SCTV: Канадский скетч-шоу о телевизионной станции

Canadian television sketch comedy show

Second City Television, commonly shortened to SCTV and later known as SCTV Network and SCTV Channel, is a Canadian television sketch comedy show that ran intermittently between 1976 and 1984. It was created as an offshoot from Toronto's Second City troupe. It is a rare example of a Canadian show that moved successfully to U. S. television, where it aired on NBC in 1981–1983.

The show's premise is the broadcast day of a fictitious TV station (later network) in the town of Melonville. Melonville's location is left unspecified; the earliest episodes imply it is in Canada, but most later episodes place it in the U. S.

A typical episode of SCTV presents a compendium of programming seen on the station throughout its broadcast day. A given episode could contain SCTV news broadcasts, sitcoms, dramas, movies, talk shows, children's shows, advertising send ups hawking fictitious products, and game shows. Several "shows" are seen regularly on SCTV, including SCTV News; soap opera The Days of the Week; late night movie features Monster Chiller Horror Theater and Dialing For Dollars; and Great White North (a show centered around two Canadian 'hosers'), among others. Many other SCTV shows are seen only once, such as the game show Shoot at the Stars, in which celebrities are literally shot at like shooting gallery targets, or full blown movie spoofs such as Play It Again, Bob, in which Woody Allen (Rick Moranis) tries to get Bob Hope (Dave Thomas) to star in his next film. Episodes also feature a range of SCTV produced promotions (for imaginary future shows) and commercials, such as spots for "Al Peck's Used Fruit" or "Shower in a Briefcase", or a public service announcement that helpfully describes "Seven Signs You May Already Be Dead". Also seen fairly frequently, particularly in later episodes, are behind the scenes plots focusing on life at the station/network. These often feature Guy Caballero (Joe Flaherty), SCTV's cheap, tyrannical owner and president who, despite being perfectly ambulatory, uses a wheelchair to earn "respect" (i. e., sympathy) from employees and viewers. Also seen regularly are weaselly, sweating station manager Maurice "Moe" Green (Harold Ramis), succeeded in the position by flamboyant, leopard skin clad, foul mouthed Mrs. Edith Prickley (Andrea Martin); vain variety star Johnny LaRue (John Candy); washed up entertainers such as singer Lola Heatherton (Catherine O'Hara) and comedian Bobby Bittman (Eugene Levy); news anchors Floyd Robertson (Flaherty) and Earl Camembert (Levy), talk show host Sammy Maudlin (Flaherty), cult stardom destined and beer addled brothers Bob and Doug McKenzie (Moranis and Thomas), and many others. The small cast, typically six to eight members at any given time, play a wide variety of other station roles ranging from program hosts to commercial spokespersons. They also impersonate numerous popular celebrities appearing on the station's programming.

There is much dispute as to who actually created the SCTV series. The show itself bears no "created by" credit, although it gives "developed by" credits to Bernard Sahlins and Andrew Alexander. In 1974, Andrew Alexander bought the Canadian rights to The Second City for one dollar, and in 1976, he was the producer of Toronto's stage show, and was looking to expand his company into TV. He called together the current cast of the stage show (including Candy, Flaherty, Thomas, and Levy) to discuss a format for a Second City TV series. Also in attendance at the meeting were Second City veterans Harold Ramis, Sheldon Patinkin, and Del Close, along with business partner Bernard Sahlins. According to Dave Thomas's account in SCTV: Behind The Scenes, various ideas were batted around, then — and here is where meeting attendees remember things differently — either Close or Patinkin came up with the idea of presenting programming from the world's smallest TV station. The cast immediately jumped on the idea as a workable model for presenting a virtually unlimited range of characters, sketches, and ideas, while still having a central premise that tied everything together. From there, the actual content of the show (the characters, the situations, the Melonville setting, etc.) was all the work of the cast, with contributions from Alexander and Sahlins. Alexander remained as producer and executive producer throughout SCTV's run. Sahlins stayed for the first two seasons as a producer. Patinkin was a first season writer and de facto editor and post production supervisor. Close had no further involvement with the series.

