Welcome to a new Wildcard Wednesday! This week marks the 60th anniversary of a tragic day in American history — the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. In mournful honor of this historic event, I thought it would be interesting to examine that fateful morning from the lens of this blog’s primary concern — sitcoms — by reviewing the specific sitcom episodes that viewers could have watched on November 22, 1963, prior to the news coverage that took over the network schedules around 2:00 PM Eastern. I was hoping to write this entry using the local listings from my hometown (Orlando), but my efforts to procure that week’s Central FL TV Guide have not yet been successful. So, this post focuses on New York City, and what the many viewers who got those powerful, flagship stations in the northeast would have been watching.
9:00 AM
(2) MY LITTLE MARGIE – “Miss Whoozis” (Originally Aired: 01/05/55)
Margie secretly becomes a model and tries to make the photographer jealous.
This is a forgettable episode from the final season of a mostly logic-less show, which too often eschews the central relationship informing its situation in favor of silly stories that have little to do with the regular characters. Gale Storm is a cute clown, but good sitcommery this is not.
9:30 AM
(2) OUR MISS BROOKS – “Angela’s Wedding” (Originally Aired: 11/05/54)
Angela mistakes the school’s new coach for her mail-order groom.
A decent entry from one of this solid show’s middling seasons, this episode shines a spotlight on the amusing Jesslyn Fax as Angela and involves Miss Brooks’ ongoing romantic pursuit of Mr. Boynton, thereby utilizing the regular situation. It’s a whole lot better than Margie!
(3) LEAVE IT TO BEAVER (episode not specified)
It’s hard to know which episode this would have been, but since Beaver is a better, more memorable sitcom than many on this list, there’s a decent chance I’d be recommending it.
(5) TOPPER – “Topper Tells All” (Originally Aired: 10/08/54)
Topper gets arrested and confesses about the ghosts who live in his house.
Originally the second season premiere of this medium’s first supernatural sitcom (based on the 1937 film of the same name), this episode is a clip show, reestablishing Topper’s high-concept premise. The series is mediocre (no one’s well-defined), but there’s worse on this list.
10:30 AM
(2) I LOVE LUCY – “Mertz And Kurtz” (Originally Aired: 10/11/54)
Fred and Ethel put on airs when they’re visited by his old vaudeville partner.
Okay, it’s not a classic by I Love Lucy’s own high standards, but the character-driven nature of this brilliant series ensures that even one of its lesser samples can still be the best of this list, with a rare Fred-focused story that reveals a lot. This is a sitcom. Nationally scheduled.
11:00 AM
(2) THE REAL MCCOYS – “McCoys Ahoy” (Originally Aired: 11/24/60)
Grandpa tries to save a ship named after a West Virginia hero.
As usual for McCoys, crotchety Grandpa Amos (Walter Brennan) enlivens an otherwise sentimental, uninspired story — disconnected from the series’ actually interesting and atypical (for the late 1950s) situation: a rural, non-traditional nuclear family. Nationally scheduled.
11:30 AM
(2) PETE AND GLADYS – “The Six Musketeers” (Originally Aired: 02/20/61)
Pete and Gladys share a mountain cabin with two other couples.
Pete And Gladys is a wannabe I Love Lucy without her guiding character motivation and Arnaz’s applied autobiography. It’s a limp December Bride spin-off, only slightly less ridiculous than the similar I Married Joan. This outing is affable, but pure mediocrity. Nationally scheduled.
12:30 PM
(7) (8) FATHER KNOWS BEST – “Man About Town” (Originally Aired: 10/03/56)
Bud tries to impress an older woman.
Father Knows Best is among the worst sitcoms of the ’50s because star Robert Young viewed most TV comedy as crass, instead favoring light drama. This entry isn’t serious, but its mildly amusing story never earns real hahas, for there’s nothing here that couldn’t be done with any other generic teen — a fault of the show’s refusal to define its leads for comedy. Nationally scheduled.
1:00 PM
(2) THE GEORGE BURNS AND GRACIE ALLEN SHOW – “The Night Out” (Originally Aired: 06/04/56)
George accidentally gets locked in the Friars Club overnight.
Despite coming from a good season from one of the decade’s best sitcoms, this particular outing isn’t among Burns And Allen’s finest, with a simple misunderstanding that’s not as clever or as Gracie-specific as it should be. However, it’s a better series than a lot of the stinkers here!
1:30 PM
(4) BACHELOR FATHER – “Bentley And The Beach Bum” (Originally Aired: 05/26/60)
Uncle Bentley steps in when Kelly falls for a beach bum.
Bachelor Father boasts a Bob Cummings-like premise about a playboy forced into the role of proxy dad, but its writing is never as funny, for its characterizations are too benign. I suppose this entry seeks mild social satire, but it’s not connected well to the situation. Interrupted by news.
