NBC Saturdays, 1984-1985
Originally Published April 26th, 2006
The 1984-1985 season was a turning point for NBC. After a decade spent as the third-place network behind CBS and ABC, in April of 1985 NBC had managed a second place finish. Thanks to the incredible success of freshman series The Cosby Show along with powerful returning shows like The A-Team and Family Ties, NBC was able to overpower ABC. However, the picture wasn’t entirely rosy for NBC. Its Saturday line-up was one of its weakest nights.
NBC finished the 1983-1984 season in third place, as it had for the previous nine years. The perennial bottom dweller, NBC had placed only six shows — including The A-Team and The Facts of Life — in the top thirty. Although the network put up a valiant fight Sunday through Thursday, the dismal performance of its Friday and Saturday line-ups took a toll on NBC’s weekly average.
When the network announced its 1984-1985 schedule in May of 1984, a total of twenty shows had been cancelled, including the ten new shows it had debuted in September of 1983 as well as Mama’s Family and a slew of midseason replacements [1]. It was a massive reshuffling built around NBC’s successful Tuesday line-up of The A-Team, Riptide and Remington Steele.
In an effort to reverse its sagging Friday ratings, NBC ordered a weekly series based on a pair of high-rated miniseries, “V” and “V: The Final Battle,” hoping to use it to start of a revamped Friday schedule [2]. Other new shows included Hunter and Miami Vice, a pair of hour-long dramas to run 9-11PM on Fridays, Highway to Heaven, Punky Brewster and The Cosby Show.
The new Saturday schedule would look like this:
8:00PM – Diff’rent Strokes
8:30PM – Gimme a Break
9:00PM – Partners in Crime
10:00PM – Hot Pursuit
Diff’rent Strokes would retain its 1983-1984 timeslot, Gimme a Break had formerly aired on Wednesdays, and Partners in Crime and Hot Pursuit were two new dramas.
Lynda Carter and Loni Anderson would star in Partners in Crime a two women with absolutely nothing in common. They were, however, married to the same man (at different times) and when he died he left his detective agency to them. They decide to become partners and fight crime together. A new take on The Fugitive, Hot Pursuit would star Kerrie Keane and Eric Pierpoint as Kate and Jim Wyler, a married couple forced to leave their lives behind and go on the run after Kate is framed for murder.
To promote its line-up of new and returning programs, NBC used the slogan “Let’s All Be There.”
View an NBC Image Spot for the 1984-1985 Season
The official start of the 1984-1985 season was Monday, September 24th. Many programs, however, were given sneak previews the previous week. On Saturday, September 22nd, NBC debuted Partners in Crime and Hot Pursuit, with Partners in Crime running from 8-9PM (pre-empting Diff’rent Strokes and Gimme a Break) and the two-hour premiere of Hot Pursuit from 9-11PM.
Rather than broadcast the two-hour pilot to Partners in Crime — which would introduce the concept and the characters to viewers — NBC decided to air an episode guest starring Vanessa Williams, who had been forced to resign as Miss America a few months earlier. It was an obvious ratings stunt, one that didn’t pay off particularly well: Partners in Crime ranked 36th for the week, Hot Pursuit 50th [3].
The following week, Diff’rent Strokes and Gimme A Break premiered in the 8-9PM timeslot and Partners in Crime and Hot Pursuit were moved to their usual timeslots. The pilot for Partners in Crime was finally shown on October 13th, pre-empting Hot Pursuit.
On October 31st, NBC announced it would shuffle its Saturday schedule beginning December 1st [4]. The new schedule:
8:00PM – Diff’rent Strokes
8:30PM – Double Trouble
9:00PM – Gimme a Break
9:30PM – Spencer
10:00PM – Partners in Crime
Double Trouble starred identical twins Jean and Liz Sagal (younger siblings of Kate Sagal) as Kate and Allison Foster, identical twins trying to make it through high school. The series had been given a limited run in April of 1984. Spencer was a brand new sitcom starring Chad Lowe as sixteen-year-old Spencer Winger, also trying to make it through high school.
