Nick at Nite
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Network | Nickelodeon |
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Launched | July 1, 1985 |
Country of origin | United States |
Headquarters | One Astor Plaza New York City, New York, U.S. |
Sister network | |
Original language(s) | English Spanish (via SAP audio track) |
Official website | www |
Nick at Nite (stylized as nick@nite) is a nighttime programming block on the American
Paramount Media Networks, a division of Paramount Global, generally regards Nick at Nite as a separate channel that shares space with Nickelodeon on the channel due to the block targeting adult audiences. Nielsen has reported Nick at Nite ratings separately from Nickelodeon since 2004.[1][2]
History
Early years
In 1984, after the
After being presented with over 200 episodes of The Donna Reed Show (a 1950s sitcom which Laybourne despised), Goodman and Seibert conceived the idea of the "first oldies TV network." They modeled the new evening and overnight programming block on the successful oldies radio format "The Greatest Hits of All Time" and branded the block with their next evolution of MTV- and Nickelodeon-style imagery and bumpers. Head programmer Debby Beece led the team to the name "Nick at Nite" for the new block; a logo originally conceived for the block was based on Nickelodeon's "pinball" logo introduced in 1981, which was discontinued with that network's rebrand. Fred/Alan developed the original logo with Tom Corey and Scott Nash of Boston advertising agency Corey McPherson Nash, creators of the well-recognized Nickelodeon orange splat logo (Nick at Nite's logo design would maintain a separate, yet similar visual appearance and design from its parent network).
Nick at Nite debuted at 8 p.m. Eastern Time on July 1, 1985 as a block on Nickelodeon. Its initial programming (running from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., seven nights a week) was a mixture of sitcoms, movies and one drama series, led by Dennis the Menace, and accompanied by The Donna Reed Show, the offbeat comedy Turkey Television (which, like Dennis, also aired on Nickelodeon), and Route 66. A nightly film presentation, branded as the Nick at Nite Movie, aired at 9 p.m. ET through the end of the decade, and included such classic films as the 1947 film The Red House and the 1937 film A Star Is Born. The same five-hour block of programs originally repeated from 1 a.m. and ran until Nickelodeon began its broadcast day at 6 a.m. Eastern Time. As Nick at Nite grew, it would add to its library of shows – expanding out to rerun sketch comedy, such as episodes from the early seasons of SNL as well as the Canadian series SCTV. It also briefly reran the 1970s mock local talk show Fernwood 2 Night. As the years went by, the channel's sitcom library expanded to over a hundred shows. For the channel's 20th birthday celebration in June 2005, TV Land aired an episode from almost every series that had appeared on Nick at Nite.
By the early 1990s, Nick at Nite began running a full schedule of programming, with overnight hours filled with a mixture of secondary runs of shows airing on its evening schedule and series that were no longer shown on the evening lineup. In 1995, Nick at Nite celebrated its tenth anniversary with a week-long event, in which the channel aired "hand picked episodes" of almost every series that had aired on Nick at Nite since its July 1985 debut. Each episode was introduced with its milestone history, episode number, and pop culture references to the individual program's original run on Nick at Nite. A special tenth Anniversary on-screen bug was shown at the bottom left corner of the screen for 10 seconds once per half-hour show, and was used for the entire 1995 year, much in the same vein as the 20th Anniversary logo in 2005 (in contrast, Nick at Nite did not make any acknowledgment of its 25th anniversary in 2010).
