Bruce Miller has composed and conducted the music for many TV series including FRASIER. He tells the inside story of what “Tossed Salads & Scrambled Eggs” really means along with other fascinating tales. Plus, a huge treat for FRASIER fans – something you’ve never heard before.
The comment about seeing Hawaii in the opening credits of a sitcom shot on a sound stage made me think of shows that open up its visuals in their opens. I realized once that I had a sense of Mary Tyler Moore's character on THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW having a life outside the confines of the studio sets. We saw her in the field at a news event, we saw her shopping, and we saw her walking down a street arm-in-arm with some lucky guy. It always made me curious about large parts of her life we never saw dramatized.
ReplyDeleteThat full length version of "Tossed Salads & Scrambled Eggs" needs released ASAP! I'd buy a copy or two of that.
ReplyDeleteThoroughly enjoyed your chat with Bruce ... and what a great tune! Loved it a lot! Have always found songwriters so fascinating ... interviewed Mancini a few times ... lovely, humble man with a very dry sense of humor! And what music he gave us. A true legend. Interviewed Hal David once and all I could think about was that while we were talking, someone in the world one of his songs was being played! And great stories about how he collaborated with Burt Bacharach!
ReplyDeleteFriday Question:Ken, I was wondering what you think of this trend of streaming services artificially stretching out the aspect ratios of older shows to make them full screen? I can only assume that someone complained about the black bars on the sides of the screen, but I find it off putting.
ReplyDeleteFriday Question: What, if anything, can viewers glean from a TV show's opening credits?
ReplyDeleteA visit to YouTube and a search of “TV Show Openings” revealed memorable music (Bay City Blues), cheesy graphics (We Got it Made), fantastic comraderie (Bosom Buddies), surprising emotion (Perfect Strangers) and even Angie Dickinson's legs, legs, and legs (Cassie and Co.).
Can the opening credits tell the audience that the network has confidence in the show? Do some credits try too hard, reveal too much, confound too many?
There was one show named after the title character's surname. The letters of his surname would appear one-by-one between action sequences. But the guys's name was a consonant-heavy Eastern European name that you have to be 110% Polish to spell. That show seemed doomed by the opening alone.
Is there a formula to do it right?
Excellent podcast. Having Grammer sing the theme reveals the Frasier character, he always had that laugh when he thought he was on to something.
ReplyDeleteWasn't the joke that Frasier was just as crazy as his patients?
Really enjoyed the podcast. And coincidentally I stumbled across this today: https://www.avclub.com/what-s-a-good-theme-song-on-a-bad-tv-show-1819139886
ReplyDeleteNeedless to say I disagree with the idea expressed in the article that Frazier was a bad show, but the relevance to this post is that the theme song is praised in some detail. The other examples mentioned are interesting as well.
Great episode! I had never put together the connotations of the lyrics to the song, which, of course, now seem so clear. And Bruce's stories of working on other shows were excellent. Learned more about the business, which is always fun. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteInteresting info about never using the lyrics to the MASH theme; I recall seeing (on youtube)Josh Groban doing medley of tv theme songs for the Emmys, and while I get it was supposed to be comedic, I still found the part where they have dancing girls in top hats to try and help him "sell" the MASH lyrics to be extra cringe-worthy. I personally have a Pavlovian response to the theme- I once had terrible insomnia (actually it's still pretty bad sometimes), and would try to watch tv to calm down enough to sleep. Since I didn't have cable, it was just reruns and infomercials on whichever local channel the antenna was picking up that night. Minutes would tick by, with me knowing that if I didn't fall sleep at least 2 hours before I had to get up, that it was a lost cause; and it just so happened that for several years the show that came on at that time was MASH (two back-to-back episodes). I'd hear those opening notes, and know that it was now officially another sleepless night. I was familiar with the show before the movie, but when I first heard the lyrics, they seemed quite apropos to my associations with the music. Also the theme from MURDER SHE WROTE gives me panic attacks, but that's a whole other story.
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