Second City Television (SCTV) - "Backstage" - WNAC-TV (Complete Broadcast, 9/16/1977) 📺

[@katenunyabizness9221]

So nice to see Harold in front of the camera! You are missed and thank you for sharing your talents with us.

[@SybilKibble]

May he rest in peace. Egon is my favourite Ghostbuster.

[@tkaye2]

The "Focus" PSA at 25:40 could pass for another SCTV skit! There's a WNAC newscast from '78 that has an electronic theme using the same notes as the "Up and Coming 7" jingle. I think the whole package, visuals and music, was a very catchy campaign. Some of the instrumental backing sounds vaguely similar to the "New Day Dawning" campaign used a few years later after the change to WNEV. Makes me wonder if it was the same composer.

[@OofusTwillip]

This is from the earliest season of "SCTV", which was made at the Global TV studios, in Don Mills (a suburb of Toronto, Canada). The cast would spend their days at Global, doing "SCTV", then would be driven by taxi to the Old Firehall on Lombard St. in downtown Toronto, to perform the nightly stage show, followed by the improv set. On top of all that, they'd write "SCTV" in rented office space, a few doors away from the Old Firehall.

[@wmbrown6]

Don Mills was also home to the headquarters (and, from 1971-88, pressing plant) of Columbia/CBS Records of Canada, Ltd. The contours of their LP's and 45's were identical to those of the U.S. Columbia label's Santa Maria, CA plant.

[@monicamattox72]

WOW what a GREAT background story...thanks for posting...all of them are amazing... :)

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

Monks live in a monkery, pigs live in a piggery, adults live in Don Mills ...

[@darringraham2613]

Thank you for the upload, back when tv was fun and from a time that is no more and some of the changes were for the better and some not so great 👍✌❤

[@christophermiller3031]

My friend, you are casting yourself a shadow with such thoughts "back when"

[@stevewik2280]

Seeing this reminds me of something I've tried to explain to others. SCTV was a creature of its time and can never be as funny as it was then simply because the humor synergized so beautifully with the real commercials and promos that surrounded it. They made SCTV funnier and SCTV made them funnier. I have all the DVD sets and even a complete set from people's personal VHS recordings with all the real world commercials and promos removed and it's just a shadow of its former self. Gotta view it with original commercials intact to really experience it correctly.

[@OofusTwillip]

This "SCTV" theme is "The Dance of the Hours", by the comedy band Spike Jones & His City Slickers. The first "SCTV News" sketch is from the Second City stage show. The earliest seasons of "SCTV" have quite a few sketches from the stage shows.

[@royalsfan]

The first season, mostly. You can also tell they're working on a threadbare budget.

[@OofusTwillip]

​@@royalsfan LESS than a threadbare budget.

[@FuzzyMemoriesTV]

Yep - and during the open of “Sunrise Semester” - another Spike Jones except from his version of William Tell Overture.

[@wmbrown6]

@@OofusTwillip - Much like a lot of the local programming on RKO stations in the U.S. RKO General was notoriously tight with a buck in terms of the operations of their TV stations. Joe Franklin, who was a mainstay on WOR Channel 9 in New York from 1962 to 1993, spoke of being in one corner of the cramped studio at the heart of Times Square (and another time when the elevator didn't work and Franklin - stuck inside with director Otto Preminger - never got to tape the show) while "Romper Room" was being taped in another corner and the newscasts (with Tom Dunn and Sara Lee Kessler) in yet another corner. I've read in various places RKO also operated WNAC on a less than threadbare budget, especially in its last years of owning the station before they were stripped of their license and sold the station to New England Television in 1982. During the early half of this season, WOR had a videotaped ID (shown half the time in a scratchy color kinescope) which coordinates were copied directly from WGN Channel 9's "Last Farewell" ID. To date, it has not been shown on YT in its original color state. On another tangent, it surprised me that WSNS Channel 44 in Chicago never ran "SCTV" in first-run, despite that station too being run pretty much on the cheap (outside of the sports teams' games they carried), that in the Windy City from the start it was in the "big leagues" via WMAQ Channel 5. Can you imagine how Don Ferris or Linda Frost would promote "SCTV" with their stentorian announcing styles?

[@wmbrown6]

The "SCTV News" anchors' names are plays on two actual Canadian "news presenters," Lloyd Robertson (for Floyd) and Earl Cameron (for Mr. Camembert). But in terms of their personae, Eugene Levy generally drew from legendary Buffalo news anchor (WKBW Channel 7) Irv Weinstein; given that Joe Flaherty grew up in Pittsburgh, I've oft wondered if his characterization of Floyd was modeled largely after that city's legendary anchor Bill Burns, plus a few others including Adam Lynch.