2004–present
In March 2004, Nielsen began splitting up Nick at Nite and Nickelodeon in its primetime and total daytime ratings reports, due to the different programming, advertisers and target audiences between the two services; this caused controversy among executives of some cable channels who believed that this move manipulated the ratings, given that Nick at Nite's broadcast day takes up only a fraction of Nickelodeon's programming schedule.[2] Nickelodeon's and Nick at Nite's respective ratings periods encompass only the hours they each operate under the total day rankings, though Nick at Nite is rated only for the primetime ratings; this is due to a ruling by Nielsen in July 2004 that networks have to program for 51% or more of a particular daypart to qualify for ratings for that daypart.[5]
On January 1, 2007, the coloring of Nick at Nite's logo was changed from blue to orange, in order to match the coloring of Nickelodeon's logo. On September 3, 2007, the network introduced a new logo based on Nickelodeon's longtime "splat" logo, with the orange "splat" formed in the shape of a waning gibbous moon – this effectively integrated the Nickelodeon branding onto Nick at Nite for the first time, as the varied logos that were used from its 1985 launch utilized variants of the Futura Condensed font (the 1984 to 2009 Nickelodeon logo designed by Seibert and Goodman used the Balloon typeface) with various shape backgrounds and a small circle with the word "at" (replaced by an "@" symbol overlaid on a circle background on July 1, 2002 for visual symmetry, owing to the character's building ubiquity from the Internet and eventually into general pop culture) lodged between and staggering the "I"'s. The updated logo debuted in promos on July 1, 2002. However, the Up Next bumpers, station idents, and on-screen bug did not begin using the updated logo until August 2002.
On July 5, 2009, Nick at Nite’s programming hours expanded to begin at 8 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time on Sunday through Thursday nights, while the Friday lineup continued to start at 10 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time (sometimes on Friday nights, it actually began at 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time, or still at 8 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time, but outside of that, the Friday lineup still had a 10 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time start time, until October 2009, when the Friday start time became 9 p.m.) (the Saturday lineup also continues to have a 10 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time start time due to the presence of the long-running Saturday primetime comedy lineup on Nickelodeon). Nick at Nite's times of operation have changed several times over the years, to at one point (between 1998 and 2000) beginning as late as 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time on Sunday through Thursdays and ending as early as 5:30 a.m. Eastern and Pacific Time.
Nick at Nite overhauled its on-air appearance on September 28, 2009, as part of Nickelodeon's rebranding effort – the new logo, also based on Nickelodeon's logo, stylized the network's name as "nick@nite" (rendered as one word in
Programming
Nick at Nite's lineup presently includes reruns of syndicated comedy series from the early 1990s to mid-2010s and movie broadcasts. The block previously had its own exclusively-produced original programs (such as See Dad Run and Instant Mom).
Due to its dependence on sitcom reruns whose cable syndication rights are limited to a
Programming history
Nick at Nite was known as the "first classic TV network," having originally aired older classic television programs from the 1950s through the early 1970s throughout its nighttime schedule. The time range of Nick at Nite's programming has shifted over the years, to the point whereby the early 2000s, its classic series consisted primarily of shows from the late 1970s to the late 1990s, and also included series from the early and mid-2000s by the end of that decade and into the early 2010s. The early success with classic television series, as well as the eventual shift away from series made prior to 1985, eventually led to the creation of
Nick at Nite airs approximately all of its programming in hour-long (and sometimes two-hour) blocks, which were branded under the "Double Takes" banner from 2002 to 2007; typically series that air back-to-back are scheduled in two blocks, one in primetime and one in late night. Also typically, series that have been airing on Nick at Nite for at least three years are often moved exclusively to the overnight schedule in order to make room for newly acquired series (though in the past, entire broadcast runs of a few series such as
Nick at Nite was previously one of the few
On May 16, 2011, Nick at Nite began scheduling programs airing from 11:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. Eastern Time in an "off-the-clock" format, in which the network runs extended commercial breaks of as much as seven minutes in length to allow additional advertising spots (a method that has tense viewer criticism due to the length between the start of each commercial break and the start of the next segment of a program[8]), allowing the programs to be broadcast in a longer time slot each half-hour until 6:00 a.m. Eastern Time, when start times return to a half-hourly format. This format was originated by sister network TV Land beginning in 2010, and has since been taken by other Paramount Global networks including MTV, BET and Paramount Network around the same time as Nick at Nite. The side effect that results from this scheduling and expanded advertising is that one full half-hour of programming is lost, therefore the overnight schedule features only a single episode of one series whereas most other Nick at Nite programs air in double episode blocks.[9]
On June 25, 2012, Nick at Nite began airing Nickelodeon programs for the first time, airing reruns of All That and Kenan & Kel from 9:00 to 10:00 p.m. Eastern Time weeknights. Two weeks later, the two series were replaced with reruns of Victorious, before being replaced by the teen drama/telenovela series Hollywood Heights, which would move to TeenNick halfway through its first (and only) season due to low ratings. Nickelodeon and Nick at Nite currently share the 9:00 to 10:00 p.m. Eastern Time time slot on weeknights.
