WKRP

[VaBeachGuy 12]

Mandy just brought it to my attention that WGN will begin airing WKRP on Sunday nights starting at 7pm Eastern time on June 8th.

 

I doubt it will contain all of it's original music but it's still a great show.

[trekz 7]

WKRP in Cincinnati

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Format Sitcom Created by Hugh Wilson

Starring Gary Sandy, Howard Hesseman, Gordon Jump, Loni Anderson, Tim Reid, Jan Smithers,

Richard Sanders, Frank Bonner

No. of seasons 4, No. of episodes 90

Production: Running time 30 minutes

Broadcast: Original channel CBS

Original run September 18, 1978 – September 20, 1982

 

WKRP in Cincinnati (1978–1982) is an American situation comedy that featured the misadventures of the staff of a struggling radio station in Cincinnati, Ohio. The show was created by Hugh Wilson and was based upon his experiences working in advertising as a client of a classic album-oriented rock radio station.

 

As was typical of most MTM productions, the humor came more from running gags based on the known predilections and quirks of each character, rather than from outlandish plots or racy situations. The characters also developed somewhat over the course of the series.

 

The series won a Humanitas Prize and received 10 Emmy Award nominations, including three for Outstanding Comedy Series.

 

When WKRP went into syndication, it became an unexpected blockbuster. For the next decade, it was one of the most popular sitcoms in syndication, outperforming many much bigger prime time hits, including all the other MTM sitcoms.

 

Jump, Sanders, and Bonner reprised their supporting roles in a spinoff/sequel series, The New WKRP in Cincinnati, which ran from 1991 to 1993 in syndication.

 

Premise

New programming director Andy Travis tries to turn around struggling radio station WKRP, despite the well-meaning efforts of the mostly-incompetent staff: bumbling station manager Arthur Carlson, oily sales manager Herb Tarlek, and clueless news director Les Nessman. Rounding out the cast are super receptionist Jennifer Marlowe, enthusiastic junior employee Bailey Quarters, and spaced-out veteran disc jockey Johnny Caravella ("Dr. Johnny Fever"). To help bolster ratings, Travis hires a new disc jockey, Gordon Sims ("Venus Flytrap"). Lurking in the background and making an occasional appearance is the station's owner (and Carlson's mother), ruthless business tycoon Mrs. Carlson.

 

Episodes

One of WKRP in Cincinnati's best-known and most-loved episodes ("Turkeys Away") is a comic account of a disastrous promotion. As a publicity stunt, the station drops live turkeys out of a helicopter over a shopping center as a Thanksgiving's Day giveaway. The turkeys plunge to their deaths as shoppers run for their lives, all while Les Nessman describes the scene in words reminiscent of Herbert Morrison's reporting of the Hindenburg disaster. A shaken Arthur Carlson later remarks, "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." It was named by TV Guide as one of the greatest episodes in television history. This episode along with the "dancing ducks" episode is based on real events occurring at WQXI in Atlanta, a station that series creator Hugh Wilson worked while in the advertising business.

 

The episode "In Concert" was inspired by a real event: the tragic concert by The Who in Cincinnati's Riverfront Coliseum on December 3, 1979.

 

Music licensing

 

The show was one of the earliest to extensively use contemporary music by big groups and artists of the time. The songs were often tied into the plot of the episode. Music licensing deals cut at the time of production were for a limited amount of time (approximately ten years). In addition, the show was videotaped rather than filmed because it was cheaper to get the rights to rock songs for a taped show. Once the licenses expired, later syndicated versions of the show did not feature the music as first broadcast, but rather generic "sound-alikes" by studio musicians in order to avoid paying additional royalties.

 

As a result, production on a WKRP DVD was delayed for years because of the expense of procuring music licenses. The DVD release of WKRP in Cincinnati - Season One has much of the music replaced by generic substitutes. In addition, some scenes have been cut or truncated and voice overs used to avoid using unlicensed musical content.

Edited June 8, 2008 by trekz

[BakulaBabe 2]

I love that show! I never missed it when it was on. I'll have to tape it, because I work Sunday nights.

 

Oh never mind. 7pm Eastern is 4pm Pacific. I can watch it!

Edited June 8, 2008 by BakulaBabe

[VaBeachGuy 12]

I love that show! I never missed it when it was on. I'll have to tape it, because I work Sunday nights.

 

Oh never mind. 7pm Eastern is 4pm Pacific. I can watch it!

I never missed them when they were first run either. The only problem might be that they've stripped out all of the original music and pur generic "elevator music" in it's place. Normally it might not be a bad thing but the music was key to a lot of the humor and in the official DVD's I've read that some entire scenes had to be deleted because they wouldn't take the music out without taking out dialog too.

 

Hopefully these will be original.

[oldfan1 0]

The first season of WKRP is available to watch on hulu.com. I could start up the WKRP version of the Gilligan's Island quandry............ Who's better Jennifer or Bailey? Personally I prefer Bailey

[Theunicornhunter 2]

The only episode I remember is when they dropped the Turkeys from the helicopter.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

The only episode I remember is when they dropped the Turkeys from the helicopter.

