Today in 1969, the premiere of Turn-On, a show that’s legendary in TV History for essentially getting turned off by its network during its first episode.
And this was a show ABC had been pretty excited about.
It was the work of George Schlatter, who had created the innovative and successful series Laugh-In for NBC.
ABC had been struggling in the ratings, so why not try something new?
And Schlatter’s vision for the show was VERY new, and very experimental.
Turn-On was sketch comedy at warp speed- in a half hour you’d see dozens and dozens of little vignettes, most of them with just a line or two of dialogue.
There was virtually no set, just a big white room; instead of having credits at the start or the end, Schlatter and company added them into random spots in the middle of the show; the soundtrack was synthesizer music.
Oh, and in place of an audience or even a laugh track, there were electronic sound effects – Turn-On was supposedly a computer programmed show and the bleeps and bloops were the computer “laughing.”
In some ways it was, to paraphrase the way Schlatter described it, a version of Laugh-In turned all the way up.
But that was also the challenge.
Laugh-In had a late 60s aesthetic, but it still had a lot of the elements of a network TV variety show.
Turn-On had its share of old-school jokes and visual gags, plus special guest star Tim Conway.
But the look and feel was so provocative and unfamiliar, audiences didn’t really know what to make of it.
ABC affiliate stations complained about the many risque jokes; Schlatter says one station manager actually wanted Peyton Place, the show Turn-On replaced, back on the air, so he was calling other stations ahead of time to get them to lobby against the new show.
That station did cut away in the middle of the premiere episode, and when stations on the West Coast heard about the reaction there and elsewhere, they moved Turn-On to a later slot, or just pulled it entirely.
The network canceled the show pretty soon after, and it stayed out of sight for years.
But Schlatter put a couple of the episodes up on YouTube, and the reaction there was, oh, so this is what TikTok might’ve looked like in 1969.
Today in 1974, a big game for a teenage basketball player in Sweden.
Mats Wermelin scored 272 points in a game, which his team won 272 to 0.
So were there other players on the court?
Turn-On’s Turning Point (Tedium)
Facts, Oddments for the Book (Los Angeles Times)
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