Movies
In addition to running sitcom reruns, Nick at Nite has also broadcast movies in early primetime; after the 1985 to 1989 run of the Nick at Nite Movie showcase, the channel did not air movies on its schedule again until the summer of 2007, when it aired films each week on Tuesday nights. The channel has aired films occasionally since then, and have begun to air them periodically since February 2010 on Sunday nights, beginning that month with telecasts of the Nickelodeon Movies-produced Good Burger, Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging, The Rugrats Movie, and The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. Additionally, many family-oriented films from other distributors air on the block.
Some movies and special presentations that Nick at Nite aired during 2010 and 2011 had occasionally aired over what is normally Nickelodeon's broadcast time (for example, the February 21, 2010 premiere broadcast of the special School Gyrls aired at 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time, though Nickelodeon typically does not turn over its channel space to Nick at Nite until 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time on Sunday nights), which is unusual as some of these special presentations are aimed at Nickelodeon's preteen target audience; however until May 2010, when the network began promoting its film broadcasts as airing on Nick at Nite, promos for these films did not acknowledge whether they were to be broadcast on Nick at Nite or Nickelodeon (an issue as promos for scheduled primetime films were cross-promoted with Nickelodeon), with the only reference as to the film's airing on Nick at Nite coming from the screen bug that is shown during the film.
Some of the movies Nick at Nite has broadcast in recent years have included the Back to the Future trilogy, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Baby's Day Out, Pretty in Pink, National Lampoon's Vacation, Ghostbusters (and its sequel Ghostbusters II), Jurassic Park, The Nutty Professor, Legally Blonde, The Princess Diaries, and The Parent Trap. Film broadcasts have become more common on Nick at Nite since fall 2012, often airing on a near-weekly basis, typically on Sunday evenings.
Original programming
Nick at Nite has also occasionally broadcast its own programs, sometimes with bizarre and surrealistic results. On December 5, 1987, the channel ran a contest called the Do It Yourself Sitcom Special, which was billed as the first time that real people ever had their own television shows. Viewers submitted their own sitcom ideas and the winner would supposedly get their own show. In 1988, the channel aired a half-hour animated Christmas special from
In the early 1990s, the channel ran a one-time special featuring old television commercials; this idea would be rehashed by the network on several other shows and eventually become a project of a spin-off channel, TV Land, as part of the "Retromercials" segment that aired during commercial breaks until the mid-2000s. Another special aired by Nick at Nite was promoted as a TV dad quiz, in which the host walked through a "typical TV Home," and quizzed viewers at home with trivia about classic TV dad
In 1991, Nick at Nite debuted its own sitcom based around the rerun genre it had developed. The short-lived
In 2017, the network also began to carry episodes of
Marathons and blocks
During the week of Halloween in late October 1990, the network held a special contest, hosted by game show host Wink Martindale, during a marathon of Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Viewers at home were supposed to keep a running total of total number of deaths on the show. At the end of the marathon, the persons who had gotten the correct total were entered into a drawing to win a prize. As Martindale said, "it's kind of like guessing the number of jelly beans in a jelly bean jar, but instead of jelly beans, you're using cadavers!"[citation needed]
When new shows are added to the lineup, they are usually accompanied by some kind of marathon that is sometimes hosted by a star from the show. For instance, when
During the summer months from the mid-to-late 1990s, the channel for a while ran a program block called "Vertivision" (later known as "Block Party Summer"), during which a different series was shown in a three-hour block each night of the week. In its first year, network promos referred to the nights featured in the special lineup as "Mary Mondays" (for
Other seasonal scheduling blocks were also not uncommon such as Christmas-themed blocks during late December, Thanksgiving-themed blocks in November, and Valentine's Day-themed episodes in February. Each New Year's Eve from 1989 to 1998, the channel would host "Nick at Nite's (year) Rerun/Classic TV/TV Hits Countdown" hosted by longtime countdown radio DJ, Casey Kasem. Kasem would spend the period from noon (11:30 a.m. in 1990) until New Year's Day at 12:30 a.m. Eastern Time counting down the 25 "most classic" episodes of the series airing on Nick at Nite at that time as determined by viewers at home, with the #1 episode being aired at midnight.
