Enterprise

Star Trek: Enterprise (titled Enterprise prior to season three) is a science fiction television program created by Brannon Braga and Rick Berman set in the Star Trek universe created by Gene Roddenberry. The series follows the adventures of humanity's first Warp 5 starship, Enterprise, ten years before the United Federation of Planets shown in previous Star Trek incarnations was formed.


Enterprise premiered on September 26, 2001. The pilot episode, "Broken Bow", takes place in the year 2151, halfway between the 21st-century events shown in the movie Star Trek: First Contact and the original Star Trek television series.


Low ratings prompted UPN to cancel Star Trek: Enterprise on February 2, 2005, but the network allowed the series to complete its fourth season; the final episode aired on May 13, 2005. After a run of four seasons and 98 episodes, it was the first Star Trek series since the original Star Trek to have been cancelled by its network rather than finished by its producers. It is also the last series in an 18-year run of back-to-back new Star Trek shows beginning with Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1987.


Production
In May 2000, Rick Berman, Executive Producer of Star Trek: Voyager, revealed that a new series would premier following the final season of Voyager. Little news was forthcoming for months as Berman and Brannon Braga developed the untitled series, known only as Series V, until February 2001, when Paramount signed Herman Zimmerman and John Eaves to production design Series V. Within a month, scenic designer Michael Okuda, another long-time Trek veteran, was also signed. Michael Westmore, make-up designer for Trek since Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG), was announced as working on Series V by the end of April. Returning as Director of Photography would be Marvin V. Rush, who had been working on various Treks since the third season of TNG. For visual effects, Ronald B. Moore was brought in, who had previously worked on TNG and Voyager.

However, the biggest news would wait until May 11, 2001. The title of Series V was revealed to be Enterprise, with Scott Bakula, of Quantum Leap fame, playing Captain Jonathan Archer. Four days later, the other main cast were announced, though the character names would not be announced until the next day.

Well, you know, if you think about it, since The Next Generation, we've had so many Star Trek entities that were called "Star Trek"-colon-something [...] Our feeling was, in trying to make this show dramatically different, which we are trying to do, that it might be fun not to have a divided main title like that. And I think that if there's any one word that says Star Trek without actually saying Star Trek, it's the word "Enterprise."
— Rick Berman,

“ You all are witness to a show that guarantees instant attention, recognition, anticipation and most importantly, success [...] Star Trek is the most popular science fiction franchise in the world. ”
—Tom Nunan,

On May 14, 2001, shooting began for the pilot episode, Broken Bow, on stages 8, 9, and 18 at Paramount Studios. Three days later, Tom Nunan, entertainment producer at UPN, held a press conference formally announcing Enterprise to the world at large. Featuring a video on the history of the Star Trek franchise, Nunan held up previous installments of the franchise as proof-of-concept that Enterprise would succeed.

On September 26, 2001, the premier episode of Enterprise, Broken Bow, aired on UPN with an estimated 12.54 million viewers.


Mars Sojourner, seen in the opening to Star Trek: EnterpriseThrough the life of the series, Star Trek: Enterprise would mark several milestones for Star Trek television production. Enterprise was the first Star Trek to be produced in widescreen, the first Star Trek series to be broadcast in HDTV, beginning on 10/15/2003, midway into the 3rd season, and the first Star Trek to be filmed on digital video (season 4)

Several episodes of Enterprise have been directed by Star Trek alumni. Star Trek: The Next Generation star LeVar Burton directed nine episodes, TNG and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine star Michael Dorn directed one episode, and Voyager stars Roxann Dawson and Robert Duncan McNeill have directed ten and four episodes, respectively.


Seasons 1 and 2
The first two seasons of Star Trek: Enterprise depict the exploration of interstellar space by the crew of an Earth ship able to go farther and faster than any humans had previously gone, due to the breaking of the Warp 5 barrier, analogous to the Bell X-1 breaking the sound barrier. The crew faces situations that are familiar to Star Trek fans, but are unencumbered and unjaded by the experience and rules which have built up over hundreds of years of Trek history established in previous Star Trek series. Star Trek: Enterprise takes pains to show the origins of some concepts which have become taken for granted in Star Trek canon, such as Lt. Reed's development of force fields and Captain Archer's questions about cultural interference eventually being answered by later series' Prime Directive.

A recurring plot device is the "Temporal Cold War", in which a mysterious entity from the 27th century uses the Kabal, a group of genetically upgraded Suliban, to manipulate the timeline and change past events. Sometimes sabotaging Enterprise's mission and sometimes saving the ship from destruction, the entity's motives are unknown. Agent Daniels, a Temporal Agent from the 30th century, visits Captain Archer occasionally to assist him in fighting the Suliban and undoing damage to the timeline.

In the past eighty years since Star Trek: First Contact, the Vulcans have been mentoring humanity to what they see as an appropriate level of civilization, routinely holding back scientific knowledge in an effort to keep humans stranded close to home, believing them to be too irrational and emotionally-dominated to function properly in an interstellar community. When Enterprise finally sets out, the Vulcans are often conspicuously close by. This generates some conflict as, in several early episodes, Archer and others complain bitterly of the Vulcan's unsubtle methods of checking up on them.


Season 3
Low ratings encouraged the series' producers to seek a new direction. In analyzing past Trek movie successes, a storyline where the Earth was put in jeopardy was devised, as such a story had proven popular before, as in Star Trek: First Contact and Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. The third season also sees the change of the series' name to Star Trek: Enterprise and introduces the Xindi, an enemy bent on annihilating humanity via a planet-destroying superweapon similar to Star Wars' Death Star.

The third season follows a single story arc, beginning in the second season finale "The Expanse" in which a mysterious probe cuts a wide, deep trench from central Florida to Venezuela, killing seven million people. Enterprise is recalled and retrofitted as a warship, with more powerful weapons and a group of elite Military Assault Command Operations (MACOs), the precursor to the heavily armed Starfleet security personnel of later Star Trek series. Enterprise travels through an area known as the Delphic Expanse to find the Xindi homeworld and prevent another attack against Earth.


Season 4
Season 4 produced a mixture of two- and three-episode arcs, with few standalone episodes. After closing out the Temporal Cold War and Xindi arcs in the first three episodes, the general theme of the season was a refocus on the prequel concept of the series, with many episodes referencing themes, concepts, and characters from past series. The fourth season saw Brent Spiner (Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation) as the imprisoned scientist Dr. Arik Soong, an ancestor of Data's creator, in a three-episode arc at the end of which Soong abandons the concept of improving mankind in favour of creating artificial intelligence: a reference to what will eventually become Data.

Season 4 also addressed some discrepancies between the Vulcans of The Original Series (TOS) and those depicted in Star Trek: Enterprise. In the "Vulcan Civil War" arc, Romulan subversion of the Vulcan High Command leads to a splinter group of Vulcans opposed to the High Command's actions, believing those actions to be against the teachings of Surak, the mythic leader who brought Vulcan to logic. After this storyline, Vulcans began a cultural transformation that was presumably a turn toward the more dispassionate, honest Vulcans of Trek series set further in the future.

The series cancellation was announced prior to the writing of the final episode of the fourth season, allowing the writers to craft a series finale. This final episode, titled "These Are the Voyages ...", aired May 13, 2005 in the United States, and was one of the most heavily criticized episodes of the Star Trek franchise.—much of the criticism focusing on the premise, which essentially reduced the finale to a holodeck adventure from an earlier Star Trek series. The episode featured guest appearances by Jonathan Frakes and Marina Sirtis as their Star Trek: The Next Generation characters William Riker and Deanna Troi. The show took place during the TNG episode "The Pegasus".[13] Brent Spiner lent his voice to the finale, and is briefly heard as Data.


Cast
Main article: List of Star Trek: Enterprise actors

Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula), captain of Earth's first Warp 5 starship, Enterprise. His father designed the engine powering Enterprise, giving Archer a very personal connection to his ship. Feels an immense amount of pressure concerning his mission, especially when hunting the Xindi to save Earth from destruction. Subsequently is assigned Earth-local or diplomatic missions. Instrumental in founding the Federation.

T'Pol (Jolene Blalock), originally attached to Enterprise by the Vulcan High Command to keep the humans out of trouble. Becomes very loyal to Archer, leaving her position in the High Command to accompany him, find the Xindi, and later join Starfleet. A version of T'Pol flung into the past gives birth to the first human/Vulcan hybrid.

Charles "Trip" Tucker III (Connor Trinneer), chief engineer of Enterprise, and long-time friend of Captain Archer. Starts off as the stereotypical hillbilly, but becomes more seasoned as the series runs, losing a sister in the Xindi attack. In later seasons, forms a romantic relationship with T'Pol.

Malcolm Reed (Dominic Keating), armory officer of Enterprise, also in charge of ship security. Reed comes from a long line of Navy men, but joined Starfleet due to a fear of drowning. An extremely taciturn man, his own family did not know his favorite food when asked. Due to an allergy he was taking medication for, Dr. Phlox correctly assumed Reed enjoys pineapple.

Hoshi Sato (Linda Park), communications officer and linguistic genius. Capable of picking up alien languages extremely fast, Hoshi serves as the translator between Enterprise and new alien species, even after the Universal Translator is on-line. Suffered anxiety about her place onboard originally, but exposure to frequent danger helped her realize her value to Enterprise.

Travis Mayweather (Anthony Montgomery), helmsman. A "Space Boomer", Travis is unique on Enterprise being born in space. Son of a freighter captain, Travis knows many of the alien species and locations that Earth traders frequent. As Enterprise moves farther and farther from Earth, his value in this area lessens, but his skill at the helm is constantly appreciated, making him the pilot of choice for many missions.

Dr. Phlox (John Billingsley), chief medical officer. A member of the Inter-Species Medical Exchange, Phlox is brought aboard Enterprise to care for their Klingon passenger. Afterwards, he volunteers to stay on, delighting in the experience of humanity taking its first steps into the larger galactic stage. An exceedingly cheerful alien, Dr. Phlox uses many animals and various naturalistic cures to practice his trade, instead of the usual technological implements. Devises a method of eradicating Borg nanoprobes, but as the method is fatal to humans and nearly so to Denobulans, it has little use.

Theme song
Main article: Where My Heart Will Take Me
The series' theme song, a pop song written by Diane Warren and sung by Russell Watson, was a marked contrast to the sweeping instrumental themes used in all other Star Trek series. It was also the first such theme not to have been composed specially for Star Trek, having previously appeared (performed by Rod Stewart) in the film Patch Adams (1998).

Like other aspects of the series, the theme song polarized fans. Online petitions were signed demanding its removal from the titles.[14] A new, more upbeat arrangement of the theme song was introduced for the third season, but this did not assuage the song's critics, and elicited criticism from some who liked the original version.

Throughout the show's run, there was extensive Internet speculation as to whether the theme song and opening credits (which was questioned by some for depicting only American flight and spaceflight advances - especially for 'ignoring' Sputnik and Gagarin[16]) would be changed.This speculation was fueled in October 2004 when the official website startrek.com posted an opening credits sequence in which Scott Bakula recites a modified version of the famous "Space, the final frontier..." speech (with the phrase "where no human has gone before" in place of "where no man" or "where no one"), accompanied by "Archer's Theme", the instrumental used as the closing credits music for the series. Around this same time an alternate version of the opening credits using music from Star Trek Generations and carrying a "Paramount Television Operations" notation, made the rounds on file sharing networks; this too was never adopted and there are doubts that this version was a genuine Paramount creation.


Cancellation
By the third season, ratings were continually declining, and the threat of cancellation loomed over Star Trek: Enterprise. (See List of Star Trek: Enterprise episodes for the Nielsen Ratings.) This, along with the poor box office performance in 2002 of the film Star Trek Nemesis, cast an uncertain light upon the future of the Star Trek franchise in general.



2004
On May 20, 2004, it was announced that Enterprise had been renewed for a fourth season, but that the show would move from Wednesday to Friday nights. This move echoed the rescheduling of the original Star Trek to a Friday night time slot for its third season prior to its ultimate cancellation, as Friday nights have traditionally been considered 'Death Row' for a major TV production.

Hired as a writer during the third season, Manny Coto was promoted to co-executive producer, becoming the series showrunner for the fourth season. Coto decided to retain the "arc" concept of season 3, but reduce it from one season-long arc to several "mini-arcs" of two or three episodes, with few standalones. The producers attempted to attract viewers by terminating a long-running story arc (the Temporal Cold War) and scheduling numerous episodes that served as prequels to storylines from the Original Series and TNG.

