It is the most watched presidential inauguration in American history. [5] [6] |
| February 6 | The cast of The Brady Bunch reunited for the TV movie The Brady Girls Get Married. Although scheduled to be shown in its original full-length movie format, NBC at the last minute divided it into half-hour segments. NBC showed one part per week for three weeks, and the fourth week debuted a spin-off sitcom titled The Brady Brides. This proved to be the only time the entire cast worked together on a single project following the cancellation of the original series. |
| February 14 | Funky 4 + 1 performed "That's the Joint" on NBC's Saturday Night Live . This made them the first hip hop act to perform on primetime (late night) television. Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry hosted (and performed on) this episode, shortly after the release of "Rapture", which later hit the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart as the first number-one song to feature rap vocals. |
| February 20 | Comedian Andy Kaufman disrupted sketches and started a brawl while broadcasting during ABC's sketch series Fridays , an occurrence that was later disclosed to have been entirely staged. [7] |
| February 21 | During an improvised segment at the end of a Saturday Night Live telecast on NBC hosted by Charlene Tilton, Charles Rocket used the word "fuck". As a result of the ensuing controversy, he was fired, along with producer Jean Doumanian and most of his fellow cast members, bringing an early end to a season that had been heavily criticized and sunk in the ratings. [8] |
| February 27 | The made-for-television film The Munsters' Revenge was broadcast on NBC. Based on 1964–1966 sitcom The Munsters , the film reunited original cast members Fred Gwynne, Yvonne De Carlo, and Al Lewis. This was the last production to be made with most of the original actors from the 1960s TV series. |
| March 1 | Miracle on Ice , a hastily made docudrama about the United States men's national ice hockey team's improbable gold medal victory in the Winter Olympics at Lake Placid, New York from the year prior aired on ABC. The film starred Karl Malden as head coach Herb Brooks, Steve Guttenberg as goaltender Jim Craig, and Andrew Stevens as captain Mike Eruzione. This was not the last time that the event known as the "Miracle on Ice" would be depicted in a film, as 23 years later, Disney released Miracle , which was this time starring Kurt Russell as Herb Brooks. |
| March 4 | CBS Sports paid $48,000,000 for the rights to broadcast the NCAA men's basketball tournament for three years, outbidding the NBC network, which had built the popularity of the playoffs since 1969. Bryant Gumbel would later comment, "I thought, How weird. We make the tournament a big deal and basically give it away." [9] |
| March 6 | After a 19-year run, Walter Cronkite resigned as main anchorman of The CBS Evening News and was succeeded the next Monday by Dan Rather. |
| March 9 | Dan Rather began a nearly 24-year tenure as lead anchorman for the CBS Evening News , lasting until he was pressured to retire on March 9, 2005. [10] |
| March 17 | Norman Fell and Audra Lindley made their final appearances as Stanley and Helen Roper on the ABC sitcom Three's Company . |
| March 18 | Independent television station KGCT-TV signed on the air in Tulsa, Oklahoma. |
| The television show The Greatest American Hero premiered on ABC, starring William Katt as Ralph Hinkley, an ordinary teacher who was given super powers, but not the knowledge of how to control them. Less than two weeks later, after John Hinckley Jr. shot U.S. President Ronald Reagan, the character was renamed "Ralph Hanley" for episodes already filmed, and then "Mr. H." for the rest of the season. The show's theme song, "Believe It or Not" (sung by Joey Scarbury) became a hit single, rising to No. 2 on the Billboard Top 40. |
| March 20 | The iconic 1950s sitcom Dennis the Menace began its first transmission in Ireland when the series went on the air on RTÉ Television. |
| March 30 | An assassination attempt against President Ronald Reagan in Washington, DC, in which the President and several other people were wounded, interrupted programming on the three major networks and CNN at 2:42 pm. Millions of viewers worldwide witnessed footage of the shooting and the chaos that followed. ABC News was flooded with unconfirmed reports, which pestered the chief anchor Frank Reynolds, one of which falsely stated that the President's press secretary James Brady had died in the shooting. This was also reported by CBS News and ABC News. Coverage of the assassination attempt continued for hours on the big three networks, and for two days on CNN. As a result, the Academy Awards were postponed for a day. |
