1980s nostalgia Archives - Retro Reminiscing Video and Pictures

NEWHART: THANKSGIVING FOR THE MEMORIES

Remember when Thanksgiving episodes were part of our regular television watching?

On November 24, 1986, Newhart gave us a Thanksgiving episode that still makes me laugh today.

Throughout the entire episode, Dick Loudon was looking forward to one thing: carving the Thanksgiving turkey!

He talked about it, anticipated it and even bought special carving knives for the occasion. You could tell this was going to be the highlight of his Thanksgiving.

But nobody told Larry, Darryl and Darryl!

The celebration began at the mansion of Stephanie’s wealthy parents before everyone eventually ended up at the Minuteman Café.

When Dick’s big moment finally arrived, instead of letting him carve the turkey, the brothers simply tore it apart with their bare hands!

After spending the entire episode looking forward to carving that bird, watching Bob Newhart’s reaction was priceless.

Here’s something I didn’t know. This was actually Newhart’s 98th episode, directed by J.D. Lobue, and it originally aired on CBS at 9 PM on Monday, November 24, 1986.

The episode was written by David Mirkin, who later became an executive producer of The Simpsons.

Larry was played by William Sanderson, while Tony Papenfuss and John Voldstad played his almost completely silent brothers. The two Darryls finally broke their silence in the show’s 1990 finale.

And remember that wonderful opening music? It was written by Henry Mancini, the composer of The Pink Panther theme.

Newhart ran from 1982 to 1990, ending with one of television’s greatest surprises when Suzanne Pleshette appeared beside Bob in bed, revealing the Vermont adventure had apparently been a dream.

But I’ll always remember Dick spending an entire Thanksgiving episode looking forward to carving that turkey, only to have Larry, Darryl and Darryl ruin his big moment in seconds!

Do you remember this Thanksgiving episode?

#Newhart #BobNewhart #Thanksgiving #LarryDarrylAndDarryl #ClassicTV #1980sTV #1986 #TVNostalgia #HenryMancini #TheRetroSite

FREDDY KRUEGER HAD A 900 NUMBER — AND THE PHONE BILL WAS THE REAL NIGHTMARE!

Remember when you could call your favorite celebrities on a 900 number? Well, back in the late 1980s, you could even call Freddy Krueger!

That’s right. Dial 1-900-909-FRED and Freddy would entertain you with his horrifying bedtime stories.

Of course, it wasn’t free. The first minute cost $2, and every additional minute was another 45 cents.

Imagine explaining THAT phone bill to your parents!
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I did some digging and discovered there were actually several Freddy hotlines. Some offered scary stories, others had trivia challenges, and one promotion even offered a chance to appear in a future Nightmare on Elm Street movie.
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And Freddy was everywhere back then. The original 1984 movie cost about $1.8 million and made more than $25 million at the American box office. By 1988, Freddy even had his own television series, Freddy’s Nightmares, which ran for 44 episodes.
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The man behind the glove, Robert Englund, had an interesting career before Freddy. He played Willie, the friendly alien on V. Talk about going from one extreme to another!
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And that creepy music from the original movie? It was written by Charles Bernstein, who helped make Freddy’s world almost as frightening to listen to as it was to watch.
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Today we can watch all sorts of horror videos on our phones for practically nothing. Back then, you paid by the minute just to have Freddy tell you a bedtime story.
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Did you ever call Freddy’s hotline — or any of those old celebrity 900 numbers?
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#FreddyKrueger #NightmareOnElmStreet #RobertEnglund #FreddysNightmares #900Numbers #1980s #1980sNostalgia #VintageCommercials #HorrorMovies #HalloweenNostalgia #RetroTV #ClassicHorror #TheRetroSite

Only Vincent Price Could Make a VHS Tape Sound Terrifying

Only in the 1980s could Vincent Price sit in a creepy castle and convince us to buy blank VHS tapes by telling us he wanted to clean our heads.
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This 1985 commercial was for Polaroid videocassettes, and the funny thing is they weren’t advertising a separate VCR head cleaner.
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Polaroid actually claimed its regular videotapes helped keep your VCR heads clean while you played them.
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Remember when dirty VCR heads were actually something we worried about?
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Using Vincent Price was perfect casting. Just a couple of years earlier, millions of younger viewers had heard that unmistakable voice at the end of Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Price recorded that famous narration in only two takes.
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And 1985 was also the year he became Vincent Van Ghoul on The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo.
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What I always find interesting about Vincent Price is how much more there was to him than horror movies. He studied art history, became a serious art collector and helped build the collection that eventually became the Vincent Price Art Museum.
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He even spent years helping Sears select original artwork that ordinary customers could buy in their stores.
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Price was also a gourmet cook and co-wrote A Treasury of Great Recipes with his wife Mary.
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But put him in an old castle, light a few candles and let that voice loose, and suddenly even a blank VHS tape became creepy.
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And apparently it cleaned your head, too.
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Do you remember Polaroid selling VHS tapes?
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#VincentPrice #Polaroid #VHS #VHSTapes #VCR #1980s #1985 #VintageCommercials #RetroCommercials #ClassicHorror #Thriller #MichaelJackson #1980sNostalgia #HomeVideo #TheRetroSite

Would Kids Today Take a McDonald’s Gift Certificate — or Trick Your House?