Beginning in the summer of 2004, and continuing throughout the fourth season, there were reports that William Shatner would reprise the role of James T. Kirk or perhaps an ancestor in the series, however an agreement could not be reached.

The fourth season got off to a slow start in the ratings on October 8, 2004 due to the Friday time-slot, preemptions by local sports in some markets, and by coverage of the second presidential debate between George W. Bush and John Kerry in others. As well, Enterprise fans continued to indicate they chose to watch the weekend showing rather than the Friday broadcast, or chose to "time-shift" the program using their VCR or TiVo equipment. In October 2004, it was announced that Enterprise was the 25th most popular Season Pass on the TiVo television recording system in the United States.


2005
Speculation as to the future of the series came to an end on February 2, 2005, when UPN announced[25] the series had been cancelled and its final episode would air on Friday, May 13, 2005. Fan groups such as "Save Enterprise" joined forces and announced a drive to raise money to finance a further season of Enterprise. Approximately $30 million US is the goal of the campaign, based upon estimates of the cost for a full season cited by John Billingsley and others.

Production of the fourth season concluded on March 8, 2005, and by the end of the month, Startrek.com was reporting the Enterprise sets had been taken down, marking the first time that Stage 9 at Paramount Studios has been without Star Trek sets since the late 1970s. The website did not indicate whether the sets have been preserved in storage (the industry term being 'fold-and-hold') or if they have been destroyed.

As of April 13, 2005, Paramount and UPN remained adamant that the cancellation of the series was final and that the studio was not interested in continuing the current incarnation of Star Trek. TrekUnited officials, however, still claimed to be in talks with Paramount over the future of the series.

The website IGN Filmforce, reporting on rumors Paramount had actually decided to cancel Enterprise after its fourth season as early as midway through the second year, quoted an unidentified "executive involved with Enterprise" as saying this scenario was "very likely".


Enterprise Babel One Part 1


Enterprise Babel One Part 2


Enterprise Babel One Part 3


Enterprise 4x12 Babel One Part 4


Enterprise Babel One Part 5

I Dream of Jeannie

Dream of Jeannie is an American sitcom with a fantasy premise. Produced by Screen Gems, it originally aired from December, 1964 to January, 1970 on NBC. The show ran for five seasons and produced 139 episodes. The first season consisted of 30 episodes filmed in black and white and since colorized. The other 109 episodes were filmed in color. The show has continued to air in reruns ever since. The show starred Barbara Eden as a female genie, and Larry Hagman as an astronaut who becomes her master, with whom she falls in love and eventually marries.



Show history

Original run
The series was created by Sidney Sheldon in response to the great success of rival network ABC's Bewitched series, which had debuted in 1964 as the second most watched program in the United States. Sheldon, inspired by the movie The Brass Bottle, starring Tony Randall, Barbara Eden, and Burl Ives as the genie Fakrash, came up with the idea for a beautiful female genie who wanted to grant her master's wishes, a stark contrast to the social ideas of what a genie was and what a genie looked like. Many Bewitched fans continue to propagate the rumor that producer William Asher was called upon unofficially to comment on the final script for the pilot episode of Jeannie. NBC was hoping Jeannie would recreate the successful ratings "Bewitched" was pulling at that time.

Interestingly, when casting was opened for the role of Jeannie, Sidney Sheldon could not find an actress who could play the role the way he wrote her. He did have one specific rule: Sheldon said that he didn't want a blonde genie because there would be too much similarity with the blonde witch on Bewitched. However, after many unsuccessful auditions he called the agent for Barbara Eden who had costarred in The Brass Bottle and then had tea with her at the Beverly Hills Hotel. The premise of the program is simple - a beautiful woman who possesses magical powers and tries to integrate with the mortal world to please the man she loves. Her "master" attempts to keep her existence a secret, while needing her powers to resolve situations she initially created. The third season features a rambunctious relative (Jeannie's sister) also played by Barbara Eden, with a black wig to mark her "black hat" status. The major difference between the first season, which aired in black-and-white, and the following four seasons, which aired in color, was the manic and fast-paced nature of later seasons in contrast to the more romantic and relaxed nature of the pilot season. Also, the jazzy title music of Season 1 is different from the perkier Emmy-Award winning introductory theme of later episodes.

When NBC began telecasting most of its prime time television programs in color in the fall of 1965, Jeannie was the one regular program that remained in black and white because of the special photographic effects employed to achieve Jeannie's magic. By the second season, however, new advances in special effects made it possible to film the shows in color.

Jeannie is a genie awakened from her two thousand year imprisonment when astronaut Anthony Nelson's final stage rocket misfires and forces him to abort a space launch. Captain Nelson washes ashore on a desert island where he finds a bottle on the beach. Upon opening the bottle he sets Jeannie free. As legend states, he who frees the genie becomes its master. However, upon summoning a helicopter for him, rescuing him from being stranded, Tony claims they are even, she is free to go. Falling in love with the first man she sets eyes on in two thousand years, Jeannie follows Tony home to Cocoa Beach, Florida. Jeannie is initially little more than a pesky, jealous servant, but as the series develops, so does their relationship, and the couple was to marry in the fifth and final season.

Sidney Sheldon and the cast fought against the wedding, feeling it would ruin the sexual tension between the two. Despite the series finishing its fourth season in 26th place, NBC was going to cancel the program if Jeannie and Tony did not wed. For the series' fifth season (1969–70), NBC moved the series to a weak time slot (Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. [Eastern/Pacific Time]) where it had done mediocre ratings during its third season (1967–68). Jeannie and Tony wed, NBC got lots of press and then canceled the series.

In most episodes, Barbara Eden wears little more than her revealing "Jeannie" costume. Strangely, the censors allowed her to be depicted living in a house with an unmarried man, but would not permit Eden's navel to be seen. The makers of the series were also presented with the situation of filming around Eden's real-life pregnancy during the pilot season, without writing it into the storyline. Instead she wore many veils to hide her stomach and as her pregnancy progressed they began to use body doubles and film Eden only above the waist though her baby bump is visible in some profile shots.


After the original run
I Dream of Jeannie was a moderate success on NBC, but the show's popularity exploded when the series began playing in syndication. The reruns became one of the highest rated series during the 1970s. For example, when the reruns debuted on New York's WPIX, Jeannie won its time period with a 13 rating and a 23 share of the audience (Variety, October 6, 1971). The series average a 14 share and 32 share of the audience when WTTG in Washington, D.C. began airing the series (Variety, September 22, 1971). Across the board, the series was reaching a bigger audience in syndication than on NBC. According to the October 6, 1971 edition of Variety, it was the first off-network series to best network competition in the ratings, "The big switch no doubt representing the first time in rating history that indies (local stations) have knocked over the network stations in a primetime slot was promoted by WPIX's premiere of the off-web Jeannie reruns back to back from 7 to 8 p.m." The show continues to have a cult following today. Hanna-Barbera Productions produced an animated series Jeannie in September 1973, which featured Jeannie (voiced by Julie McWhirter) and genie-in-training Babu (voiced by former Three Stooges star Joe Besser) as the servants of Corry Anders, a high-school student (voiced by Mark Hamill).

There were two I Dream of Jeannie NBC-TV reunion movies: I Dream of Jeannie: 15 Years Later (1985) and I Still Dream of Jeannie (1991). In the first reunion movie Wayne Rogers replaced Larry Hagman in the role of Tony Nelson. In the second reunion movie, the character of Tony Nelson was written out of the movie with his character being away on an extended mission, therefore officially unable to act as "Master" (which was most of the movie's premise). Hagman refused to appear in the first reunion movie, reportedly because of a payment dispute. When it came time to film the second reunion, Barbara Eden asked Hagman to join her. However, as she told Geraldo Rivera in a 1991 interview, Hagman was just coming off a 13-year run on Dallas and was taking a vacation. Eden expressed her disappointment, as a year earlier, she had obliged Hagman by appearing on a few episodes of Dallas, playing an ex-lover out for revenge.

However in November 1999 brought together for the very first time the official I Dream Of Jeannie Reunion on The Donny & Marie daytime talk show. For the first time in 29 years, Barbara Eden, Larry Hagman, Bill Daily and even the creator & producer Sidney Sheldon reunited on this 1 hour show that was filled with loving memories & clips from I Dream Of Jeannie.

In 2002 when I Dream Of Jeannie was set to join the cable channel TV Land. Once again there was an I Dream Of Jeannie Reunion, this time on the Larry King Live show for CNN. For the first time ever fans of I Dream Of Jeannie were able to call in and talk to the cast.

On the TV Land Awards in March 2004, Barbara Eden & Larry Hagman were the first presenters to reunite on stage to give out the first award to the best TV twin. The award went to Patty Duke for The Patty Duke Show.

In October 2004 Larry Hagman & Bill Daily appeared at The Ray Courts Hollywood Autograph Show.

In October 2005 the cast reunited again at the Chiller Expo Show in New Jersey to meet fans and sign autographs. This would mark the first and only time that all three stars were together at an autograph show.

In February 2006 Barbara Eden and Larry Hagman reunited on stage in Florida for the play Love Letters. This would be their first acting gig since acting together on a few episodes of Dallas in 1990

In March 2006, Barbara Eden once again reunited with Larry Hagman and went on a publicity tour in New York to promote the First Season DVD of I Dream Of Jeannie appearing together on such shows as Good Morning America, The View, Martha Stewart, Entertainment Tonight, Access Hollywood and CNN Showbiz Tonight. Later that week they both appeared at an autograph signing for the DVD at Barnes & Nobles in downtown Manhattan in Chelsea New York. That same month, both reunited on stage again for the play Love Letters at the College Of Staten Island in New York and Upstate New York.

Rumors of a big screen treatment of I Dream of Jeannie have flown around Hollywood for years. One of the more interesting casting suggestions was Will Smith as Major Nelson and Halle Berry as Jeannie. Jessica Alba, Amanda Bynes, Jessica Simpson, Mandy Moore, Paris Hilton, Keira Knightley, Valeria Mazza, Parminder Nagra, Jenna Elfman, Lindsay Lohan and Lisa Kudrow have been considered for the part of Jeannie. The latest news is that Columbia Pictures is in pre-production for a feature film version of I Dream of Jeannie, the date of release now pushed back to 2008 with no defined script, cast or director. According to some sources, writer/director Gurinder Chadha, who had been set to direct the remake, lost the job because of her lack of knowledge of the show and its initial success. Chadha suggested a possible story line which would be somewhat darker than the original series, with Jeannie as a headstrong girl who is punished for becoming a soldier by being imprisoned in a bottle as a genie. As Columbia Pictures began to see the direction Chadha was going it is rumored they cancelled that idea and told her to create a story line more closely relating to the original show. Upon her incapability to do so Columbia released Chadha from her contract on I Dream of Jeannie.

Over the past ten years, merchandise based on the series has been produced including numerous dolls, ceramic pieces, lunchboxes, a board game and a series of Instant Scratchit cards. There is even an officially licensed slot machine with Jeannie sound effects, new animations and voice samples recorded specifically for the machine by Eden herself.


A street near the Lori Wilson Park adjacent to the waterfront in Cocoa Beach was named "I Dream of Jeannie Lane" in honor of the series.Recently, Cocoa Beach has been embracing the fame it garnered from Jeannie. A street near the Lori Wilson Park in Cocoa Beach is named "I Dream of Jeannie Lane." On September 15, 2005, they held the We Dream Of Jeannie Festival, during which were memories of the show and a Jeannie look-alike contest. There were plans for one in 2004, but it was interrupted by Hurricane Frances and Hurricane Jeanne. They did, however, hold the Jeannie look-alike contest in 2004, with Bill Daily attending. None of the cast members went to the 2005 festival.


Main cast
Jeannie — Barbara Eden
Tony Nelson — Larry Hagman, who occasionally directed
Roger Healey — Bill Daily, who occasionally wrote
Dr. Alfred Bellows — Hayden Rorke
Amanda Bellows (Dr. Bellows' wife) — Emmaline Henry
Gen. Wingard Stone (1965) - Philip Ober
Melissa Stone (Nelson's fiancee) (1965) - Karen Sharpe
Gen. Martin Peterson (1965–1969) — Barton MacLane
Gen. Winfield Schaeffer (1969–1970) — Vinton Hayworth
Jeannie's Sister (also named Jeannie and officially known to NBC as "Jeannie II") — Barbara Eden
Jeannie's Mother — Barbara Eden (Jeannie's Mother was also played by Florence Sundstrom and Lurene Tuttle)


Main story

Tony opens the bottle he finds on the beach.Astronaut Captain Tony Nelson is on a space flight when his one-man capsule comes down far from the planned recovery area, near a deserted island. Tony notices a strange bottle that rolls by itself, and when he rubs it after removing the cork, smoke starts shooting out and Jeannie materializes. "I must have gone further into orbit than I thought!" he says. Eventually, Jeannie (a homonym of "genie") , who was locked up in her bottle 2,000 years prior by the Blue Djinn, "blinks" a recovery helicopter into the area to rescue Tony, who is so grateful for her help that he tells her she's free. But Jeannie, who falls in love with Tony at first sight, reenters her bottle and moves it into Tony's duffel bag so she can accompany him back home.