| NBC broadcast its final NCAA Division I Basketball Championship Game, having done so since 1969. The tournament moved to CBS the following year. Dick Enberg, Billy Packer, and Al McGuire called the game for NBC. |
| April 1 | Berlinda Tolbert and Michael Jonas Evans made their final appearances as Lionel and Jenny Willis Jefferson on the CBS sitcom The Jeffersons as series regulars. |
| A videotape was shown on CNN, reportedly made during a January 6, 1981 broadcast of The Dick Maurice Show, showing psychic Tamara Rand's appearance on the talk show seen on KTNV in Las Vegas, and her amazing prediction of a March 30, 1981 event. On the tape, shown again the next day on NBC's Today and ABC's Good Morning America , Rand was seen telling Maurice that "the last few days of March or early April" would be "a crisis time" for U.S. President Ronald Reagan; that when she had the vision she felt "a thud" in her chest but that she also perceived "gunshots all over the place". Rand added that "It has to do with somebody young and radical... The only thing I can attach to it is Humbley, and maybe Jack, or something like that." [11] Five days later, after the authenticity of the tape came into dispute, Rand and Maurice admitted that the prediction sequence had been taped the day after the March 30 attempted assassination of Reagan by John W. Hinckley, Jr. [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] |
| April 11 | Van Halen's lead guitarist Eddie Van Halen married actress Valerie Bertinelli, who appeared on the CBS sitcom One Day at a Time . |
| April 12 | The Alpha Repertory Television Service (also known as ARTS) launched right after the Nickelodeon time period. |
| April 21 | "Weird Al" Yankovic made his first television appearance on NBC's The Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder . |
| May 1 | The season-four finale of Dallas , entitled "Ewing-Gate", aired on CBS. |
| May 5–14 | The NBA Finals between the Boston Celtics and Houston Rockets was broadcast on CBS. This was the last NBA Finals to be broadcast on tape-delay, with weeknight games airing after the late local news in most cities except Boston and Houston. Games 3 and 4 were played back-to-back on Saturday and Sunday, May 9 and 10, to give CBS two live Finals games. Game 3 was the last Finals contest played on a Saturday until Game 5 in 2021. Game 4 tipped off at noon Central (1 pm Eastern/10 am Pacific) on Mother's Day for CBS to telecast golf following the game. Had Game 7 been played, it would have tipped off at 1 pm Eastern. All in all, the Finals drew a 6.7 rating, according to Nielsen Media Research. Consequently, this was the lowest-rated NBA Finals in history prior to 2003. |
| May 7 | Stand-up comedian Jerry Seinfeld, of Massapequa, New York, performed for a national audience for the first time, introduced by Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show on NBC. His routine, taped in the evening, aired an hour into that night's show. Seinfeld's national television debut had been in 1980 on three shows of the TV comedy Benson . [17] |
| May 15 | The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan's Island , the third and final made-for-television film that reunited the cast of the 1964–1967 sitcom Gilligan's Island , aired on NBC. |
| June 2 | On ABC's 20/20 , Barbara Walters famously asked Katharine Hepburn, "If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be?" |
| June 24 | The series finale of Charlie's Angels aired on ABC. |
| June 30 | Fred Silverman was dismissed as president of NBC after failing to improve that network's third-place rating, and was replaced by Grant Tinker. |
| July 4 | Showtime ended its part-time status and inaugurated a 24/7 schedule. |
| July 10 | The final episode of Sanford was broadcast on NBC. A sequel to the original 1972–1977 sitcom Sanford and Son , this officially marked the end of Redd Foxx's run as Fred G. Sanford. |
| July 29 | A worldwide television audience of over 750 million people watched the Wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Lady Diana Spencer at St Paul's Cathedral in London. [18] |
| August 1 | The MTV network debuted on cable television, playing music videos 24 hours a day. "Video Killed the Radio Star" by The Buggles was the first video broadcast on the network. |
| August 9 | Following a two-month-long players strike, Major League Baseball resumed with the All-Star Game from Cleveland on NBC. During the strike (which began on June 12 and lasted through July 31), [19] NBC used its Saturday Game of the Week time-slot to show a 20-minute strike update, followed by a sports anthology series hosted by Caitlyn Jenner (then Bruce) [20] called NBC Sports: The Summer Season. [21] [22] |
