Ten Awesome Sitcom Intros from the 80s and 90s
YouTube is likely the apex for time-wasting and pointlessness our culture will ever achieve. Twitter, Facebook, and a whole slew of other narcissistic time sinks are charging hard, but when seeking to achieve absolutely nothing, connecting with absolutely no one, and going absolutely nowhere outside your fart encrusted desk chair for hours on end, nothing beats YouTube.
I’ve watched Keyboard Cat play off hapless schlemiels more times than I can count. I consider that “Boom Goes the Dynamite” Guy a close personal friend after our many hilarious late night Internet rendezvous.
But lately, even though there’s a whole world out there to explore and I have a ton of shit to do besides, YouTube has sucked me back in and I find myself watching the opening themes from cheeseball ‘80s and early ‘90s sitcoms. Here are my 10 current favorites.
10. Mr. Belvedere
Synopsis: Effeminate British butler Mr. Belvedere tires of traveling all over the world, having tea with interesting people, kickin’ it with Gandhi, and opts to settle down in Pittsburgh with Bob Uecker and his bratty kids. Wait, what?
Not only that, he has to fucking hitchhike? What the hell put Mr. Belvedere so out on his ass? A handsome, well-dressed, mustachioed man should never have to hitch a ride under any circumstances. Although can you imagine if you were the guy who picked him up? This foppish British guy gets in and starts talking about having tea with world leaders and how he’s going to become a butler for some dude’s family in Pittsburgh. It’d be like the time Tron picked up General Douglas MacArthur III in New Mexico only somehow weirder.
This song gets special credit as being the only song I can think of to use an almost Dixieland beat and boomtown stomping good time. Special credit to Stewie Griffin for angrily singing this on an episode of Family Guy as well.
What We Take Away: Don’t fuck with Mr. Belvedere. Once he sets his mind to something, he’s going to do it. Even if he has to hitchhike all the way to freaking Pittsburgh, he’ll get there. Take an insolent tone? Get ready for a lap full of mashed potatoes, mister. Because no one messes with Brocktune. Not even Bob Uecker.
Synopsis: Welcome to Chicago, Larry Appleton! Congratulations on leaving Wisconsin and going for it in the big city! Welcome to Chicago, Balki Bartokomous! Congratulations on leaving Mypos! America or burst indeed.
So here we’ve got two young men pursuing their dreams in the damn fine city of Chicago. How do we effectively convey that? With some of the most blatantly expositional lyrics ever written, that’s how! Get plenty of shots of Chicago, show Larry and Balki fighting the wind, send them to Wrigley Field, send them to the opera, and make sure the audience knows “nothin’s gonna stop me now!” And throw in a harmonica to boot.
I mostly like this song because it’s a love letter to Chicago at its most base. In fact, last time I was there as I was pulling away from O’Hare Airport, I started humming this song to myself and texted to both Hart and Limon that I couldn’t stop thinking about this stupid song. Hart claimed he didn’t know the song and asked me to type out the lyrics. I ended up typing out almost the whole first goddamn verse, and he still didn’t know it. He then asked me what key it was in and I finally realized he was punking me. I’m an idiot. Well, here you go, buttface. Click the link above. I hope it gets stuck in your head for days like it was mine.
What We Take Away: This is one of the most weirdly re-watchable intros ever created. Need a quick pick-me-up today? Perfect Strangers has the lyrics for you. Want to see a foreigner wear shorts to an opera. Perfect Strangers. Like seeing gentle English malapropisms? Perfect Strangers, FTW! I could probably watch this every day, and just might.
8. Golden Girls
Synopsis: Four old ladies live together in Miami, talk about sex and farts, and make inappropriate jokes at each other. Of all the songs on this list, I like the lyrics to this one best, which we’ll get to in a minute. First, seeing Rue McLanahan walk sexy in a nightgown is downright uncomfortable now that I’m 27. I didn’t think anything of it as a kid because I likely didn’t know any better. But man, she makes me nervous for some reason. Second, is it weird that out of that group the one I’m most attracted to is Bea Arthur? I think I’ve watched her roast Pam Anderson too many times. And third, the lyrics.
These lyrics tell a story, a story of friendship. And because this is a women’s show, they can get away with this kind of naked emotion much easier than men can. Because these lyrics just lay out the bonds of friendship more explicitly than any other sitcom I’ve ever watched. The blunt force of such expositional emotion hits me like a punch in the face for the only time I say things like the lines of this song is when I’m about 12 beers deep and me and a buddy are inexplicably weeping over something that was said.
