Well, if you’re going to consider cast lists:
Comedy Tonight: Robert Klein, Peter Boyle, Madelyn Kahn
And moving to radio:
National Lampoon Radio Hour: Chevy Chase, John Belushi, Christopher Guest, Michael O’Donoghue, Bill Murray, Brian Doyle-Murray, Gilda Radner, Harry Shearer, Harold Ramis, Joe Flaherty, Richard Belzer, George Coe, Anne Beatts, and Alice Playten. (Note: this predated SNL by almost two years.)
That’s an interesting question, and I suppose a lot rides on how you would define “short-lived” (does this mean cancelled or intentionally short) and how you would define influential.
Some respected shows were mentioned, and as great as **Fawlty Towers ** is, where do you see it’s influences? And it was only intended to run the 12 episodes it did.
**Firefly ** created a surge in interest in the sci-fi western? Wha? I don’t see that at all; in fact I see **Firefly ** as a vanity failure, really. I liked it, but no influence there.
Star Trek? Undoubtedly. But is three years short-lived? Maybe; guess that’s up to debate.
The one that I thought of first, and was mentioned here, was Twin Peaks. Nearly twenty years later, we still get shows and situations that cause critics and viewers to refer to **Twin Peaks ** by name. There are probably a half dozen shows in the past two years that can trace lineage back to Twin Peaks. Spooky serialized shenanigans like Lost, Jericho, Invasion, and the like.
I’ve often heard **James at 15 ** was hugely influential, but I’ve never seen it and know little about it.
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, maybe? Ran for three years off and on in America. Influential, but not exactly short-lived.
And yeah, speaking of cast lists, **The State ** springs to mind, but I don’t think it’s any more influential than The Ben Stiller Show.
Oh, I know. The 1966-1968 Batman. Huge flame-out, but still influences comic-book movie and media perception today. When’s the last time you read an article about comic books that doesn’t mention “Pow!” and “Blammo!” Some of the **Captain America ** articles these past two days used it.
Kolchak: The Night Stalker. It ran 20 episodes. Not only did it get revived a couple of years ago, Chris Carter has been quoted more than once saying that it was his influence for The X-Files. It wouldn’t be surprising if it also secretly inspired other shows like Angel, Special Unit 2, Supernatural, Psi Factor etc that also involve people investigating the paranormal.
I loved this show too! I can’t recall anyone I know mentioning it since it was on. They don’t make 'em like that anymore.
At 82 episodes The Tracy Ullman show probably doesn’t qualify. But who can deny the influence of it’s spawn The Simpsons.
The miniseries Roots
James Burke’s 6-part series Connections and his later The Day the Universe Changed. (The Learning Channel later did two longer series of Connections, and there was a short-lived column in Scientific American by him of Connections, as well as several books, both tie-ins and otherwise). Burke’s unique way of looking at developments influenced a great many others (including, some have said, me.)
Millionare is still on the air, hosted by Meridith Viera. She has a contract through next year which will be the shows 10th year in the US.
I didn’t realize that Fawlty Towers only had 12 episodes, that’s pretty amazing considering that it still shows on the air at times.
I loved it, too.
And not JUST because of a young Kyle Chandler in a baseball uniform. 
Thanks for pointing that out.
I’m not sure it was exactly influential, but I loved Maximum Bob (Maximum Bob (TV Series 1998) - IMDb)
Bosom Buddies ran for a respectable two years (and with that cast, it should have run longer). I don’t think it launched Tom Hank’s career anymore than Growing Pains launch the career of Leonardo DiCaprio.
Bzzzzzzzzt
Sorry, but his pre-BB work was negligible and largly unnoticed. I had to be told later he was in the horrible Mazes and Monsters, which I watched during its original broadcast.
Bosom Buddies got him Bachelor Party and Splash, which showed he could actually act.
I’d say Letterman, et al owe a good deal of their successful format to Ernie Kovacs. True, he didn’t exactly have a short-lived run but some of his routines were truly experimental and innovative for the time.
As for a short-lived run, how the 12 episode An American Family, widely considered the first modern reality TV show?
My So-called Life
Yes, thank you - it was the original discussion with mambowoman - ("did you know GI only ran 38 episodes?) that prompted the thread. We both thought 38 was hinky.
Snopes has a hilarious page about an “urban legend” about Mr. Ed really being a zebra. I believed it at first. The lesson? Don’t believe everything you read on the internet, Willllbur.
Well, not exactly…I was talking about the Regis version (I could have been clearer, yes) which arguably launched the game-show craze in America. It started in 1999 as an occasional show and flamed out by 2002. The syndicated version with Meredith Viera started in 2002, so there’s no way either of them will be 10 years old in 2008.
Well, I vote for H.R. Puffinstuff (17 epsiodes), which was profoundly influential on stoners everywhere, and inspired the McDonalds cast of advertising characters.
I don’t know - it seems like there are about a billion more sitcoms/comedies filmed (partially) on location without laugh tracks after AD ran than there were before, when 99% of all sitcoms were on sets with canned/audience laughter. Also, more with continuing stroylines rather than self-contained half-hours of idiocy.
Scrubs preceded Arrested Development by two years while pulling off the on-location filming trick sans laugh track. Sports Night did it as well and that debuted in 1998.
And the modern usage of a continuing storyline in a sitcom actually goes back to Friends, which, as we all know, debuted in 1994.