29 Trivia Nuggets From Pop Culture History About TV For Monday, December 22nd

At this point, we watch TV more for your benefit than ours
29 Trivia Nuggets From Pop Culture History About TV For Monday, December 22nd
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Don’t get us wrong, we still get a lot of joy out of watching TV. It’s just that taking notes the entire time starts feeling a little like a homework assignment. Of all the homework assignments we could have, it’s the best one, but it’s still homework nonetheless. Just once we’d like to put the ol’ pad and pen down and zone-out to the happenings on the screen. 

It’s our pesky brain’s fault. Its unquenchable thirst for TV knowledge has us chained to the pen like the counter at the bank! Our only hope of being free is to rewatch every episode enough to extract every single possible fact about it. Then, and only then, will we be able to watch it for pure enjoyment.

Another World

The first abortion mention 1964 ANOTHER WORLD CRACKED.COM Soap opera Another World had a storyline where a woman's abortion drives her to illness, madness, and murder. Not exactly progressive.

The Hasselhoffs

David Hasselhoff CRACKED.COM After Baywatch, he struggled to reach the same level of success in the soap opera scene. Не struggled even harder when he made his family and, like, some parts of his face? appear in the reality series The Hasselhoffs.

It's Always Sunny

Rob McElhenney had a nightmare that inspired the show. Glenn Howerton describes, The show started as a night terror, basically. A late-night sweating station. BEHIND THE SCENES CRACKED.COM

The Handmaid's Tale

BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS THE SHOW MADE STREAMING HISTORY. THE HANDMAID S TALE In 2017, the Hulu original became the first streaming show to win an Emmy for Outstanding Drama. CRACKED.COM

Mr. Show

BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS Goofballz minus dead comic = MR. SHOW MR. Show CRACKED.COM David Cross and Bob Odenkirk first worked together on stage as The Three Goofballz. Who was Goofball number 3? The joke was that the mystery comic was either out getting high or dead.

The Muppet Show

BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS Gonzo was often stuntless on the MUPPET SHOW CRACKED.COM Gonzo was famous for risking his life in a series of bizarre, ill-advised stunts. But he did fewer than you remember. Over the course of 120 episodes, Gonzo only performed 20 stunts. The rest of the time, he was romancing chickens.

Loki

BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS MISS MINUTES ALMOST HAD A FIGHT SCENE. LOKI According to director Kate Herron, a cut scene from the show involved Miss Minutes having an actual fight scene with Loki and Sylvie at the Citadel. Hopefully, we'll get to see what the TVA mascot is made of next season. CRACKED.COM

SNL

JANUARY JONES NOVEMBER 14, 2009 CRACKED.COM In the awkward first sketch, on live television, Jones looked around and asked Which camera? The night didn't get much better from there.

Freaks and Geeks

FREAKS AND GEEKSWAS PASSED ON BY FOX, CBS, AND ABC CRACKED.COM A development exec at NBC said, If we don't make this show, I'm quitting the television business.

Scrubs

COMEDY NERD CRACKED.COM SCRUBS' BLACKFACE EPISODES ACTUALLY GOT PULLED FROM STREAMING SERVICE HULU. There were three episodes in total, and show creator Bill Lawrence and ABC Studios requested that they all be pulled.

Jaleel White

COMEDY NERD CRACKED.COM JALEEL WHITE NEARLY GOT A PART ON THE COSBY SHOW, IT TURNS OUT. ST S Не lost the role of Rudy --My agent had been told that they've pretty much settled on , so I went to the audition thinking I was just going on a last audition. And then, all of a sudden, this little girl walks in.

Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventures

COMEDY NERD CRACKED.COM TURNS OUT, THERE WAS A BILL & TED'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURES LIVE-ACTION TV SHOW. It ran for eight episodes, and although it apparently wasn't terrible, it wasn't great either - the franchise was getting kind of milked dry by then (there was already a sequel and a Saturday morning cartoon).

