I was very, very fortunate to work at a family owned station, well actually, group of stationd, which has been number one in our market for at least 30 years.a wonderful atmosphere.
A horse with No Name tell me about it! I can think of one particular St. Louis station that had a proud history...now just a memory. They had a noteworthy T.V. station as well which suffered a similar zombification.
When this series came on I was 13 and the next year I was 14 and in a local (medium at the time market) AM radio station (860 on the dial) doing a once the week gig. I loved this show and one time I called them on the telephone to tell them they were not doing something right as DJs do it differently and what stuck with me since then is they answered the phone as WKRP in Cincinnati. Good show at the time before syndication made them (due to costs) remove the real music and replace them with nonsense.
Scenes like this are why I purchased the entire 4 years of the original WKRP on DVD’s. I wanted to be able to physically hold all 80 plus episodes of this gem of a series. The cast will live with me until the day I die.
Likewise, bought the box set on DVD years ago. I've only ever bought one other box set of a TV series - Kolchak Night Stalker...and WKRP. They don't make shows like these anymore.
As a DJ in the 70s & 80s,I totally got this show.It was right on,created by a guy that was in the business.Most stations were owned by people with bigger companies & used radio as a tax write off & didn't care about ratings or the incomes of the people that worked there,so they either changed the format or closed them.That's how I lost my last radio job.I went through a lot of the situations they did in this show & applaud the creators for showing what radio stations were like then(and probably now).
Nothing nearly like this can be found anymore on broadcast TV. The characters, dialog, situations and imagination were matchless. Touching, funny, personal, and outlandish as well. One of my all time favorites. Rip WKRP.
It was a huge shock when WKRP got canceled. No one saw it coming. I was 16 in 1982 and everyone I knew watched this show: all my friends, parents, grandparents, teachers and on and on. It really was a show that had something for everyone. It could be really hilarious, and be really hard hitting. The show stands out in my mind was when Venus Flytrap refused to have his picture taken for promotional purposes, and it seemed bizarre because you would think he’d love that. It turned out he had run away from the military because he was so traumatized by what he’d seen and done in Vietnam.
@@bostonrailfan2427 The ratings tumbled because CBS kept moving its timeslot to help as a lead-in to less popular sitcoms. In fact I recall reading an interview with one of the cast members and they noted that by the last season even they didn't know what day the show was on. Unfortunately WKRP was a victim of its success.
So Johnny Caravella - who was 'saved' by WKRP - ends up saving WKRP. This - to me - was WKRP at it's best...both serious and funny at the same time. For those who don't know, this was the second last scene in the last episode of the series.
Then came the two seasons in the nineties of the syndicated *The New WKRP in Cincinnati* series. It wasn't as good as the original. But it didn't suck either until they got desperate for ratings. And brought in the old cast as guest stars.
Ah. Part of why it was cancelled. I had heard that 'Dr. Johnny Fever' or Howard Hessman had expressed some views that got TV execs panties in a bunch, so they dropped the show. It never recovered. Sad.
She was also very right about the direction AM radio was taking. Now if she wanted her son to feel like a success she could have split WKRP into two: WKRP-FM for the rock music, WKRP-AM for the talk format
Hirsch, played by the veteran character actor Ian Wolfe (who appeared twice in Star Trek, more famously as Mr. Atoz the librarian in "All Our Yesterdays") and one of those figures in movies and television who always seems to be somewhere between 50 and 200 in age going back even to the 1940s.
I have been in radio broadcasting over 30 years. I have been at stations in several states and formats. Live local radio has and will always be the way to go.
Tell us why, radio stations play the same songs, over and over, daily..even ones who play the oldies??? It's no wonder people make their own playlists.
@@janetduncan87 As a former radio broadcaster at a small, live/local station hub, I can tell you that it's because of money. Sure, payola is illegal, but commercials are king. And people don't want to pay for commercials when no one is listening. So, how do you get them to listen? Pay for the right to play the "most popular" songs and play them every hour and make sure that people who listen to that garbage also hear the advertisements so that they, in turn, go buy that crap so the people buying advertisement time have to pay more to have their ads played because people are buying their crap. Management isn't going to pay for the right to play a song that won't help the sales department sell air time so you hear the same songs played over and over again every day.
