Not-Laugh-In Looks at the News

Producer George Schlatter and comedians Dan Rowan and Dick Martin combined to put Laugh-In on the air. After a rather unpleasant split, both sides tried to recreate it. And not very successfully.

Schlatter revived the show for the 1977-78 season with an all-new cast, including Robin Williams. Meanwhile, Rowan and Martin signed a deal with ABC to develop a weekly comedy series starting January 12, 1976—but a week before, asked out of their contract.

Why? George Maksian of the New York News wrote at the time it was because the network changed its mind about another Rowan and Martin venture.

One of the regular segments on their old show was “Laugh-In Looks at the News,” with an opening musical number, followed by (at least in the early years) phoney headlines and sketches based on news of the past, present and future. Rowan and Martin decided to rework the concept and took it to ABC.

Here’s the Associated Press talking about it in a wire story dated October 22, 1975.

TV News Funny Stuff Set by Rowan-Martin
By BOB THOMAS
Associated Press Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) – Is the nation ready for a weekly Rowan and Martin review of the news? Rowan and Martin think so, ABC heartily agrees, and the network will present the pilot show Nov. 5.
"Two years ago we couldn't have done a show like this," says Dick Martin, the basset-faced zany of the comedy team. "Watergate was still going on, and people were too uptight to laugh at the news."
"Now the timing is just right," agrees Dan Rowan, the smooth straight man. "We're coming into an election year, the Fords are doing things you can make jokes about, and the Democrats are funnier than ever."
"The Rowan and Martin Report" next month will set the pattern for a series expected to reach the ABC network in January. Both comics and producer Paul Keyes declare it will be unlike anything television has ever seen before.
Does that sound like show biz hyperbole? Perhaps. But eight years ago all three were saying the same thing about their new show "Laugh-In," and their prediction turned out, to be true.
"When we went on the air with 'Laugh-In,' critics tried to compare it to early Ernie Kovacs, 'Hellzapoppin' or whatever, but it bore no relationship to anything that went before," says Martin. "Nor will the new show."
Rowan, Martin and Keyes bristled at the suggestion their show might resemble "That Was The Week That Was."
"TW3 used sketches to satirize the news," explained Keyes. "It was a failure because it had an Englishman (David Frost) telling us what is wrong with America, and the principal target of the sketches was President Eisenhower, whose popularity was 65 per cent in the polls. Besides, the show wasn't funny.
"Our show will have no sketches, no music, no laugh track, no guest stars, nothing but funny stuff about the news done the way television normally handles the news."
After their enormous success with "Laugh-In," Dan and Dick kept a low profile in television.
"It would have been ridiculous for us to do stand-up comedy routines on variety shows," said Rowan, 53. "Except for the Emmy show which we did for Paul (who was producing) we've tried to stay off the tube as a team. But both Dick and I like to do the game shows as singles."
Two months ago, the pair and Keyes took their idea for "Report" to Fred Silvermann newly moved from CBS to ABC as chief programmer.
"Fred said he could only give us 20 minutes because his schedule was tight," Rowan recalled.
"Silverman bought the show seven minutes after we entered his office," Keyes added.
Now they're in the process of assembling a team for their show. They were over in Burbank, Calif., of all places, the other day to audition performers at a tape studio.
Unknown actors and actresses from local improvisation theaters and nightclubs trooped before the camera and read gagged-up news items. Out of the candidates may come the future Henry Gibsons, Lily Tomlins, Arte Johnsons and Goldie Hawns.
“We’re looking for people can seem to be newscasters but have a way with comedy,” said Martin, 53. “They will also have to think fast on their feet, because the show will be live, and we may throw in last-minute news items.”

A test episode aired as scheduled. If anyone wondered where Cousin Oliver of The Brady Bunch went, he was hired by Dan and Dick. Robbie Rist, age 12, was the show’s TV critic and wrote his own material. 11 writers were hired and the show was taped only 24 hours in advance to be current. Keyes told the Gannett News Service prior to the broadcast there would be five reporters, but didn’t name them. He described the segments at “Rumor Corner,” “Man in Washington,” “Statistics,” and “Names in the News.”

As for the reviews, Percy Shain of the Boston Globe proclaimed “It’s all pretty static and not very funny. Sometimes, in its ethnic shots, it’s rather tasteless. Nothing emerged to stick to the memory, except for those flushing numbers at the bottom of the screen, which revealed that while the show was on the national debt increased $3 million. There’s certainly nothing humorous in that.”

But Win Fanning of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette called it “a sure winner,” adding “The fast-paced, up-to-air-time combination of actual news stories and inspired, witty commentary recaptured the best of the ‘Laugh-In’ excitement—without being in any way derivative.”

John J. O’Connor of the New York Times also approved. “[T]he two comedians and a small but choice cast of funny people commented on a wide range of current events, from President Ford’s latest press conference to Jacqueline Onassis’s new $200-a-week job in book publishing. ‘The Rowan and Martin Report’ brought some badly needed topicality and nice lunacy to the battered concept of ‘family hour’.”

Jay Sharbutt of the Associated Press was concerned about the stupidity of viewers: “What with its realistic-looking anchorman’s set, its joshing and its reporter who is seen across the street from the White House, ‘The Rowan and Martin Report’ is a frightening prospect for TV. People might mistake it for a local nightly news program.”

And what did George Schlatter think? He told the New York Daily News “It will make things better for me if I want to do ‘Laugh-In’ again.” He stayed away from a direct comment about the content.

But maybe Freddie Silverman’s golden gut couldn’t stomach what he saw. He passed on finding it a January time-slot, so Rowan and Martin went from potentially two shows to none at the start of 1976. Ironically, Schlatter's effort at ABC a few years earlier, Turn On, lasted one show as well.

Jump ahead 40 or so years to an era of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert. Maybe Dan Rowan and Dick Martin were way ahead of their time.