REEL WILD CINEMA (1996-1997) – This program is still beloved by us fans of Psychotronic movies and the So Bad It’s Good subculture. Reel Wild Cinema helped feed America’s growing appetite for bizarrely awful cinema, an appetite most recently whetted back then by Joel Hodgson’s Mystery Science Theater 3000.
If, like me, you also enjoyed The Incredibly Strange Film Show hosted by Jonathan Ross, Reel Wild Cinema blended elements from both shows plus all the Movie Host programs from the 1950s onward.
Reel Wild Cinema‘s 1-hour runtime wouldn’t let the creative team show and mock entire films like MST3K did, just tightly edited highlights from them, anticipating the videos of countless internet movie critics of the future. Reel Wild Cinema didn’t riff constantly on the bad movies being shown, just before and after commercial breaks like old-time Movie Host shows.
Similar to Jonathan Ross’ Incredibly Strange Film Show, Reel Wild Cinema also aired interviews with many cult figures from fringe cinema as well as campy trailers for vintage Golden Turkeys. Also like the Jonathan Ross show, Reel Wild Cinema featured an animated opening accompanied by catchy theme music. Continue reading
ALL THAT GLITTERS (1977) – With the syndicated late-night soap opera satire Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman becoming a cultural phenomenon in the 1970s, Norman Lear launched this oddball, self-consciously “adult” program which added a touch of parallel world sci-fi stories to the soapiness. 
Want to see women running the business world and men serving as secretaries while getting ogled and sexually harassed? This show’s got it! Want to see a tuxedo-clad groom carrying flowers and walking down the aisle toward his intended bride? This show’s got it! 
It is such a waste that so few installments of National Educational Television Playhouse are available despite video copies still being in their archives. For six years, N.E.T. Playhouse offered up some of the most interesting, profound and innovative productions from around the world. That 1966-1972 run puts what passes for educational television today to shame. 
HAMILE (January 15th, 1970) – A Ghanaian adaptation of Hamlet written by that nation’s Joe C. De Graft and performed by actors from the National Theatre of Ghana. 
YESTERDAY THE CHILDREN WERE DANCING (February 26th, 1970) – A 90-minute CBC drama about the 1964 terrorist attacks in Canada launched by Quebec Separatists and plans for further attacks during the federal elections. 
THE CAPTAIN AND TENNILLE (1976-1977) – Balladeer’s Blog’s recurring Forgotten Television posts look at the variety show hosted by the musical duo called the Captain and Tennille. The pair were married in real life and their full names were Toni Tennille and Daryl Dragon. Since “Captain Dragon” sounds like a superhero, the recording partners just went by the Captain and Tennille. 
NANCY (1970-1971) – With I Dream of Jeannie having finished its final season, creator Sidney Sheldon launched his new series Nancy, about the 21-year-old daughter of the incumbent U.S. President finding love with a small-town Iowa veterinarian. Would it complete a sitcom Hat Trick for Sidney and be as successful as his previous Patty Duke Show and the aforementioned I Dream of Jeannie? Not a chance. 
Renne Jarrett starred as First Daughter Nancy Smith, a pretty young lady living in Center City, IA. Nancy stayed with her guardian and chaperone Abby Townsend, played by the one and only Celeste Holm. 
A MAN CALLED SLOANE (1979) – Robert Conrad, often called the ultimate man’s man, was famous for several television series over the decades, especially The Wild Wild West and Black Sheep Squadron. Here is a look at his modern-day spy series from 1979, the last Quinn Martin Production. 
Sultry Michelle Carey, daughter of MacDonald Carey and a veteran of many Wild Wild West episodes herself, provided the voice of EFFIE, the supercomputer at UNIT headquarters. Dan O’Herlihy played UNIT’s director. 
HAWKINS (1973-1974) – Before Matlock, there was Hawkins! The iconic Jimmy Stewart starred as Billy Jim Hawkins, an aw-shucks country lawyer who was really shrewd and calculating behind his stammering, Good Ol’ Boy facade. 
Hawkins rotated with Shaft, which starred Richard Roundtree reprising his big screen role as private detective John Shaft (but a John Shaft who couldn’t be as violent or profane as he was in the movies, of course).
HEADMASTER (1970) – Andy Griffith had left the streets of Mayberry behind him to take on a new leading role in this short-lived comedy-drama. Griffith played Andy Thompson, Headmaster of the Concord School, a top-tier private academy in California. 
The star had expressed his pleasure at getting to play an urbane academic rather than a country bumpkin for once. Headmaster was shooting for the same appeal boasted by Room 222, another half-hour series that mixed high school comedy with drama. 
GRIFF (1973-1974) – The one and only Lorne Greene starred as Wade “Griff” Griffin, a former police captain who becomes a private investigator. Ben Murphy played Mike Murdoch, who was McCormick to Greene’s Hardcastle. 
To me and presumably any other trivia buffs Griff is must-see tv. The guest stars and behind the scenes figures were a virtual Who’s Who of American television’s past and present. Before I get to that, let’s look at the fate of the program’s TWO pilot movies. 
AGATHA ALL ALONG SCREWS UP BIG-TIME – Hey, I enjoyed the song Agatha All Along from WandaVision back in 2021 as much as anybody, and I was initially curious about what Kathryn Hahn would do as the star of an 
I could see it being used for pilot stories about 
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