Tony at first keeps Jeannie in her bottle most of the time, but finally relents and allows her to develop a life of her own. The first thing Jeannie does is break up Tony's engagement to the general's daughter.

Tony's efforts to cover up Jeannie's antics brings him to the attention of NASA's resident psychiatrist Dr. Alfred Bellows. In a running gag, Dr. Bellows tries over and over to prove to his superiors that Tony's either crazy or hiding something, but he's always foiled and Tony's job remains secure. The closest Dr. Bellows ever comes to finding out the truth happens twice in the series:

When he discovers, via a magical movie projector, that Jeannie is a genie; her bottle is broken; and Major Nelson resigns from the Air Force. However, this is a dream sequence.
In another episode in which Jeannie sees the future (if she marries Major Nelson), Dr. Bellows and his wife stop by the Nelson house and see Jeannie and Major Nelson's son "flying".
Tony's best friend and fellow astronaut Army Major. Roger Healey doesn't know about Jeannie for several episodes – when he finds out, he steals her so he can become rich and live in luxury. It's not long though before Tony reclaims his status as Jeannie's master. Roger continues to demonstrate his desire to use Jeannie's powers for his own benefit, but for the most part he respects Tony's status as Jeannie's master. Both Tony and Roger are promoted to the rank of major early in the series.

Jeannie's sister, mentioned in a second season episode (and also named Jeannie), proves to have a mean streak starting in the third season, repeatedly trying to steal Tony for herself, with her as the master. One of her final efforts comes right after Tony and Jeannie get married.

Early in the fifth season, Jeannie is called upon by her Uncle Sully to become queen of Basenji, and she decides, for his birthday gift, to give Tony the country of Basenji and make him its king. However, NASA has assigned Tony to deal with the ambassador from Kajsa, Basenji's neighbor and enemy, to secure finkilium, a mineral needed for the space program. Sully causes Tony to unwittingly and repeatedly threaten Kajsa's ambassador, harming America's friendship with Kajsa. When Roger warns Tony about Sully, Tony tries to trap Sully and tells him he won't marry Jeannie. Jeannie had gotten Sully to leave and she was waiting to talk to Tony, so he alienated her. She leaves to become queen, while Tony and Roger are exiled to a remote post in Alaska. NASA finds another source of finkilium, and sends a dispatch that recalls Tony and Roger to Cocoa Beach. However, the newspaper came with the message, mentioning the new queen of Basenji. The boys fly to Basenji (somewhere near Russia) where Tony reconciles with Jeannie. They arrive back at NASA and Tony introduces Jeannie as his fiancée. The two were wed before the end of the season.


Multi-part story arcs
In a four-part episode, it is established that Jeannie did not know her birthday, and her family members couldn't agree when it was either (2,000 years being a long time to remember such a thing). Tony and Roger use NASA's powerful new computer, and horoscopic guidance based on Jeannie's traits, to calculate it, but Roger wants to make a game out of revealing it. Jeannie finally forces it out of him in the fourth episode: April 1, 64 B.C. (See Trivia, below)

In another four-part episode, Jeannie is locked in a safe bound for the moon, and any attempt to force the safe or use the wrong combination will destroy the safe with an explosive. Jeannie is in there so long, four weeks, that whoever opens the safe will become her master. The episodes spread out over a month, during which a national contest was held to guess the safe's combination. This explains why Larry Hagman is never seen actually saying the combination out loud... his face is turned away from the camera, or the shot is on Jeannie when he says it. The actual combination wasn't decided until right before airing, and Hagman's voice was dubbed in. Over the closing credits, Barbara Eden announced and congratulated the contest winner. The combination: 4-9-7. [1]


The Jeannie theme
The first season Jeannie theme was an instrumental jazz/waltz written by Richard Wess. From the second season on, however, a new theme, titled Jeannie, was written by Hugo Montenegro, with lyrics by Buddy Kaye. The lyrics were never used in the show, but read as follows:

Jeannie, fresh as a daisy
Just love how she obeys me
Does things that just amaze me so
She smiles, presto, the rain goes
She blinks, out pops a rainbow
Cars stop, even the train goes slow
When she goes by
She paints sunshine on every rafter
Sprinkles the air with laughter
We're close as a quarter after three
There's no one like Jeannie
I'd introduce her to you
But it's no use, sir
Cause my Jeannie's in love with me
She's in love with me!
Songwriters Gerry Goffin and Carole King wrote a spec theme, called Jeannie, for Sidney Sheldon before the series started, but it was rejected.

The animated opening was done by world famous animator Friz Freleng.
DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince sampled the theme song for their debut single Girls Ain't Nothing But Trouble.
Mark Davis & Marilyn E Whitelaw sampled the theme song in their single "Jeannie's Diner" in 1991.

The bottle
Jeannie's famous bottle was not created for the show. It was actually a special Christmas 1964 Jim Beam liquor decanter containing 'Beam's Choice' bourbon whiskey.
The studio prop department painted the bottle to look like an antique. For years it was said that Sidney Sheldon received one as a gift and thought it would be a perfect design for the series. Several people in the Screen Gems art department also take credit for finding the bottle. There is strong evidence, however, that it was first season director, Gene Nelson who saw one in a liquor store and bought it, bringing it to Sidney Sheldon.
The first season bottle had a clear glass stopper that Tony took from a 1956 Old Grand Dad Bourbon bottle in his home, as the original stopper was left behind on the beach where Tony found Jeannie. The color seasons (and the movies) used the original bottle stopper, painted to match the bottle. (During some close-ups, you can still see the plastic rings that hold the cork part of the stopper in place!) Jeannie's bottle was painted mainly in pinks and purples, while the bottle for the Blue Djinn was a first season design with a heavy green wash and Jeannie's sister's bottle was simply a plain, unpainted Jim Beam bottle. The movies again used Jim Beam bottles, but with a new, more dramatic paint job. The TV movie "I Still Dream of Jeannie" showed for the first time and for less than a minute what has come to be known as the sister's bottle in a two tone black and green bottle with gold and pink accents.
Jeannie's bottle was left its original dark, smoke-green color with a gold leaf pattern during the first season. In the first episode, it also looked quite rough and weathered. Since the show was originally filmed in black and white, a lot of colors and patterns were not necessary. When the show switched to color, the prop people came up with a brightly colored bottle to replace the original. On the last day of filming the final episode of the television series Barbara Eden got to keep the color 'stunt' bottle. Several of each season bottles were made, as they did occasionally get broken during production. In the DVD release of the first season, during the first episode commentary, Bill Daily also claims to own an original bottle.
The bottle itself was designed in 1964 by Roy Kramer for the Wheaton Bottle Company.
No one knows exactly how many bottles were used during the show, but members of the production have estimated that from six to eight bottles were painted and used during the run of the series. The stunt bottle used mostly for the smoke effect was broken frequently due to the heat and chemicals used to produce Jeannie's smoke. In the pilot episode several bottles were used for the opening scene on the beach, one was drilled through the bottom for smoke and another was used to "walk" across the sand and slip into Tony's pack. Two bottles were used from promotional tours to kick off the first season and one bottle was used for the first season production.

Jeannie's origin
Throughout the first season, it is made clear that Jeannie was originally a human who was turned into a genie by the Blue Djinn when she refused to marry him. We meet several members of her family, including her parents, and while some are rather eccentric, none are genies. Her mother describes the family as "just peasants from the old country". The topic of Jeannie originally being human is restated in season two during the episode "How to be a Genie in 10 Easy Lessons." Jeannie does mention that she has a sister who is a genie, but the phrasing - "she was a genie when I left Baghdad" - does bring up the question of whether or not she too was born a genie.

In the third season, this back story was omitted and it is assumed that Jeannie has always been a genie. All her relatives are now genies, including her mother (now played by Barbara Eden). This may have been done to increase the similarity with "Bewitched", or simply to increase the number of possible plotlines. Whatever the reason, this new concept was retained for the rest of the series.

In the 1985 movie, Jeannie reverts to her first-season origin when she tells her son, Tony Jr., that she was turned into a genie "when she was a girl."


Other inconsistencies
Early on, Jeannie's budding movie career ended when she discovered that genies cannot be photographed, but in the middle of the series run, Jeannie was successfully photographed. The original premise is reasserted for the actual wedding episode, in which the fact that people would be trying to take pictures of her was part of the drama.
In a four-part episode, it was determined that Jeannie's birthday was April 1, 64 BC (which was a Thursday, according to the proleptic Gregorian calendar). However, in the fifth episode of the first season, "G.I. Jeannie", she stated that her birthday was July 1, 21 BC (a Tuesday). This is somewhat resolved by the understanding that she did not know her birthday until it was calculated in that later episode (Many people who do not know their birthdays choose one for ceremonial or social purposes, which Jeannie could have done in choosing, or assuming, that date). In the same episode, she gives her place of birth as Pompeii.
The end credits of the pilot episode list Larry Hagman as Capt. Anthony Wilson. (This error was corrected on the DVD release)
In the pilot, when rescued Jeannie speaks Persian (not Arabic as is often stated), and can only speak English after Tony wishes her to. (And even then, she inexplicably speaks archaic English until she learns the modern form.) Yet, whenever anyone from Jeannie's family show up, or she visits them, etc., they speak perfect contemporary English.
Jeannie claims to come from Baghdad, and to be around 2000 years old. Yet Baghdad was not founded until AD 762. In an earlier episode she claimed to be from Babylon.
In one early episode, before Roger knew about Jeannie, he was simply made to forget something "impossible" that he'd seen. In a different episode, after Roger has gotten himself into serious trouble while having control of Jeannie, she eventually resolves it by just rewinding time. Yet in later episodes, both of these "easy escapes" seem to be beyond her capabilities.
In one episode, Jeannie replicates a Rembrandt painting from the Louvre, so that the replicant also appears to be 300 years old. In another episode she takes back her 2000 year old Bukistan slippers from an international exhibition causing a diplomatic emergency. However no one suggests she replicates the slippers.
Jeannie was supposedly held captive in her bottle for two thousand years, yet has had relationships with famous people throughout the ages.
One episode asserts that genies are forbidden to marry mortals, while another claims that genies who marry mortals will lose their powers. However, when Tony and Jeannie's marriage actually takes place there are no objections amongst her kind nor any loss of her powers afterwards.
A crystal ball also shows a possible future: of the two children they have, the boy is mortal but the girl is a genie. In the movie made in 1985, they have one child, Tony Jr., who turns out to be a djinn. However, in the 1991 movie, Tony Jr.'s powers are inexplicably absent.
The bottle's interior design changed from the first season's Old World look of hanging lanterns and drapery to the color episode's pillow strewn pink decor.

Miscellaneous
Actor Larry Hagman was notoriously difficult to work with, to the point where the producers seriously considered getting rid of him and replacing him with another actor. Darren McGavin was at the top of the list for Hagman's replacement. They even worked out a story where Tony lost Jeannie and McGavin found her, but the studio execs loved Hagman and wouldn't consider a change.
Gene Nelson, the first director for I Dream of Jeannie, was originally an actor, singer and dancer. He appeared as Will in the motion picture version of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Oklahoma!.
The idea that a genie is female and Djinn is male is mistaken. In Arabic, Djinn (or jinn جن) is the collective name for the whole group, Djinni (or jinnī جنی) is singular and masculine. A female genie is called a jinnīyah (جنیه). The word "genie" is just an alteration of the Arabic word jinnī that was adopted into English, via a mistaken association with the Roman mythological genii.
According to the show, genies have both red and green blood corpuscles.
While not apparent in the first season (due to the black & white film), Tony Nelson was a Captain in the Air Force, while Roger Healey was a Captain in the Army. This is clearly shown when, in color, Nelson wears the blue uniform and Healey wears the green. These ranks, while in two different branches of the military, are equal in seniority. Healey is in the Army Corps of Engineers, according to his lapel insignia, and wears Army pilot wings which are distinct from Nelson's Air Force pilot wings. There were no real Army astronauts until the Space Shuttle program.[1] Both Healey and Nelson were promoted to the grade of Major in the latter episodes of the first season.
Due to network censorship Barbara Eden was forbidden to bare her navel for the entire series run, although it does slip out in several instances in the series. It would not be established that Jeannie actually had a navel until Eden wore a redesigned costume in the movies.