View a Promo for the Premiere of Spencer
View a Promo for Partners in Crime at 10PM
View a Promo for Hot Pursuit on Fridays
Partners in Crime and Hot Pursuit were pre-empted on November 10th and 17th and on November 24th, Partners in Crime moved to 10PM. The following week, the new schedule took affect. Three episodes of Hot Pursuit were broadcasts on Fridays at 10PM before it was placed on hiatus. On December 6th, NBC announced it was canceling Partners in Crime, its first cancellation of the season [5]. The final episode would air December 29th.
The replacement for Partners in Crime was Berrenger’s, an hour-long soap opera centered on a family that owned and operated a posh department stores in New York City. Yvette Mimieux and Sam Wanamaker starred. A special ninety-minute premiere was broadcast on Saturday, January 5th, 1985, pre-empting Spencer. It tied for 56th for the week, only slightly better than the numbers Partners in Crime drawn the previous week [6].
View a Promo for the Premiere of Berrenger’s
Spencer was pulled from the Saturday line-up in mid-January; It’s Your Move, a sitcom starring Jason Bateman, replaced it on January 26th [7]. Less than three weeks later, NBC announced it was canceling It’s Your Move [8]. A special live episode of Gimme a Break — reportedly the first live broadcast of a sitcom in three decades — was presented on February 23rd (it was live only on the East Coast; the West Coast saw a taped version) [9].
Berrenger’s was cancelled in late February, having finished last in the Nielsen ratings in three of its last four broadcasts [10]. The final episode aired March 9th; three additional episodes were left unaired.
On March 23rd, NBC’s third Saturday line-up premiered. A revamped version of Spencer, now called Under One Roof and featuring several new faces in addition to a few holdovers, took over for It’s Your Move. And police drama Hunter, formerly shown on Fridays, returned from hiatus to replace Berrenger’s.
View a Promo for Under One Roof on Saturdays
View a Promo for Hunter on Saturdays
The 1984-1985 season officially ended on April 21st. A two-week strike by the Writers Guild of America in March had done little to disrupt the network’s regular programming. More importantly, NBC finished the season in second place with a 16.2/26 Nielsen rating, behind CBS (16.9/27) and ahead of ABC (15.4/24). It was the only network to see a year-to-year increase in overall audience and drew the most viewers in the 18-to-49 demographic [11].
Despite this success, NBC won only one night of the week — Tuesday — while CBS won Monday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday and ABC took Wednesday and Saturday [12]. None of the programs NBC aired on Saturday ranked in the top thirty for the season, although several placed in the top forty. Diff’rent Strokes, Gimme a Break and Double Trouble ranked 35th, 39th and tied for 41st, respectively [13].
It’s Your Move tied for 47th, Spencer was 59th, Hunter 62nd, Partners in Crime tied for 64th, Berrenger’s 73rd and Hot Pursuit 74th (out of 75 prime time programs) [14]. Only Diff’rent Strokes, Gimme a Break and Hunter would return for the 1985-1986 season, and only Gimme a Break remained on Saturdays.
For the 1985-1986 season, NBC’s Saturday line-up consisted of Gimme a Break, The Facts of Life, The Golden Girls, 227 and Hunter. Three of those programs, The Golden Girls, 227 and The Facts of Life, would rank in the top thirty for the 1985-1986 season.
Several episodes of Hot Pursuit were burned off during the summer repeat season.
From 8AM through 1PM on Saturdays, NBC and the other networks aired a combination of animated and live-action programs geared towards younger viewers. NBC’s Saturday morning line-up premiered a week before its primetime line-up, on September 15th:
8:00AM – Snorks (New)
8:30AM – Pink Panther and Sons (New)
9:00AM – Smurfs
10:30AM – Alvin And The Chipmunks
11:00AM – Kidd Video (New)
11:30AM – Mr. T
12:00AM – Going Bananas (New)
12:30AM – Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends
Both Mr. T and Kidd Video incorporated live action segments that introduced the cartoons themselves, while Going Bananas was a fully live-action series focused on an orangutan. The series was cancelled in early December, replaced by The Amazing Spider-Man.
