The Big Show | |
---|---|
Genre | Variety show |
Written by | David Axlerod Stan Burns |
Directed by | Steve Binder Tony Charmoli |
Presented by | Dick Clark |
Country of origin | United States |
Original language | English |
No. of seasons | 1 |
No. of episodes | 11 |
Production | |
Running time | 90 minutes |
Production company | Dick Clark Productions |
Original release | |
Network | NBC |
Release | 4 March – 3 June 1980 |
Related | |
The Big Show (radio) |
The Big Show is an American comedy-variety-musical television series produced and broadcast by NBC from March 4, 1980, through June 3, 1980. [1]
The series aimed to revitalize the moribund variety television genre, which had been in a downward spiral for several years. The Big Show took its title seriously, using a huge stage set (complete with a live audience and an ice rink and swimming pool) and filling a 90-minute time-slot (one of the only variety programs in American television history to run this length), with at least one two-hour installment broadcast. It was in many respects a revival and television adaptation of The Big Show , which had aired on the NBC Radio Network from 1950 to 1951 and likewise was a big-budget, 90-minute weekly variety show designed to prevent old-time radio from fading into history.
Although the first broadcast ranked 16th in national ratings, [2] poor reviews and low ratings of succeeding episodes (typical of NBC during the Fred Silverman era) resulted in the program being cancelled after only a few months on May 8, 1980. The series nonetheless was nominated for six Emmy Awards, winning for Outstanding Costume Design.
Regular performers included Joe Baker, Mimi Kennedy, Shabba-Doo, Charlie Hill, Graham Chapman, Owen Sullivan, Edie McClurg, Paul Grimm, and Pamela Myers. [1] Groups that appeared regularly included The Big Show Water Ballet, The Big Show Ice Skaters, The Tony Charmoli Dancers, and The Nick Perito Orchestra. [3]
Guest hosts included Steve Allen, Nell Carter, David Copperfield, Geoffrey Holder, Gary Coleman, and Sid Caesar. Skaters who performed in the show included Peggy Fleming, Dorothy Hamill, John Curry, Jim Bray, and Toller Cranston.
The Big Show was broadcast on Tuesdays from 9 to 10:30 p.m. Eastern Time. [3] Nick Vanoff was the producer, and Steve Binder was the director. [4]
John J. O'Connor wrote in a review of the premiere episode in The New York Times that the program's format was intriguing because "the variety format has evidently fallen out of favor with television audiences". [4] He described the attempted revival via this program as "not only startling but gutsy." [4] Nevertheless, O'Connor wrote that the premiere was "delightful" and added, "The overall conception is astonishing, the pacing is bright, much of the comedy is funny, and the special acts are -- well, special." [4]
The Gong Show is an American amateur talent contest franchised by Sony Pictures Television to many countries. It was broadcast on NBC's daytime schedule from June 14, 1976, through July 21, 1978, and in first-run syndication from 1976 to 1980 and 1988 to 1989, and was revived in 2017 for broadcast on ABC. The show was created and originally produced by Chuck Barris, who also served as host for the NBC run and from 1977 to 1980 in syndication. Its most recent version was executive-produced by Will Arnett and hosted by Tommy Maitland, a fictional character performed by Mike Myers. The Gong Show is known for its absurdist humor and style, with the actual competition secondary to the often outlandish acts presented; a small cash prize has typically been awarded to each show's winner.
The Tonight Show is an American late-night talk show that has been broadcast on NBC since 1954. The program has been hosted by six comedians: Steve Allen (1954–1957), Jack Paar (1957–1962), Johnny Carson (1962–1992), Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien (2009–2010), and Jimmy Fallon (2014–present). Besides the main hosts, a number of regular "guest hosts" have been used, notably Ernie Kovacs, who hosted two nights per week during 1956–1957, and a number of guests used by Carson, who curtailed his own hosting duties back to three nights per week by the 1980s. Among Carson's regular guest hosts were Joey Bishop, McLean Stevenson, David Letterman, David Brenner, Joan Rivers, and Jay Leno, although the practice has been mostly abandoned since hosts currently prefer reruns to showcasing potential rivals.
Variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is entertainment made up of a variety of acts including musical performances, sketch comedy, magic, acrobatics, juggling, and ventriloquism. It is normally introduced by a compère or host. The variety format made its way from the Victorian era stage in Britain and America to radio and then television. Variety shows were a staple of English language television from the late 1940s into the 1980s.
E! Entertainment Television is an American basic cable television network. It is owned by the NBCUniversal Media Group division of Comcast's NBCUniversal. The channel focuses primarily on pop culture, celebrity based reality shows and movies.
TV Land is an American pay television channel owned by Paramount Global through its networks division. Originally a spinoff of Nick at Nite consisting exclusively of classic television shows, the channel now airs a combination of recent and classic television series, original scripted series and limited theatrically released movies. The network is headquartered at One Astor Plaza in New York City.
Nick at Nite is a nighttime programming block on the American basic cable channel Nickelodeon. The programming broadcasts from prime time to late night. The block initially consisted of syndicated sitcoms and films from the 1950s to the 1970s. Nick at Nite gradually shifted its programming to primarily airing sitcoms as recent as the mid-1990s to the 2010s.
