For those of you who have Trio...

[Hiroland]

Robert Conrad Demanding a Run off Against Gabe Kaplain, while taking a smoke....man....that was some great stuff. Ill be watching Trio All Week...

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'Hiroland\' date=\'Jul 21 2003, 02:20 PM\'] Robert Conrad Demanding a Run off Against Gabe Kaplain, while taking a smoke....man....that was some great stuff. Ill be watching Trio All Week... [/quote]
 Good for you.  That was one of my vividly specific memories of watching the original all those years ago.  Not so much the smoking, but the fact that Kaplan beat him, to just about everybody's surprise, I'm sure.

Another, and they'll be showing it later in the week, is Ed Asner -- not exactly known for his athleticism -- captaining a CBS team.  His explanation of their tug-of-war strategy is priceless.

[Hiroland]

What year was McLean Stevenson's Matt? Id like to se his...

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'Hiroland\' date=\'Jul 21 2003, 04:11 PM\'] What year was McLean Stevenson's Matt? Id like to se his... [/quote]
 I believe you'll see McLean on Tuesday, and if I'm right, that's the one with David Letterman!  

There's a little confusion about which 1978 episode they'll show.  I read that they were going to use the one from May (with Tony Randall as the CBS captain), but Letterman and Stevenson were both ONLY on the November show, and since they showed a McLean clip in Stein's half-hour preview, and mentioned Letterman (from Mary Tyler Moore's variety show, BTW) in their press release, that one seems more likely.  Don't expect to see a lot of Dave, however.  He was a nobody then.

On the other hand, they've been featuring Fred \"Rerun\" Berry in some of the promos, and my info is that they're not using his single appearance from 1977.  So ultimately, we'll just have to see what happens.  

Naturally, I'm now wondering what we have to do to see more than just the five shows they picked.  ABC ended up doing 19 specials, and although the star quality got decidedly less impressive as they went on, we still saw Michael J Fox, William Shatner, Tony Danza, Vicki Lawrence and Heather Locklear in some of the later ones.

Can you tell I'm really into this?

[Timsterino]

[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' date=\'Jul 21 2003, 12:15 AM\'] Just gotta say -- I've wanted to see those old Battles of the Network Stars for at least a decade or so.  Having now seen the first one for the first time in twenty-seven years,  I have to say I was not disappointed in the slightest.

You under-30s have no idea what a cool-geek thing these shows were.  Real stars.  BIG stars.  (well, not ALL of them, but certainly enough...)  All having fun but taking the competition so, so seriously.  And produced as an actual sporting event by the top people at ABC, including the inimitable Howard Cosell.

For those of you who caught Sunday's premiere (a sweeps event from November, 1976), Monday's airing at 7 eastern is a rematch put together in time for the February '77 sweeps.   All three team captains are back, as are many of the stars from the first one and new faces, including Rob Reiner, LeVar Burton, Jaclyn Smith, Kurt Russell and Sonny Bono.  When you watch, marvel at the fact that THREE of the sitcom TV stars playing (Ron Howard, Penny Marshall and Reiner) went on to be major film directors.

OT:  Some game show faces in the crowd this week:  Marcia Wallace, Tony Randall, John Davidson, Sarah Purcell, Jamie Farr, Arte Johnson and....on Thursday.....can you stand it?....PATRICK WAYNE!!!!! [/quote]
 I remember watching the shows when I was young and I was glued to the TV. Will NBC be victorious? Will ABC trounce CBS? It was great stuff. This was my must see tv when I was 8,9,10.

Sigh...I wish I had Trio.

Tim :-)

[Diggity Dawg]

[quote name=\'Hiroland\' date=\'Jul 21 2003, 09:20 AM\'] Robert Conrad Demanding a Run off Against Gabe Kaplain, while taking a smoke....man....that was some great stuff. Ill be watching Trio All Week... [/quote]
 I was dying laughing at this...Cosell ( I'd totally forgotten that he worked these shows ) going on & on about what a great athlete Robert Conrad was, & Conrad's standing over there puffing away on a coffin nail. lol. Classic.

And as far as the bra-less nature of the show goes, as a youth it sure made for some early \"tingly feelings\" .

[PeterMarshallFan]

[quote name=\'matchgame\' date=\'Jul 21 2003, 01:57 AM\']

No, Victoria Principal in a dunk tank.

End of story.

Don't forget about Adrienne Barbeau running the obstacle course...

JOSH [/quote]
I'm getting on the phone w/ my cable company right now.... I can't believe I missed that one! Shoot!


:)

[Peter Sarrett]

I'm amazed that the format hasn't been revived.  Amid the current wave of reality TV shows, Battle of the Network Stars seems like a natural.  Or is it from an era whose time has passed, when we were content to see celebrities in a dunk tank rather than a shark tank?

  - Peter

[uncamark]

I'm amazed that the format hasn't been revived.  Amid the current wave of reality TV shows, Battle of the Network Stars seems like a natural.  Or is it from an era whose time has passed, when we were content to see celebrities in a dunk tank rather than a shark tank?

The trick was that back then they were able to get enough A-level celebs on those shows to get people interested in watching.  Like on the \"WWTBAM\" celeb shows, the nets might be less willing to let their stars go on another network (although the mini-nets would probably jump at the opportunity).

It was obvious that over the run of the series, there had been network interference--the network logos disappeared from the uniforms of the contestants after the first few editions and the graphics and Cosell's commentary made pains to say \"Stars of (insert network here) Shows Team\" instead of the \"(network) Team.\"

Where it could happen is a vertical-within corporation format (in other words, \"Battle of the Fox Networks\"--Fox v. FX v. FNC v. FSN--and wouldn't you like to see Tom Arnold, Bill O'Reilly, Michael Chiklis and Ryan Seacrest competing against each other?  You wouldn't?  OK.  How about Jillian Barberie and Paula Abdul in the obstacle course?)

[PeterMarshallFan]

[quote name=\'uncamark\' date=\'Jul 22 2003, 05:13 PM\'] How about Jillian Barberie and Paula Abdul in the obstacle course?) [/quote]
 Holy crap.

[rugrats1]

It was obvious that over the run of the series, there had been network interference--the network logos disappeared from the uniforms of the contestants after the first few editions and the graphics and Cosell's commentary made pains to say \"Stars of (insert network here) Shows Team\" instead of the \"(network) Team.\"

I also recall during the run that they would play the network's latest jingle while the stars were being introduced -- did that disappear over time, too?