| August 15 | The Eternal Word Television Network, devoted to spreading the Roman Catholic faith in the United States and founded by Mother Angelica, made its cable television debut at 6:00 pm Central Time on the date of the Feast of the Assumption. Based in Irondale, Alabama, EWTN was, by 2000, the largest religious cable network in the world, on 1,500 systems in 38 nations. [23] |
| August 30 | In Baltimore, Maryland, CBS affiliate WMAR-TV swapped affiliations with NBC affiliate WBAL-TV, marking the first affiliation switch in that city. CBS cited weak ratings for WMAR-TV's newscasts and heavy pre-emptions of network programming for programs of local interest as the reason they chose to switch affiliations. (However, the NBC affiliation would return to WBAL-TV on January 2, 1995, with WMAR-TV switching to ABC, and WJZ-TV, which had been the city's only ABC affiliate at this point, switching to CBS.) |
| September 7 | During the course of the year, several soap operas produced by Procter & Gamble changed title sequences and theme songs. On this day, new title sequences debuted for Another World on NBC and Guiding Light and Search for Tomorrow , both on CBS. |
| The People's Court made its syndicated television debut on 39 television stations in the United States. Created by producer Ralph Edwards, the show presented real small claims court cases, with the litigants agreeing to dismiss court proceedings and to go before retired Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Joseph A. Wapner. Of the $800 provided by the producers for each case, the amount not awarded to the plaintiff ($750 maximum) would be divided evenly between both sides. The very first case saw a landlady receive an award of $614. [24] |
| September 11 | The Pee-wee Herman Show , a stage show starring Paul Reubens as his fictional comic character, Pee-wee Herman aired as a special on HBO. Taped at the Roxy Theatre in West Hollywood, California, this marked one of the first significant appearances of the Pee-wee Herman character. The nightclub show notably, had more adult humor than the later children's television series Pee-wee's Playhouse . |
| September 12 | The Smurfs began a nine-season run on NBC Saturday morning television. [25] |
| September 13 | The 33rd Primetime Emmy Awards was broadcast on CBS. For the third consecutive year, the Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series went to Taxi. The top show on the drama side was Hill Street Blues which, in its first season, tied the record for most major nominations (14) and wins (6) by a non-miniseries. NBC's ratings juggernaut Shōgun received eight major nominations, but only won one, for Outstanding Limited Series. Also, history was made when Isabel Sanford, star of The Jeffersons , became the first black woman to win an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series. |
| September 14 | Entertainment Tonight made its syndicated debut in various television markets. [26] |
| September 26 | Elvira's Movie Macabre , hosted by Cassandra Peterson, aired for the first time on KHJ-TV in Los Angeles. |
| September 28 | WRGB in Schenectady, New York, NBC's first television affiliate, ended its 42-year relationship with the network (dating back to its days as experimental station W2XB) and swapped affiliations with CBS affiliate WAST, which changed its call letters to the current WNYT to mark the new affiliation. |
| September 29 | Spectrum is initiated. |
| October 6 | Priscilla Barnes made her first appearance as Terri Alden on the ABC sitcom Three's Company . Alden was brought in as the full-time replacement for Chrissy Snow following the abrupt and controversial departure of Suzanne Somers. Barnes stayed on Three's Company through the end of its run in 1984. |
| CBS broadcast Return of the Beverly Hillbillies , which reunited most of the surviving cast members of the 1962–1971 sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies . |
| October 8 | Cagney & Lacey was first telecast as a made-for-TV movie on CBS, and attracted a Nielsen rating of 42. [27] |
| October 12 | CBS Cable was initiated. |
| October 19 | WPBT's news program Nightly Business Report became nationwide, launching on over 125 public television stations. [28] |
| October 29 | The situation comedy Gimme a Break! began a six-season run on NBC, as one of the few new hit shows of the 1981–82 season. [29] |