@@Drakijy I have to "like" your comment, that doesn't equate to my wanting it to be true : ( Remember when people used to listen to the radio to hear the new stuff? The same people that would sit with their cassette players on pause until AFTER the DJ ceased talking & then played it back for friends? Even here in Japan it was the same. I miss the old days of radio
@@janetduncan87 Don't get me started on that! LOL There's an "independent" station in Utica, NY, that prides itself on that. But they sound exactly like the rest of the FM stations anywhere you go. I'll turn FM off and put on AM, even with the static.
Frank Bonner died last month and I only found out because I looked it up today. But still, the main cast has done a great job of staying alive. Gordon Jump died long ago but he was older than the others, and of course Carol Bruce (Mama Carlson), who was already in her sixties when this show aired. But there are six members of the main cast still living. That's pretty good for a show that started over 40 years ago.
For four years, it was a cold war between Andy and Mama Carlson, with Andy managing to outmanoeuver Mama at nearly every turn when she tried to interfere with the station. Even when Andy managed to derail the unionisation effort, at Mama's behest, his cooperation came at a heavy price to put in improvements and better the working conditions. At last, at long last, she had Andy right where she wanted him, was about to screw up the station so it could become a huge tax write-off, and here it's Johnny who gets Mama over a barrel by threatening to expose the old bat to her son. One of my favourite Johnny Fever scenes in the whole series.
Hirsch was comedic gold. Only a few appearances, he wasn't even introduced until late Season 3 I believe, but he made the absolute most of every moment he was given.
I was fortunate to work for a radio station that was locally owned. I started in radio in the late 80's, and can say that I was one of the last group of announcers that spun vinyl.
I got to spin vinyl for a college station back in the 80s. Got back into the game about ten years ago as a sales rep, but quit two years later because closing sales just isn't my thing. A lot had changed. Damn, I miss this show.
agree....spontanaety (sp) was an important part of radio. Voices are now pre-recorded which means you have the chance to go over if you don't like what you said or how it sounded.
@@OptimusWombat That is because Toronto fans support the nonsense. Just like Detroit Lions fans do! Though I am done watching sports due to the pandering for Black Lives Matter. Let them kneel for criminals and pander to Marxists all they want! I refuse to support woken BS.
"It's not the plus and minuses that count, it's the plus and plus, IF the minuses are placed correctly" That's actually great advice in both business and life., take a couple of minuses and place them to equal a plus. One of the things I loved about WKRP, it was a comedy, yes. But it was intelligent as well.
1. I love that the actress playing Mrs. Carlson leaves space for the “number six?” joke to breathe. 2. The randomness of the pointillism painting on the wall.
yeah, this was the series finale. WKRP was finally gonna be a success, and she needed a tax shelter that would lose money. I really wish they would have done more seasons, this show was awesome..
Can you explain the tax shelter? I get a business can write off losses, but wouldn't it be cheaper never to buy the company in the first place? How would a company net a profit from writing off losses?
@@mattm7798 It works when said company is part of a larger conglomerate owning multiple businesses. Assuming that the net losses from the "loser" divisions of the conglomerate do not exceed to a great extent the profits from the "winner" divisions, the resulting losses can be claimed for deductions that in the end add up to a larger overall post-tax profit, either through the writeoffs or by pushing the conglomerate into a slightly lower bracket as a result.
@@jumblejumbo Except it is not fraud. The law does not require that you run a business to guarantee a profit from its operation, and it does not disallow changes in how a business is run. To establish fraud, it would be necessary to produce evidence that assets were being deliberately hidden, that false records were being kept to mask asset concealment, that false tax deductions were being claimed, that the business was not delivering the product promised to its customers or the general public. You would have to establish intent, which is in itself extraordinarily difficult, particularly if the decisions and actions of the business owners can be explained as perfectly legal operations and logical consequences of said operations --- such as changing the broadcast format of a radio station, for example. Now, a grey area can be said to exist when one or more divisions of a conglomerate are being used in a scheme to lower the conglomerate's overall tax burden or to garner windfalls from losses. But so long as tax law (which itself is ever changing and is the reason why whole armies of tax lawyers are perpetually kept on retainer) allows loopholes, allows the recovery of business losses through the tax code, and nothing which is actually illegal is being committed, then the actions of, say, Carlson Industries are held to be above-board and in compliance with the law.
