Loading the player…
Here’s a promotional spot for the premiere of F Troop in which Forrest Tucker introduces the show, which premiered on September 14th, 1965 in black and white. The following season, the show’s last, it was seen in color. Notice that there’s time at the end of the spot for local station identification.
And I wonder if ‘Batman,’ still a highly-rated show but clearly not at the top as it was for its first season, served as an excellent lead-in to the 2nd season of ‘F Troop’ on Thursday nights in 1966-67.
Here’s a fact: Immediately following ‘F Troop’ at 8:30 pm on the ABC schedule for that season was ‘The Tammy Grimes Show.’ Anybody remember that one? The ratings were so awful for ‘Tammy Grimes’ that the network canceled it before the month of September was out and in its place aired a nighttime version of ‘The Dating Game.’ ‘The Green Hornet’ was also a new addition to the ABC prime-time lineup but aired on Friday nights; both it and ‘F Troop’ would be gone at the conclusion of the season.
As for new Warner Bros. management discontinuing the series after season two [purely for economic reasons], executive producer William T. Orr himself confirmed their decision to Jeff Kisselhoff in his 1991 oral TV history book, “The Box”. I’ll “shoot” his quote to you when I have a chance…….
This is what Bill Orr told Jeff Kisseloff concerning the demise of “F TROOP”, by way of explaining his idea to “extend” the life of his early ’60s Warner Bros. TV shows for future syndication:
“ABC was the last network to go to color. When they did, I told Jack {Warner, his father-in-law} and Benny Kalmanson {the studio’s East Coast executive V.P.} that we should shoot in color, but print them in black and white. That way, we would have the color when we got to syndication.
“‘It’ll cost more to paint the sets.’
“I said, ‘So what?’ but he killed it. In the long run, it cost us millions. Today, all those shows would be on if they were in color. The only thing on is ‘F TROOP’. The first year of that was black and white and the second year was in color, and then Benny had it taken off because we were three thousand dollars over budget.”
Located the Television Magazine (Volume 24, Number 8) with the complete season-ending Nielsen ratings for 1966-1967 and numbers clearly support F TROOP’s case for renewal for a third season, if the decision had been up to ABC.
Lead in BATMAN had a 33 share and ranked # 37; F TROOP was # 40, with a 31.3 share and 18.8 rating. THAT GIRL (# 57, 28.8 share) was renewed by ABC despite a lower rating that night, and other ABC shows ranked lower that were renewed for 1967-68 included VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA (#64), FELONY SQUAD (#46), IRON HORSE (# 48) and HOLLYWOOD PALACE (# 41) among others. F TROOP also outranked I DREAM OF JEANNIE (# 43) and THE MONKEES (# 42) to name two other notable sitcoms that were renewed.
Of the top 45 shows, only F TROOP and MR. TERRIFIC (which sank like a rock after a top 15 mid-season debut) were not renewed.
In reading Mr. Orr’s comments regarding color; just imagine how much money Warners lost in the long run by not shooting 77 SUNSET STRIP and MAVERICK in color like Orr suggested.
I think that, with the exception of MAVERICK, most of what came out of WB wouldn’t have had an indefinite shelf life, even in color.