Picturemaker Productions
All but two decades produced new series this week, with several receiving great critical and viewer acclaim, garnering many Emmy and Golden Globe nominations — if not wins. 1955 produced a long running, local after school series in South Dakota, 1995 gave a new sitcom to an actor from a previous long-running comedy, while 2005 had another comedy with an actress from that same long-running comedy. 2015 saw the premiere of a highly acclaimed crime drama anthology series, as well as a highly acclaimed comedy series. But 1985 has the most notable series that helped make its lead actor a star, and created a whole new genre of television and movies. Scroll down to see the list of shows that premiered this week, and tell us if any of your favorites are celebrating milestone anniversaries.
1955
- March 7 – Captain 11 (KELO-TV, 41 seasons, last broadcast on December 28, 1996)
Captain 11 was an after school children’s program broadcast on Channel 11 in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, hosted by weatherman Dave Dedrick. The show originally aired weekdays, but switched to weekly as cable TV offerings eroded the show’s ratings. Dedrick retired from broadcasting two days after the final show aired. He was inducted into the South Dakota Broadcasters Hall of Fame on April 18, 1997, and into the South Dakota Hall of Fame in 1999. The Captain 11 set and other memorabilia is displayed in the State Historical Museum in Pierre.
1965
- No new series premiered this week in 1965.
1975
- No new series premiered this week in 1975.
1985
Harmony Gold USA
- March 3 – Moonlighting (ABC, Five seasons, 67 episodes)
- March 4 – Robotech (Syndication, Three seasons, 85 episodes)
Moonlighting was the first series to successfully combine comedy and drama, creating the ‘dramedy’ genre. Because of the show’s innovative structure, it made Directors Guild history by being nominated for both Best Drama and Best Comedy in the same year (in both 1985 and 1986). The show made Bruce Willis (David) a star, and relaunched the career of Cybill Shepherd (Maddie). Series creator Glenn Gordon Caron had to fight for Willis’ casting as ABC felt no one would believe there would be any sexual chemistry between him and Shepherd. Mark Harmon appeared near the end of Season 3 as a romantic interest for Maddie and rival of David. Virginia Madsen appears in Season 5 as a short-term romantic interest for David. The series was also known for breaking the fourth wall, with actors often addressing the viewing audience. Cold opens were created to fill air time as the dialogue was spoken so quickly producers needed something to fill the entire hour. In the final episode, David and Maddie find out the show is being cancelled, and the office set is dismantled around them while they argue with a producer. The show also embraced fantasy, with ‘The Dream Sequence Always Rings Twice’ being a stand-out with two elaborate black-and-white dream sequences which were actually shot on black-and-white film so the network could not go back and insert color film later. ABC feared this would alienate audiences and demanded a disclaimer be aired before the episode, so Orson Welles was hired to deliver the introduction. The episode aired just a few days after his death. Caron also created Remington Steele, and Moonlighting mocked the connection by having Pierce Brosnan jump networks to make a cameo as Steele in one episode. Hart to Hart was also acknowledge as an inspiration in the ‘It’s a Wonderful Job’ episode, with Lionel Stander making an appearance as Max. The show also featured musical numbers, and the ‘Big Man on Mulberry Street’ episode included a major dance production number set to the Billy Joel song of the same name directed by Stanley Donen. Moonlighting was one of only three shows at the time to be owned and produced in-house by a network, due to FCC regulations, which allowed ABC greater flexibility with the budget and a potentially higher profit margin. ABC gave Caron more control over production, which he treated as a one-hour movie every week, forbidding the use of zoom lenses which required cameras to move back-and-forth on a track and the constant resetting of lights. Diffusion disks were used to soften Shepherd’s features, and special lenses were created so that in two-shots, Maddie would be diffused and David would not. Typical TV episodes took seven days to shoot, but Moonlighting took 12-14 days, with scripts being double the amount of pages than normal due to the fast-paced and overlapping dialogue. Caron frequently wrote dialogue the same day it was being shot. The average one-hour drama series cost around $900,000 at the time, while Moonlighting ran about twice that with the black-and-white episode costing about $2 million. Due to Caron’s drive for perfection, reruns were often aired as the scheduled new episodes were not completed in time to air. The network even mocked the delays, notably in one episode where TV critic Jeff Jarvis sarcastically reminded viewers what was going on since it had been so long since the last new episode, and a Season 3 clip show in which Rona Barrett dropped by the detective agency to figure out why David and Maddie could not get along, and convincing them in the end to apologize and promise viewers there would be a new episode the following week. Shepherd’s pregnancy and a skiing accident that left Willis with a broken clavicle also contributed to the delays. To resolve some of the issues, later episodes began to focus on supporting characters Agnes and Herbert so new episodes would be ready to air. Ratings began to falter not because David and Maddie consummated their relationship in Season 3, as many had suggested, but because a show that depended on the chemistry of its leads often did not have the leads during the fourth season while Shepherd was giving birth and Willis’ career took off after making Die Hard, his interest in a weekly TV series waning. Caron also exited the series due to clashes with Shepherd, feeling it was going to come down to him or her and the network was not going to choose him. Neither of the stars were fully committed to the final season with Shepherd tired of the gruelling schedule and Willis focused on a movie career. During its run, the show earned 40 Emmy nominations, winning six, and 10 Golden Globe nominations, winning three.