[@samanthanickson6478]

love SCTV!! there’s commercials too? yay!!!!

[@tkaye2]

The guy who did the voiceover on the Boston kindergarten PSA is also heard on the 1970 WFLD sales reel. I think the vocalists (at least the female one) on the "Up and Coming 7" campaign song are the same ones that did the XETV "Olé!" jingle.

[@richardrykala925]

Damn never saw that """WHITE BUFFALO""" never even heard of it, got to check it out. SCTV much funnier than SNL, have a couple of their episodes.

[@jamesc8259]

It’s actually a pretty good movie. I’ve watched it a few times

[@richardrykala925]

Johnny La Rue ,John Candy funny as hell🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@wmbrown6]

Have to wonder if the character name was a play on exercise guru Jack La Lanne, despite the LaRue character being anything but.

[@chrisballas3356]

​@@wmbrown6I would say most likely yes.

[@mr1000Cent]

This is a weird and interesting find, being born in 1980, I always associated WNAC as channel 64, a UHF station, and eventually, a FOX affiliate (granted, the offices were located in Massachusetts, but always figured it was a Rhode Island station, until I guess they got bought a couple of times, and eventually moved). A lot must have happened between 1977 and I would assume, 1985.

[@wmbrown6]

The current WNAC on Channel 64 is of no relation to this Channel 7. The owners of that station named it after the old Boston station.

[@monicamattox72]

& then Johnny La Rue UPSTAGES Dr Sigmund Freud and His wife played by Catherine O'Hara..a TOTALLY classic brilliant piece of SCTV pure hilarity nearly PUKING with laughter...OMG :)

[@billrtomison4440]

I think the section of “Dance of the Hours” that’s reversed is a vast improvement. Even Dave Thomas taps his pencil on his lips right in time with the (“revised”) music!!

[@mrkrinkle72]

This was the month I started Kindergarten, now I'm 51 years old! Arrrrgh!!

[@theloyalorderofclassictv5435]

The half-hour series eventually moved over to WSBK-TV 38 in Boston for either the 2nd or 3rd half-hour first-run syndicated season.

[@NEPatriot]

Leif Jensen would continue to be channel 7 Boston's voice even after its 1982 switch to WNEV-TV.

[@richardgadberry8398]

Nice to see Bruce Feinstein on "Morning Semester."

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

BE THERE!

[@KylaByte]

OJ!!! hahaha!

[@miss_anne_thropic_]

Double the OJ, OJ selling OJ.

[@donstaples4812]

Is that Melanie Chertoff in the Dristan commercial?

[@kengeorgejones6855]

Yes.

[@richardgazinia5482]

Yes. I recognized her voice first. This is about 3? years before Fridays.

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

Shuah!

[@Legend813a]

5:54 Again THAT wouldn't fly today. No sir no sir.

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

I think you mean No miss no miss

[@db9692]

I need some linguisa, stat!

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

"You're right! I need help. HELP!"

[@jaelepke]

I couldn't tell if 14:25 was an SCTV bit or not at first

[@DanConroy78]

SCTV. The Canadian SNL.

[@ModMokkaMatti]

Vastly superior to the American't product that was being shoved down our throats.

[@Foxonian]

Think this was back when RKO-General still owned Ch.7 before they were forced to sell it due to some kind of issue with the FCC.

[@wmbrown6]

The "issue" the FCC had was with RKO General itself.

[@randalls9822]

I could go for a glass of TreeSweet OJ right now....maybe not from OJ 😮

[@theloyalorderofclassictv5435]

Who is/was this Steve Albert?

[@m.r.e.5731]

OJ!!!

[@jbvideos6605]

2:55 Linguiça: like kielbasa, but Portuguese

[@dominickdirienzo8266]

4:06, Moe Green needs to find a new line of work.

[@vashtikelly6837]

wow oj was good looking and talented, did he fuck hs life up....

[@OofusTwillip]

Johnny LaRue's girlfriend is played by Monica Parker.

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

She complained that he was gay.

[@stump182]

I wish we knew who any of these people were. 😀

[@Censoredbyfscists]

They were big back In the day. Alot of people know the well.

[@OldBittyGrandma]

I know them all!!

[@RideAcrossTheRiver]

_SCTV_ is hugely popular. You're just new to the planet.

[@cyrysvonnachtseite4546]

The Spike Jones opening theme