Hessman was just brilliant in every scene he was in. WKRP was a great example of just how good tv used to be back then- shows that developed characters over time and got their audiences invested in them, who they were and what they did. They got their audiences the best way there is- through good writing, good casting and faith in both. Now if something isn’t an instant hit, it’s gone. WKRP, Cheers, Seinfeld, Taxi- all iconic groundbreaking shows that are remembered and quoted and totally unable to be duplicated today because they wouldn’t have had a decent chance today.
I wholeheartedly agree. I'm so freaking sick of these cookie-cutter corporate stations with hack DJs who laugh at their own jokes, play the same 300-400 songs over and over again, and bombard you endlessly with little blue pill commercials where they repeat the phone number six times. With the exception of a few local radio stations that are real gems, radio today is a vast wasteland of mediocrity.
My Wife's Brother worked for a radio station in Jackson, Ohio. So I can relate to this show. It would have been on longer if they had left in one time slot.
Have you not seen Trading Places, then...? Or Back to school, where Rodney Dangerfield takes a business class when he's HAD a very successful business for many years. So, he's arguing with the professor on the realities of business. Lol.
I hadn't seen this in years, but as soon as Andy and Venus entered, I remembered their lines and instantly broke out laughing, even before they said them.
THINK WHAT YOU LIKE ,neither Jan Smithers nor Loni Anderson could touch Donna Douglas. WKRP never shot to number 1 staying there for 2 years straight, the giant jack rabbit episode STILL HOLDS THE RECORD FOR SINGLE NON SPORT NON FINALE EPISODE EVER
It’s one of the very few shows that never jumped the shark. It was brilliant its entire four year run. Its cancellation was a travesty then and it still baffles me.
Hey, Fever was in a GREAT movie with Rainn Wilson called The Rocker. He plays a bus driver. Took me only 5 times watching it to catch it in the credits.
We still have a local rock station in Breese Illinois. I believe it's all locally owned. All the commercials are local. Great station. The play the old hits but dig down deep in the album for more obscure songs. WDLJ 97.5
You guys need cooler call letters, tho...Chicago had WLUP the Loop and WDRV the drive (not nearly as good, still up there) WDLJ doesn't quite slide off the tongue, right? Lol
This was one of the things I used to watch on TV in the UK that made me want to work in Radio. And I'm still at it, nearly 40 years later. Some of us never learn, do we... 😱😂📻🎧🎙️👍
This show is so sacred to me, I can't watch the reruns because the music was such a huge part of this show and they inserted a bunch of nondescript, nameless garbage music so they wouldn't have to pay royalties to the bands that were featured on the show. If I were in a classic rock band, I would consider it a fucking honor that I got to be a part of this show, but that's just me I guess.
Not so much. I watched an interview and they were saying the first year they couldn't use music but by the second on they had record companies and artist beating down their door to get music on the show.
This show was from a time where the tv could actually deliver a good well written story. Hey Hollywood writers of today, if you want to look to the past for something to steal from try looking here and try looking at the script writing skills they had.
Bein an audiophyle meself, I LOVED WKRP !! I LOVED it's quirky characters, I LOVED it's KOOKY plots. And BAILEY PORTERS was a HOTTIE !!! YES even hotter than Loni !! And who could fergets Ness Lessman and his CHA WHUA WHUA and Chi CHI Roddigras !!! AWESOME SHOW EH !!
I miss the days when a radio station was locally owned and employed local DJ’s that cared about the music and the community.
It was a joyous day when iHeartMedia declared bankruptcy.
I was very, very fortunate to work at a family owned station, well actually, group of stationd, which has been number one in our market for at least 30 years.a wonderful atmosphere.
Yeah, before the age of "playlists."
A horse with No Name tell me about it! I can think of one particular St. Louis station that had a proud history...now just a memory. They had a noteworthy T.V. station as well which suffered a similar zombification.
When this series came on I was 13 and the next year I was 14 and in a local (medium at the time market) AM radio station (860 on the dial) doing a once the week gig. I loved this show and one time I called them on the telephone to tell them they were not doing something right as DJs do it differently and what stuck with me since then is they answered the phone as WKRP in Cincinnati. Good show at the time before syndication made them (due to costs) remove the real music and replace them with nonsense.
Moral of the story is: Don't f*ck with someone who has nothing to lose. Proud of ya' Johnny!