Robotech was an adaptation of three unrelated Japanese anime television series from three different fictional universes — The Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross, and Genesis Climber Mospeada — made between 1982 and 1984 in Japan. Robotech was one of the first anime series televised in the United States that attempted to include most of the complexity and drama of its original Japanese source material.
1995
- March 4 – NHL 2Night (ESPN2, last broadcast on May 22, 2004)
- March 5 – The Great Defender (FOX, One season, 8 episodes, 3 unaired)
- March 8 – The George Wendt Show (CBS, One season, 8 episodes, 2 unaired)
The Great Defender starred Michael Rispoli, Peter Krause, Kelly Rutherford, Rhoda Gemignani and Richard Kiley. The George Wendt Show was a star vehicle for Wendt following the end of Cheers, and was based on the public radio show Car Talk.
2005
- March 3 – Law & Order: Trial By Jury (NBC, One season, 13 episodes)
- March 3 – The Contender (NBC/ESPN/Versus/Epix, Five seasons, 47 episodes)
- March 6 – Damage Control (MTV, Two seasons, 18 episodes)
- March 6 – Iron Chef America (Food Network, Thirteen seasons, 205 episodes)
- March 6 – The Starlet (The WB, One season, 6 episodes)
- March 7 – Fat Actress (Showtime, One season, 7 episodes)
- March 8 – Blind Justice (ABC, One season, 13 episodes)
- March 8 – Lie Detector (PAX TV, One season, 13 episodes)
Law & Order: Trial By Jury was the first series of the franchise to be cancelled, consistently beat in the ratings by CBS’ Numbers. NBC pulled the show with one episode left unaired, which was eventually broadcast when the entire series was rerun on Court TV (now TruTV).
The Starlet was a reality series created by Jamie Kennedy in which young actresses competed to win a role on One Tree Hill. Katie Wagner hosted, with Faye Dunaway and Vivica A. Fox as judges.
Fat Actress was generally unscripted, with the actors improvising lines from a basic story outline. Blind Justice was ordered by ABC as a replacement for NYPD Blue, which was ending its run.
2015
Universal Television
- March 4 – CSI: Cyber (CS, Two seasons, 31 episodes)
- March 5 – Dig (USA Network, One season, 10 episodes)
- March 5 – American Crime (ABC, Three seasons, 29 episodes)
- March 6 – In an Instant (ABC, Three seasons, 22 episodes)
- March 6 – Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (Netflix, Four seasons, 52 episodes)
- March 7 – My Lottery Dream Home (HGTV, Thirteen seasons, 158 episodes to date)
CSI: Cyber was the third spin-off of the CSI: franchise.
American Crime was a crime drama anthology series with a different format each season, and generally the same cast playing different roles. Felicity Huffman, Timothy Hutton, Lili Taylor and Regina King were featured in all three seasons. The series received 16 Emmy nominations during its run, with King winning for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Movie (Season 1) and Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series (Season 2).
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt received 20 Emmy nominations during its run, including four for Outstanding Comedy Series, and one for Outstanding Television Movie for the 2020 special Kimmy vs. the Reverend, an interactive sequel. The original premise was that the Kimmy Schmidt character would awaken from a coma but the idea was abandoned in favor of the cult survivor premise. NBC was originally developing the series under the title Tooken, but eventually sold it to Netflix. Megan Doods was originally cast as Jacqueline Voorhees, but was later replaced by Jane Krakowski.