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Test films, pilots, trial series, limited runs, summer tryouts--by whatever name, televison networks have produced thousands of experimental shows that never made it into the regular line-up. Some were actually shown, but failed to gain an audience; many others never even made it on the air. This work includes more than 3,000 experimental television programs, both aired and unaired, that almost became a series. Entries include length, network, air date (if appropriate), a fact-filled plot synopsis, cast, guest stars, producer, director, writer, and music coordinator. Fully indexed.

Here is an excellent reference book on'first run'syndication--the distribution of programs either made exclusively for non-network play, or of programs intended for network telecasts but ultimately making their debuts in syndication. Bringing together information not easily found, this work covers the classics such as Sea Hunt, Highway Patrol, The Merv Griffin Show and the Muppet Show, as well as such once-popular but now obscure productions as China Smith, Ripcord and The Littlest Hobo. Coverage goes back to 1947 and the book includes a number of series ignored in other works. The first section is an overview of the concept of syndication from its earliest application in the newspaper world to the attempt by Fox Television to become a fourth network. The next four sections each cover ten years of syndication, listing the shows (with full background--who produced them and why, who liked them and why, etc.) alphabetically by title under the following genres: Adventure/Mystery, Children's, Comedy, Drama, Game/Quiz, Informational, Music/Variety, Religious, Sports, Talk/Interview, Travel/Documentary, Westerns, and Women's.

On November 27, 1937, NBC presented TV's first pilot film, Sherlock Holmes (then called an'experiment'). Thousands of pilot films (both unaired and televised) have been produced since. This updated and restyled book contains 2,470 alphabetically arranged pilot films broadcast from 1937 to 2019. Entries contain the concept, cast and character information, credits (producer, writer, director), dates, genre and network or cable affiliation. In addition to a complete performer's index, two appendices have been included: one detailing the pilot films that led to a series and a second that lists the programs that were spun off from one series into another. Never telecast pilot films can be found in the companion volume, The Encyclopedia of Unaired Television Pilots, 1945-2018. Both volumes are the most complete and detailed sources for such information, a great deal of which is based on viewing the actual programs.

Whether rocketing to other worlds or galloping through time, science fiction television has often featured the best of the medium. The genre's broad appeal allows youngsters to enjoy fantastic premises and far out stories, while offering adults a sublime way to view the human experience in a dramatic perspective. From Alien Nation to World of Giants, this reference work provides comprehensive episode guides and cast and production credits for 62 science fiction series that were aired from 1959 through 1989. For each episode, a brief synopsis is given, along with the writer and director of the show and the guest cast. Using extensive research and interviews with writers, directors, actors, stuntmen and many of the show's creators, an essay about each of the shows is also provided, covering such issues as its genesis and its network and syndication histories.

This is a complete revision of the author's 1993 McFarland book Television Specials that not only updates entries contained within that edition, but adds numerous programs not previously covered, including beauty pageants, parades, awards programs, Broadway and opera adaptations, musicals produced especially for television, holiday specials (e.g., Christmas and New Year's Eve), the early 1936-1947 experimental specials, honors specials. In short, this is a reference work to 5,336 programs--the most complete source for television specials ever published.

This reference work, the most complete guide to aired and unaired television pilot films ever published (or made available in any way), contains 5,190 alphabetically arranged programs, each with storyline information, performer and character cast listings, producers, air dates (where applicable), genre, and network or cable association. Also included are the unaired versions of pilots that became a series (like 90 Bristol Court, Hazel, The Middle and Perfect Strangers) and the updates of aired series that were never telecast (e.g., The Robinsons: Lost in Space, the 1997 version of Hawaii Five-0, the 2011 Wonder Woman and the 2001 Electra Woman and Dyna Girl).

This book finally casts a spotlight on some short-lived and almost forgotten sitcoms--those which aired for only one single season. Many books have already been written about situation comedies that enjoyed long and storied runs on television but this volume focuses upon the others. Overflowing with fresh facts, interviews, photographs, and stories, nearly 300 short-lived sitcoms over a 32 year span are presented A-to-Z, whether network or syndicated, prime time or Saturday morning.