SCTV was initially produced in 1976 at the studios of the Global Television Network in Toronto, then a small regional network of stations in southern Ontario. For the first six episodes, new episodes were seen once a month. For the next seven episodes (beginning in February 1977, and continuing through the spring of 1977) new episodes were increased in frequency to biweekly. In September 1977, Global ordered 13 additional episodes, which were seen once a week from September through December. These irregularly scheduled 26 episodes (produced over a period of 15 months) were considered one "season" for syndication purposes. All of the original cast except Harold Ramis was from the Toronto branch of The Second City theatre improvisation troupe; Ramis was a Second City veteran, but with the Chicago troupe. The original SCTV cast consisted of John Candy, Joe Flaherty, Eugene Levy, Andrea Martin, Catherine O'Hara, Harold Ramis, and Dave Thomas. All also served as writers on the show, although Martin and O'Hara did not receive writing credits on the first four episodes. Ramis served as SCTV's original head writer, but only appeared on screen as a regular during the first season (spread out over two years). Ramis and Flaherty also served as associate producers. Sahlins produced the show; Global staffer Milad Bessada produced and directed the first 13 episodes. George Bloomfield became director as of episode 14. With the exception of Ramis, every cast member of SCTV worked as a regular performer on another Canadian TV show concurrently with the first year of SCTV. Several (Flaherty, Candy, Thomas, and Martin) also worked together as regulars on The David Steinberg Show, which premiered the same week as SCTV on the Canada wide CTV Television Network and in U. S. syndication. The David Steinberg Show also featured future SCTV cast member Martin Short, but did not use any of the SCTV cast as writers. It folded after a single season. Martin, Flaherty, and Levy were also cast members of the short lived comedy/variety series The Sunshine Hour, which finished its run less than a month before SCTV premiered (and while the first SCTV episode was being filmed). During the first season, Levy was also doing double duty; in addition to his work on SCTV, he was also a cast member of the CBC sketch comedy series Stay Tuned, which aired weekly from October 1976 through January 1977. At the same time SCTV debuted, Candy and O'Hara became regular cast members of the CBC comedy series Coming Up Rosie. This gave Candy the distinction of appearing as a regular on three TV series simultaneously, on three different Canadian networks. For the second season (1978–79), SCTV became a weekly series on Global, and was seen in syndication throughout Canada and parts of the United States. After episode three of the second season, Ramis was no longer in the cast, but continued to receive credit as the show's head writer for most of the season.

In 1980, one year after the Toronto Global television station dropped SCTV due to high production costs, show producer Andrew Alexander negotiated a deal to produce SCTV at CITV facilities, with Edmonton, Alberta broadcaster Charles Allard, owner of the independent station CITV TV and the Allarcom studios. Candy, O'Hara, and Ramis dropped out at this point, and Dave Thomas was promoted to head writer. Added to the cast (and writing room) were Tony Rosato, Robin Duke, and Rick Moranis. Moranis, a friend of Dave Thomas, then known as a radio personality in Canada, was the only cast member not to have come from the ranks of The Second City. John Blanchard became the series director. This season of the show was seen in Canada on the CBC, and in scattered U. S. markets in syndication.