Comparison to actual NASA astronauts
I Dream of Jeannie's NASA differs from the real NASA in a number of ways:

The NASA shown in the series appears to be launching a few more flights than real-life NASA, since Tony makes it into space at least three times during the series. But several real astronauts did make second and third flights.

The first season pilot uses footage from an actual launch of a Project Gemini spacecraft (identifiable by its LGM-25 Titan II booster with twin rocket engines), and this footage also appears in the opening title sequence for some early first season episodes. However, the pilot storyline has Tony as the only crewmember of the craft, which would imply it must have been a Project Mercury mission, since all crewed Gemini spacecraft were flown with two crew members. The cartoon spacecraft shown in the opening titles of later seasons appears to be a one-man spacecraft bearing some resemblance to Project Mercury (flown 1961–May 1963), but during the series' run, the two-man Project Gemini (March 1965–November 1966) and three-man Project Apollo (February 1967–July 1975) craft were flying, aside from the hiatus between Gemini 12 and Apollo 7. In fact, Tony was shown on the series to fly all three of these craft, as well as the Space Shuttle (if you count the TV movies).

NASA has always hired more astronauts than it has seats on flights, and there was an emphasis on rotation, so that other astronauts would get equal opportunity in space. (This is especially true of John Glenn, who was "grounded" after his Mercury flight Friendship 7 in 1962, for fear of anything risky happening to such a celebrity. He finally flew again in Shuttle Discovery flight STS-95 in 1998.)

The only real astronaut in history to fly one of each of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo spacecraft was astronaut Wally Schirra. (Mercury Sigma 7 flight, Gemini 6, and Apollo 7 flights.) Charles Conrad, James Lovell, Thomas Stafford and John Young were the only astronauts to fly two Gemini missions; 15 astronauts made both Gemini and Apollo flights during the series five-year run.

Since Tony seems to be comparable to James Lovell and Wally Schirra, he was probably, fictionally, one of NASA's earliest-chosen astronauts. That is, healthy and skilled enough to be valuable for several flights.

I Dream of Jeannie's NASA also was far more militaristic than the real NASA. Major Nelson and Major Healy wore their uniforms at all times. Virtually all the NASA characters such as astronauts (Nelson and Healy), mission controllers (Doctor Bellows), and support personnel were portrayed as active Duty military personnel and commanders. Jeannie's NASA was governed along a strict military hierarchy. In real life NASA did not operate as such.


References in popular culture
In the Nickelodeon cartoon series Jimmy Neutron, there is an episode called "I Dream of Jimmy", where Jimmy enters Carl's dreams.
Barbara Eden appears as Jeannie at the end of A Very Brady Sequel, saying she is Mike Brady's wife.
On an episode of American Dreams, taking place in the spring of 1966, Meg and Roxanne go to Los Angeles, and visit the set of I Dream Of Jeannie. They see the large version of Jeannie's bottle, and meet Barbara Eden, played by Paris Hilton, in her Jeannie outfit.
The soap opera As the World Turns did a mini-spoof of I Dream of Jeannie called "I Dream of Carly" as a part of their 50th Anniversary celebration on March 30, 2006. Character Jack Snyder played Tony and Carly Snyder played Jeannie.
On the Adult Swim animated series Robot Chicken, I Dream of Jeannie was spoofed in a short segment of the episode Celebrity Rocket. In the segment, Jeannie is shown apologizing to an irritated-looking Major Nelson for causing problems in his life again, then disappearing into her bottle. In retaliation for what she did to him, Major Nelson shook her bottle vigorously while she was still inside it.
The 'genie-in-a-bottle' premise was parodied in the Charmed episode I Dream of Phoebe, where the original genie was imprisoned in the bottle by a sorcerer in retaliation for not returning his feelings. Anyone who wished the previous genie free had to take its place.
In the same episode, Paige Matthews makes a joke about Major Nelson.
Half Baked features a music video by "Sir Smoke-A-Lot" (Dave Chappelle) where he demands weed from a genie in a bottle. (The genie was a cameo by the director of Half Baked, Tamra Davis.)
Philadelphia punk rock band Dead Milkmen have a song called "I Dream of Jesus", in which the singer's mother finds Jesus who is trapped inside a bottle. The song appears on the 1993 album Not Richard, but Dick.
"I Dream of Jenna" (starring porn-queen Jenna Jameson) is the title of a pornographic film based on a lucid premise of the series.
There is also another pornographic film parody called "I Dream of Farrah" starring porn star Farrah.
Family Guy episode "Untitled Griffin Family History": In the Big Bang Theory scene, Peter Griffin is "obligated by the state of Kansas to present the Church's alternative to the theory of Evolution." The screen scrolls left and shows Jeannie walking out of the water and creating things (animals, humans, etc.) Afterwards, the animals, humans, and Jeannie finish the scene by doing a short dance.
In a Roseanne episode, there is a short spoof on I Dream of Jeannie, which Roseanne as Jeannie and Dan as Major Nelson.
The song Girls Ain't Nothing but Trouble by Fresh Prince and DJ Jazzy Jeff released in 1986 samples the I Dream of Jeannie theme song.
The song Jeannie's Diner By Mark Davis & Marilyn E Whitelaw released in 1991 recounts the tale of Barbara Eden's Jeannie.
In an episode of "That 70s show" the cast argues in the basement over who's powers are better: Jeannie, or Samantha from Bewitched.
In an episode of the Simpsons, Homer tries to overcome his attraction to new coworker Mindy Simmons by imagining Barney dancing in a bikini while vocalizing the I Dream of Jeannie theme.

I Dream of Jeannie - Lady In The Bottle


i dream of jeannie -bodyswap


I Dream Of Jeannie - Jeannie Or The Tiger

Taxi

Taxi is an award-winning American sitcom that originally aired from 1978 to 1982 on ABC, and from 1982 to 1983 on NBC. The series focuses on the everyday lives of a handful of New York City taxi drivers working for the fictional "Sunshine Cab Company", as well as their abusive dispatcher. The show was produced by the John Charles Walters Company and funded by Paramount.

A non-fiction article entitled "Hip-Shifting for the Night Fleet" by Mark Jacobson, which appeared in the September 22, 1975 issue of New York magazine, helped suggest the idea for the show to James L. Brooks and David Davis, though nothing from it was actually used.[1] The article was a profile of several drivers who worked the night shift for a New York cab company.

It was ranked 48th in TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time.


Premise and themes
Much of the show focuses on attempts to "make it out of the garage" by achieving enough success in their external careers that they no longer need to supplement their income by driving. Alex, who is older than his colleagues and disillusioned with life, considers driving a cab his profession. The others, despite being unable to make a living via their outside careers, do not consider taxi driving their profession. Elaine is a receptionist at an art gallery, Tony is a boxer with a losing record, and Bobby is a struggling actor. John Burns, who was written out of the show after the first season, is working his way through college. The rest of the drivers take pity on "Reverend Jim" Ignatowski, an aging hippie minister burnt out from drugs, and help him become a cabbie. Many episodes involve one of the characters having an opportunity to realize his or her dream and move up in the world, only to see it yanked away.

Despite the zany humor regularly featured on the show, Taxi often tackled such dramatic issues as drug addiction, single parenthood, blindness, bisexuality, teenage runaways, failed marriages, sexual harassment, pre-menstrual mood disorders, and the loss of a loved one.


Characters


The cast: (back row, left to right) Danza, Kaufman, Kane; (front) Lloyd, Henner, Hirsch, DeVitoAlex Reiger (Judd Hirsch)


Alex is the sensible, compassionate core of the show, the one everyone else turns to for advice. At one point, he reveals his frustration with this unwanted burden. He once worked in an office, with a good chance of advancement, but lost his job due to his refusal to follow the company line. He was married to Phyllis Bornstein (Louise Lasser). When his wife divorced him because of his lack of ambition, she sought sole custody of their baby daughter, Cathy; he gave in rather than fight. He is also estranged from his philandering father, Joe (Jack Gilford). Alex is a recovered compulsive gambler, although he relapses in one episode. A pessimist, he has resigned himself to driving a cab for the rest of his life.
Louie De Palma (Danny DeVito) - The dispatcher for the Sunshine Cab Company is the boss from Hell. He not only has no morals to speak of, he positively revels in his misdeeds. Nothing is beneath him, from taking advantage of a drunken friend of his sometime-girlfriend Zena Sherman (played by real-life wife Rhea Perlman) to gambling with a young boy to stealing from the company. He lives with his mother (DeVito's real mother, Julia, in two episodes). Under the amoral exterior beats a heart of pure lead. TV Guide ranked De Palma first on its list of the 50 greatest TV characters of all time.
Elaine O'Connor-Nardo (Marilu Henner) - Elaine is a divorced mother of two struggling to cope, while trying to realize her ambitions in the field of fine art. The object of lust of Louie, she is attracted to characters played by actors ranging from Tom Selleck to Wallace Shawn.
Tony Banta (Tony Danza) - The sweet-natured, if somewhat dimwitted boxer has little success in the sport. In fact, Louie makes a lot of money betting against him. Finally, the boxing commission takes away his license because he has been knocked out one too many times. Danza actually was a professional boxer.
Bobby Wheeler (Jeff Conaway) (1978-1982) - Bobby is a shallow, conceited actor whose pretensions are Louie's favorite target. Success eludes Bobby. Once, he is signed up by a famous manager, but it turns out she doesn't want to represent him; she only wants him as a lover. Another time, he is cast in a pilot for a soap opera called Boise. The show goes into production, but his part is recast.
Reverend Jim Ignatowski (Christopher Lloyd) (1979-1983) - A burned-out relic of the '60s, Jim lives in a world of his own. He was once a hard-working, serious student at Harvard University, with an extremely wealthy father (Victor Buono), but one bite of a drug-laden brownie was enough to get him hooked and send him into a downward spiral. The cabbies help him pass a written exam to become one of them, in a particularly memorable episode (see Quotes section below). He occasionally exhibits unexpected talents, such as the ability to play the piano masterfully. TV Guide placed Ignatowski 32nd on its list of the 50 greatest TV characters of all time.
Latka Gravas (Andy Kaufman) - Latka is an immigrant from a very strange land, often speaking in his invented foreign tongue ("ibi da", "nik nik"). He works as a mechanic, fixing the taxis. Latka was an adaptation of the "Foreign Man" character Kaufman originated in his stand-up comedy act. He grew tired of the gag, so the writers gave Latka multiple personality disorder, allowing Kaufman to play other types of characters. This usually manifests itself as a repellent, smooth-talking lounge-lizard persona calling himself Vic Ferrari. In one episode however, he becomes Alex, with profound insights into "his" life. Just when he is about to reveal to the real Alex the perfect solution for all his problems, he reverts back to Latka.
Simka Dahblitz-Gravas (Carol Kane) (1980-1983) - She is from the same country as Latka. They belong to different ethnic groups which traditionally detest each other, but they fall in love and eventually get married. She is much more assertive than her husband, often standing up to Louie for him.
John Burns (Randall Carver) (1978-1979) - The naive young man works as a cabbie to pay for college. According to Carver, "...the characters of John Burns and Tony Banta were too similar...Some of the lines were almost interchangeable..."[2], so he was dropped after the first season without explanation.
Jeff Bennett (J. Alan Thomas) - Sunshine Cab's assistant dispatcher, he shares the "cage" with Louie but rarely speaks or interacts with the other characters. One exception is the Season 5 episode "Crime and Punishment", wherein Louie turns Jeff in for stealing car parts from the company and selling them on the black market (a crime which Louie himself committed).

Theme music
Bob James created the theme music for "Taxi" throughout its entire run, including the main theme, "Angela", which was written for a sequence in Episode #3 of the series' 1st season ("Blind Date", see below), but the producers liked the slower, more-melancholy tune better than the original, more-uptempo original opening theme selected, which was the title cut of James' 1978 album "Touchdown". "Angela" also appears on the same album.