To me, a gift certificate was delayed gratification on Halloween night. By the time my parents got around to bringing us to McDonald’s back then, it would probably be summer and the gift certificate would have been long forgotten.
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This commercial is from 1986, when McDonald’s was selling books of 20 Halloween Gift Certificates for just one dollar. Instead of another candy bar, you could hand a trick-or-treater a certificate that could later be exchanged for a soft drink.
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Twenty treats for a buck sounded like a great deal for the person answering the door. I’m just not sure how exciting it was for the kid standing there with a bag full of candy they could eat that night.
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What surprised me is how far back the idea goes. McDonald’s was offering Halloween gift certificates at least as early as 1973, so this had already been around for years by the time this commercial aired.
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And 1986 was also the year McBoo, McPunk’n and McGoblin made their debut — those plastic Halloween pails that probably created a lot more immediate excitement than a coupon for a future soda.
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Here’s the really surprising part: McDonald’s still does a version of the idea today. Participating restaurants continue to sell Halloween treat coupon packs, although now the coupons can be good for things like hamburgers, cones, apple slices and drinks.
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Maybe kids today would be more patient than I was.
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But on Halloween night, I wanted the candy.
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How about you — would a McDonald’s gift certificate have been a treat, or a disappointment?

SEARS IN ITS HEYDAY — “THERE’S MORE FOR YOUR LIFE AT SEARS”

Believe it or not, Sears has an early online-shopping story that deserves a report all by itself. I’m working on that one. But for now, let’s go back to Sears during its heyday.

If you were watching football on a Sunday, it seemed like you were guaranteed to see a Sears commercial somewhere along the way. And that memory actually has some history behind it — Sears was buying advertising around NFL broadcasts as far back as the 1970s, including ABC’s NFL coverage and CBS NFC games. By 1981, an NFL executive said the first 32 pages of the Sears Christmas catalog were NFL merchandise.

This commercial comes from 1983, and watch how much Sears manages to squeeze into 30 seconds. Cheryl Tiegs and fashion. Winnie-the-Pooh for the kids. A big stereo. Lamps and home furnishings. Craftsman tools. It’s not really a commercial for any one product — the product is Sears itself.

And then there’s that jingle:

“There’s more for your life at Sears.”

You heard those few notes and immediately knew what was coming.

Cheryl Tiegs was especially important to Sears in this era. She had launched a Sears clothing collection in 1980, and the company used her in its catalogs and television commercials to shake off some of its old-fashioned image. By 1984, TIME was writing about a revitalized Sears, with its catalog reaching roughly 12 million homes and the company operating more than 800 stores and thousands of catalog-sales locations.

And Sears was enormous. In 1984 it reported a record $38.83 billion in revenue and $1.45 billion in net income. This was still the retailer Americans measured everybody else against.

I think that’s what makes this commercial hit differently today. Sears wasn’t trying to convince America that it mattered.

Everybody already knew it did.

Do you remember shopping at Sears — and did Sunday football immediately make you think of that jingle?

When Tippee-Toes Tiptoed Into Trouble

Leave it to the early 1980s to give us a controversy over a baby doll’s bare bottom.

Mattel’s Tippee-Toes was one of those dolls that was supposed to look cute, innocent, and lifelike. She could crawl, and like a lot of toy commercials from back then, the ad was aimed right at kids sitting in front of the TV, probably during cartoons or family programming. But then came the part that got people talking: the commercial showed the doll’s little bare backside.

That may sound pretty tame today, but back then one viewer found it offensive enough to complain to David Horowitz, the consumer advocate best known for Fight Back! with David Horowitz. Horowitz was the guy people turned to when they felt a product, commercial, or company needed to be called out. He built a career on standing up for consumers, testing products, and bringing viewer complaints into the spotlight.

The issue even made its way to The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson in 1982. Horowitz appeared on Carson and discussed the Tippee-Toes commercial, reportedly showing both the original ad and the changed version after complaints were made. It was one of those perfect Johnny Carson moments where something small, silly, and strangely serious all came together on national television.

Looking back, it feels almost impossible to believe this was a controversy. We grew up with talking dolls, creepy ventriloquist dummies selling chocolate milk, clowns selling cereal, and commercials that would probably send today’s internet into a panic. But a baby doll’s bare bottom? That was enough to get a consumer advocate involved and Mattel’s attention.

It’s a funny little reminder of how much TV, advertising, and what people considered “offensive” has changed over the years. Tippee-Toes was just trying to crawl across the screen, but somehow she crawled right into consumer TV history.