That's probably one of their more famous episodes. I loved the one with the Phone Cops too, but then again I loved the entire series.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

The first season of WKRP is available to watch on hulu.com. I could start up the WKRP version of the Gilligan's Island quandry............ Who's better Jennifer or Bailey? Personally I prefer Bailey

 

I watched the first 10 or 15 minutes of episode 1 and I can tell you right off, it's not the orignial music.

[Kor37 9]

I love this show. I watched it every week when it was on originally.

[trekz 7]

The only episode I remember is when they dropped the Turkeys from the helicopter.

That's probably one of their more famous episodes. I loved the one with the Phone Cops too, but then again I loved the entire series.

I also loved the series and watched it every week.

 

In Concert - mentioned in my wikipedia post - was a strong episode and I really enjoyed the one with the Russian defector, who refered to Bailey as a tiny dancer and they played the song with the lyrics "Tiny dancer"

[He Who Shall Not Be Named 2]

WKRP in Cincinnati

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Episodes

One of WKRP in Cincinnati's best-known and most-loved episodes ("Turkeys Away") is a comic account of a disastrous promotion. As a publicity stunt, the station drops live turkeys out of a helicopter over a shopping center as a Thanksgiving's Day giveaway. The turkeys plunge to their deaths as shoppers run for their lives, all while Les Nessman describes the scene in words reminiscent of Herbert Morrison's reporting of the Hindenburg disaster. A shaken Arthur Carlson later remarks, "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." It was named by TV Guide as one of the greatest episodes in television history. This episode along with the "dancing ducks" episode is based on real events occurring at WQXI in Atlanta, a station that series creator Hugh Wilson worked while in the advertising business.

That was a classic.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

I really enjoyed the one with the Russian defector, who refered to Bailey as a tiny dancer and they played the song with the lyrics "Tiny dancer"

I remember him referring to Les as "Tiny Dancer" at the end when he said to Les "Hold me closer Tiny Dancer", I don't remember him saying that to Baily though. Unless it was at the press conference early in the episode.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

Here's a clip of the pilot episode where Johnny switches from Elevator music to Rock. The first half of the video is with the original soundtrack restored, the second half is the same clip with the "generic" soundtrack in place.

 

As you can see from the first part the mucis is different and you can hear the audience along with the music. In the second half you only hear the audience when Johnny turns the music down to say "Booger" and then they vanish once he turns the music back up.

 

wkrp.wvx

[RikerChick 5]

Oh that's awful

[He Who Shall Not Be Named 2]

What was the big deal about saying "booger" anyway?

[VaBeachGuy 12]

What was the big deal about saying "booger" anyway?

It was explained a little earlier in the episode that Johnny had been fired from a station in the late 60's where he was making 100k a year for saying booger on the air. So when Andy told him to switch to Rock that morning he said "You can even say Booger if you want."

[He Who Shall Not Be Named 2]

There was a later episode where Fever was coming back to the station after being on the air in California for a while. One of the ladies - not Loni Anderson's character, the other one with the glasses - asked if he said Booger on the air again.

 

Fever said "No, you can say that out there now. But what you really can't say is..." and then the sound cut out for a while and everyone starts backing away in disgust. We never did find out what he said to get fired again.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

There was a later episode where Fever was coming back to the station after being on the air in California for a while. One of the ladies - not Loni Anderson's character, the other one with the glasses - asked if he said Booger on the air again.

 

Fever said "No, you can say that out there now. But what you really can't say is..." and then the sound cut out for a while and everyone starts backing away in disgust. We never did find out what he said to get fired again.

Yeah, they edited that one out completely lol I remember it well though. In the late 70's and early 80's WKRP was one of, if not my favorite series on the air. That and Taxi were great but neither ever really got the respect from the networks that they deserved.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named 2]

Taxi is like the Star Trek of sitcoms. Networks hated it but audiences loved it in syndication. There was a lot of talent on that show. Pretty much every actor (except the guy playing the actor) went on to bigger and better things.

Edited June 10, 2008 by Lt. Van Roy

[VaBeachGuy 12]

Taxi is like the Star Trek of sitcoms. Networks hated it but audiences loved it in syndication. There was a lot of talent on that show. Pretty much every actor (except the guy playing the actor) went on to bigger and better things.

Even in first run the audience loved it. It was winning awards (Grammy?) or whatever TV shows win even as they were canceling it. I remember Judd Hirsch accepting an award and sort of lighting the Network up for the cancellation.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

Pretty much every actor (except the guy playing the actor) went on to bigger and better things.

Yeah, the guy that played Bobby Wheeler left the show early because he thought was bigger than he was and I believe he wound up with a bad drug habit. I'm not positive on that though, I'd have to look it up.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named 2]

I loved it when they got everyone back together for Man on the Moon.

[VaBeachGuy 12]

I loved it when they got everyone back together for Man on the Moon.

I've never seen it but intended to. I'll have to get it from NetFlix.

[Gabri 0]

I miss WKRP. Taking the original music out is just inexcusable. I'd have bought the dvd set in a heartbeat if they'd kept the music in, even if they charged twice the price. As it is, I won't pay a cent with the episodes mangled to avoid paying the musicians' royalties.