Lol..WTF is WRONG with you? It's just a TV show
@@BAKER22-l4u You mean this wasn't a documentary??? I never knew!
@@BAKER22-l4uIt was a documentary with a laugh track.
RIP HOWARD HESSMAN you will be missed
I never missed it. WKRP was one of the best shows ever written.
And what's funny is all the classic ones were from season 1
Gary Sandy in those jeans! The hair!
Excuse me, I need a moment...
Atticus it was real like the movie FM.
And perfectly cast. =^..^=
Beats Green Acres. I mean, really Green F Acres :(
Rest in peace: Dr.Johnny Fever. Booger
Scenes like this are why I purchased the entire 4 years of the original WKRP on DVD’s. I wanted to be able to physically hold all 80 plus episodes of this gem of a series. The cast will live with me until the day I die.
Jc, does the library have it? You can request they buy it, just for the record. So to speak. Lol
I too have the entire seasons, love this show!
Likewise, bought the box set on DVD years ago. I've only ever bought one other box set of a TV series - Kolchak Night Stalker...and WKRP. They don't make shows like these anymore.
You too, Michael?
;)
This was the end of the series. Shame.
As a DJ in the 70s & 80s,I totally got this show.It was right on,created by a guy that was in the business.Most stations were owned by people with bigger companies & used radio as a tax write off & didn't care about ratings or the incomes of the people that worked there,so they either changed the format or closed them.That's how I lost my last radio job.I went through a lot of the situations they did in this show & applaud the creators for showing what radio stations were like then(and probably now).
"used radio as a tax write off..." like major league sports teams
Town to town, up and down the dial ... you didn't get into breeding guard dogs, though, did ya?
Nothing nearly like this can be found anymore on broadcast TV. The characters, dialog, situations and imagination were matchless. Touching, funny, personal, and outlandish as well. One of my all time favorites. Rip WKRP.
I know a lot of people go on and on about "Cheers" and "Taxi" but I never liked them, much preferred "WKRP" and "Wings".😁🎭🛩
@@jerikropp6394 Beauty is in the eye of the beholder...for me, all 3 are great memories. Not so much for Wings.
Today's TV shows suck...
Show was so brilliantly written, with actors that delivered things perfectly. Amazing program.
RIP Johnny...2022...All that kinetic energy!!!!!!!!!!!! Miss him already...
Doctor Johnny Fever has left the booth. Rest in peace.
WKRP was an example of life imitating art. The Network treated the TV show the way Carlson''s mom treated the station.
I saw an interview with Frank Bonner and he said him and the cast didn't even know what night the show was on thank to CBS
I believe WKRP would've been better without CBS
It was a huge shock when WKRP got canceled. No one saw it coming. I was 16 in 1982 and everyone I knew watched this show: all my friends, parents, grandparents, teachers and on and on. It really was a show that had something for everyone. It could be really hilarious, and be really hard hitting. The show stands out in my mind was when Venus Flytrap refused to have his picture taken for promotional purposes, and it seemed bizarre because you would think he’d love that. It turned out he had run away from the military because he was so traumatized by what he’d seen and done in Vietnam.
I loved this show and was very disappointed when it was canceled.
@night rider No, they were live turkeys until they hit the ground.
nobody saw it coming…except anyone who saw the ratings tumble
@@bostonrailfan2427 The ratings tumbled because CBS kept moving its timeslot to help as a lead-in to less popular sitcoms. In fact I recall reading an interview with one of the cast members and they noted that by the last season even they didn't know what day the show was on. Unfortunately WKRP was a victim of its success.
I can understand why he did that. Even if his "father " didnt....😂
So Johnny Caravella - who was 'saved' by WKRP - ends up saving WKRP.
This - to me - was WKRP at it's best...both serious and funny at the same time.
For those who don't know, this was the second last scene in the last episode of the series.
Booger...
Then came the two seasons in the nineties of the syndicated *The New WKRP in Cincinnati* series. It wasn't as good as the original. But it didn't suck either until they got desperate for ratings. And brought in the old cast as guest stars.
Ah. Part of why it was cancelled. I had heard that 'Dr. Johnny Fever' or Howard Hessman had expressed some views that got TV execs panties in a bunch, so they dropped the show. It never recovered. Sad.
Really. Thanks for the information. She was awful.
