Presenting ... without context "Love Boat" clip

[The Big Ragu]

As a kid, we were allowed to watch the Love Boat, but not Fantasy Island. Also, after we got cable, mom somehow got MTV pulled.

The Saturday night ritual when I was 9, 10, 11:

• My mom and my two older sisters would settle into our tiny den to watch The Love Boat. ... (I can still see the ugly plaid pull-out couch in my head).
• I wanted to watch ANYTHING except The Love Boat, and my mom always did a, "Fair enough. Let's take a vote."
• I would lose the Bolsonaro-style vote 3 to 1.
• I'd sulk for an hour while they feasted on their girl porn.
• The episode would wrap up, and they would clear out of the den, leaving me alone to watch TV by myself.
• Fantasy Island would come on, and even though I knew better, I'd start watching.
• There would always be one "scary" fantasy. ... Tattoo would end up being chased by hostile natives in canoes, Roddy McDowell would show up randomly as the devil, a woman who wants to know Jack the Ripper's identity goes back in time and is about to become one of his victims, various episodes with haunted houses, possessed teen-aged girls, nightmares with maniacal cackling, etc. ...
• I'd be frozen to the ugly plaid couch scared out of my mind as the episode unfolded.
• My mom would come in at around 10:30 to roust me and send me to bed, "You're still up?!?!?"
• I wouldn't get the resolution of the fantasy (usually Mr. Roarke showing up in a motor boat to save someone from sure death) and I'd have nightmares.

I'm convinced all of my psychological issues to this day can be traced to The Love Boat and Fantasy Island.

 

[poindexter]

I'm the same age demographic as a lot of you olds. Our family didn't watch Love Boat regularly and certainly not Fantasy Island. I think we were a CBS family. MTM and the Carol Burnett show I think.

It certainly doesn't seem like we were missing a ton.

 

[DanOregon]

Carol Burnett bowed out in the spring of '78 - there might have been one season where they overlapped. And even then CB was on at 10

If I was a celeb - I'd tell my agent if they wanted me - it would be when they are filming on an actual cruise - though I wonder if that would be irritating since I'm guessing there would be regular people on board as well.

 

[The Big Ragu]

I don't think the other networks even bothered trying to put on anything competitive opposite Love Boat and Fantasy Island; kind of like ABC's Tuesday night lineup with Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, Three's Company and Taxi.

You had CHiPs on NBC for the hour before The Love Boat came on. ... I am pretty sure Welcome Back Kotter was on ABC opposite half of CHiPs, at least for a while.

 

[Driftwood]

I don't think you could make The Love Boat today because the production cost would be so high. I don't know if all the weekly guest stars were technically A-listers, but they were certainly well-known.

 

[Sam Mills 51]

The 1970s and early 1980s were full of cheese and the Love Boat was the ultimate in cheese.

Oh no ... there was plenty of cheese. But "Love Boat" was Limburger melted on a hot engine block.

 

[BTExpress]

I'm the same age demographic as a lot of you olds. Our family didn't watch Love Boat regularly and certainly not Fantasy Island. I think we were a CBS family. MTM and the Carol Burnett show I think.

It certainly doesn't seem like we were missing a ton.

CBS ruled in the early 1970s, but MTM ended in 1977, Carol Burnett in 1978, and ABC became a juggernaut and took over the ratings for the first time with, in addition to LB and FI, Kung Fu, The Six Million Dollar Man, Wonder Woman, Starsky & Hutch, Charlie's Angels, The Bionic Woman, Battlestar Galactica, Three's Company, Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, Soap and the newsmagazine 20/20. And this was all as they were setting ratings records with Roots. They could do no wrong for a while, it seemed. NBC, meanwhile, was in some wasteland.

 

[Songbird]

Welcome Back Kotter

Better than any of the shows mentioned in your post.

 

[BTExpress]

Possibly. Everything ABC touched turned to gold.

 

[DanOregon]

And yet, Fred Silverman bailed on ABC, got a big gig at NBC and gave us Supertrain and Hello, Larry. Silverman also built the bulk of CBS's juggernaut in the 70s. Perpetrator of the Rural Purge

 

[poindexter]

NBC was even the loser on the Battle of the Network Stars, when Robert Conrad lost the challenge race to Gabe Kaplan (the greatest moment of 1970s television, and IMHO the greatest TV moment of all time)

 

[Driftwood]

Apparently 32 Academy Award winners were guest stars on Love Boat.

 

[DanOregon]

Including Kathy Bates, Jamie Lee Curtis, Tim Robbins, Don Ameche and Hanks BEFORE they won.

And the "voice" Ernie Anderson...of "The Looooovvve Boat..."

 

[Bubbler]

Better than any of the shows mentioned in your post.

Questionable. Kotter aged really poorly.

 

[The Big Ragu]

Maybe. But Gabe Kaplan has aged beautifully.

 

[Songbird]

Questionable. Kotter aged really poorly.

Possibly but it's still the #1 American TV theme song of all time.

 

[DanOregon]

Better than "The Love Boat?" (lyrics by Paul Williams, Music by Charles Fox) - but really isn't the theme a rip job of Love's Theme by Barry White.

 

[Huggy]

Ah, what might have been.

 

[Songbird]

Someone mentions MTM here and this pops up in my FB feed ...

 

[User 149557]

got a big gig at NBC and gave us Supertrain and Hello, Larry.

You’re making those up. Those sound like Troy McClure roles.