Another well-known lineup was "A Whole Lotta Lucy" block which ran on Saturday nights from June 4, 1994, to May 3, 1996, which consisted of I Love Lucy, The Lucy Show and The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour, which were all airing on the network at that time (a similar block aired on Saturday nights from 1996 to 2001, featuring only I Love Lucy and The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour). In the mid-1990s, another Saturday night programming block titled "Very, Very Nick at Nite" centered around a different theme each week, such as "Very Very Mary" with four classic Mary Tyler Moore Show episodes. In summer of 2008, Nick at Nite aired a marathon called Battle of the Sexes, which featured episodes of their regular programs that engaged conflict between men and women.
Nick at Nite generally broadcasts a marathon of their programming on holidays (such as the "Luck of the Lopez" marathon of George Lopez that aired on Saint Patrick's Day in March 2008). For two years in a row, in October 2007 and 2008, Nick at Nite broadcast the Shocktober marathon (branded as Shocktober 2 for the 2008 event), featuring Halloween-themed episodes of the regularly scheduled program. Other holidays that the network often features themed marathons include Mother's Day, Father's Day, and Christmas.
On June 17, 2019, Nick at Nite aired a simulcast of the 2019 MTV Movie & TV Awards for the first time, along with many of its sister networks. On August 26, it also aired a simulcast of the 2019 MTV Video Music Awards for the first time. In December 2019, Nick at Nite began airing a marathon of Friends to celebrate the show's 25th anniversary since its finale throughout half of Nick at Nite's regular programming time.
On April 18, 2020, Nick at Nite aired a simulcast of One World: Together at Home, which was simulcast on multiple networks and platforms.
Television specials
Occasionally, episodes of .
On June 17, 2019, Nick at Nite aired a simulcast of the
Branding and commercials
Nick at Nite has used numerous unusual and offbeat commercials, logos and promotions. Alan Goodman and Fred Seibert assembled a team of highly imaginative writers/producers, modeled on their original 1981 creative team that had launched sister channel MTV. The group – which included Scott Webb, Jim Levi, Dave Potorti, Jay Newell, Will McRobb, and Tom Hill – was guided towards creating a series of internal campaigns to emphasize the seeming paradox of a contemporary network setting that programmed reruns from the 1960s and earlier. A series of five "promises" were organized into four 30-second spots each hour, each emphasizing an attribute of the innovative programming format.
In 1986, the channel began running a few different animated 10-second
There were also sarcastic promotions created for shows airing on the network: an announcer's voiceover would discuss the series, accompanied by clips and music, and sometimes the show's theme song. The commercials would use an actor's line or expression and take it out of context to create a new subversive meaning. The channel still uses this technique today, although often in a more partial way. A popular take-off of the
The channel also had a unique way of informing viewers about the show that was about to air next. Beginning as only some of the night's shows and their airtimes being listed as music played over an on-screen graphic, this simple concept would be revised and re-revised many times over. At one point, a television with objects and people from the show scrolling by (for instance, for
A few of Nick at Nite's promos in the early 1990s involved Dixie the TV Land Pixie promoting Nick at Nite "Brand Reruns". During this time, the network would also play an interstitial series called "Milkman," about a milkman who would distribute good advice to customers on his milk delivery route. By 1995, Nick at Nite introduced a new mascot named "Phil". Phil was seen doing several stunts, such as dressing up as a crab during Block Party Summer bumpers. In an ID usually seen when Nick at Nite signed on, Phil was seen working as technician to "try to get Nick at Nite up and running." In December 1996, Nick at Nite introduced twelve network IDs directed by
Nick at Nite received a rebrand in January 1999 (which was used until March 2001) produced by Scott Stowell and Chip Wass (who previously designed a set of CGI IDs for the network in 1996). The rebrand prominently used the color yellow and shades of blue (which became darker overnight). Nick at Nite's IDs at the time typically featured a moving illustration by Chip Wass and either a female voiceover singing a jingle about the network which ended with "Nick at Nite, the place for TV hits" or narration by Bill St. James for overnight IDs.