RIP Howard Hesseman - aka Johnny Caravella
She was also very right about the direction AM radio was taking. Now if she wanted her son to feel like a success she could have split WKRP into two: WKRP-FM for the rock music, WKRP-AM for the talk format
Oh, if we we were only allowed to be funny again!!! Think how much happier we would all be, despite the way the world is today!
I miss these shows
The butler killed me every time, he was never afraid of her
RJ 1999 he was so awesome. Made me love the show even more when someone had to go visit Mother Carlson. 😂
Hirsch, played by the veteran character actor Ian Wolfe (who appeared twice in Star Trek, more famously as Mr. Atoz the librarian in "All Our Yesterdays") and one of those figures in movies and television who always seems to be somewhere between 50 and 200 in age going back even to the 1940s.
Like Robert Guillaume as Benson on Soap.
Mr. Atoz.
Hirsch was a Genius. Late Actor Ian Wolfe
I have been in radio broadcasting over 30 years. I have been at stations in several states and formats. Live local radio has and will always be the way to go.
Tell us why, radio stations play the same songs, over and over, daily..even ones who play the oldies??? It's no wonder people make their own playlists.
@@janetduncan87 As a former radio broadcaster at a small, live/local station hub, I can tell you that it's because of money. Sure, payola is illegal, but commercials are king. And people don't want to pay for commercials when no one is listening. So, how do you get them to listen? Pay for the right to play the "most popular" songs and play them every hour and make sure that people who listen to that garbage also hear the advertisements so that they, in turn, go buy that crap so the people buying advertisement time have to pay more to have their ads played because people are buying their crap. Management isn't going to pay for the right to play a song that won't help the sales department sell air time so you hear the same songs played over and over again every day.
@@Drakijy I have to "like" your comment, that doesn't equate to my wanting it to be true : (
Remember when people used to listen to the radio to hear the new stuff? The same people that would sit with their cassette players on pause until AFTER the DJ ceased talking & then played it back for friends? Even here in Japan it was the same. I miss the old days of radio
@@janetduncan87 Don't get me started on that! LOL There's an "independent" station in Utica, NY, that prides itself on that. But they sound exactly like the rest of the FM stations anywhere you go. I'll turn FM off and put on AM, even with the static.
Too bad it's on it's way out. And I also was in the biz...the best days are behind us.
RIP Dr. Johnny Fever🙏🏿🕊️
Frank Bonner died last month and I only found out because I looked it up today. But still, the main cast has done a great job of staying alive. Gordon Jump died long ago but he was older than the others, and of course Carol Bruce (Mama Carlson), who was already in her sixties when this show aired. But there are six members of the main cast still living. That's pretty good for a show that started over 40 years ago.
Don't forget the original Mrs. Carson in the first 2 episodes
And we lost another a couple days ago. The Doctor is out. 😢
For four years, it was a cold war between Andy and Mama Carlson, with Andy managing to outmanoeuver Mama at nearly every turn when she tried to interfere with the station. Even when Andy managed to derail the unionisation effort, at Mama's behest, his cooperation came at a heavy price to put in improvements and better the working conditions. At last, at long last, she had Andy right where she wanted him, was about to screw up the station so it could become a huge tax write-off, and here it's Johnny who gets Mama over a barrel by threatening to expose the old bat to her son. One of my favourite Johnny Fever scenes in the whole series.
I’m tired of your crud
@@greedyd5524 "I've got four things to say to you. Number two..."
c. 1:15 Gotta love Hirsch. Ian Wolfe was such a great character actor.
Hirsch is one of the best WKRP Minor recurring characters.
Hirsch was comedic gold. Only a few appearances, he wasn't even introduced until late Season 3 I believe, but he made the absolute most of every moment he was given.
He steals the show every time!
I just realized that Hirsch may have been the inspiration for the character Woodhouse on Archer!
@@rogermurph101 Good call!
Ian Wolfe and Carol Bruce were a great comedic duo in this show.
The best series ending ever. Classic stuff, no vulgarities needed, just good clean comedy.
Nothing beats Newhart, but this was excellent. Also Mary Tyler Moore finale was right up there.
That is one of my all-time favorite lines when Johnny says that "this is so warped that even I get it".
I was fortunate to work for a radio station that was locally owned. I started in radio in the late 80's, and can say that I was one of the last group of announcers that spun vinyl.
