TFTP's Monochrome Monday: "Our Miss Brooks" from CBS (May 20, 1955)

Posted to YouTube by user 'balsamwoods'
Length - 22:04

TFTP's Monochrome Monday brings you a classic black & white TV program or clip every Monday morning to kick off the week....

Like many early TV shows, "Our Miss Brooks" started out as a radio program (in 1948) and then was adapted for TV (in 1952). The radio and TV versions ran simultaneously then until both left the air in 1957. Eve Arden starred in both versions as Madison High School English teacher Connie Brooks. Arden was surrounded by a supporting cast made up of staff members and students of Madison High, including Gale Gordon (later best known as Lucille Ball's foil in her 1960s sitcoms) as Principal Conklin and Robert Rockwell as biology teacher Philip Boynton.

The episode above, from May of 1955, shows the dynamic between stuffy Principal Conklin and well-meaning but flighty Miss Brooks. It also is a great example of that perennial sitcom trope--the misunderstanding. Conklin wishes for Madison High to have a new mascot for the school's football team (to show up a rival at another high school); through a misunderstanding stemming from having received only part of a note from Conklin, Brooks ends up getting him a different mascot than he had in mind.

TFTP Late Night: "The Tonight Show" w/ Steve Allen, premiere episode from NBC (Sep. 27, 1954)

Posted to YouTube by user 'CatThatHasNoName'
Length - 1:48

"The Tonight Show", now hosted by Jimmy Fallon, has a long and venerable history of over 60 years, less than half of which now was hosted by the "King of Late Night" Johnny Carson. The program's first host, from 1954-1957, was comedian Steve Allen. For the inaugural "TFTP Late Night" post, which will periodically highlight programs from the late-night daypart of TV, we bring you this short clip from Allen's first "Tonight" show on September 27, 1954.

At the very beginning, the program was referred to as "Tonight!" (complete with exclamation point); Allen's tenure later took on the name "Tonight Starring Steve Allen". A late-night network TV program was still a novelty when "Tonight!" went on the air--the only previous attempt was the short-lived "Broadway Open House" in 1950-51. This explains Allen's joking in this clip about the theatre "sleeping" 800; people were not used to watching TV at that hour.

Although not evident in this clip, much of the structure of the late-night TV talk show was established by Allen during his "Tonight" stint, including the desk, the monologue, comedic sketches, interviews with guests, and musical numbers. We do see here Allen's easygoing manner and sharp wit, which helped him to establish the late-night talk show as a durable television genre.