From the Television Obscurities YouTube channel, here’s a 60-second NBC image spot from the 1980-1981 TV season when the network used the slogan “Proud As a Peacock.”
From the Television Obscurities YouTube channel, here’s a 60-second NBC image spot from the 1980-1981 TV season when the network used the slogan “Proud As a Peacock.”
NBC’s 1980-81 TV season was hit by a “double whammy”.
First, the 1980-81 television season was delayed thanks to a writers’ strike.
Secondly, the U.S. boycotted the Summer Olympics in Moscow, which NBC was to have broadcast.
Originally, I believe NBC was going to start the TV season in mid-August, right after the Summer Olympics.
But after the U.S. decided to boycott the Games, NBC cut back Olympic coverage from a planned 180 hours to a couple of specials on weekends as well as a daily highlights report fed to local NBC affiliates for use on their local newscasts.
Several NBC affiliates refused to broadcast the daily Olympic highlights and weekend specials.
The 1980-1981 season was affected by an actors strike. The 1981-1982 season was the one affected by the writers strike.
NBC did receive good ratings for its “Shogun” miniseries, but the ratings couldn’t carry very well through the season because of the actors’ strike, so NBC still ended up in 3rd place, and Fred Silverman lost his job the next year.
There was a funny parody of Proud As A Peacock called Loud As A Peacock which came out at the same time.
Yes, I’ve heard that parody, and I can’t see this promo w/o thinking of that parody now.
The “Loud as a Peacock” jingle is on youtube at the link below:
https://youtu.be/ir6gJHSyAgc