(7) THE ANN SOTHERN SHOW – “It’s A Dog’s Life” (Originally Aired: 12/15/58)
Katy helps Donald hide a puppy in his room.
This is the only episode on this list that I’ve not yet seen. It comes from the early hotel-focused portion of the series, which is mediocre, and this logline isn’t promising. Interrupted by news.
(8) THE GALE STORM SHOW – “Pat On The Back” (Originally Aired: 09/14/57)
Susanna tries to encourage Pat Boone to perform.
Gale Storm’s cruise ship-set sitcom too often devolves into guest-of-the-week fare, as evidenced by this offering, which features Pat Boone. If you like him, you may appreciate this musical half hour, but otherwise, it’s another subpar sample of sitcommery. Interrupted by news.
Well, as you can see, it wasn’t a great morning for sitcoms — mostly light, forgettable stuff from the prior ten years, soon to be swept away by the memory of an unforgettable tragedy…
Come back next week for a new Wildcard! And stay tuned Tuesday for more Scrubs!
My Little Margie is a rip off of Lucy point blank period.
Hi, Track! Thanks for reading and commenting.
I think there are obvious similarities between I LOVE LUCY and MY LITTLE MARGIE. For instance, they’re both filmed sitcoms starring B-level movie actresses eager to clown and showcase their capacities for slapstick, with their characters’ childish scheming often informing the story beats. And in the broad sense that most sitcoms in the initial wake of I LOVE LUCY were deliberately studying its success and hoping to achieve the same, there is a connection between the two.
But I don’t think MARGIE is a simple “rip off” of LUCY — primarily because it has a completely different premise, about a widower and his adult daughter both gatekeeping each other’s romantic pursuits. It’s specific. Unfortunately, one of MARGIE’s many problems (and there are many) is that its scripts seldom play to this established situation in story, too often indulging outrageous farcical scenarios with episodic concerns that aren’t well-attached to any of the sustaining particulars — namely the characterizations, which are far less defined than those on LUCY.
Speaking of which, I’d be more inclined to say that something like I MARRIED JOAN or PETE AND GLADYS are “rip offs” of LUCY because their premises are closer — using the basic “zany wife and put-upon husband” low-concept setup. But, of course, that’s too generic to be proprietary. LUCY’s actual situation involves exact and individual details about Lucy and Ricky, such as her guiding objective to be in show biz and his autobiographically applied career and heritage.
The leads on JOAN and GLADYS are not nearly as well-crafted, and they’re therefore not as precisely, uniquely available to help inspire plots. That’s why they both, like MARGIE, are subpar sitcoms — they don’t reliably exemplify a “situation” with elements that can be directly used to generate both story and comedy. As usual, the difference is character.
Thanks for covering this interesting topic. I’ve seen clips from another ABC station (maybe on the West Coast) where this same FATHER KNOWS BEST episode was interrupted by the first bulletins of the assassination. I’ve lived in TX for the most part for the last 40 years, and WFAA-TV, DFW’s ABC affiliate which was carried on cable in my college dorm, reran a great deal of its assasssination footage for the 20th anniversary over Thanksgiving week 1983 during overnight hours. WFAA-TV interrupted a local show hosted by Julie Benell to carry first news of the shooting and had footage of both the show and its interruption. NBC affiliate WBAP-TV was carrying a local news show, and CBS affilate KRLD-TV was carrying AS THE WORLD TURNS, clips of which can be seen on YouTube along with Walter Cronkite’s first bulletins. KRLD-TV carried the same sitcoms as the CBS stations you list except for MY LITTLE MARGIE, which it preempted regularly for a local newscast and that morning specifically to cover, along with all other local stations, President Kennedy’s breakfast speech from the Ft. Worth hotel where he’d spent the night. NBC’s HARRY’S GIRLS was the only sitcom that was to be carried in the area that night, as WFAA-TV was going to preempt the entire ABC evening schedule that night, including THE FARMER’S DAUGHTER, with a movie in color.
Hi, Jon! Thanks for reading and commenting.
Always interesting to read remembrances of local coverage, especially with regard to historic dates and sitcoms. Thanks for sharing.
Incidentally, MARGIE was not nationally programmed by CBS at this time; that local JFK speech pre-empted the regularly scheduled morning news. And, of course, keep in mind that any other sitcom besides those deliberately marked above as “nationally scheduled” could have been running (or planning to run) different episodes from those cited here, so local stations carrying the same shows ≠ same episodes.
Thanks, Jackson, particularly for specifying which were national network reruns. I have seen other blogs cover what was preempted in prime time that night. This is a nice compliment.
Hi, Paul! Thanks for reading and commenting.
Glad you enjoyed!