On March 31, 1943, the musical Oklahoma! premiered and the modern era of the Broadway musical was born. Since that time, the theatres of Broadway have staged hundreds of musicals—some more noteworthy than others, but all in their own way a part of American theatre history. With more than 750 entries, this comprehensive reference work provides information on every musical produced on Broadway since Oklahoma's 1943 debut. Each entry begins with a brief synopsis of the show, followed by a three-part history: first, the pre–Broadway story of the show, including out-of-town try-outs and Broadway previews; next, the Broadway run itself, with dates, theatres, and cast and crew, including replacements, chorus and understudies, songs, gossip, and notes on reviews and awards; and finally, post–Broadway information with a detailed list of later notable productions, along with important reviews and awards.

This fully updated and expanded edition covers over 10,200 programs, making it the most comprehensive documentation of television programs ever published. In addition to covering the standard network and cable entertainment genres, the book also covers programs generally not covered elsewhere in print (or even online), including Internet series, aired and unaired pilot films, erotic series, gay and lesbian series, risque cartoons and experimental programs from 1925 through 1945.

The entertainment world lost several legendary stars and a host of other men and women involved in the performing arts in 2008. Notables who died include Heath Ledger, Barry Morse, Suzanne Pleshette, Bo Diddley, Tim Russert, Eartha Kitt, Beverly Garland and Isaac Hayes. Obituaries of these and other performers and filmmakers, musicians and producers, dancers and composers, writers and others associated with the performing arts who died in 2008 can be found in this comprehensive reference work. For each, the date, place, and cause of death are provided, along with a recap of their career and citations from major newspaper and periodical stories reporting the death. Filmographies are given for film and television performers, and photographs of many of the individuals are included. Individual books in this annual series are available dating back to 1994. A subscription plan is available for future issues.

In the early days of television, many of its actors, writers, producers and directors came from radio. This crossover endowed the American Radio Archives with a treasure trove of television documents. The collected scripts span more than 40 years of American television history, from live broadcasts of the 1940s to the late 1980s. They also cover the entire spectrum of television entertainment programming, including comedies, soap operas, dramas, westerns, and crime series. The archives cover nearly 1,200 programs represented by more than 6,000 individual scripts. Includes an index of personal names, program and episode titles and production companies, as well as a glossary of industry terms.

New York City's Broadway district is by far the most prestigious and lucrative venue for American performers, playwrights, entertainers and technicians. While there are many reference works and critical studies of selected Broadway plays or musicals and even more works about the highlights of the American theater, this is the first single-volume book to cover all of the activities on Broadway between 1919 and 2007. More than 14,000 productions are briefly described, including hundreds of plays, musicals, revivals, and specialty programs. Entries include famous and forgotten works, designed to give a complete picture of Broadway's history and development, its evolution since the early twentieth century, and its rise to unparalleled prominence in the world of American theater. The productions are identified in terms of plot, cast, personnel, critical reaction, and significance in the history of New York theater and culture. In addition to a chronological list of all Broadway productions between 1919 and 2007, the book also includes approximately 600 important productions performed on Broadway before 1919.

Before the Internet and the rise of scholarship on popular culture, Vincent Terrace built his reputation as one of the leading researchers in television reference. This work represents decades of research and spans the entire history of television. While documentation regarding cast and personnel is now often found online, descriptions of the shows from authoritative sources are still not widely available. Terrace fills that gap with this work, which covers more than 9,350 shows (including pilots!) and constitutes the most comprehensive documentation of television series ever published. All the traditional genres are here along with show genres not well covered elsewhere--including children's programming, talk and advice shows, game shows, opera, stage plays, women's programming, dance, documentary television, and more.

This work covers every actor that received major award recognition for work in movies, theater, and television in the past 80 years. Information includes awards earned, a chronological list of performances, and interesting facts about the award or the actor's experience at the awards ceremony.