The theme music is also used on UK satellite television programme Soccer AM for a segment highlighting a particularly embarrassing on-pitch moment in a game that week (usually involving an attempted 'showboat' gone wrong) (see Soccer AM)


Episodes

Season 1


# Episode Title Airdate/Summary
01 "Like Father, Like Daughter" September 12, 1978

John finds that the money case on the pay-phone is missing the door; thus, any call can be made using the same quarter over and over again. Alex uses his free call to get in touch with his ex-wife and find out the location of his daughter, whom he has not spoken to in fifteen years. He learns that his daughter is taking a flight out of Miami to study in Portugal. Alex's friends volunteer to take turns driving a company cab all the way there so Alex can spend time with her before she leaves.

02 "One-Punch Banta" September 19, 1978

Tony knocks out champion Carlos Navarone (played by real-life world champion Carlos Palomino) with one punch during a sparring session, and as a result, gets a rematch at Madison Square Garden. Tony is confident that he can win, but finds out minutes before that Carlos let him win.

03 "Blind Date" September 26, 1978

Alex, after having a conversation with the operator on Bobby's answering service, decides to ask her out, only to find that she is overweight and so defensive about it that she is obnoxious. Meanwhile, Latka finds $2,000 in the back of one of the taxis and is pressured by Louie to hand it over.

04 "Bobby's Acting Career" October 5, 1978

After giving himself three years to succeed as an actor, Bobby finds his deadline approaching and goes on a mad audition spree. Meanwhile, Alex rescues an abused dog from its owner and refuses to return it.

05 "Come As You Aren't" October 10, 1978

Elaine throws a party at her apartment for the art dealers she works with, and invited Alex. Fearing that her guests would look down on her if they found out she is a taxi driver, she tells Alex to lie about his occupation.

06 "The Great Line" October 17, 1978

John uses a pick-up line ("Let's skip the preliminaries...you want to get married?") to ask out a girl named Suzanne Caruthers (Ellen Regan), only to find it works all too well when he finds himself a married man only one hour later.

07 "High School Reunion" October 24, 1978

Louie does not want to show up for his twentieth high school reunion, fearing that being a taxi-dispatcher (and still the same height) would not impress those who tormented him back then. Bobby is intrigued by the acting challenge and offers to impersonate Louie, an offer which Louie accepts. Bobby convinces everyone he is Louie (telling them he had a growth spurt in college) and proceeds to charm everyone, including the class beauty Louie lusted after. He tells Stanley Tarses, Louie's former chief nemesis, that he now works for the Internal Revenue Service, and that, based on their conversation, Tarses can expect an audit.

08 "Paper Marriage" October 31, 1978

Latka finds out he is going to be deported, so the cabbies arrange a marriage between Latka and a call girl to keep Latka in America. Reverend Jim, in his first appearance, performs the ceremony. (Jim does not appear again until the second season, when he becomes a regular cast member.)

09 "Money Troubles" November 14, 1978

John and Suzanne find themselves in financial trouble, so Alex offers them a loan. Louie attempts to talk Elaine into inviting him to John's house for dinner.

10 "Men Are Such Beasts" November 21, 1978

Tony starts to get annoyed with his clingy, pill-popping girlfriend Denise, and tries to break up with her. But Denise refuses let him go, and starts following him around. Finally, he is forced to take desperate measures to drive her away. Meanwhile, Alex gets into an accident when, swerving to avoid a dog, he hits a parked car instead.

11 "A Full House For Christmas" December 12, 1978

Louie's brother Nicky, a professional gambler, comes to visit from Las Vegas for Christmas. Louie's mother, upset over not having heard from Nicky for six years, wants him to take her back to Vegas with him for a while, but Nicky refuses. Louie, frustrated over his brother's indifference for their mother (though he himself treats her no better), gets Alex to play poker with Nicky. When Nicky loses all his money, Louie pays him to show Mrs. De Palma a good time in Las Vegas.

12 "Sugar Mama" January 16, 1979

Alex is hired by a rich older widow named Dee Wilcox to drive her around town, but Alex starts to feel uncomfortable with the relationship.

13 "Friends" January 30, 1979

While Tony is away, Bobby neglects to feed Tony's long-lived goldfish. When Tony returns to find "Tony" and "Wanda" dead, Tony vows never to talk to Bobby again.

14 "Louie Sees The Light" February 6, 1979

Louie is about to get a big operation, and is nervous he won't live through it. In a desperate attempt to save himself, Louie promises God (with Alex as his witness) that he will be "the best man he can be." Louie returns to the garage a changed man, and Bobby bets with Alex how long Louie will be able to go without reverting to his old self.

15 "Elaine And The Lame Duck" February 13, 1979

Congressman Walter Griswold breaks up with his girlfriend in the back of Alex's cab. Feeling sorry for the pathetic politician, Alex introduces Walter to Elaine. Elaine soon gets annoyed by Walter's childish behavior and sexual suggestions, but does not have the heart to dump him.

16 "Bobby's Big Break" February 15, 1979

Bobby lands a role as a new character on a popular soap opera. Bobby, thinking he has gotten his big break, rips his cab driver license up in Louie's face. He later finds out that his character is being killed off, and is too embarrassed to ask for his job back.

17 "Mama Gravas" February 27, 1979

Latka's attractive widowed mother visits. She and Alex end up spending the night together. But Latka thinks the relationship is much more serious than it is.

18 "Alex Tastes Death And Finds A Nice Restaurant" March 6, 1979

Alex is shot in the ear by one of his passengers, and turns into a nervous wreck (he is unwilling to pick up a priest). Eventually, Alex quits his job and becomes a waiter at a stuffy French restaurant.

19 "Hollywood Calling" May 8, 1979

A Hollywood bigwig is writing a film about New York City cab drivers, and comes to the Sunshine Cab Company looking for inspiration. He takes a liking to Alex, but Louie is annoyed about the commotion in the garage disrupting business.

20 "Substitute Father" May 15, 1979

Elaine is going away for a week, but doesn't want to take her son Jason because he has a spelling bee the day before Elaine's return. Alex, Bobby, Tony, John and Louie take turns taking the kid on outings, but they have such a good time with the boy, he does not have time to study.

21 "Memories of Cab 804, Part 1" May 22, 1979

John crashes Cab 804, the most beloved cab in the garage. Alex, Bobby, Tony and Louie reminisce about their greatest moments in the cab:

Alex picks up John in that cab.
Bobby gets held up, but manages to hold his own and drive the mugger out of the cab.
Tony stops a man from committing suicide by jumping off a bridge.
Louie wins a $800 bet with a rich, obnoxious boy after the child cheats him out of $200.
22 "Memories of Cab 804, Part 2" May 29, 1979

As Latka tries to save Cab 804 (which is now a heap of scrap metal), Elaine and Alex recount their memories of the beloved cab. Elaine picks up the man of her dreams and has a wonderful night with him, only to find she will never see him again. Alex delivers a baby in the backseat. Latka manages to repair the cab, although several defects remain (such as not being able to go over 20 miles per hour), and Alex gets to take it out first. However, the engine catches on fire after Alex starts it up. In subsequent episodes, the cab appears to work fine.)



Ratings
The show was acclaimed by critics, but it was never a major ratings success. It performed respectably during its first two seasons, even placing in the Top Ten in its first season behind the ABC powerhouse line-up of Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, and Three's Company, but numbers plummeted when it was moved from that secure time-slot into more competitive positions. The show was cancelled in 1982 by ABC. The show was then picked up for its fifth and final season by NBC, being paired at first on Thursday night with Cheers.

The show's seasonal ratings were as follows:

1978-1979: #9
1979-1980: #13
1980-1981: #53[citation needed]
1981-1982: #53[citation needed]
1982-1983: #73[citation needed]

Awards and nominations
Taxi is one of the most lauded television shows in American history. During its run, the sitcom was nominated for 31 Emmy Awards and won 18, including three for Outstanding Comedy Series. It was also nominated for 25 Golden Globes, with four wins (three for Best TV Series - Musical/Comedy). In 1979, it received the Humanitas Prize in the 30 minute category.


Awards
Emmy Awards:

Comedy Series (1979-1981)
Lead Actor in a Comedy Series - Judd Hirsch (1981, 1983)
Guest Actress in a Comedy Series - Ruth Gordon (1979)
Lead Actress in a Comedy Series - Carol Kane (1982)
Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series - Carol Kane (1983)
Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series - Danny DeVito (1981)
Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series - Christopher Lloyd (1982, 1983)
Directing in a Comedy Series - James Burrows (1980, 1981)
Writing in a Comedy Series - Michael Leeson (1981)
Writing in a Comedy Series - Ken Estin (1982)
Film Editing for a Series - M. Pam Blumenthal (1979-81), Jack Michon (1981)
Golden Globe Awards:

Best Television Series-Comedy (1979-1981), tied in 1980 with Alice
Best TV Supporting Actor - Danny DeVito (1980), tied with Vic Tayback in Alice

Nominations
Emmy Awards:

Comedy Series (1982, 1983)
Lead Actor in a Comedy Series - Judd Hirsch (1979, 1980, 1982)
Lead Actress in a Comedy Series - Eileen Brennan (1981)
Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series - Danny DeVito (1979, 1982, 1983)
Directing in a Comedy Series - James Burrows (1982)
Writing in a Comedy Series - Michael Leeson (1979)
Writing in a Comedy Series - Glen Charles and Les Charles (1980, 1981)
Writing in a Comedy Series - David Lloyd (1981)
Writing in a Comedy Series - Barry Kemp and Holly Holmberg Brooks (1982)
Writing in a Comedy Series - Ken Estin (1983)
Golden Globe Awards:

Television Series-Comedy (1982-1984)
Actor in a TV Series-Comedy - Judd Hirsch (1979-1983)
TV Supporting Actress - Marilu Henner (1979-1983)
TV Supporting Actress - Carol Kane (1983)
TV Supporting Actor - Tony Danza (1980)
TV Supporting Actor - Danny DeVito (1979, 1981, 1982)
TV Supporting Actor - Jeff Conaway (1979, 1980)
TV Supporting Actor - Andy Kaufman (1979, 1981)

Writers
According to The Taxi Book, David Lloyd, a veteran of The Mary Tyler Moore Show (he wrote the award-winning "Chuckles Bites the Dust" script), was responsible for the episodes "Jim Gets a Pet", "Elaine's Strange Triangle", "Louie Bumps into an Old Lady", "Jim Joins the Network", "Nina Loves Alex", "Alex the Gofer" and "Louie Moves Uptown", while Ken Estin wrote "What Price Bobby?", "Alex Jumps Out of an Airplane", "Fledgling", "Vienna Waits", "Tony's Lady", "The Schloogel Show", and "Jim's Inheritance". Other notable writers were Glen Charles, Les Charles, Howard Gewirtz, Katherine Green, Daniel Kallis, Barry Kemp, Michael Leeson, Earl Pomerantz, Ian Praiser and Sam Simon. The writers combined for two Emmy wins (Estin, Leeson) and five nominations.

Deep Space Nine producer Ira Steven Behr tried and failed to sell a script about Louie DePalma's outrage when the sleazy uncle he idolizes has a religious conversion and becomes a nice guy. Behr reworked the story for a Deep Space Nine episode where Quark the Ferengi has a similar experience with the Grand Nagus.


Quotes
Elaine [on first meeting Alex]: I'm only going to be working here part-time. I'm not really a taxi driver.

Alex: Oh yeah, I know. We're all part-time here. You see that guy over there? Now he's an actor. The guy on the phone, he's a prize fighter. This lady over here, she's a beautician. The man behind her, he's a writer. Me? I'm a cab driver. I'm the only cab driver in this place.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jim [taking a written driving test]: Pssst. What does a yellow light mean?
Bobby: Slow down.
Jim: Okay. What...does...a...yellow...light...mean?
Bobby: Slow down!
Jim [increasingly befuddled]: Okay. Whaaat...doooeees...aaa...yeeel-looow...liiight...meeeaaan?
Director James Burrows instructed Conaway and Lloyd to continue repeating their lines until he called cut. The gag wound up being performed at least a half-dozen times in the studio until the audience laughter finally died down. Henner (who was also in the scene) can be seen stabbing her hand with a pen in order to avoid laughing.

Opening sequence
The opening titles show a cab driving across the Queensboro Bridge. The footage was originally intended to be a "bridge" between scenes and is only about fifteen seconds long. Parts of it are subtly repeated a couple of times to accommodate the entire credits. Tony Danza drove the cab in the sequence. He was already in New York in order to shoot a scene that would air in the first season finale. It ended up being the only scene in the whole series actually filmed in New York.

The external shot of the Sunshine Cab Company was an actual garage in New York's West Village. The building has since been demolished. The site now contains an apartment building and a Rite Aid.


