RealityChuck Ok I’ll take your word for it. I didn’t mean to Hijack the thread.
I’ll try and find smoe more trivia and post back later.
Wait a second…what about when Loretta Swit went on her honeymoon? Or, is there ONLY one (and the same) episode when she comes back crying about how Donald treated her?
- Jinx
I reckon I was asleepin’ all those years. I thought Granny was his Mom. Any specific episode come to mind when they clarify this? I mean, when your family tree don’t fork, it’s hard to tell! (Just kidding :D)
Guess my brains got fried out by the cement pond! 
- Jinx
Meet the Press is the longest-running commercial program
Margaret Williams (Jean Hagen) was the first lead sitcom character to be killed off (Make Room for Daddy)
Mary Kay and Johnny were the first TV couple to share a bed
The Complete Guide to Prime Time, a great book!
And wasn’t there an episode of MAS*H where Hawkeye was in a jeep accident and spent the entire episode talking to a non-speaking Korean woman, with no other characters?
Les Nessman had a bandage somewhere on him in every episode, and always in a different place. (Now to wait for someone to demonstrably say otherwise…)
David Hyde Pierce, who plays Niles Crane on Frasier, was hired because of his striking resemblence to Kelsey Grammer.
Mr. Burns, on The Simpsons, got his name (Charles Montgomery Burns) from an incident in Matt Groening’s childhood: across the street from his house was a Montgomery Wards. One night it caught on fire, and hence, “Montgomery burns”. The Charles part is inspired by the Charles Foster Kane character on Citizen Kane, whom Mr. Burns bears striking resemblence to.
When The Seinfeld Chronicles first aired, in 1989, NBC bought only four other episodes as they were sure it was going to fail. This, at the time, was the lowest amount of episodes a station ever bought for a new show.
Cheers was originally going to take place in a hotel. The creators thought it neat to be able to bring in any new characters they wanted that way. But when they realized that most of the action took place in the bar, that’s where they set the show.
In the first draft script for the Star Trek episode “Space Seed,” the character eventually known as Khan Noonian Singh was called Harold Erricson.
Gartog, et al., my memory of reading Shatner’s memoir is that he relates that two versions (lips touch, lips don’t touch) were indeed shot, but NBC, after mch deliberation, had the courage to show the lips touching version.
Sir Rhosis
In one episode of WKRP, Les explains this is because he has a pet dog that attacks him for some reason or another.
In the first episode of Seinfeld (The aforementioned “Seinfeld Chronicles”), Jerry calls Kramer “Kessler.” This is because the inspiration in name and character, Kenny Kramer, had not yet been asked permission by the producers for use of his name. In a later episode, Jerry states he called Kramer that at first because it said “Kessler” on his doorbell buzzer.
:eek:
Will have to fire my fact-checkers and see if Cecil will lend me one of his for a while.
One piece of TV trivia that has been fact-checked (from the Fortean Times FT135 June 2000, pg 51) is that during the blitz on London during WWII (1940) the BBC cancelled all TV broadcasts until the end of the war. When this directive was given, the BBC were broadcasting a Mickey Mouse cartoon. This cartoon was hastily terminated in the middle of a scene in order to comply with this directive. When the BBC started broadcasting again in 1945, the first show to be broadcast was that Mickey Mouse cartoon they didn’t get to finish screening the first time around. Allegedly, someone in the BBC with a sense of humour suggested that they start broadcasting the Mickey Mouse cartoon from where it was stopped in 1940, however the cartoon was reshown from the beginning.
Not that I doubt you, and maybe I’m just blind, but I just don’t see it. 'Course, I don’t like that show and hardly ever watch it so I’m probably not the best judge. Bears more of a resemblance to Eddie if you ask me. 
Syl
(1) On The Golden Girls, Estelle Getty, who played the oldest character of the four principals, was the youngest actress.
(2) In the same show, Rue McClanahan and Betty White were originally cast to play the roles of Rose (the nitwit) and Blanche (the “slut”), respectively.
(3) Dame Joanna Lumley of Absolutely Fabulous fame starred in The Avengers, pre-Diana Rigg.
(4) The principal cast members of Babylon 5 formed a rock band as a result of working together on the show.
(5) Nobody was sorry to see Wesley Crusher (played by Wil Wheaton) leave Star Trek: The Next Generation.
No – she was the first post-Diana Rigg female companion. Honor Blackman preceded Diana Rigg, and there was at least one male companion before Blackman.
Trivia note: Honor Blackman, Diana Rigg, Joanna Lumley, and Patrick MacNee all went on to appear in James Bond films.
Here’s another bit of Seinfeld trivia: The bike in Jerry’s apartment is a Klein mountain bike. It’s there because Michael Richards (Kramer) is an avid cyclist and he told the set designer a bicycle would give the apartment a more interesting look. Also, Jerry never once used the bike on the show.
Vic Lundin, probably best known for his role as “Friday” in the movie “Robinson Crusoe on Mars” was the first Klingon ever to appear on “Star Trek.”
Gordon Griffith was the first person ever to play Tarzan on film. (OK, it’s not TV, but I thought I’d throw it in.)
Dick Sargent was the first choice to play “Darren” on “Bewitched.”
The actors who portrayed the main German soldiers in “Hogan’s Heroes” were all Jewish: (Werner “Col. Klink” Klemperer, John “Sgt. Schultz” Banner, Howard “Maj. Hochstetter” Caine (Cohen), and Leon “Gen. Burkhalter” Askin).
And which member of McHale’s Navy would yelp “Oy vey!” whenever trouble arose? Not Seaman Gruber (played by Carl Ballantine) as you might expect, but the POW Fuji.
In Nichelle Nichols’ memoir “Beyond Uhura,” Nichelle writes that the NBC suits demanded the kiss be cut because of the Southern marketing concerns. Roddenberry told them they would shoot two versions of the scene, one with the kiss and one without, and the suits could decide which one to use. She and Shatner forced shooting into “golden time” by messing up the kissing scene, then they sabotaged the non-kissing version (Shatner out-Kirking himself, crossing his eyes, etc.). It was unshowable and there was no time to reshoot it, so the suits relented.
She goes on to say that the episode generated a lot more fan mail than other episodes, including one from a “white southern gentleman” who was opposed to “race mixing,” but who conceded that anytime a “red-blooded American” like Captain Kirk has the chance to kiss a woman as beautiful as Uhura, he’s not going to fight it.
John Cleese and Connie Booth wrote the first series (6 shows) of Fawlty Towers. How much do you think they were paid in total by the BBC for writing all 6 shows?
Hint: This was back in 1975.
v
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Answer: £900. Not 900 each. 900 total.
And I believe the actual reason was that on the first day of filming the actor playing Les Nessman had a bandage from a cut and they just went with it.
Just checked, she does appear in that episode.
I knew all these tapes I’ve been making and collecting would come in handy someday!
The theme song for the cartoon Franklin the Turtle is sung by Bruce Cockburn.
Kelsey Grammer is well on his way to being the actor who has portrayed the same character for the most consecutive years. His first appearance as Fraiser was on an episode of Cheers in 1983. The current record is held by James Arness who was Matt Dillon for 20 years on Gunsmoke (1955-1975). Also, Gunsmoke holds the record for most episodes (635) for a primetime show (news programs are not included).