“Thank you for being a friend, man!” It’s like Superbad when Seth and Evan wonder why they can’t tell their best friends they love ‘em. Why can’t we just go to the rooftops and shout it to the world? The Golden Girls do it. It’s right there in the damn song.
What We Take Away: If some of you get a drunken call from me in the next few days, you’ll know why.
Synopsis: Here we meet Corey Matthews who’s in no way like Kevin Arnold. Nope. No way. No sir.
Except that they look exactly the same, both come from a house with two siblings, have a best friend they hang out with constantly, and seem to have every class with an instantly recognizable nerdy teacher.
And this introduction is downright loony. It alternates between Corey interacting with all of the various people in his life, and some animated universe where all these markers of boyhood (Rollerblades! Baseballs! French fries!) float around like those old crazy Macaroni and Cheese commercials.
And the song goes through at least five different styles in introducing the characters. I get the impression the writers storyboarded a ton of different ideas for the introduction, couldn’t decide which one they liked best, crumpled them all up, threw them in a blender, hit the magic button, and vomited out this manic orgy of adolescent iconography.
And the mind-blowing thing? This intro is at least 50x better than their third intro when they were all in college and the poor man’s version of the Beach Boys sang the lyrics “When this boy meets world…” over and over again. Hart and I used to watch Boy Meets World all the time, and holy shit did we hate that version. Granted, we spent our days watching sitcoms for children so the problem was wholly ours, but that song sucked nevertheless.
What We Take Away: If you can’t decide on one idea, fuck it, just do ‘em all. Just make the intro a bombastic geyser of interrelated young boy crap, and then sit back and count your money. Television executive made easy by E Dagger!
Synopsis: A Different World was a spinoff from The Cosby Show designed to make Lisa Bonet a star. It chronicled the lives of a group of African American college students at a black college in Virginia that tackled issues such as race and class relations. I’ll be completely honest here. When I was a kid, I didn’t understand one fucking thing about this show. Growing up in an entirely white neighborhood will do that to you.
All I remember was the intro where the camera pans across a bunch of dorm rooms and people go from intensely studying to dancing, partying, or getting hit on by girls while wearing flip-up shades. And I remember wondering how someone could be named Sinbad. Watching it again now, that’s exactly what I got. This looks like it inspired the Mad TV intro as we move seamlessly from room to room and way too much stuff happens at once. The only other place you find adjacent rooms with this much disparate activity going on is a haunted house. We go from the sorority house, to the marching band, to a study hall, to what I think is a gym where Sinbad smiles like a freak, to some parties, to the ROTC, to fucking God knows what, to graduation day. That much motion makes me want to have a panic attack. I’ve watched this approximately 1,700 times this week just to see if I can figure it out. I’m either retarded or captivated. Probably both.
What We Take Away: I didn’t grow up with much diversity. And seeing the opening credits for this show makes me lament that. The only black people I knew growing up were Michael Jordan and Andre Dawson so seeing black folks embodying all sorts of different roles is cool, and totally out there for 1987. Although there are SO many characters, I wonder how they wrote for all of them.
Synopsis: I know what you’re thinking. Why this particular season? It’s simple really. Intros for seasons 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6 of The Cosby Show follow the same basic template. Some jazzy music plays while Bill Cosby dances with each cast member as the opening credits roll. A saxophone plays some variation of the same ditty while Cosby makes some funny facial expressions and his co-stars dance in whatever style they see fit.
Season 5 is crazy because it looks like the cast relocated to Miami and have shifted the focus of the show to producing a cross between Beach Blanket Bingo and The Lion King if the whole thing were painted neon. No one gets their own little vignette as the name of the cast appears rapid fire above the group. The jazzy lounge music has been replaced with an overproduced Broadway-style score, big timpani drums, and huge sweeping transitions.
And The Cos’ sits in the middle of it wearing his beach gear looking downright svelte. For whatever reason, this is my favorite image of The Cos’. Thin, healthy, not ranting about racial issues, surrounded by a bunch of effervescent young actors, and closing up shop with his goofy little half grin. It’s Happy Cosby! And what’s not to be happy about? It’s 1989! Look at all this neon!