View a Promo for Snorks
View a Promo for Mr. T
Snorks and Pink Panther and Sons would run until September 1986 (much of the time in repeats). Kidd Video ran for several years on NBC before moving to CBS, although that network only showed repeats of the NBC episodes.
NBC’s Saturday Night Live premiered on October 8th at 11:30PM. The October 20th show, hosted by Jesse Jackson, drew a 10.4/29 overnight Nielsen rating, the highest the series had seen in years [15]. However, the December 15th show hosted by Eddie Murphy did even better, with an 11.7/31 overnight rating [16].
The writers strike forced Saturday Night Live to air repeats in lieu of new episodes for a few weeks. A planned episode with John Candy and Eugene Levy was scrapped entirely [17].
Take a look at some promotional spots for Saturday Night Live:
View a Promo for SNL with George Carlin, Version One
View a Promo for SNL with George Carlin, Version Two
View a Promo for SNL with Ed Asner
View a Promo for SNL with Eddie Murphy
View a Promo for SNL with Kathleen Turner
View a Promo for SNL with Pamela Sue Martin
Additional hosts included the 1984-1985 season included Howard Cosell, Michael McKean and Ringo Starr.
Works Cited:
1 Rothenberg, Fred. “NBC’s “V” Series Key to Success Next Season.” Associated Press. 10 May 1984: AM Cycle.
2 Ibid.
3 Buck, Jerry. “Bill Cosby’s Return to Television Tops Ratings.” Associated Press. 25 Sep. 1984: AM Cycle.
4 “NBC Announces Two New Comedy Series; Shuffles Friday, Saturday Night Lineups.” Associated Press. 31 Oct. 1984: AM Cycle.
5 “‘Partners in Crime’ Gets the Ax.” Associated Press. 6 Dec. 1984: PM Cycle.
6 According to the December 28th, 1984 edition of The Washington Post, the December 22nd episode of Partners in Crime tied for 60th in the Nielsen ratings (Page C6), so Berrenger’s 56th ranking was only a slight improvement (Rothenberg, Fred, “Football Is Bonus to CBS in Ratings Race.” Associated Press. 8 Jan. 1985: AM Cycle).
7 Margulies, Lee. “NBC Playing Musical Chairs With Comedies.” Los Angeles Times. 16 Jan. 1985: 10.
8 “The TV Column.” Washington Post. 13 Feb. 1985: B11.
9 “‘Gimme a Break’ / TV Sitcom Shown Live — And It Works.” San Francisco Chronicle. 25 Feb. 1985: 37.
10 Carmody, John. “The TV Column.” Washington Post. 25 Feb. 1985: B10.
11 Carmody, John. “The TV Column.” Washington Post. 29 Apr. 1985: C6.
12 Ibid.
13 [No Title]. Associated Press. 23 Apr. 1985: AM Cycle.
14 Ibid.
15 Carmody, John. “The TV Column.” Washington Post. 22 Oct. 1984: C9.
16 Carmody, John. “The TV Column.” Washington Post. 18 Dec. 1984: B8.
17 Smith, Sally Bedell. “Scant Initial Effect Seen For TV Writers’ Strike.” New York Times. 6 Mar. 1985: C22.
Last Updated June 26th, 2008
June 9th, 2009 at 11:11PM
“DOUBLE TROUBLE” returned in mid-season because Brandon Tartikoff, NBC’s programming “whiz”, believed the show could be “improved” after its initial episodes aired in the summer of 1984. He also had a commitment from Columbia Pictures Television (the series’ studio) to feature a pair of comedic actors known as “The Funny Boys”, Jonathan Schmock and James Vallelly, in a series; their first effort for the network was an unsold pilot called “T.L.C.” for the 1984-’85 season (first-year med students in an all-women college). When that tanked, Tartifkoff added them to the new format of “DOUBLE TROUBLE” (as Kate & Allison Foster’s upstairs neighbors in New York). Despie the changes, the series ended that season…and Jonathan Schmock went on to become a producer, most notably “SABRINA THE TEENAGE WITCH” in the late ’90s.