TVSquad

Oh, they don't make 'em like this anymore.

After the jump is a video from the NBC 60th Anniversary show in 1986 (very interesting). It's rather surreal. We get to see Bea Arthur, Nell Carter, Charlotte Rae (Mrs. Garrett from Facts of Life), Marla Gibbs, and Alfonso Ribiero sing a song about "family." That's the NBC family, that is, as all of them were starring on shows at the time (Facts of Life, Golden Girls, Gimme A Break, 227, and Silver Spoons). Punky Brewster herself makes an appearance too, but only to say three words and gives a thumbs up. Barbara Eden introduces the song. The most cringe-worthy moment isn't any of the singing, it's when Gibbs and Carter pass each other on the stairs and casually say that they love each other's shows.

Can you imagine a network doing this now? I want to see Hugh Laurie, Stewie, the guys from Prison Break, Marge Simpson, and Gordon Ramsay get on stage at the next Emmy Awards and sing about the FOX family.

[via Best Week Ever]

I have a love/hate feeling about Chuck Klosterman. I think a lot of his ideas are clever and interesting, but he just gets so many things wrong in his columns that it makes you tear your hair out a little bit (and I don't have that much to tear out anymore). And his tone is one of superiority when he's actually off quite a bit in what he says.

For example, his latest Esquire column is about how TV networks "feel" and "look." How ABC looks a certain way, how NBC looks a certain way, and you can tell what channel you're watching, even if you can't figure out why or how you know, you do (even if you're not watching a show that you know is on a certain network). It's something I actually noticed 20 years ago, and I'm a little freaked out that someone else brought it up.

I've never breakdanced. Not even in a "I'm going to comically breakdance around my friends" sort of way. I did do the Macarena once, after several drinks at a wedding.

The video after the jump, from 1985, shows Dancing with the Stars/Celebrity Duets star Alfonso Ribeiro pitching his breakdancing book. Over 100 pages of instruction on how to do everything from The Wave to The Centipede to The Windmill. But that's not all! You also get a giant foldout floor to breakdance on, a full "rap sheet" on how to rap, and an album of rap/dance music that is, in Alfonso's words, "radical." And all for only $19.99! He guarantees you'll freak out your friends. It's brought to you by Telmak, who, if I've not mistaken, was Spock's brother.

[via Cracked]

Question: What's better than full episodes of T.J. Hooker? Shortened episodes of T.J. Hooker, of course.

MySpace has launched The Minisode Network, a place devoted to edited versions of episodes of old TV shows like Silver Spoons, Starsky & Hutch, Diff'rent Strokes, Who's The Boss, Sheena, and others. They're actually sort-of complete episodes, it's just that all the trivial parts have been edited out. More like a quick summary of the plot/episode than a full episode. I don't know how this benefits the storytelling, but then again, if you're watching Silver Spoons you're probably not watching it for the storytelling. Of course, you can watch complete episodes of shows over at In2TV.

As for T.J. Hooker, it amazing how cheesy and ridiculous it is, though in an entertaining way. It's like Police Squad.

[via Pop Candy]

Usually when I report upcoming DVD releases I find the information on TVShowsOnDVD.com, but this time the news comes from Sitcoms Online. Keep in mind this is not an official announcement, but apparently Judith A. Moose, author of Together - A Sitcom Lover's Guide To Silver Spoons, says the DVDs are being produced by Sony Home Entertainment and will include special features and audio commentaries. No word on whether these will be released as seasons or not, but if all of this is true we should be seeing the DVDs sometime this summer. Ah, to see a young Ricky Schroder and Alfonso Ribeiro again. Also, that duck phone was awesome. I always wanted one of those. And a racecar bed. Well, I don't want a racecar bed so much anymore, but the duck phone would still be cool.

Look, I know that his years on NYPD Blue redeemed him from a crash course with the child star curse of reality shows and cultural irrelevance, but he'll always be Ricky Schroeder to me. Ricky Schroeder - Silver Spoons star, friend to "Tap Dance Kid" Alfonso Riberio and owner of the racing car bed. Fortunately for Ricky, he overcame the 80s with the aforementioned three seasons on NYPD Blue, a comedic turn as Nurse Paul Flowers on Scrubs and his latest outing as Dr. Dylan West on Lifetime's Strong Medicine.

Ricky has made another great career move - further distancing himself from that plucky young lad in The Champ. He'll be joining the cast of 24 as CTU operative Mike Doyle. Expect to see Schroder team up with Kiefer Sutherland's Jack Bauer in executing "key field ops." 24 is really pulling out all the stops with its latest casting decisions. Schroder is just one of a list of fancy new cast members including Chad Lowe, Regina King, Powers Boothe, Peter MacNicol, James Cromwell, Kal Penn and David Hunt. That's right - Deadwood's Cy Tolliver meets Babe's Father Hoggett meets The Boondocks' Huey Freeman meets Kumar. Who doesn't want to see that?

I took this quiz over at Mental Floss and scored 100%. You have to match the sitcom with the house/setting they show in the opening credits.

By the way, I'm not bragging about that score, the test is just incredibly easy, especially since two of the pictures are very, very easy to identify, which means you can guess the others by process of elimination, if you don't know one or two of them. I mean, one of the shows is The Love Boat, so you know there's going to be a boat involved, right?

This might prove to be very satisfying, that you know you TV homes as much as you do your own. On the other hand, it might be kind of scary that somewhere in your mind you have actually memorized what sitcom family homes look like (and from shows that you probably haven't seen in a long time).

Also, just so you know, scroll down very slowly and stop when you get to the sitcom names. If you go any further you'll see the answers, and you don't want that to happen.

[via Pop Candy]

I thought a lazy Sunday afternoon would be a good time to hop in the way back machine for a look at one of the Celebrity Duets finalists in their younger days. The person we're going to look on is Alfonso Ribeiro.

Before his role as Carlton Banks on the hit NBC sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, even before his role as Ricky Schroeder's friend Silver Spoons, Alfonso was already a recognized personality. Since 1983 he had been starring in the Broadway musical The Tap Dance Kid. His talents at acting and dancing impressed media types so much that, in 1984, he was cast in a Pepsi commercial with members of the Jackson family, as well as The Gloved One himself, Michael Jackson.

In the video, which you'll see after the jump, Alfonso is decked out in full Jackson garb, circa the Thriller era. As he's showing off to his friends he runs into Michael and his siblings. Rather then getting angry, the Jacksons dance along with Alfonso in his friends, because that is what you did back in the 1980's. If you grew up in the during this time and don't remember this commercial, it will come back to you as soon as you watch the first five seconds.

There are so many cable channels now - I think I have one on my cable system which is just 24 hours of programming about cheese - that it's hard to keep track of them all. Did you know there's an i network? From ION Media Networks. I've never heard of it, but they reach 90 million homes.

They just made a deal with Sony to start showing classic Sony Pictures movies and television series. The shows include Charlie's Angels, Starsky and Hutch, The Monkees, The Partridge Family, and Silver Spoons.

So, basically, it sounds like TV Land or Nick at Nite, only with crappier shows.