In May 1981, NBC picked up SCTV in a 90 minute format as a presumably inexpensive replacement for the canceled Friday music/variety show The Midnight Special, enabling the show to air nationwide in the United States. This occurred mainly because that network had practically no time to prepare and develop a new American produced program in the light of Midnight Special producer Dick Ebersol's emergency return to Saturday Night Live, which he co created with Lorne Michaels in 1975, in an effort to save it from cancellation, an effort that was successful. SCTV thus functioned as a solution to a serious scheduling bind for NBC, but, as things turned out, it was a temporary fix that only lasted two years. Less than two months after season three ended, SCTV was back on the air for season four, airing first as SCTV Network 90, then as simply SCTV Network, late Friday nights (early Saturday mornings), airing at 12:30 a. m./11:30 p. m. Central. For this iteration, Rosato and Duke dropped out (ending up as cast members of SNL during its rebuilding years following Jean Doumanian's stint as producer [see above]), and Candy and O'Hara returned. Because of the rush to generate material for the 90 minute format, several early season four episodes consisted partially or entirely of sketches broadcast during seasons one to three. Ramis, Duke, and Rosato appeared in many of these sketches, uncredited, with the new American viewers not recognizing them. Season four (25 episodes) was broadcast irregularly from May 1981 to July 1982. Beginning in January 1982, production of the series returned to Toronto for the remainder of its run, ending the year and a half stay in Edmonton. Writer/performer Martin Short joined the cast at the end of season four, taping three episodes before O'Hara, Thomas, and Moranis left; one of those episodes was aired as the season four finale in July 1982; the other two were held for the start of season five (14 episodes), which began in October 1982. For the remaining 12 episodes of season five, the cast of Candy, Flaherty, Levy, Martin, and Short was augmented by supporting players John Hemphill and Mary Charlotte Wilcox, neither of whom became an official cast member. Also, during season five, Ramis and O'Hara returned for one episode each as guest stars. The last original SCTV episode for NBC was broadcast in March 1983, with reruns continuing through June. For both seasons four and five, the show continued to air on the CBC in Canada as only an hour in length, edited down from the 90 minute NBC broadcasts. The 90 minute NBC episodes were released in a series of DVD sets in 2004 and 2005, and selected skits are also available in 90 minute collections.

In the fall of 1983, NBC wanted the late Friday night time slot for the new Friday Night Videos; SCTV, despite its unexpected popularity among younger U. S. audiences, was not a high priority with the network and essentially acted as a placeholder for two years while NBC reevaluated its late night programming strategies. SCTV was offered a slot on early Sunday evenings by NBC (presumably 7 p. m./6 Central), but because the producers would have had to alter the show's content to appeal to "family" audiences (per a 1975 amendment to the Prime Time Access Rule), as well as face CBS's dominant 60 Minutes (against which several NBC shows had failed since the 1981 cancellation of The Wonderful World of Disney), they declined. Instead, for its final season, the show moved to the premium cable channels Superchannel in Canada and Cinemax in the United States, changing the name slightly to SCTV Channel. The running time was now 45 minutes, and new episodes (18 in total) were seen on alternating weeks from November 1983 to July 1984. For this final season, the cast consisted solely of Flaherty, Levy, Martin, and Short, although Candy, Thomas, and O'Hara all made guest appearances. Writer/performers Hemphill and Wilcox once again appeared semi regularly. After the show went out of production, several SCTV characters continued to make appearances on Cinemax, with Flaherty reprising his roles as Count Floyd and Guy Caballero during free preview weekends in 1987 and 1988, and Bobby Bittman appearing in a standalone special chronicling his life and career under the Cinemax Comedy Experiment banner.

On September 5, 1988, ABC aired a one time special called The Best of SCTV. In the special, Flaherty and Martin returned as Caballero and Prickley. The two presented a look back at SCTV (using flashbacks) as they tried to convince the FCC to renew their license. A slightly different version aired in Canada, wherein the pair make their arguments to the CRTC; this necessitated a few changes to certain lines of dialogue and on screen text, but the show content was otherwise identical. This special was ordered during the 1988 Writers Guild of America strike and was not repeated.

The earliest three seasons, in Canada, were 30 minutes. NBC broadcast two seasons of 90 minute programs, including at the beginning material from the Canadian seasons. Some of these 90 minute shows were abbreviated to 60 minutes for the Canadian market. After the end of the NBC seasons, the material was repackaged into 30 minute shows.