For the few hundred television viewers in 1946, a special treat on the broadcast schedule was the variety show called Hour Glass. It was the first TV program to go beyond talking heads, cooking demonstrations, and sporting events, featuring instead dancers, comics, singers, and long commercials for its sponsor, Chase and Sanborn coffee. Within two years, another variety show, Texaco Star Theatre, became the first true television hit and would be credited with the sales of thousands of television sets. The variety show formula was a staple of television in its first 30 years, in part because it lent itself to a medium where everything had to be live and preferably inside a studio. Most of the early television stars--including Jackie Gleason, Milton Berle, Sid Caesar, Ed Sullivan, Red Skelton, Dinah Shore, and Arthur Godfrey--rose to prominence through weekly variety shows. In the 1960s, major stars such as Jerry Lewis, Dean Martin, Judy Garland and Danny Kaye were hosting variety shows. By the 1970s, the format was giving way to sitcoms and dramas, but pop music stars Sonny and Cher, Tony Orlando and Dawn, and Donny and Marie Osmond hosted some of the last of the species. This book details 57 variety shows from the 1940s through the 1990s. A history of each show is first provided, followed by a brief look at each episode. Air date, guest stars, sketches performed, and a listing of songs featured are included.

From its earliest days to the present, the onscreen image of the librarian has remained largely the same. A silent 1921 film set the precedent for two female librarian characters: a dowdy spinster wears glasses and a bun hairstyle, and an attractive young woman is overworked and underpaid. Silent films, however, employed a variety of characteristics for librarians, showed them at work on many different tasks, and featured them in a range of dramatic, romantic, and comedic situations. The sound era (during which librarians appeared in more than 200 films) frequently exaggerated these characteristics and situations, strongly influencing the general image of librarians. This chronologically arranged work analyzes the stereotypical image of librarians, male and female, in primarily American and British motion pictures from the silent era to the 21st century. The work briefly describes each film, offering some critical commentary, and then examines its librarian, considering every aspect of the total character from socio-economic conditions and motivations for leaving or not leaving the library, to personal attributes (such as clothing, hair, and age) and entanglements with the opposite sex, to commonly used props, plot situations and lines ('Shush!'). The work comments on whether librarians and library work are depicted accurately and analyzes the development of the public's image of a librarian. The accompanying filmography lists librarian characters and notes stereotypes such as buns and eyeglasses. With bibliography and index.

Do you remember the 1959 game show where ABC cancelled a tape featuring a female impersonator (Across the Board)? Ever heard of Snip, the 1976 sitcom starring David Brenner that NBC canned just before it debuted? Almost everyone who has worked on a successful television series has also been on one that flopped. Even during the first thirty years of broadcasting, when NBC, CBS, and ABC were the only networks and not quite so quick to cancel unsuccessful programs, hundreds of shows lasted less than one year. This work tells the stories of those ill-fated series that were cancelled within one year after their premieres. The entries are arranged chronologically from the 1948-1949 through the 1977-1978 seasons, and provide brief descriptions of the shows along with such facts as the type of program each series was; its times, dates, and network; its competition on other networks; and the names of the cast, producer, director and writer. The book also includes information from more than 100 interviews with actors, writers, directors, and producers who worked on the short-lived television series.

The headline of the Variety extra on October 27, 1926, proclaimed'Vitaphone1 Thrills L.A.!'Vitaphone, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. formed in association with Western Electric, was one of the major producers of talkies, even though its sound-on-disc technology barely lasted four years. The Vitaphone features and shorts that have survived intact, or that have been so carefully restored, preserve much of the show business history that might otherwise have been lost with the industry's fast-paced advances in movie making. This book is a catalogue of Vitaphone features and shorts. The first section lists the features and shorts by release number. The New York productions (1926-1940) are listed first, followed by the West Coast productions (1927-1970). For shorts, the following particulars, if known and if applicable, are given: title, alternate title(s), instrumental and vocal selections performed on screen, composer(s) and performers of instrumental and vocal selections, release date and synopsis of the film, names of major cast members and directors, set information if two or fewer sets were used, and the amount paid to early performers. For features, entries list release dates, genre, and major cast members. The section on performers includes only those who appeared in shorts, listing dates and places of birth when known.