Reviews
The Uncle Floyd Show (1974)
Not a show for little kids.
Someone told me about this TV show that very underground that was being shown on a UHF station. My friend told me that there were cool bands to see and that it was really a show for adults because of the many dirty and off the cuff jokes that were made. Needless to say, I saw the show and was hooked on it. Part of the show always seem to have Uncle Floyd singing and playing the piano to some song. I used to love it when Uncle Floyd would sing "Pennies from Heaven" and the cast would throw real pennies at him and he would duck while singing. Some of the skits were really off the wall. I remember the skit "The Dull Family", where the cast would dress up as red necks and debate if they should turn on the TV. Just my two cents here, I think that the fascination that so many people had with this show was the bad production. The show in the beginning of it's run had only one camera and it was not uncommon to have something fall down or apart while the cast was doing a skit. As teenagers we would just start laughing at things like that. The fact that it was a NJ show was important as well. Keep in mind that NJ has always had an identity crisis. In northern NJ, we watch New York stations because New York City is not far away and it's news media has always been criticized for not reporting enough on NJ. So to watch a home grown TV show like Uncle Floyd seem to be a special treat. It was like your own underground TV program that you could watch that promoted and made fun of New Jersey. I miss you Uncle Floyd.
Are You Afraid of the Dark? (1990)
Great show...
In the late 1990's, when I was in my late 30's, I was a news junk. If the news was bad for the day, I would surf the channels. This Are You Afraid of the Dark show was awesome. Soon I was watching it everyday at around 5pm. What I liked most about the show was that each episode was unique and it kept you interested through the whole show. There was no real sex or violence, instead there was a really good story line and good acting-something that seems rare today. It was the type of show that you could watch with your kids and not feel ashamed. I really liked the way the story always seemed to wrap up on time at the end of the show and you felt good. Lots of famous and not so famous actors as well made it interesting time after time.
David Niven's World (1976)
I liked this series a lot...
The David Niven Show was an adventure series show. Each week a different adventure highlighting a particular adventurer would be shown. David Niven usually introduced the adventurer and the type of adventure that was to be shown. He would also make a comment about how dangerous the adventure is or how courageous the adventurer is. Before David would talk, the announcer would say something like "...and heres your host: actor, comedian, writer, producer, director, (etc) David Niven." I liked this show because it was the 1970's and the show showed hang gliders and motorcycles, mountain climbers, explorers, etc, which really appealed to me as a teenager. For his age, David Niven looked really good I thought (and that was when I was 17). He had a slim waist. I remember a episode where a guy was driving a motorcycle across a foreign country and the film crew was filming it. This was a typical episode. Most of the content was not original but that of footage that they got from the adventurers and directors. It looked to me like a show that didn't cost a lot to produce. Many of the episodes were similar format to the National Geographic series for that time period. The show would appear on the weekends in the afternoon in the NY metro area. I never went out of my way to watch the show, rather the show seem to come on when ever the network could fit the show in. It always was a pleasant surprise to to me to see the show coming on.