| October 30 | John Carpenter's 1978 horror film Halloween made its broadcast network television premiere on NBC (the same day that its first sequel was released in theaters and the day before star Donald Pleasence guest-hosted NBC's Saturday Night Live). To fill the two-hour time slot, Carpenter filmed 12 minutes of additional material during the production of Halloween II. The newly filmed scenes [30] include Dr. Loomis at a hospital board review of Michael Myers and Dr. Loomis talking to a then-6-year-old Michael at Smith's Grove, telling him, "You've fooled them, haven't you, Michael? But not me." Another extra scene featured Dr. Loomis at Smith's Grove examining Michael's abandoned cell after his escape and seeing the word "Sister" scratched into the door. Finally, a scene was added in which Lynda comes over to Laurie's house to borrow a silk blouse before Laurie leaves to babysit, just as Annie telephones asking to borrow the same blouse. The new scene had Laurie's hair hidden by a towel, since Jamie Lee Curtis was by then wearing a much shorter hairstyle than she had worn in 1978. |
| October 31 | The punk rock band Fear's appearance on Saturday Night Live included a group of slamdancers, among them John Belushi, Ian MacKaye of Minor Threat (and later Fugazi), Tesco Vee of the Meatmen, Harley Flanagan and John Joseph of the Cro-Mags, and John Brannon of Negative Approach. The show's director originally wanted to prevent the dancers from participating, so Belushi offered to be in the episode if the dancers were allowed to stay. The result was the shortening of Fear's appearance on TV. Fear played "I Don't Care About You", "Beef Bologna", and "New York's Alright If You Like Saxophones", and started to play "Let's Have a War" when the telecast faded into commercial. The slamdancers left ripe pumpkin remains on the set. Cameras, a piano, and other property were damaged. |
| November 1 | The NBC soap opera The Doctors broadcast its 5,000th episode. |
| November 2 | The CBS soap opera As the World Turns debuted a new opening sequence and theme song for the first time in its 25-year history. |
| November 8 | ESPN televised its first live flag-to-flag NASCAR race, the Atlanta Journal 500, which was won by Neil Bonnett. |
| November 9 | The cast and crew of The Incredible Hulk were delivered a surprise; despite maintaining good ratings, The Incredible Hulk was cancelled immediately, despite executive producer Kenneth Johnson's attempts to convince CBS to buy six additional episodes to fill season five. |
| November 11 | Joan Collins made her first appearance as Alexis Carrington Colby on the ABC drama Dynasty . |
| November 16–17 | Luke and Laura's wedding on the ABC soap opera General Hospital became one of the most-watched weddings in American television history, second only to the wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales and Lady Diana Spencer. |
| November 30 | Financial News Network went on the air. |
| December 6 | NBC affiliate KARD in West Monroe, Louisiana, and ABC affiliate KTVE in El Dorado, Arkansas swapped affiliations. [31] |
| Interviewed by satellite in Tripoli by the ABC News program This Week With David Brinkley , Libya's President Muammar Gaddafi denies a U.S. State Department report that he had sent a "hit squad" to assassinate U.S. President Ronald Reagan. Speaking in English, Gaddafi said "We are sure we haven't sent any people to kill Reagan or any other people in the world... if they have evidence, we are ready to see this evidence." He added, "How you are silly people! You are superpower, how you are afraid? Oh, it is silly this administration, and this president." [32] Despite rumors that a 5, 10 or 14 member death squad had landed in the U.S. the previous weekend, nothing was ever confirmed and no person was ever arrested or detained. [33] |
| December 10 | KJAA in Lubbock, Texas, signed on the air as an independent station. It adopted its current call letters KJTV in 1985 and became a charter Fox affiliate the next year. |
| December 14 | WFTS-TV in Tampa Bay, Florida, signed on the air as an independent station. It eventually became a Fox station in 1988, and an ABC affiliate via an agreement with Scripps-Howard in 1994. |
| December 18 | KVEO-TV in Brownsville, Texas, signed on the air, returning primary NBC service to the Rio Grande Valley market for the first time since KRGV-TV in Weslaco left the network in 1976 to become a full-time ABC affiliate. |
| December 18 | Raleigh's first independent station WLFL-TV went on the air. It became a Fox affiliate in 1986, moving to The WB in 1998, and finally with The CW in 2006. |
| Tom Brokaw signed off from The Today Show , for the last time as co-anchor on NBC. Bryant Gumbel would succeed him as anchor in January 1982. Brokaw would go on to anchor NBC Nightly News , with Roger Mudd, for most of 1982 before becoming sole anchor. |
| December 24 | HBO began broadcasting 24 hours a day. |
| December 25 | Chuck Woolery hosted his last episode of the NBC game show Wheel of Fortune , quitting after a salary dispute with series producer and creator Merv Griffin. The next Monday, December 28, Pat Sajak began hosting. |
| December 31 | Cable News Network 2, later called CNN Headline News and now HLN, first appeared on American cable television. [34] |