The Jackie Gleason Show is the name of a series of American network television shows that starred Jackie Gleason, which ran from 1952 to 1970, in various forms.
The "rural purge" of American television networks was a series of cancellations in the early 1970s of still-popular rural-themed shows with demographically skewed audiences, the majority of which occurred at the end of the 1970–71 television season. In addition to rural-themed shows such as Mayberry R.F.D., The Beverly Hillbillies, Petticoat Junction, and Green Acres, the cancellations ended several highly rated variety shows that had been on CBS since the beginning of television broadcasting. CBS saw a dramatic change in direction with the shift, moving away from shows with rural themes and toward more appeal to urban and suburban audiences.
The Big Show was an American radio variety program featuring 90 minutes of comic, stage, screen, and music talent. It was aimed at keeping American radio in its classic era and making it robust against the rapidly growing television tide. The show ran from November 5, 1950, to April 20, 1952.
The Midnight Special is an American late-night musical variety series originally broadcast on NBC from 1972 to 1981, created and produced by Burt Sugarman. It premiered as a TV special on August 19, 1972, and then began its run as a regular series from February 3, 1973, to March 27, 1981. The 90-minute program aired on Saturday mornings at 1 a.m. ET/PT after the Friday night edition of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.
Friday Night Videos was an American music video/variety program that aired from July 29, 1983, to May 24, 2002, on NBC. Originally developed as an attempt by the network to capitalize on the emerging popularity of music videos, which had been brought into the mainstream by MTV during the early 1980s, the program shifted over to a general music focus in 1990, mixing in live music performances alongside the video showcases. Upon being retitled Friday Night in 1994, its format was expanded to incorporate a variety of entertainment content to supplement, and eventually surpass, the music videos. The program evolved into its final format in 2001 under the title Late Friday, removing the music and feature segments and becoming dedicated solely to showcasing new stand-up comedy talent.
Thank God You're Here is an Australian television improvised comedy program created by Working Dog Productions, which premiered on 5 April 2006 on Network 10, where it aired for the first three and from the fifth season; the fourth season aired on the Seven Network.
America's Got Talent is a televised American talent show competition, and is part of the global Got Talent franchise created by Simon Cowell. The program is produced by Fremantle USA and Syco Entertainment, and broadcasts on the NBC television network. It premiered on June 21, 2006, after plans for a British edition in 2005 were suspended, following a dispute within the British broadcaster ITV. Production would later resume in 2007, following the success of the first season. Each season is mainly run during the network's summer schedule, and has featured various hosts over the course of the program's history. The current host is Terry Crews.
The Music Scene is a television series aired by the ABC Television Network in its Fall 1969 lineup, featuring primarily rock and pop music. The 45-minute program aired Mondays at 7:30 pm. It was paired with a second 45-minute program, The New People, to form a 90-minute block intended to compete with the more popular offering on NBC, Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In.
The Colgate Comedy Hour is an American comedy-musical variety series that aired live on the NBC network from 1950 to 1955. The show featured many notable comedians and entertainers of the era as guest stars. Many of the scripts of the series are archived at the UCLA Library in their Special Collections.
The Tomorrow Show is an American late-night television talk show hosted by Tom Snyder that aired on NBC in first-run form from October 1973 to December 1981, at which point its reruns continued until late January 1982.
The Marriage Ref is an American reality television series and panel game hosted by comedian Tom Papa and produced by Jerry Seinfeld, in which a rotating group of celebrities decides the winners of real-life marital disputes. The show premiered on NBC on Sunday, February 28, 2010 on the final night of the Olympics before moving to Thursdays. The show's second season debuted on June 26, 2011.
The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon is an American late-night talk show hosted by actor and comedian Jimmy Fallon that airs on NBC. The show premiered on February 17, 2014, and is produced by Broadway Video and Universal Television. It is the seventh incarnation of NBC's long-running Tonight Show franchise, with Fallon serving as the sixth host. The show also stars sidekick and announcer Steve Higgins and house band The Roots. The Tonight Show is produced by Katie Hockmeyer and executive-produced by Lorne Michaels. The show records from Studio 6B in Rockefeller Center, New York City, which is the same studio in which Tonight Starring Jack Paar and then The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson were produced from 1957 until 1972.
The Tim Conway Show – the second of two television series of the name – is a 1980–1981 American variety/sketch comedy television show starring Tim Conway. It aired on CBS from March 22, 1980 to May 17, 1980, and from September 20, 1980 to March 7, 1981.
CBS Thursday Night Movie was the network's venture into the weekly televising of then-recent theatrical films, debuting at the start of the 1965–1966 season, from 9:00 to 11 p.m.. Unlike its two competitors, CBS had delayed running feature films at the behest of the network's hierarchy. Indeed, as far back as 1960, when Paramount Pictures offered a huge backlog of titles for sale to television for $50 million, James T. Aubrey, program director at CBS, negotiated with the studio to buy the package for the network. Aubrey summed up his thinking this way: "I decided that the feature film was the thing for TV. A $250,000 specially-tailored television show just could not compete with a film that cost three or four million dollars." However, the network's chairman, William Paley, who considered the scheduling of old movies "uncreative", vetoed the Paramount transaction.