Why aren't older Sesame Street shows rerun?

[Philo and Gunge]

Well, I have e-mailed Thiteen (my main PBS station) to show SSU somewhere in the prime time/latenight line-up. They never replied.

 

[ssetta]

Been there, done that. I have called ALL the PBS stations that I get on cable, and they all said the same thing. I was actually upset when they all did away with the afternoon airings of the show years ago, and I called and complained, and they never did a thing about it.

But unfortunately, the research says that kids don't like the old characters as much as they like elmo, because they're old. I mean, I do agree that kids should like the old shows, and you know what really makes me upset? A lot of parents think that ANYTHING from their childhood is dated, and they NEVER turn on SS for their kids, but they let them watch endless hours of stupid shows like Barney and Teletubbies. I don't think the age of anything matters, as long as its good.

 

[mikebennidict]

the individual tv staions don't have power over what is distributed, that's up to the producers. while maybe what Ssetta says about the kids not liking the older stuff maybe true, i doubt at such a young age kids, the preschools age would have any concept on such stuff. the only thing i might understand a little bit better is the parents though i can't understand why any of them would be so rediculous other than noticing that their kids aren't enjoying them. that's why i suggest showing them once in a while. there's a couple of reasons why SS and other older shows haven't been shown over the years. they have an agenda wich is so important to the point that they just don't give a ----- about the older stuff, also i learned and it's mentioned on their website PBS holds the rights to shows for 3 years and within that time they're no longer allowed to show them after that. i don't know if it was always like that. The Electric Company while on from 1971-1976 continued to be shown in many markets at least 9 years after production ceased. Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood wich began in 1967 and went national in 1968, had episodes between the years of 1969 though 1975 being shown up til the early 90s. the reason for that was probably due to the fact the show for whatever reason ceased production between 1975-1979. today the epiosdes are 1979-2001. 321 contact witch began in 1980 i saw on and off up untill 1990 including the shows from the 1st season. i get a feeling some of this is PBS itself. matter of fact i rad in some internet acticle they weren't happy with the older shows being shown on Noggin. with the grown up shows, it's seems to be the same thing. though i rememeber seeing old reruns of Julia Child's 1st cooking sries The French Chef being shown on an off. til 1987. that was in production from 1963-1973 thought the reruns for some reason were limited to the early 70s. obviously PBS wasn't alway so ridgid. also Nova began in 1974 wich mean it will be 30 years old in fact this month i believe. doubt will see any old episodes of that. seeing all of theese would be better than seeing reruns of Andy Williams variety hr. that aired on NBC in the 1960 witch was aired last Sat. night on WTTW.

 

[ssetta]

Well, some PBS stations do air more old shows than others, but not SS, unfortunately. Also, it's the minor ones that air more old shows, and not so much the major ones. Especially the Rhode Island PBS station, which I receive here. I've seen educational programming during the day where they even have the 1989 PBS logo. I know about these things partially because I get 4 different PBS stations where I live.

 

[mikebennidict]

i've been going through the though message board and saw ssetta's post about talking to the Sesame Workshop and inspite reading the same stuff at YL, i noticed the person said they, the people there hate the old stuff. what? now it's one thing if the public isn't interested. that's partly why i've said though them once in a while especially if they have a good ammount of older people watching them. i wonder if theese shows really got a chance to succeeed since at the time and maybe even now isn't carried on many companies. but the staff not appreciating the early SS? there's something twisted about that. i don't think i'm looking foward to this upcommong PBS special next month.

 

[ssetta]

You aren't going to belive this, but...

Throughout this and next week, WGBH is airing pledge shows from Season 32! Isn't that unbelievable? I wonder what kids will think when they see this! I mean, I have seen them rerun pledge shows from previous seasons before, but Season 32 was back when they had the old format! Isn't that amazing? And also, it's not PBS that's rerunning them, it's only WGBH. In other words, it's a decision that the local PBS station made. Because all the other stations that I get are airing the regular nationwide shows. Has anyone else ever seen something like this before?

 

[mikealan]

"They" already did that, for almost four years. The Noggin channel started out as a joint venture between CTW (now known as Sesame Workshop) and Nickelodeon and was a sister station to Nickelodeon and TV Land. Noggin ran a package of 67 "Sesame Streets" from between 1969 and 1989 and another set of episodes from the 1993-1994 season, and those shows were shown over, and over, and over, and over, and over, under, around and through for four years. Noggin is still showing "Sesame Street," but now the episode selection has been changed to much more recent shows. The older ones were run under the title "Sesame Street Unpaved," and apparently, it didn't bring in the number of ratings Noggin wanted...the standard party line is that kids weren't interested in those shows because Elmo is the most popular character these days and he wasn't in many of those episodes, but I think that's just a standard PR statement. Sure, there are a lot of adults who remember these shows and would like to see them again, but those people (including myself) don't make up a large enough number to justify keeping that stuff on. One other major reason why the show might not have been very successful, though, is that the same 67 episodes were repeated many times, and once people realized they had seen them all, then there probably wasn't as much of an interest in watching them. One other factor is that CTW/Sesame Workshop sold out their half of Noggin to Nickelodeon, so eventually, the CTW shows might not be part of it at all. The good news is that a lot of people recorded those shows when they were on, so you can get your fix if you look around. And what I hear a lot of people whining about is true...there are thousands of shows that CTW produced that haven't been repeated...if more were out there, I'd be glad to have them, but remember that until four years ago, none of these shows had been repeated anywhere since their original broadcasts. So if it's a choice between getting 67 episodes (even if a few minutes were edited from each one) versus none at all, I'm glad to have the 67.

Oh, I wish I had all 67 episodes. Even though, the PBS/Noggin combos of #2226 and #2404 are really hard to find!

 

[opensezame]

I've wondered why they can be rerun, and there's really no good reason. ABCs and 123s and triangles and such haven't changed much recently, and in just the past 10-20 years there are enough episodes that a kid could have the pleasant experience of NEVER watching an episode twice if they reran em. I don't but the excuse that "kids might get confused" -- most kids don't religiously watch every episode in order, they see an episode now and then and that's it.

Some people might be out of work though...if they show reruns maybe they won't ned as many episodes. But those resources could be directed towards making the old episodes better, maybe scrubbing any lousy content out of them?

Do any producers watch this show?