I miss the human touch in modern radio
@@hauntedhouse7827 Radio lost their special touch when they took away that.
I got to spin vinyl for a college station back in the 80s. Got back into the game about ten years ago as a sales rep, but quit two years later because closing sales just isn't my thing. A lot had changed.
Damn, I miss this show.
agree....spontanaety (sp) was an important part of radio. Voices are now pre-recorded which means you have the chance to go over if you don't like what you said or how it sounded.
I swear this is how the Toronto Maple Leafs are run.
Detroit Lions are run the same way.
Cleveland Browns for sure.
The Leafs suck on the ice, but they're one of the most profitable NHL franchises.
@@OptimusWombat That is because Toronto fans support the nonsense. Just like Detroit Lions fans do! Though I am done watching sports due to the pandering for Black Lives Matter. Let them kneel for criminals and pander to Marxists all they want! I refuse to support woken BS.
@@mrg8581 edgy.
Missed the best part of the scene Hirsch" it is Dr Johnny Fever isn't it?" Johnny "yes" Hirsch " madam your physician is here"
I remember that, "oh Fever its you?"
🤣🤣
HIRSCH! Phone!
_marches in, twists phone around, marches out_
"It's not the plus and minuses that count, it's the plus and plus, IF the minuses are placed correctly"
That's actually great advice in both business and life., take a couple of minuses and place them to equal a plus. One of the things I loved about WKRP, it was a comedy, yes. But it was intelligent as well.
Not a bad description for an unintuitive concept.
The earliest finance lesson I ever received.
How does this actually work? What are the actual mechanics of it?
1. I love that the actress playing Mrs. Carlson leaves space for the “number six?” joke to breathe.
2. The randomness of the pointillism painting on the wall.
I bet it was ad-libbed!
And 2:32-2:38 Johnny trying not to laugh.
😍 Loved the show. RIP Dr. Fever. 😢
Gordon Jump played Arthur Carlson perfectly. It is so funny to watch his fuddled ways as the head of the station.
This scene is one of my absolute favorites of this show.
I STILL remember it clearly even before I watched the video.
Such pleasant nostalgia.
Gordon Jump had such timing. Dead pan. Fantastic.
johnny fever is so smart even though he never looks it
You had to figure that he had been in multiple markets and figured out how everything worked.
@@pauljohnson3340 He's been there, done that. Real world experience can beat college education many times.
@@JrGoonior Johnny went through Princeton once. In a car. A police car ....
yeah, this was the series finale. WKRP was finally gonna be a success, and she needed a tax shelter that would lose money. I really wish they would have done more seasons, this show was awesome..
Can you explain the tax shelter? I get a business can write off losses, but wouldn't it be cheaper never to buy the company in the first place? How would a company net a profit from writing off losses?
@@mattm7798 It works when said company is part of a larger conglomerate owning multiple businesses. Assuming that the net losses from the "loser" divisions of the conglomerate do not exceed to a great extent the profits from the "winner" divisions, the resulting losses can be claimed for deductions that in the end add up to a larger overall post-tax profit, either through the writeoffs or by pushing the conglomerate into a slightly lower bracket as a result.
@@jumblejumbo Except it is not fraud. The law does not require that you run a business to guarantee a profit from its operation, and it does not disallow changes in how a business is run.
To establish fraud, it would be necessary to produce evidence that assets were being deliberately hidden, that false records were being kept to mask asset concealment, that false tax deductions were being claimed, that the business was not delivering the product promised to its customers or the general public. You would have to establish intent, which is in itself extraordinarily difficult, particularly if the decisions and actions of the business owners can be explained as perfectly legal operations and logical consequences of said operations --- such as changing the broadcast format of a radio station, for example.
Now, a grey area can be said to exist when one or more divisions of a conglomerate are being used in a scheme to lower the conglomerate's overall tax burden or to garner windfalls from losses. But so long as tax law (which itself is ever changing and is the reason why whole armies of tax lawyers are perpetually kept on retainer) allows loopholes, allows the recovery of business losses through the tax code, and nothing which is actually illegal is being committed, then the actions of, say, Carlson Industries are held to be above-board and in compliance with the law.
@@jumblejumbo You can write off 100% of your losses. When you make money you only get to keep about 50%.