What We Take Away: The Cosby Show knew how to do entertaining intros. I went back and forth about whether to choose this one or the one that ends with Cosby going “This is the best elevator music I’ve ever heard!” When I was a kid, I found that line hilarious. But ultimately, the bizarre and drastic break from form was too much to ignore. So, you get Season 5.
4. Going Places
Synopsis: Here’s a show no one remembers. When ABC tried to broaden their TGIF lineup to appeal to young adults as well as kids, they tried this show. Basically this falls right in the middle, if not slightly before, the “Hey, Friends is a successful show. Let’s get some directionless Gen-X people together and watch them be wacky together!”
And oh, how this intro tries so hard to demonstrate what a fun-loving group of kooks this is. Look, they’re putting their hands in the wet cement outside Mann’s Chinese Theater! They have big dreams! They’re pallling around on a boat! Hey, they dance around funny while cooking dinner! Doesn’t this look like a riot?!
In short, no. No it doesn’t.
And why? Because have you ever known anyone in their 20s who acts this innocently gregarious for no reason? I feel like this is an ad for lemonade or detergent or something. I remember only a little of this show, and Jerry Levine plays the off-kilter one of the group. And god love 1990. How do they alert us to this? They put him in a brightly colored sweater. Classic. Yeah, because all the wild and wacky guys I know express themselves via bombastic color on a cadigan. Did I say all the guys I know? I meant all the kids’ party magicians.
What We Take Away: Whenever executives try to blatantly target people in their 20s, it fails spectacularly. Friends worked because it had acerbic wit and didn’t really give a crap what you thought of it until it jumped the shark. This had a bunch of smiling doofuses bouncing around a kitchen. I like Alan Ruck as much as the next guy, but watching him grin like a schmuck for a half hour each week isn’t what any of us want to see. Likewise with Heather Locklear. We want to see her tramp it up. I don’t want to see her laughing it up on a boat with some square-looking chick named Hallie. If this were made today, not even ABC Family would pick this up. It’s too happy-go-lucky even for them.
Synopsis: The new boy in the neighborhood. Lives downstairs and it’s understood. He’s there just to take good care of me. Like he’s one of the family.
I’ll bet you were able to recite those lyrics in your head upon seeing this title without having to watch the video. Of all the songs on this list, the Charles in Charge theme was definitely the friendliest. Charles was definitely in charge, and that was a good thing. It’s weird they even needed a guy to take care of the kids and all the housework since they had Mom and old man navy there, but I suspect that Charles came in after Dad died, and they all liked him so much they asked him to stay.
I mean, look at the smiles on those kids’ faces. Scott Baio in the 80s was one of the most instantly charismatic people ever created, so who wouldn’t want him to stay and take good care of them? And this wasn’t unique to Charles in Charge either. You look at Scott Baio’s resume, and he’s banged virtually every transcendently hot woman from 1985-1992. Charles was in charge in the love department too.
What We Take Away: Based on the lighting of this intro, I don’t think the sun ever stopped shining on this house. I’ll be damned if I can remember where this show took place, but if it wasn’t either San Diego, California or however the guy who founded Hallmark views the world, it’s full of shit. This looks like the most temperate, pleasant piece of geography on the planet filled with smiling children, a semi-hot mom, a kooky Navy grandfather, and Ellen Travolta. Whenever I watched this show, I never especially gave a crap about the plot and can’t remember a single story arc from this show, but loved watching it just because it looked so warm. I’m tempted to buy this DVD now just so I have it to watch on cold days from here on out.
That, and even when she was illegal, Nicole Eggert was painfully hot. I mean, holy shit.
Synopsis: All right, so here we have Howard Hesseman playing an out-of-work actor who takes on a substitute teaching position while he tries to get his acting career in order. Lo and behold he grows to like teaching the gifted students history and helps them with their problems outside the classroom as well. Their original teacher quits leaving Hesseman to teach full-time. Okay then.
Surprisingly enough I have no problem with this plot. Even though it seems far-fetched that some bum actor teaches gifted students and succeeds at it. And that it’s even more far-fetched that despite ordinarily needing to go through some horrifying bullshit bureaucratic process to become a full-time teacher, he just slides right in after six weeks. And that he’s so ready and willing to just give up his acting dreams to teach a bunch of snot-nosed high schoolers history for the rest of his life. All of this is basically fine.