Cast reunions
Danny DeVito hosted an episode of Saturday Night Live soon after Taxi was canceled after the fourth season. A filmed bit had him driving around New York looking morose until inspiration strikes and he blows up the ABC building. In addition, the Taxi cast members were given an opportunity for closure, which up to that point had been denied them due to the abrupt cancellation. The actors took their "final" bows during DeVito's opening monologue, only to have NBC pick up the show. HBO was also interested in renewing the series for a fifth season after ABC's cancellation.

Decades later, most of the cast returned to play their younger selves and briefly re-enact scenes for the Kaufman biopic, Man on the Moon. Judd Hirsch, Marilu Henner, Jeff Conaway, Carol Kane, Randall Carver and Christopher Lloyd all reprised their roles. The only two who didn't were Danny DeVito, who produced and co-starred in the film as Kaufman's manager George Shapiro, and Tony Danza, who declined to participate.


Kaufman incident
Kaufman wanted his stage character Tony Clifton to appear on the show. "Clifton" was hired for a guest role, but after throwing a tantrum on stage, had to be escorted off of the Paramount studio lot by security guards. The incident was recreated in Man on the Moon.

Taxi


Angela (Theme From Taxi)


Taxi-Jim at the DMV


TV's Funniest Moments - Taxi's Christopher Lloyd - Hilarious


TAXI - Jim at Harvard


Are We Lumberjacks?


Taxi's Television Epiphany

American Bandstand

American Bandstand was a television show that aired in various versions from 1952 to 1989, hosted until its final season by Dick Clark, who also served as producer. The show featured teenagers dancing to Top 40-type music introduced by Clark; at least one popular musical act - over the decades, running the gamut from Jerry Lee Lewis to Run DMC - would usually appear in-person to lip-sync one of their latest singles.



Show description
It premiered locally as a live show, Bandstand, on Philadelphia television station WFIL-TV (Channel 6, now WPVI-TV) on October 7, 1952 in "Studio 'B'", which was located in their just-completed addition to the original 1947 building (4548 Market Street), and was hosted by Bob Horn, with Lee Stewart as co-host until 1955. Tony Mammarella was the original producer with Ed Yates as director.

The series originally featured Horn merely hosting two collections of filmed musical performances from both Snader and Official films (forerunners of modern music videos), but this was soon changed to the familiar format of having kids dance to hit records, an idea that came from a Philadelphia radio show, The 950 Club.

On July 9, 1956, Horn was fired for a drunk driving arrest. He was replaced temporarily by producer Tony Mammarella before the job went permanently to Dick Clark. After some badgering of the network by Clark, the show was picked up nationally by ABC (becoming American Bandstand) on August 5, 1957. The program was broadcast daily (first live, then on kinescope when Clark went on tour with the singers) until 1963 and then aired weekly until 1989. The show's popularity helped Clark become an American media mogul and inspired other similar long-running music programs, such as Soul Train and Top of the Pops.

"Studio 'B'" measured 80'x42'x24', but appeared smaller due to the number of props, television cameras, and bleachers that were used for the show. The show was briefly shot in color in 1958 when WFIL-TV started experimenting with the then-new technology. The size of the studio made it possible to only have one camera (RCA TK-41) where three black & white models were used before (RCA TK-10). WFIL-TV went back to black & white two weeks later when ABC-TV refused to carry the color signal and management realized that the show lost something without the extra cameras.

Clark would often interview the teenagers about their opinions of the songs being played, most memorably through the "Rate-a-Record" segment (to which the phrase "It's got a good beat and you can dance to it" is credited, perhaps apocryphally).


Theme music
Audio sample:
"American Bandstand" (1975)

Theme song performed by Barry Manilow.

Problems playing the files? See media help.
Bandstand originally used "High Society" by Artie Shaw as its theme song, but by the time the show went national, it had been replaced by various arrangements of "Bandstand Boogie" composed by Charles Albertine, including the big-band version performed by Les Elgart remembered by viewers of the daily version. From 1969 to 1974 "Bandstand Theme", a synth instrumental version written by Mike Curb opened each show. Moreover, from 1974 to 1977 an orchestral disco version of "Bandstand Boogie" arose playing during the opening and closing credits. Joe Porter was the music arranger and performer of this orchestral disco version of American Bandstand's theme song at this time.

From 1977 to the end of its ABC run in 1987, the show opened and closed with Barry Manilow's rendition of the theme, which he originally recorded for his 1975 album Tryin' to Get the Feeling. The song's new lyrics, which heavily referenced the series, were co-written by Manilow and Bruce Howard Sussman.

The Manilow version was replaced by an updated instrumental arrangement of "Bandstand Boogie" when Bandstand went into syndication.

From 1974 onward, Bandstand featured another instrumental at its mid-show break—Billy Preston's synth hit "Space Race".


Changes
The show moved from its weekday slot to Saturday afternoons on September 7, 1963.

Production of the show moved from Philadelphia to Los Angeles on February 8, 1964, which coincidently was the same weekend that WFIL-TV moved from their 46th and Market location to their new facility located on City Line Avenue. Color broadcasts began for good on September 9, 1967.

Bandstand moved from ABC to syndication on September 19, 1987, and to cable's USA Network on April 8, 1989 with a new younger host, comedian David Hirsch. Clark remained executive producer. The show ended on October 7, 1989.

In 2004, Dick Clark announced plans to revive the show in time for 2005; although this did not occur, one segment of the revived "Bandstand" - a national dance contest - eventually became the series So You Think You Can Dance. Dick Clark Productions is credited as the show's co-producer and longtime DC employee Allen Shapiro serves as co-executive producer.



References in popular culture
Main article: American Dreams
The show was featured prominently in the 2002–2005 NBC-TV drama series American Dreams, which like Bandstand was executive produced by Dick Clark. In a 2005 episode of American Dreams, Eddie Kelly and Bunny Gibson—one of the most famous couples to appear on American Bandstand in the Philadelphia years—were the only two to make cameo appearances on the acclaimed TV series. Along with that, Eddie Kelly and Bunny Gibson were named a number of times in the script and Eddie Kelly referred to in the last episode.
In the movie Grease, Rydell High School plays host for a dance contest on a televised show similar to American Bandstand, called National Bandstand.
In 1988, the popular John Waters film Hairspray's The Corny Collins Show is a mix between this and Baltimore's Buddy Deane Show.
In the 1989 film Dead Poets Society, English teacher John Keating, played by Robin Williams, belittles the school's poetry textbook's introduction to poetry. The introduction describes a method of giving poems numerical scores of "perfection." He derides this by saying "we're not laying pipe, we're talking about poetry. How can you describe poetry like American Bandstand? "I like Byron, I give him a 42 but I can't dance to it!"
In 2001, IGT acquired the rights from Dick Clark Productions and created and developed a slot machine based on the show's popularity.
In 2004 the band Low released the compilation album A Lifetime of Temporary Relief: 10 Years of B-Sides and Rarities, featuring the track "Peanut Butter Toast And American Bandstand" which mentions the show.
In 2005, rapper Bow Wow came out with the featured single Fresh Azimiz from the album Wanted. The song, produced by Jermaine Dupri mentioned the popularity of American Bandstand in the line, "I'm goin' down in history like American Bandstand."


American Bandstand Remembered : PART ONE


American Bandstand Remembered : PART TWO


American Bandstand Remembered : PART THREE


American Bandstand Remembered : PART FOUR

SOULTRAIN

Soul Train is a long-running music-related syndicated television program. Soul Train has primarily featured performances by R&B, soul, and hip hop artists, although jazz musicians and gospel singers have also appeared. The program was created by Don Cornelius, who also served as its first host and continues to serve as its executive producer.




History
Soul Train premiered on WCIU-TV in Chicago on August 17, 1970 as a daily program. Its success attracted the attention of two Chicago-based companies -- the Johnson Products Company (manufacturers of the Afro Sheen line of hair-care products), and Sears, Roebuck and Co. -- who agreed to sponsor the program's expansion into syndication. Soul Train began airing in selected cities across the United States, on a weekly basis, on October 2, 1971. When it moved into syndication, the program's home base was also shifted to Los Angeles, where it remains to the present day. Syndication of the program was initially handled by Syndicast Services until 1985, when Tribune Entertainment took over those responsibilities.

Don Cornelius ended his run as host in 1993, and guest hosts were used from that time until 1997, when comedian Mystro Clark began a two-year stint as host. Clark was replaced by actor Shemar Moore in 1999. In 2003, Moore was succeeded by actor Dorian Gregory, who hosted through 2006.

The show is known for its animated opening title featuring the popular cartoon train.

As a nod to Soul Train's longevity, the show's opening sequence (during later seasons) contains a claim that it is the "longest-running, first-run, nationally-syndicated program in television history," with over 1,100 episodes produced from the show's debut through the 2005-06 season.

Production of first-run episodes was suspended at the conclusion of the 2005-06 season, the show's thirty-fifth. However, Soul Train has not been officially cancelled, and Don Cornelius Productions has not commented on the program's future. Since the 2006-07 season, the program has been airing archived episodes under the title "The Best of Soul Train", in lieu of new installments. [1] The future of Soul Train was placed in further uncertainty with the announced closing of Tribune Entertainment's syndication division on December 18, 2007, leaving Don Cornelius Productions to seek a new distributor for the program. ([1]),


Influence
During the heyday of Soul Train in the 1970s and 1980s, the program was widely influential among younger black Americans, many of whom turned to it not only to hear the latest songs by well-known black artists but also for clues about the latest fashions and dance trends. Moreover, for many white Americans in that era who were not living in areas that were racially diverse, Soul Train provided a unique window into black culture. Some commentators have called Soul Train a "black American Bandstand", another long-running program with which Soul Train shares some similarities.


Program elements
Within the structure of the program, there have been two enduring elements. The first is the "Soul Train Scramble Board", where two dancers are given sixty seconds to unscramble a set of letters which form the name of that show's performer or a famous person in African American history. In describing the person's renown, the host concludes with the phrase "whose name you should know".

Near the program's conclusion, there is also the popular "Soul Train Line", in which all the dancers form a two lines with space in the middle for individual dancers to strut down and dance in consecutively. Sometimes, new dance styles or moves are featured or introduced by particular dancers.

In addition, there is an in-studio group of dancers who dance along to the music as it is being performed. Rosie Perez, Carmen Electra, Nick Cannon, MC Hammer, Jermaine Stewart, Fred "Rerun" Berry, Pebbles, and NFL legend Walter Payton were among those who got noticed dancing on the program over the years. Two former dancers, Jody Watley and Jeffrey Daniel, enjoyed years of success as members of the disco group Shalamar after they were tabbed by Soul Train talent booker/record promoter Dick Griffey to replace the group's original session singers in 1977.

Performers who appear on Soul Train generally lip-sync their songs to its recorded version, though several have chosen to sing their songs live. Each guest usually performs twice on each program; after their first number, they are joined by the program host on-stage for a brief interview.

The show is known for two popular catchphrases: Referring to itself as the "hippest trip in America" at the beginning of the show; and for closing the program with, "...We wish you love, peace... and SOUL!"


Non-black performers on Soul Train
The program features African American singers and performers almost exclusively, although non-black artists have also appeared on Soul Train through the years, including:

Paula Abdul
a-ha
Christina Aguilera
Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass
The Average White Band
The Backstreet Boys
The Beastie Boys
Michael Bolton
David Bowie
Captain and Tennille
Cheech and Chong
Culture Club
Sheena Easton
Gary's Gang
Gino Vannelli
Hall and Oates
Don Henley
The Jets
Elton John
JoJo
The Manhattan Transfer
Teena Marie
Michael McDonald
New Kids on the Block
Pet Shop Boys
The Romantics
Sting
Robin Thicke
Frankie Valli
Gino Vannelli
Yellow Magic Orchestra
Wild Orchid (featuring Fergie)
Expose

Spin-offs
In 1987, Soul Train launched the Soul Train Music Awards, which honors the top performances in R&B, hip-hop, and gospel music (and, in its earlier years, jazz music) from the previous year.

Soul Train later created two additional, now-defunct annual specials: The Soul Train Lady of Soul Awards, broadcast from 1995 to 2006, celebrated top achievements by female performers; and the Soul Train Christmas Starfest, broadcast from 1998 to 2006, featured holiday music performed by a variety of R&B and gospel artists.


Theme music
Besides hosting and producing Soul Train, Don Cornelius also commissioned the show's theme song. When Soul Train first premiered in 1971, a funky instrumental called "Hot Potatoes" by King Curtis (later redone by The Rimshots) was used as the show's theme.