MADtv

Record mogul Quincy Jones created and produced MADtv CRACKED.COM Following Gaines' death in 1992, the music monolith and father to Rashida purchased the television rights through his production company QDE which, at the time, was enjoying the success of Jones' first venture into comedy programming, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

Fawlty Towers

COMEDY NERD Fawlty Towers originally had a totally different theme song than the one you know. You can hear the original version only in the pilot-it got changed in the very next episode. CRACKED.COM

Friends

COMEDY NERD The original pilot script for Friends features pretty different characters. HOUS CLOSED Phoebe was into busking, Monica was cynical, and Joey was actually sort of mean. CRACKED.COM

South Park

PILOTS THAT WERE WILDLY DIFFERENT SOUTH PARK THE SPIRITURE OF CHRISTMAS OM'S RHIN South Park's pilot: Way more musical, and designed to be the world's weirdest Christmas Card. CRACKED.COM

Seinfeld

COMEDY NERD Seinfeld originally didn't have Elaine - she's not in the pilot at all. Which means the show came this close to being about Jerry, George, and Kramer, which would have made it totally different (and probably much less successful). CRACKED.COM

Another World

Anne Heche Movies Another World This was Anne Heche's first role (first two roles, actually). Heche played twin sisters Vicky Carson and Marley Love in this soap opera. Not only was it her first TV job, but also her first Emmy. CRACKED.COM

SNL

CRACKED SEVEN AMATEURS AND A CANADIAN PRODUCER CREATED A COMEDY EMPIRE. The first season of Saturday Night Live was made up of seven inexperienced improvisers and a nervous Canadian producer, Lorne Michaels. Even though the show had a rough start, the cast eventually made SNL a cultural phenomenon.

The Wayne Brady Show

The Wayne Brady Show CRACKED.COM Wayne Brady was absolutely crushing it on Whose Line Is It Anyway? and ABC thought they had a superstar on their hands. They gave him his own show, first as a prime time variety show, later moving it to daytime. Despite winning a bunch of Daytime Emmy Awards, it only lasted 3 seasons.

The Dana Carvey Show

BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS Mainstream met 'nerd pirates' on the DANA CARVEY SHOW CRACKED.COM ABC wanted Carvey to play his famous characters, while his writers wanted to bring bleeding-edge comedy to prime time. The tension shows up in the first sketch where Carvey plays Bill Clinton (good!), opening his shirt to breast-feed baby animals (cue ABC execs passing out).

Kristen Schaal

Kristen Schaal & Rich Blomquist B E Schaal, a former Daily Show correspondent, and Blomquist, a former Daily Show writer, didn't meet at the late night show. They met one day while working on a pilot for Adult Swim- when Schaal had the stomach flu. CRACKED.COM

South Park

BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS FOX TURNED DOWN THE SHOW. SOUTH PARK Before landing on Comedy Central, Trey Parker and Matt Stone pitched the show to Fox. Executives at Fox turned them down because they didn't think a show about kids could work and wanted it to be more family-centric. CRACKED.COM

30 Rock

Alec Baldwin bought all of Jack's suits after the show ended. The costume designer said, Не wrote a big check to NBC. BEHIND-THE-SCENES CRACKED.COM

Strangers

COMEDY NERD BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS Stephen Colbert and Paul Dinello are still together. his en - - M ... - Sew CRACKED.COM The Strangers co-stars have continued to work together over the years. Dinello was a producer/writer for The Colbert Report, where he would often appear as building manager Tad. He's now supervising producer for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.

The Guardian

COMEDY NERD CRACKED.COM WILL FERRELL HAD A RANDOM CAMEO ON THE CBS DRAMA THE GUARDIAN. My manager Jim, who was also a producer on it at the time, and we basically forced CBS to write a guest role for me which looks like I'm going to be a series regular, he said.

Roswell

Roswell fans saved the show by mailing Tabasco sauce to the network. When the WB drama Roswell was about to be canceled after one season, the fans organized a mass mailing of Tabasco sauce bottles to the network. And they were successful(ish), as UPN picked up the show for another season. CRACKED

Lookwell

Conan O'Brien and Bob Smigel created lookwell CRACKED.COM The perfect-for-today show starred Adam West in the kind of self-mocking role he'd later perfect on Family Guy. As Lookwell, West was an ex-TV cop who believes he can solve real-world crimes. Used to play detective... mind can't help but... make... deductions.

Nobody's Watching

What better name for a failed pilot than nobody's watching BROWN GRACKED.COM Two dudes, including young Taran Killan, bet the WB they can make a funnier show than the network's 2006 comedy lineup (not the tallest mountain to climb). The barely aired show gained notoriety for massive (for 2006) YouTube views. Ironically, it's since been deleted.

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