I remember the quote, "More news... with Les Nessman."
Who is this 'Ness' guy that nobody wants much to do with?
kenneth gomberg how about when Less mispronounced Chi Chi Rodriguez,s name.?
@@lilorbielilorbie2496 Terry howute
@Ken Lompart I think it was WKRP with more music and Les nessman
kenneth gomberg He won the Buck eye News Hawk Award and the Sliver Sow and invented eye witness weather
I still remember looking forward to watching this show as a kid.
The greatest moment in television explaining the truth about profit and loss in big business.
Gordon Jump was so great! The entire cast was perfect.
Hessman was just brilliant in every scene he was in. WKRP was a great example of just how good tv used to be back then- shows that developed characters over time and got their audiences invested in them, who they were and what they did. They got their audiences the best way there is- through good writing, good casting and faith in both. Now if something isn’t an instant hit, it’s gone. WKRP, Cheers, Seinfeld, Taxi- all iconic groundbreaking shows that are remembered and quoted and totally unable to be duplicated today because they wouldn’t have had a decent chance today.
Smartest thing Johnny ever did!
I counted myself fortunate to have ridden out the 'good old days' of radio before it got the Corporate America Enema ('92-'02).
I wholeheartedly agree. I'm so freaking sick of these cookie-cutter corporate stations with hack DJs who laugh at their own jokes, play the same 300-400 songs over and over again, and bombard you endlessly with little blue pill commercials where they repeat the phone number six times. With the exception of a few local radio stations that are real gems, radio today is a vast wasteland of mediocrity.
@@pcbacklash_3261 Exactly!
The acting is spectacular in this scene.
I agree. Mrs. Carlson knows that if her son finds out that she set him up to fail, he will cut her out of his life.
Similar plot point of "Slapshot" with Paul Newman. Good stuff.
I have the WKRP First Annual Turkey Toss t-shirt. One of my favorite episodes!
Johnny Fever, ",BOOGER!!!".
Peter K 😂😂😂😂
Yeah, when I saw ‘Format change ‘ I thought it would be that episode.
"And by the way, fellow babies...... BOOOGER!" That was a ringtone on my phone for over a year.
It's the phone cops!
This was a great show. Does anyone recall the episode where they dropped frozen turkeys for Thanksgiving.
that was smart tv. i miss those days. it's amazing how much things have changed.
I think _30 Rock_ had some of it.
this is the last show. a pretty good episode
My Wife's Brother worked for a radio station in Jackson, Ohio. So I can relate to this show. It would have been on longer if they had left in one time slot.
We didn't get to see enough of Mrs. Carlson's butler. I'll bet the stress of working for that woman aged him so much he looked 80 but was actually 40.
Dr. Fever, Reverend Jim .... Characters like that can't be anymore. Too politically incorrect.
As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly!
Hessman should have won an Emmy, just for this one scene
It is such a fantastic program. Two words; "Phone Cops!"
thanks for the upload. this show was so awesome back in the days of when real sitcoms were funny.
So deeply warped even I understand
That Episode was to Priceless. 👌👌
Mama Carlson knew if her son knew of her scheme, he would never forgive her.
I remember the 'turkeys' episode, even now it brings a smile to my face
She looked pissed when she heard a mother's love. LOL
The doctor ruled.
This was the best lesson on economics I ever had.
Have you not seen Trading Places, then...?
Or Back to school, where Rodney Dangerfield takes a business class when he's HAD a very successful business for many years. So, he's arguing with the professor on the realities of business. Lol.
Carlson's mother was one of my favorite characters. I've always wondered if Mom from Futurama was a nod to her.
Sad that the last episode was the best ever in the series, it was EPIC!!!
There just aren’t any shows like this anymore. Except last man standing.
I liked The Big Bang Theory. Intelligent and clever.
@@windsofmarchjourneyperrytr2823Sheldon was way too whiney!!!
Great show, very funny. I loved watching it.
One of my favorite episodes as a kid
Rip to both hugh Wilson and Gordon jump from the show
And Mama Carlson
This was one of the first shows to explain how the rich get richer, Tax free.
WKRP was the "Network" of TV shows.
WELL SAID
This was an awesome show back in the day.
It still is. Totally great show.
Carol Bruce always got it perfectly right in every scene and dialogue!!! Amazing! And Howard Hesseman always got me feeling real!