In March 2001, in an effort to cash-in on the reality-TV boom, Nick at Nite underwent an extensive rebrand with the new theme of "Unreality", with IDs and bumpers featuring clips from actual events then going to clips from TV shows inspiring the events and then ending with the Nick at Nite logo and slogan "100% Sitcoms, 100% Unreality". One bumper used during this era had the slogan "All Sitcoms, All Night Long".
TV Land
On April 29, 1996,
International
Compared to Nickelodeon, the international versions of Nick at Nite are limited, despite the block's success in the United States. Most international versions of Nickelodeon either run as a 24-hour channel (such as Asia) or share space with a non-Nick at Nite channel (such as Germany, which had a version of Nick at Nite called "Nicknight," but replaced it with MTV Plus in 2018, later a timeshift of Comedy Central in 2021). As of 2023, Australia is the only country outside the United States to have a Nick at Nite block.
See also
- Antenna TV – an American digital broadcast network owned by the Nexstar Media Group, focusing on classic television series and movies from the 1950s to 1990s.
- Luken Communications, focusing on classic television series from the 1950s to 1980s.
- MeTV – an American digital broadcast network owned by Weigel Broadcasting, focusing on classic television series from the 1950s to 1980s.
- Cozi TV – an American digital broadcast network owned by NBCUniversal airing classic television programs from the NBCU library, along with programming from forerunner network NBC NonStop.
- getTV – an American digital broadcast network owned by Sony Pictures Televisionairing classic television series (including those from the Sony Pictures library).
Notes
- ^ The logo's wordmark has been used since September 28, 2009; color changed in October 6, 2012. Additionally, this logo is a variant meant for white backgrounds; the main variant has a white wordmark in conjunction with a fully orange splat.
References
- ^ "Nickelodeon Squeezes 2 Ratings Out of 1 Very Diverse Network – Los Angeles Times". Articles.latimes.com. 2004-03-25. Retrieved 2012-10-24.
- ^ a b "Nielsen's 51% Solution Nixes Nicks | Cable Television News | Broadcast Syndication | Programming". Multichannel.com. 2004-07-19. Retrieved 2012-10-24.
- ^ Gerry Laybourne: Oral and Video Collection Interview, archived from the original on 2021-12-21, retrieved 2019-09-15
- ^ "Toledo Blade Television Programming Guide". news.google.com. June 28, 1985. Retrieved 2019-03-17.
- ^ "Content | Cable Television News | Broadcast Syndication | Programming". Multichannel.com. Archived from the original on 2011-08-09. Retrieved 2012-10-24.
- ^ YouTube
- ^ BET Bails On Infomercials, MediaPost', July 1, 2002,
- ^ Viacom Loads More Ads on Channels, The Wall Street Journal, August 26, 2012.
- ^ Nick at Nite Adding That '70s Show in June 2011, Buffy Finally Scheduled on TeenNick; The Hub Adds Jem, Sitcoms Online, May 23, 2011. Retrieved May 24, 2011.
- ^ "On the Television" (1990)
- ^ Schneider, Michael (2008-05-05). "Nick at Nite integrating 'Family' TV". Variety. Retrieved 2013-09-30.
- ^ Bianculli, David, "Oldies Net Loaded with Goodies"; New York Daily News, March 19, 1996
External links
- Official website
- Nick at Nite at the Wayback Machine (archive index)