Then in 1973, the show changed its theme to the well-known "TSOP (The Sound of Philadelphia)", recorded by Philadelphia soul studio group MFSB, with vocals by the Three Degrees. Released as a single, this song became a pop and R&B radio hit in 1973. Soul Train used "TSOP" until around 1975.

In 1975, the show's in-house group Soul Train Gang came up with "Soul Train '75" which was later released as a single for the newly formed Soul Train Records. This theme was only used for the 1975-1976 season.

From 1976 to 1978, Soul Train used another theme from the Soul Train Gang called "Soul Train '76 (Get on Board)".

In 1978, a new theme was introduced: "Soul Train '78", produced by the Hollywood Disco Jazz Band and sung by The Waters, was used until the middle half of the 1979-1980 season when it switched to "Up on Soul Train" by the Whispers [2], in 1980.

For several seasons beginning in 1983, the program switched to another theme created by R&B artist O'Bryan. This lesser-known theme to the program, "Soul Train's a Comin'" [3], had a funkier beat and a stronger bass line.

In 1987, George Duke composed the first remake of "TSOP", known as "TSOP '87", and Duke also remixed the theme into a newer version ("TSOP '89") in 1989.

"Soul Train '93" (You Know You Want to Dance)" performed by the rap group Naughty by Nature with a saxophone solo by Everette Harp, was introduced in 1993.


References in pop culture

The sketch comedy show In Living Color parodied Soul Train in 1990 with a sketch called Old Train. Keenen Ivory Wayans portrayed Don Cornelius as the host of a show that featured dancing elderly people. Participants in the "dance line" included a nurse pushing an old person in a wheelchair, and a casket being carried by pallbearers.
The improvisational comedy show Whose Line Is It Anyway? once featured a game in which one of the actors pretended he was the host of Soul Train, repeatedly morphing into a "goofy white guy" and back again.
The video game Streets of SimCity has a parody called Soul Transit featured briefly in the intro.
The Simpsons featured a parody of the show entitled Soul Mass Transit System.
A sequence in the movie Charlie's Angels featured actress Cameron Diaz dancing on Soul Train.
Don Cornelius played himself in an episode of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, where the main characters appear on Soul Train. Cornelius also made a cameo appearance in the 1998 comedy Jane Austen's Mafia!. He appears during the funeral of Vincenzo Cortino, portrayed by Lloyd Bridges.
IGT created a slot machine based on the show.
Johnnie Taylor's No. 1 hit "Disco Lady", from 1976, contains the line "Girl, you oughta be on TV... on Soul Train!"
In 1974, Junior Walker recorded a song called "Dancin' Like They Do on Soul Train."
Marvin Gaye's "After the Dance", includes the line, "You were looking good on Soul Train."
Archie Bell & the Drells' "I Could Have Danced All Night", includes the line, "Look at those kids on that Soul Train show."
In the "Arthur Plays the Blues" episode of the PBS Kids Arthur cartoon series, Arthur's piano teacher Dr. Fugue says to Arthur after giving Arthur a second chance at piano lessons "I don't want to miss Soul Train".
Cartoon Network's Dexter's Laboratory did an animated parody of Soul Train called Groove Train in the episode, "Sister's Got A Brand New Bag."
The Proud Family featured a similar program entitled Hip-Hop Helicopter.

SOULTRAIN


Eve - Tambourine (Soul Train Line)


Got To Be Real (Soultrain 79)


The Spinners i'll be around

Lost in Space

Lost in Space is a science fiction TV series created and produced by Irwin Allen. The series was released by Fox Television and broadcast on CBS. The show ran for three seasons, with 83 episodes airing between September 15, 1965 and March 6, 1968. Lost in Space was the second of Allen's four science fiction TV series. The show's main theme was space travel adventure. The show's first season was in black and white, but the second and third seasons were in color.

Conceptually the series is a space-age adaptation of the classic adventure novel Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss. During the first two seasons, the series follows the adventures of an astronaut family that is shipwrecked on an alien world after getting lost trying to reach the Alpha Centauri star system. In the third season they travel to other worlds in their never-resolved attempts to reach their destination, which was either Earth or Alpha Centauri.

Following the successful format of Allen's first TV series, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, the emphasis was on creating exciting fantasy-oriented adventure stories. Each week, the show delivered a fast-paced visual assault of special effects, explosions, monstrous aliens, spaceships, and exotic sets and costumes drenched in bright, primary colors. On the other hand, unlike the other space TV show of the day, Star Trek, character development, serious issues, dramatic depth, or even maintaining a coherent story were ignored. ("Don't get logical with me!" was Allen's frequent retort to writers who objected to changes to their scripts. Source: Starlog #219)[citation needed] Critics complained that this was the television equivalent of dangling a shiny object to distract the non-discriminating viewer. However, in spite of criticism, the show still became a success.

Allen had hit upon a winning formula which he used to create a third fantasy-adventure show, The Time Tunnel (1966-1967), followed by his last and most ambitious series, Land of the Giants (1968-1970), all of which have become cult, if not critical, favorites.


Plot
In 1997, the Earth is suffering from massive overpopulation and depletion of natural resources. Professor John Robinson (played by Zorro alumnus Guy Williams), his wife, Maureen (Lassie alumna June Lockhart), their children, Judy (Marta Kristen), Penny (played by Make Room For Daddy aluma Angela Cartwright), Will (Bill Mumy) and their friend and pilot, Maj. Don West (Mark Goddard) are chosen to travel on a space vehicle named the "Jupiter 2" to Alpha Centauri to search for a habitable planet for mankind to colonize. After the Robinsons have been placed in suspended animation for the long journey, but before the launch, foreign agent Dr. Zachary Smith (Jonathan Harris) sneaks aboard the spacecraft on a sabotage mission. He reprograms the ship's robot to destroy the vehicle shortly after it leaves Earth. However, he becomes trapped on the spaceship during the launch. His extra weight throws the Jupiter 2 off course, causing it to encounter a meteor storm shortly after launch. The robot's subsequent rampage does not destroy the vehicle, but does finish the job of getting the crew completely lost. Dr. Smith continues to fulfill his role as saboteur throughout the episodes, although no one seems to notice besides Maj. Don West. The Robinsons (especially young Will) are often placed in danger by Dr. Smith.


Cast
Doctor John Robinson (Guy Williams) is the expedition commander, a pilot, and the father of the Robinson children. He is an astrophysicist who also specializes in applied planetary geology.
Maureen Robinson (June Lockhart) is John's biochemist wife. Her role in the series is often to prepare meals, tend the garden, and to help with light construction. Whilst adding the much needed "voice of reason".
Major Don West (Mark Goddard) is the pilot of the spacecraft and is frequently Dr. Smith's intolerable young partner. There is a romantic interest in Judy Robinson which is never developed on screen. In the pilot, West was also an astrophysicist and expert in interplanetary geology.
Judy Robinson (Marta Kristen) is the oldest child. She planned a career in musical theater, but went with her family, instead.
Penny Robinson (Angela Cartwright) is the middle child. She loves animals and classical music. She acquires an alien pet she names Debbie. (To viewers, quite obviously a chimpanzee wearing a fur hat). The chimp made one sound, "Bloop", and is sometimes remembered by that name[1]
Will Robinson (Bill Mumy) is the youngest, a child prodigy in electronics. Often, he is a friend to Dr. Smith when no one else is.
Doctor Zachary Smith (Jonathan Harris) is ostensibly a specialist in environmental and intergalactic psychology, but is an enemy agent (These roles are dropped early in the series). His attempt to sabotage the mission strands him aboard the Jupiter II. He begins as sinister, but while never losing his self-serving qualities, he evolves into passive-aggressive, often cowardly and effeminate behavior as comic relief. He frequently traded barbs with the Robot and Major West.
The Robot is a Model B-9 Environmental Control Robot, which had no given name. The Robot was designed by Robert Kinoshita and performed by Bob May in a suit built by Bob Stewart, with voice by Dick Tufeld, who was also the series' narrator.

Series history
Irwin Allen produced a pilot film for the series, No Place to Hide. After CBS accepted the series, characters Dr. Smith and the Robot were added. The ship was redesigned with a second deck, and named the Jupiter II. (It had been the "Gemini 12".) For economy, a good part of the pilot was reworked into the early series episodes. According to June Lockhart, the show was intended to be called "Space Family Robinson", but Disney wouldn't release the copyright.

The first season was filmed in black-and-white and was more serious in tone than the subsequent two. It chronicled the daily adventures that a pioneer family might well have marooned on an alien world. These included dealing with dangerous native plants and animals, and occasionally off-planet visitors.

The second and third seasons were filmed in color, were more whimsical and fantastic, and emphasized humor, including fanciful space cowboys, space hippies, pirates, and a beauty pageant. The show aired in the same time slot as Batman (TV series), and it's been suggested the camp tone was adopted to compete. There was a growing emphasis on Dr. Smith, Will and the Robot at the expense of the other characters. Smith's change in character was not appreciated by the other actors, according to Billy Mumy, and Mark Goddard and Guy Williams disliked the shift from serious science fiction. [2] The third season had slightly more adventure emphasis, but episodes like "The Great Vegetable Rebellion" — with talking carrots — still demonstrated humorous fantasy.

The first two seasons, shows ended with a trailer anticipating the following week, with the cliff-hanger "To be continued next week!". There was usually little ongoing plot continuity between episodes, except in larger goals, for example, to get enough fuel to leave the planet. The third year, the end of each episode merely showed clips from the next episode.

After cancellation, the show was successful in reruns, and syndication for many years, lately on FX and Sci-Fi Channel.


Stylistically, the series was of high quality, featuring what was expected for space travel at the time; eye-catching silver, tapered space-suits, laser guns and a number of spectacular props and sets, including the control cabin of the Jupiter 2.

Ratings & Popularity
Although it retains a cult following, the science-fiction community often points to Lost in Space as an example of TV's bad record at producing science-fiction (perhaps overlooking the series' deliberate fantasy elements), comparing it to its supposed rival, Star Trek. Ironically, Lost In Space was a mild ratings success, unlike Star Trek, which received very poor ratings during its original network TV run, often not placing any higher than 60th place, while LIS finished season one with a rating of 32nd, second season in 35th place, and the third and final season rating 33rd.[citation needed] The last primetime episode to be broadcast nationally across the USA was a cast & crew personal favorite, a repeat from the second season appropriately titled "A Visit to Hades". Starting the next week, CBS replaced the Wednesday night favorite with the fourth season premier of the wild life adventure series Daktari in September 1968.

The show's fans tend to split into two groups: those who enjoy the more serious episodes of the first season, and those who enjoy the wild, campy episodes that came later.

The general public now most recognizes Lost In Space via the memorable, oft-repeated lines of the Robot, "Warning! Warning!", "That does not compute.", and, of course, "Danger, Will Robinson!"; although the last sentence was only said once, different variations of it were used. Doctor Smith's endless put-downs of the Robot are also still popular ("You bubble-headed booby!") as his often-repeated whines: "Oh, the pain... the pain of it all!" and "My back is extremely delicate today." Smith would consistently employ the latter excuse when asked to perform manual labor.

Lost in Space Clips - Danger Wil Robinson!!


Lost In Space First Season COLOR Footage.


LOST IN SPACE BEST TRIBUTE

The Midnight Special

The Midnight Special was a weekly musical television series that aired during the 1970s and early 1980s, created and produced by Burt Sugarman and airing on NBC. It premiered as a special on August 19, 1972, then began its run as a regular series on February 2, 1973; its last episode was on May 1, 1981. The ninety-minute program followed the Friday night edition of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.


The program featured over 1,200 performers during its run. Some notable guest stars and hosts included Andy Kaufman, Tina Turner, Richard Pryor, The Bee Gees, Kiss, Donna Summer, Joan Baez, Kris Kristofferson, Diana Ross, AC/DC, Dolly Parton, B.B. King and Fleetwood Mac.

The show mostly featured guest hosts, except for a period from July 1975 through March 1976 when Helen Reddy was the regular host. Wolfman Jack served as the announcer.

The show was noted for featuring musical acts performing live, which was unique since most television appearances during the era showed performers lip-synching to prerecorded music. The series also occasionally aired vintage footage of older acts (such as Bill Haley & His Comets).


History
Burt Sugarman proposed the program as a way for NBC to take advantage of Johnny Carson’s large audience. At the time, none of the Big Three television networks had programming on after 1:00 a.m.; in spite of this lack of competition, NBC initially rejected the idea. The rejection led Sugarman to buy air time for the premiere on his own, convincing Chevrolet to become the show’s first sponsor. It premiered with ratings big enough that NBC changed its mind and bought the program.