My favorite part of this was definitely when Andy and Venus walk in
I hadn't seen this in years, but as soon as Andy and Venus entered, I remembered their lines and instantly broke out laughing, even before they said them.
02:27 Perfect reaction by Carol Bruce. Just great!!!
I watched every episode of this show last year on MeTV...then they replaced it with the Beverly Hillbillies, which was a total bummer.
Green Acres. Pure garbage-the dumbing down continues.....
Yeah WKRP was a way better show then either one of those
THINK WHAT YOU LIKE ,neither Jan Smithers nor Loni Anderson could touch Donna Douglas. WKRP never shot to number 1 staying there for 2 years straight, the giant jack rabbit episode STILL HOLDS THE RECORD FOR SINGLE NON SPORT NON FINALE EPISODE EVER
Dr. Johnny Fever--my 2nd favorite smart weirdo. After myself of course.
It’s one of the very few shows that never jumped the shark. It was brilliant its entire four year run. Its cancellation was a travesty then and it still baffles me.
God, I loved this show.
Such a great show.
One of the best tv shows in history, if not the best. The writing got better and better and better each season.......
I loved that show. What a great cast!!
Good writing. Good acting. Fun show.
Hey, Fever was in a GREAT movie with Rainn Wilson called The Rocker. He plays a bus driver. Took me only 5 times watching it to catch it in the credits.
Mrs Carlson is exactly the way corporate America is.
We still have a local rock station in Breese Illinois. I believe it's all locally owned. All the commercials are local. Great station. The play the old hits but dig down deep in the album for more obscure songs. WDLJ 97.5
You guys need cooler call letters, tho...Chicago had WLUP the Loop and WDRV the drive (not nearly as good, still up there)
WDLJ doesn't quite slide off the tongue, right? Lol
This was one of the things I used to watch on TV in the UK that made me want to work in Radio. And I'm still at it, nearly 40 years later. Some of us never learn, do we... 😱😂📻🎧🎙️👍
This show is so sacred to me, I can't watch the reruns because the music was such a huge part of this show and they inserted a bunch of nondescript, nameless garbage music so they wouldn't have to pay royalties to the bands that were featured on the show.
If I were in a classic rock band, I would consider it a fucking honor that I got to be a part of this show, but that's just me I guess.
It’s not the bands it’s the holders of the publishing rights, which in many cases are not the bands.
@@boataxe4605 Tho the songwriters always gets paid...lol.
I LOVE the Dogs by Pink Floyd clip.
Gripping music, isn't it?
Do you hear dogs barking?
I do.
They're good.
"It Came Out of the Sky" by Creedence for the flying turkeys episode!
Not so much. I watched an interview and they were saying the first year they couldn't use music but by the second on they had record companies and artist beating down their door to get music on the show.
Forgot about the butler he was always Hilarious
WKRP was a great show! Still fun to watch!
Howard Hessman was awesome in this series.
This show was from a time where the tv could actually deliver a good well written story. Hey Hollywood writers of today, if you want to look to the past for something to steal from try looking here and try looking at the script writing skills they had.
Using the station as a tax write off. That was what Maddie Hayes was doing in “Moonlighting”. It was also the subplot of “Slap Shot”.
And ‘Major League ‘.
@@boataxe4605 No, in Major League the owner wanted the team to finish last so she could break the lease in Cleveland and move to Miami.
Rob Edin Correct, I was alluding to the fact that she wanted the team to lose money, not the reason why.
@@robedin6626 Not just finish last, but have the Indians play so poorly, that hardly anyone in Cleveland would come and watch them.
Howard Hesseman was one of the greats.
What an incredible show!
I got fired when I discovered this exact thing from a station in ME owned by a real estate guy from NYC.
Madam, your physician is here, then Johnny walks in
RIP Dr. Johnny Fever!
Bein an audiophyle meself, I LOVED WKRP !! I LOVED it's quirky characters, I LOVED it's KOOKY plots. And BAILEY PORTERS was a HOTTIE !!! YES even hotter than Loni !! And who could fergets Ness Lessman and his CHA WHUA WHUA and Chi CHI Roddigras !!!
AWESOME SHOW EH !!
I still remember the Thanksgiving episode with the turkeys. Never laughed so hard in my life.
As God is my witness....I thought turkeys could fly.