Crosswords Cleared on NBC O&O's

[tvmitch]

From B&C this morning...read the article for more details. (Meant to find the old thread on this topic but search is awfully slow this morning...)

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[TravisP]

I wonder if it will have the staying power Crosswits has done for us Brits. Lasted over a decade on daytime.

Question. As this is Merv Griffin's new format. What was the situation with the Jeopardy! revival in the 1980's, did it start on all of the syndicated stations. Or, like Millionaire, started on a few then gradually invaded the country?

[tvmitch]

[quote name=\'TravisP\' post=\'146577\' date=\'Feb 21 2007, 03:46 PM\']
I wonder if it will have the staying power Crosswits has done for us Brits. Lasted over a decade on daytime.

Question. As this is Merv Griffin's new format. What was the situation with the Jeopardy! revival in the 1980's, did it start on all of the syndicated stations. Or, like Millionaire, started on a few then gradually invaded the country?
[/quote]

From what I've read, J! debuted in many markets in poor time slots...I seem to recall that WABC in New York scheduled it on overnights in the very beginning. (I also remember seeing a TV Guide half-page ad pairing J! and Lange NTT in the same hour on WABC, although I don't remember what hour that was...) Then the show built success and found its home in late fringe.

Some of us with access to their TV Guide collections (mine are across town!) might shed some light on this one.

[uncamark]

[quote name=\'TravisP\' post=\'146577\' date=\'Feb 21 2007, 02:46 PM\']
I wonder if it will have the staying power Crosswits has done for us Brits. Lasted over a decade on daytime.

Question. As this is Merv Griffin's new format. What was the situation with the Jeopardy! revival in the 1980's, did it start on all of the syndicated stations. Or, like Millionaire, started on a few then gradually invaded the country?
[/quote]

"Wheel" started out on about 30 stations and exploded over its first season to the lineup it has now.  Don't remember how big a lineup "J!" started with, but it was much heftier, due to it being the followup to "Wheel" (and the first big example of King World's hardball games with stations on its shows and getting renewals).  However, "J!" initially had bad time slots in many cities, but within the first couple of years that changed immensely.  By the time the ABC-owned stations picked up "Wheel" and "J!", they were on their way to being the double powerhouses they've remained.

Interesting note:  Due to the joining up of KW and CBS Paramount, the combined CBS Distribution has nine out of ten shows in the syndication Top 10.  That's brute force.

[BrandonFG]

According to the first J! book, Alex mentioned that in L.A. the show had an afternoon time slot when it debuted, but when Alex tuned to the show, he found a rerun of "Quincy". At the time, the show had an overnight slot in L.A.

[Jimmy Owen]

Checking my back issues of TV Guide, In LA, J! started out at 4pm on Channel 2 and was off by November 2, 1984. It and the "All-New Let's Make a Deal" were repaced by "Quincy."  J! moved to Channel 13 in January of 85 following WOF at 7:30.

In NYC, Channel 4 aired it from Sept-Dec 84 in a post-Letterman time slot (either 1:30 or 2am).  J! moved to 4pm on WABC following the network cancellation of "The Edge of Night."

[The Ol' Guy]

Glad to read the news. Sounds like it'll be a fun show. But I had to smile at the "master of the game show genre" comment. Living master, maybe.  If I got them all, Merv has a 2W and 9L record (Word For Word, Post Office, Memory Game, One in a Million, Click, Monopoly, Stars, Ruckus, Chasers - without counting the Wheel & Jeopardy spin-offs). Still wish him all the best on this one, tho, especially if it stirs up an interest in what I'd call the modest game show, like Password and Cross Wits. No big flash, no big cash, just something simple and fun to watch.

[TimK2003]

Per The B&C Article:

“The NBC Universal stations are an ideal launch platform for Let’s Play Crosswords,” said Ritch Colbert of Program Partners. “We look forward to partnering with NBC to ensure the success of this series.”  

Is Ritch Colbert any relation to Colbert Television Sales, once popular with many Barry & Enright syndicated shows?

[Jimmy Owen]

[quote name=\'TimK2003\' post=\'146594\' date=\'Feb 21 2007, 06:22 PM\']
Per The B&C Article:

“The NBC Universal stations are an ideal launch platform for Let’s Play Crosswords,” said Ritch Colbert of Program Partners. “We look forward to partnering with NBC to ensure the success of this series.”  

Is Ritch Colbert any relation to Colbert Television Sales, once popular with many Barry & Enright syndicated shows?
[/quote]

Yes, he is the son of Dick Colbert of CTS and schlepped TTD and TJW as a salesman in his younger days.

[Don Howard]

On WEWS-TV Channel 5, the ABC affiliate in Cleveland, Jeopardy! has been on at 7:30pm since its 1984 debut.
Likewise, Wheel Of Fortune has been a 7pm show on TV-5 since its 1983 syndicated premiere.
Have any other stations out there cleared The WOF/J! combo at 7-8pm ET continuously over the same channel since '84?

[Jimmy Owen]

Yes. WDIV in Detroit, though the order of shows has not always been the same.

[Ian Wallis]

Have any other stations out there cleared The WOF/J! combo at 7-8pm ET continuously over the same channel since '84?

WKBW Buffalo has aired Wheel of Fortune at 7 p.m. weeknights since Aug 1983.  Jeopardy was on at 5:30 in fall '84, and moved to 7:30 I believe in fall 1985, and has been there ever since.

[tvmitch]

I might call on Aaron Sica if he's around to confirm this, but I believe that WHP, CBS 21 in Harrisburg, has cleared the combo in the same spot since their launch. I'm curious about other channels that were covered by his Central PA edition TV Guide, though...

[aaron sica]

[quote name=\'mitchgroff\' post=\'146644\' date=\'Feb 22 2007, 09:23 AM\']
I might call on Aaron Sica if he's around to confirm this, but I believe that WHP, CBS 21 in Harrisburg, has cleared the combo in the same spot since their launch. I'm curious about other channels that were covered by his Central PA edition TV Guide, though...
[/quote]

You rang?

All except for the 1985-1986 season (when Kennedy PiR ran at 7:30, and J! was moved to 5:30), WoF/J! have been on from 7pm-8pm on WHP.

As far as other stations in the edition:

New York:
WCBS-2 aired WoF at 7:30 up until fall 1990, when it moved to WABC-7, same timeslot (where it airs to this day). As mentioned somewhere else on the boards recently, J! aired in the wee hours on WNBC-4 for the first half of the '84-'85 season, until it moved to WABC-7 in January 1985 at 7pm (where it has stayed to this day).

Philadelphia:
WoF has been WPVI-6's 7:30pm program since September 1983, when it was one of a handful of stations to premiere it. J! started at 12:30pm on KYW-3 upon its premiere, and moved to WPVI-6 sometime after its first season (not sure when though, unfortunately...perhaps someone can help?)

Scranton/WB:
WoF premiered on WNEP-16 right around the time of the 1984 Olympics at 7:30pm; in the fall of 1986 it moved to WYOU-22 at 7pm. It stayed there until 1992, when it moved to WBRE-28 (still at 7pm) where it has been to this day. J! premiered at 5:00pm on WYOU-22, moving to 7pm in early 1985; when WYOU got WoF as well, J! moved to 7:30pm. Like WoF, it moved to WBRE-28 in the fall of 1992, where it remains to this day.

[Sodboy13]

According to Robert Feder's column in today's Chicago Sun-Times, "Crosswords" will likely be on a double-run from 1-2 pm on WMAQ Channel 5 in Chicago, replacing the cancelled "Passions."  Strikes me as a bit of an odd time slot.