My problem is with the way he gets to the school. This show takes place in New York, a city with more public transportation options than virtually any other city on earth, and yet Hesseman hitches a ride on the back of some truck delivering plants while comfortably reading a newspaper, stops at what is presumably 7:00 in the morning for a hot dog, finds the subway closed, can’t catch a cab, tries to hitchhike and fails, ends up hoofing it across Manhattan, arrives late to the displeased look of his principal who’s just hanging out in the middle of the hallway instead of working, and opens the door where his students applaud his arrival.
Okay, that’s a lot to digest.
First of all, does he always hitch a ride on that truck? And if so, is he related to Marty McFly and just never learned to skateboard?
Secondly, how can travel in this city be this fucking difficult? Answer: It’s not. I’m willing to bet the producers just wanted us to know that hey, you’re looking at New York, you middle America mouth breathers. Statue of Liberty, pow! Hot dog stand, boom! New York skyline, kablam! New York, bitches!
Third, have you ever applauded a teacher when he shows up? Ever? I had a fantasy that my students would do this for me when I taught public speaking, but all I ever got was, “Hey dude, your fly’s open.” Not the same obviously, but I appreciated his sentiment nevertheless.
What We Take Away: When you have kids, try to encourage them to applaud one of their teachers when he or she arrives just once. And make it for no specific reason. The teacher will be dumbfounded, but I guarantee they’ll never forget it. That, and if Howard Hesseman can’t figure out how to get to his school on time without hopping on the back of a truck, attempting to hitchhike, and ultimately walking, should we entrust him with our children?
1. Step By Step
Synopsis: This is the magnum opus of opening theme songs for sitcoms. Shortly after this show went off the air, shows by and large stopped producing opening credit montages of this scope [citation needed]. Coincidence? I think not. Nothing will ever top this introduction in terms of its enormity, its audacity, and its willful overdose of people in brightly colored clothing smiling merrily. This video lasts a ghastly 1 minute and 49 seconds, introduces us to no less than 10 characters, features raspy male and female singers pepping out each cheery “Having a blended family rocks!” lyrics, takes place at an amusement park, and features some sort of children’s chorale singing the song’s chorus. This video is like a recruiting tool for a cult in Oregon somewhere that promises eternal life and rollercoasters in exchange for your money and slavish servitude. Only with more bright colors~!!!
This intro opens and closes with shots of the family on a rollercoaster which I suspect is some hamfisted metaphor for family life and getting re-married, but I could just be reaching for the sledgehammer of symbolism. In between those shots however, we get plenty of merriment as we’re introduced to this new cast of characters. I think it’s supposed to be fun-looking, but all I could think about was how fucking poor this family likely is. They have six kids aging in range from what appears to be about 9 to 17 which means plenty of new clothes, driver’s licenses and constant nagging for money. And from what I remember, Patrick Duffy is a two-bit contractor while Suzanne Somers runs a hair salon out of their garage with her chunky sister and dingbat mother. So all you can think is, “Hey, enjoy your day at the carnival, fuckos. We’re not going to be able to afford this for another two years!”
What We Take Away: Two enduring images from this opener: 1) Patrick Duffy and Suzanne Somers stand on the bridge of the big water ride and get soaked as their kids cascade down the hill and everyone suffers from legionnaire’s disease a week later (not shown) from that disgusting, infested water. Any time you’re at Six Flags, invariably you will hear someone between the ages of 15 and 30 talk about how this bridge is like “that Step By Step show.” 2) The final shot is a horribly chroma keyed shot the family waving from the rollercoaster to the kid with the allergies and the dingbat grandmother. This shot is really a fine metaphor for most of the shows like this. Everyone looks happy, but the type of ridiculous glee on display here is ultimately phony and not representative of real life.
Because too many times life is like a rollercoaster, only most of the track is busted, there’s some idiot kid throwing up behind you, and you just want it to stop. If life were like “Step by Step,” we’d all joyously sneeze into our popcorn and bumrush our fat aunt for a big glob of cotton candy. In reality, the theme park is closed, the popcorn has some angry teenager’s jizz on it, and cotton candy still sucks.
But that’s what makes these intros so charming. They’re a cultural time capsule from an era of more innocent television. Now they serve as the primary purpose of YouTube’s existence. And I’m more than happy to indulge.
02 Jul 2009 E Dagger