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Second City Television, commonly shortened to SCTV and later known as SCTV Network and SCTV Channel, is a Canadian television sketch comedy show that ran intermittently between 1976 and 1984. It was created as an offshoot from Toronto's Second City troupe.
- Sketch Comedy
The basic premise of SCTV was based on a television station (later a network) in the fictional city of Melonville.
- Sctvhad Five Different Official Titles, None of Which Were SCTV
- The Total Budget For The First Seven Episodes Was $35,000
- Not Everybody on The Show Was Canadian
- One Season Was Taped in Edmonton, and Eugene Levy Wasn’T Happy About It
- Bill Murray Guest Starred in An Episode
- The Cigarette Smoking Man from 'The X Files' Made His TV Debut on SCTV
- ABC Thought That The Show Was Too Smart For Them
- Three (or Four) Sctvcast Members Ended Up on The Cast of Saturday Night Live
- The Season Two Writing Sessions Were Very Rowdy
- Sctvand Snlalmost Alternated Time Slots
For the first two seasons, the half hour show was Second City Television. For season three it became SCTV Television Network. To acknowledge the now 90-minute runtime for seasons four and five, it was rechristened SCTV Network 90, then later SCTV 90. For its sixth and final season, and now with 45-minute episodes (with commercials), it was SCTV Cha...
Working with the then-regional Canadian network Global, the show only had $5,000to produce each of the first 30-minute episodes, which were aired one month at a time.
Even though all but one member of the original cast came from the Second City improvisational group in Toronto, there were some comedians from the States. Harold Ramis, season one’s head writer, was born and raised in Chicago, where he performed in that city’s theater. Joe Flaherty was born in Pittsburgh and performed at the Chicago Second City bef...
After two seasons of shooting in Toronto, SCTV was off the air for one year and struggled to find funding or a willing network to keep it going. The city of Edmonton was willing to fund 26 episodes if they taped them at the CBC studios in Alberta. As the Hamilton, Ontario born Eugene Levy explained, “People didn’t want to move to Edmonton because i...
Murray appeared in three sketches on the season four episode “The Days of the Week/Street Beef,” including the fake commercial “DiMaggio’s on the Wharf,” as Joe DiMaggio himself.
Toronto-born William B. Davis was an artistic director and acting teacher before making it as a television and movie thespian himself when he was in his mid-forties. Naturally, he appears in the sketchwearing a suit.
SCTV was almost on ABC. The network's late night decision maker “loved” what he saw of the pilot, but ABC President Fred Silverman overruled him, saying the show was “too intelligent.” Around the time that Silverman made that decision, Time proclaimed in a cover storythat he was a man with a “golden gut” for knowing what American TV audiences wante...
It’s four if you count Catherine O’Hara. O’Hara left SNL after one week in 1981 to go back to SCTV without appearing in an episode of the American show. Robin Duke, who replaced O’Hara for the Edmonton season of SCTV, then replaced O’Hara on SNL. Tony Rosato, who, like Duke, joined SCTV for season 3, followed Duke to New York. Martin Short joined S...
In the summer of 1977, Second City CEO and SCTV executive producer Andrew Alexander rented a five-bedroom house near Bel-Air where Candy, O’Hara, and Levy took up residence. The cast and writing staff wrote season two of the show during the day and partied at night. At one shindig, John Candy kept Chevy Chase in a headlock for 90 minutes, or the le...
While unthinkable now, Saturday Night Live was consistently on the cancellation bubble in the early to mid 1980s, with middling ratings and little support from critics. Meanwhile, NBC picked up critical darling SCTV as a 90 minute show (as SCTV Network 90) in 1981, airing it on Fridays from 12:30-2 in the morning. An NBC Vice President went as far ...
- Roger Cormier
Oct 5, 2010 · In 1973, the Toronto-based Alexander bought Canadian rights to Second City from its Chicago founder for one dollar, its first show opening in February 1974 at The Old Firehall in downtown Toronto. Soon a respected theatrical institution in that city, SCTV grew out of the stage show.
May 11, 2021 · Second City Television, better known as SCTV, grew out of the Toronto branch of Second City, the legendary comedy stage show and organization in Chicago.
Second City Television (SCTV) was a popular comedy television show originating from Canada that ran in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Pulling much of its talent and ideas from the Chicago and Toronto ‘Second City’ comedy venues, the show became an important pipeline for comedians into the mainstream of the US entertainment market.
The premise of the show is the broadcast day of a fictitious TV station (later network) in the town of Melonville. The location of Melonville is left unspecified; the very earliest episodes imply it's somewhere in Canada, though most later episodes place it in the US.
