Antenna TV Request: "Married With Children"

[stevearino]

Dear Sean Compton,

I have a proposal for Antenna TV: to make a deal with Sony Pictures Domestic Television Distribution for Antenna TV to become the exclusive Digital OTA home of the hit 1987-1997 sitcom "Married With Children," showcasing all 262 half-hour episodes of the groundbreaking sitcom classic "Married With Children" 100% Complete, 100% Uncut, AND 100% Unedited, just the way that each episode originally aired on the FOX Television Network.

Created by Ron Leavitt & Michael Moye, "Married With Children" was a hit '80s sitcom which ran for an incredible 10 seasons on FOX from April 5, 1987 - June 9, 1997; the show centered on the Bundy family of Chicago who lived at 9674 Jeopardy Lane: dad Al (Ed O'Neill), a hapless shoe salesman who was unhappily married for 15 years to wife Peg (Katey Sagal), a lazy housewife who almost never cleaned or cooked, with whom he had 2 teenage children: 15-year-old Kelly (Christina Applegate), the blond sexpot who eventually graduated from high school but, despite making a little money as a model, continued to live at home with her parents; and 11-year-old Bud (David Faustino), the sanest member of the Bundy family (which wasn't saying very much), who constantly tried to lose his virginity--which he eventually would.

Living next door to the Bundy family were young newlywed couple Steve (David Garrison) and Marcy (Amanda Bearse) Rhoades, young and gloriously in love until Al began explaining the real world to Steve and Peg did the same thing to Marcy.

The first season of the show was Videotaped at ABC Television Center in Los Angeles, California, after which taping moved permanently to Sunset Gower Studios in Los Angeles in September 1988 before moving once again permanently to Sony Pictures Studios in Los Angeles in September 1994, after Columbia Pictures Television was bought by Sony.

The first season of the show was produced by Embassy Communications, after which the show was produced for Seasons 2-10 by Columbia Pictures Television.

During the 2nd season in Fall 1988, a Michigan housewife named Terry Rakolta (then sister-in-law of future 2012 Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney) allowed her kids to watch an episode of "Married With Children," believing it was a wholesome, typical '80s family sitcom like "Family Ties," "Growing Pains," "The Cosby Show" and other family sitcoms of the era.

Boy, did Terry get MORE than she bargained for! As a result of what she saw, Terry began a Boycott of the show, hoping for it to get cancelled by FOX, but instead, the ratings went through the roof, and "Married With Children" became a bigger and bigger hit and success.

As the years went by, the show eventually became, in September 1991, the first FOX series to enter rerun Syndication, thus earning the show an eternal rerun life forevermore.

During the Fall 1989 TV season, actor David Garrison decided to leave "Married With Children" to resume his Broadway career; to prepare for David's departure, the producers had his character Steve Rhoades spend several months unemployed after losing his job at the bank until the February 4, 1990 telecast when Steve left Marcy to be a Yosemite National Park ranger.

For the rest of that season (and the first half of Season 4 in September 1990), Marcy lived life as a bachelorette until January 1991, when actor Ted McGinley (who previously guest-starred in the Season 3 Hour-Long Christmas episode "It's a Bundyful Life" as Norman Jablonski, the man Peg married in a world where Al Bundy was never born) joined the cast as Jefferson D'Arcy, a man Marcy met and married during a drinking binge who never had a job, living off Marcy's earnings as a banker--truth told, Jefferson was an ex-con, having just been released from Prison (where he served time for blowing up a toxic waste dump) before marrying Marcy.

Ted McGinley stayed with "Married With Children" for the rest of its 10-year run, with his Jefferson D'Arcy character becoming more of an ally for Al Bundy over time than Steve Rhoades, Marcy's prior husband, had previously been.

Several proposed spin-offs over the course of the show's 10-year run on FOX were used as backdoor pilot episodes on "Married With Children," but only one (1991's "Top of the Heap," starring future TV "Friend" Matt LeBlanc as Kelly Bundy's boyfriend Vinnie Verducci alongside Joe Bologna as Vinnie's father, which itself spun off 1992's "Vinnie & Bobby," another sitcom flop, the next year) made it to series--and was a flop for FOX lasting 13 weeks.

In September 1996, after 9 years airing Sunday nights on FOX (initially at 8 P.M. ET as the lead-in to "The Tracey Ullman Show" in its first season, and then in the 2nd season at 8 P.M. ET after "America's Most Wanted" before moving permanently to 9 P.M. ET in September 1989), FOX moved "Married With Children" permanently to Saturday nights at 9 P.M. ET as the lead-in to a new FOX sitcom called "Love & Marriage" (ironically the name of the show's theme song as performed by Frank "Ol' Blue Eyes" Sinatra); whereas "Love & Marriage" lasted just 4 weeks on FOX, "Married With Children" would change timeslots 4 more times before Season's end, initially on Sunday nights at 7 P.M. ET before moving permanently to Monday nights at 9 P.M. ET

On April 18, 1997, 3 weeks after the Season 10 finale was taped, FOX announced the official cancellation of "Married With Children" due to gradual decline in audiences combined with production costs; nobody even bothered telling the cast the show had been cancelled.

In the Hour-Long Series Finale telecast on May 5, 1997 (though an earlier taped episode, "Chicago Shoe Exchange," would air as the de-facto Series Finale on June 9, 1997) titled "How to Marry a Moron," Kelly Bundy became engaged to be married to ex-con Lonnie Tot (Chip Esten); unbeknownst to Kelly and the rest of the Bundy family, the entire Tot family was fickle, filled with serial philanderers: Lonnie's parents (Gordon Jump and Edie McClurg, respectively) had respectively been married 5 times AND had a Boyfriend, while Lonnie had OTHER wives; at Finale's end, Al Bundy called the impending wedding of Kelly & Lonnie off.

Despite its unceremonious cancellation, reruns continue to flourish in Syndication, as well as on various cable networks such as FX, Nick at Nite, TV Land, and most recently TBS.

With Antenna TV's "Married With Children" acquisition, I'm certain that the show will continue to live on forever more; as part of the Antenna TV's "Married With Children" acquisition, I'm suggesting that each and episode be lovingly restored from the original FOX network prints--including the original "Love & Marriage" theme song at the start of each episode (sadly omitted from Sony DVDs from Seasons 2-10) as well as the original Embassy Communications logo from Season 1 and Columbia Pictures Television logos from Seasons 2-10 after Embassy Communications was bought by Columbia Pictures Television.

Sincerely,
Steve Arino