A sitcom called These Friends of Mine debuted a few months before another one with a similar name, and when the latter became a smash hit, the former was renamed for its star: Ellen.
When Valerie Harper was fired from her own self-titled show, Valerie became Valerie’s Family and later The Hogan Family.
A short-lived sitcom called Cursed was so named because of the premise that the lead character was living under a curse placed on him by an ex-girlfriend. Hilarity did not ensue, so they dumped the premise and re-christened it The Weber Show (after star Steven Weber). It still died after less than a full season.
Saturday Night Live was called NBC’s Saturday Night during its first season. 10 points to the first doper who can explain why.
“Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place” proved to be too many syllables for the unwashed massed, and was rechristened, “Two Guys and a Girl.” (Actually, in-show changes ended up with characters no longer working at the titular pizzaria, so the old title didn’t make any sense, much like Valerie.)
A spin-off of the Columbo detective series featuring “Mrs. Columbo” was first given that title. Critical savaging of the show quickly followed, and references to Kate Mulgrew being Columbo’s husband were dropped.
The series was subsequently renamed Kate the Detective and Kate Loves a Mystery, but it was ultimately cancelled after 13 episodes.
The most famous bomb in television history is undoubtedly You’re in the Picture, a game show hosted by Jackie Gleason that debuted in March of 1961.
The premiere episode was so embarrassingly bad that Gleason appeared on a bare set for the second episode and devoted the entire 30 minutes apologizing for it. Critics said this was considerably more entertaining.
Subsequently, the series was renamed The Jackie Gleason Show, and the format was changed to a talk/interview program. But as it remained in the same time slot, it technically was the same show.
They’re now talking about changing the name of Cougar Town because the whole Courtney Cox dating younger men premise was dropped after about six episodes.
Not sure if this is what the OP is looking for, but it gives me a chance to ask a question I’ve wondered about for awhile.
Why, when a show goes into syndication, does it sometimes change names to something similar but not quite the same?
The two examples I can think of offhand are “What’s Happening?” which became “What’s Happening Now?” in syndication, and “It’s a Living,” which became “Making a Living.”
I think I also saw “Happy Days” become “Happy Days Again,” but I might just be dreaming that one–in any case, it certainly wasn’t widespread. I’m sure about the other two.
There was also CHiPs Patrol (which is California Highway Patrol Patrol) when it was in syndication while first run eps still played on NBC. Emergency was called Emergency One (which is the title that I was familiar with growing up).
It sometimes happened to shows that were syndicated as well as on networks in primetime to differentiate them. You don’t see that so much any more.
Like KneadToKnow said, *What’s Happenning and What’s Happening Now were actually two different shows. But you’re right, it used to be that if a show went into syndication while still airing original episodes on a network, the syndicated version got a new title. Thus: Happy Days (Again), Emergency (One), Laverne and Shirley (and Company)… I have no cite for this, but going from memory, I think it was MASH that pushed back on this rule and refused to syndicate unless the title was unchanged. They won that battle, and since then shows have gone into syndication with their original titles.
A syndicated show from the late '80s called Second Chance – about a guy who died but St. Peter couldn’t make up his mind (too bad for heaven, too good for hell), so he put the guy back on earth as a guardian angel to a teenager and his Fonz-like friend.
Amazingly, this show got renewed for another season and they dropped the whole guardian angel premise, and the show was renamed Boys Will Be Boys.
Oh…and Dana Carvey’s short-lived variety show was renamed every week – but maybe that doesn’t count because it was named (place brand name here) Presents The Dana Carvey Show, and each brand name every week was actually owned by the same company.