The show sponsored the last performance of David Bowie as Ziggy Stardust — it was broadcast on November 16, 1973, in an episode taped a month earlier from specially-commissioned performances at the Marquee Club in Soho.

The series was cancelled by NBC at the request of Dick Ebersol as part of a deal for him to take over then-ailing Saturday Night Live. Two years later, after the conclusion of a run of the Canadian import SCTV Network, Midnight Special was eventually replaced by the music video show Friday Night Videos, also produced by Ebersol.

In 2006, a DVD collection entitled Burt Sugarman's Midnight Special was made available by Guthy-Renker through television and radio informercials.


Trivia
The show was satirized by Ray Stevens in 1974 on the novelty single, "The Moonlight Special".

The show was referenced in Tammy Wynette's 1976 hit "(I'd Like to See) Jesus on the Midnight Special".

Guests
1972 (pilot)
First aired: 8/19/1972

John Denver - "(Take Me Home) Country Roads" & "Goodbye Again"
Mama Cass Elliot duet with John Denver- "Leaving on a Jet Plane"
Argent - "Hold Your Head Up" & "Tragedy"
Harry Chapin - "Taxi"
David Clayton-Thomas (from Blood, Sweat & Tears) - "Yesterday's Music" & "Nobody Calls Me Prophet"
The Everly Brothers - "All I Have to Do Is Dream" & "Stories We Could Tell"
The Isley Brothers - "Pop That Thang"
Helen Reddy - "I Don't Know How to Love Him"
Linda Ronstadt - "Long Long Time" & "The Fast One"
War - "Slippin' into Darkness"
Three Dog Night

1973
First aired: 2/2/1973

Al Green
Albert Hammond
Albert King
Alvin Lee & Mylon LeFevre
Anne Murray
Aretha Franklin
Arlo Guthrie
B.B. King
B. W. Stevenson
Bachman-Turner Overdrive
Badfinger
Barbara Fairchild
Barbara Mandrell
Barbara Mason
Barbi Benton
Ben E. King
Bill Cosby
Billy J. Kramer & The Dakotas
Billy Paul
Billy Preston
Black Oak Arkansas
Blood, Sweat & Tears
Bo Diddley
Bobby Bare
Bobby Darin
Bobby Womack
Bonnie Bramlett
Brewer & Shipley
Brian Auger
Brownie McGhee
Bud Brisbois
Buddy Miles
Canned Heat
Carmen
Carol Burnett
Charlie Rich
Chi Coltrane
Chris Smither
Chubby Checker
Clarence Carter
Climax Blues Band
Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen
Country Joe McDonald
Curtis Mayfield - "Superfly"
Danny & the Juniors
Danny O'Keefe
David Bowie
David Brenner
David Essex
Del Shannon
Dionne Warwick
Dobie Gray
Doc Severinsen
Don Gibson
Don McLean - "Dreidel" & "If We Try"
Doug Kershaw
Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show
Dr. John
Earl Scruggs
Earth, Wind & Fire - "Shining Star"
Ed McMahon - walked on to wish the show a success
Edgar Winter Group
Edward Bear
Edwin Hawkins Singers
Electric Light Orchestra (2 episodes) - "Roll Over Beethoven", "Showdown" & "Ma-Ma-Ma Belle"
Elton John
Eric Weissberg
Flash
Fleetwood Mac
Focus
Foghat
Frank Welker
Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons
Freddy Cannon
George Burns
George Carlin - performed his comedy routine
George Jones
Gerry & the Pacemakers
Gilbert O'Sullivan
Gladys Knight & the Pips
Gunhill Road
Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes
Helen Reddy - "I Am Woman," "Peaceful" & "Come On John"
Henry Mancini
Herman's Hermits
Honey Cone
Hoyt Axton
Humble Pie
Ike & Tina Turner - "I Can't Turn You Loose" & "With a Little Help from My Friends"
Incredible String Band
Jack Burns and Avery Schreiber
Jerry Butler
Jerry Lee Lewis
Jim Croce
Jimmie Spheeris
Jimmy Clanton
Joan Baez
Joan Rivers
Joe Walsh
John Kay
John Mayall
John Stewart
Johnnie Taylor
Johnny Mathis
Johnny Nash
Johnny Paycheck
Johnny Rivers
Johnny Rodriguez
Johnny Winter
Jonathan Winters
Jose Feliciano
Kenny Rogers & The First Edition
Kenny Rankin - "Comin' Down"
King Crimson
King Harvest
Kiss - "Black Diamond"
Kris Kristofferson
Lakshmi Shankar
Lee Michaels
Leo Kottke
Linda Gail Lewis
Linda Ronstadt
Little Anthony & The Imperials
Livingston Taylor
Lloyd Price
Loggins and Messina
Loretta Lynn
Lou Rawls
Mac Davis
Malo
Manfred Mann's Earth Band
Marianne Faithfull
Mark-Almond
Martin Mull
Marty Robbins
Maureen McGovern
Melissa Manchester
Mimi Fariña
Mott the Hoople
Muddy Waters
Mylon LeFevre
New York Dolls
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
Paul Anka
Paul Butterfield
Paul Williams
Peter Frampton
Peter Noone
Procol Harum
Ramblin' Jack Elliott
Rare Earth (band) - "We're Gonna Have a Good Time" & "I Just Want to Celebrate"
Ravi Shankar
Ray Charles
Richard Pryor
Rick Derringer
Rita Coolidge
Robert Klein
Robin Trower
Roger McGuinn
Savoy Brown
Seals and Crofts
Sha Na Na
Shawn Phillips
Skeeter Davis
Skylark
Slade
Sly & the Family Stone
Smokey Robinson
Sonny Terry
Spooky Tooth
Steeleye Span
Steely Dan
Steve Goodman
Steve Martin
Steve Miller Band
Stories
T. Rex
Taj Mahal
Tammy Wynette
Tanya Tucker
Ted Nugent
The Association
The Bee Gees - The first group to host the show in April, 1973.
The Byrds - "Mr. Tambourine Man" & "So You Want to Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star"
The Chi-Lites
The Coasters
The Crusaders
The Del-Vikings
The Doobie Brothers
The Four Tops
The Grass Roots
The Guess Who
The Hollies
The Impressions - "Preacher Man"
The Mindbenders
The Miracles
The O'Jays
The Penguins
The Pointer Sisters
The Raspberries
The Ronettes
The Searchers
The Shirelles
The Skyliners
The Spinners
The Staple Singers
The Statler Brothers
The Stylistics
The Troggs
Murray Langston
Timmy Thomas
Todd Rundgren - "Black Maria" & "Hello It's Me"
Tom T. Hall
Tower of Power
Uriah Heep
Vicki Lawrence
Waylon Jennings
Wilson Pickett
Wishbone Ash

1974
Aerosmith - "The Train Kept A-Rollin'"
Ann Peebles
Barry White - "Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe"
Bill Withers - "Ain't No Sunshine"
Brownsville Station
David Essex - "Rock On"
Eddie Kendricks
Edwin Starr
El Chicano
Genesis
Gladys Knight & B.B. King - "The Thrill is Gone"
Golden Earring - "Radar Love"
Gordon Lightfoot - "Sundown"
Ike & Tina Turner - "Proud Mary"
James Brown - "The Payback"
Jo Jo Gunne
Jobriath
Leo Sayer
Lynn Anderson
Maria Muldaur - "Midnight at the Oasis"
Marvin Gaye - "Let's Get It On"
Neil Sedaka - "Laughter in the Rain"
Phil Ochs and Jim Glover - "The Power and the Glory" and "Changes"
Redbone - "Come and Get Your Love"
Sly & the Family Stone - "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)"
The New York Dolls
The O'Jays - "Love Train"
Todd Rundgren - "Couldn't I Just Tell You?" & "A Dream Goes On Forever"

1975
PFM - "Celebration" and "Alta Loma Nine Till Five"'
The Bee Gees - "Nights On Broadway"
Fleetwood Mac - "Rhiannon"
Earth Wind and Fire - "Shining Star"
Kiss - "Black Diamond"
KC and the Sunshine Band - "That's The Way I Like It"
Rod Stewart - "You Wear it Well"
Peter Frampton - "Show Me The Way"
Helen Reddy - "I am Woman"
Olivia Newton John - "Have You Ever Been Mellow"
Ohio Players - "Love Rollercoaster
Barry Manilow - "Could It Be Magic?"
Minnie Riperton - "Lovin You"
Orleans - "Dance With Me"
Natalie Cole - "This Will Be"
Glen Campbell - "Rhinestone Cowboy"
Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles - "It Takes Two to Tango"
Electric Light Orchestra (guest hosts) - "In the Hall of the Mountain King", "Great Balls of Fire", "Can't Get It Out of My Head", "Orange Blossom Special", "Laredo Tornado", "Flight of the Bumble Bee" & "Roll Over Beethoven"
Todd Rundgren - "Real Man", "Freedom Fighters" & "Seven Rays"

1976
Electric Light Orchestra - "Evil Woman", "Nightrider" & "Strange Magic"
Elton John - "Your Song"
Fleetwood Mac - "Over My Head"
Spinners - "The Rubberband Man"
Heart - "Magic Man"
Hot Chocolate - "You Sexy Thing"
Wild Cherry - "Play That Funky Music"
Starbuck - "Moonlight Feels Right"
George Benson - "This Masquerade"
Michael Murphey - "Wildfire"
Diana Ross - "Love Hangover"
Eric Carmen - "All By Myself"
Tom Jones - "Delilah"
Donna Summers - "Love to Love You Baby"
England Dan and John Ford Coley - "I'd Really Love to See You Tonight"
Janis Ian - "At Seventeen"
Ray Charles - "Georgia On My Mind"

1977
Electric Light Orchestra (hosts) - "Livin' Thing", "Do Ya", "Telephone Line" & "Livin' Thing" -- ELO (on tape) - "Rockaria!" music video
Heart - "Crazy on You"
Manfred Mann's Earth Band - "Blinded By The Light"
Marvin Gaye - "What's Going On"
Dave Mason - "We Just Disagree"
Sanford & Townsend - "Smoke From A Distant Fire"
Thelma Houston - "Don't Leave Me This Way"
Bread - "Make It With You"
Andy Gibb - "I Just Want To Be Your Everything"
The Emotions - "Best Of My Love"
Johnny Rivers - "Slow Dancin'"
Bonnie Raitt - "Runaway"
Leo Sayer - "You Make Me Feel Like Dancing"
Van Morrison - "Domino"
Lou Rawls - "You'll Never Find Another Man Like Me"
Marilyn McCoo & Billy Davis Jr. - "You Don't Have To Be A Star (To Be In My Show)"

1978
Hall & Oates - "Rich Girl"
Eddie Money - "Baby Hold On"
Robert Plamer - "Every Kinda People"
The Cars - "Just What I Needed"
Exile - "Kiss You All Over"
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - "American Girl"
Chic - "Le Freak"
Four Tops - "Ain't No Woman (Like The One I've Got)"
Reo Speedwagon - "Roll With The Changes"
Ambrosia - "How Much I Feel"
AC/DC - "Sin City"
Yvonne Elliman - "If I Can't Have You"
Chuck Mangione - "Feels So Good"
Ted Nugent - "Cat Scratch Fever"
The Trammps - "Disco Inferno"
Todd Rundgren - "Can We Still Be Friends" & "Bread" (with the Hello People)
Todd Rundgren's Utopia - (guest host) "Real Man", "You Cried Wolf", "Love in Action", "Sometimes I Don't Know What to Feel" & "Just One Victory"

1979
Blondie - "One Way or Another"
Journey - "Lovin', Touchin'. Squeezin'"
Commodores - "Three Times a Lady"
The Cars - "Let's Go"
The Babys - "Everytime I Think of You"
The Beach Boys - "Good Vibrations"
Gloria Gaynor - "I Will Survive"
Nick Gilder - "Hot Child in the City"
Rick James - "You and I"
Dolly Parton - "I Will Always Love You"
Amii Stewart - "Knock on Wood"
The Pointer Sisters - "Fire"
The Charlie Daniels Band - "The Devil Went Down to Georgia"
Peaches & Herb - "Reunited"
Rupert Holmes - "Escape (The Pina Colada Song)"


Journey singing Midnight Special


Creedence Clearwater Revival- Midnight Special


Ike &Tina Turner -Proud Mary Live


Bee Gees - Turn Of The Century - Midnight Special 1973