https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZupYOmRsb8

Wind to 2 minutes 30 seconds for Bing Crosby talking about the show.

Below are links to outtakes from the show presented, with tongue in cheek, by the producer Steven Gethers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WTlMqaB61Q Part 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4xd97JdzVE Part 2

 

I barely remember there was such a series.  I would have been about 12 or 13 when it aired.  Around that time, or not long after, I repaired a broken Victrola and started buying old 78s, soon amassing a collection of Crosby lacquers.  I wish I could have paid better attention, and recalled more clearly now, what Bing was doing on TV in those days.  Of course then, he was still around, with no thought of losing him at the time.

In judging Bing's sitcom, it must be remembered that most sitcoms were pretty bad, even some people still want to see today would be horrible, if not for all the nostalgia they stir up in people.  We have a channel locally that reruns "The Love Boat." My gawwwwwd, what a waste of electrons to broadcast that dreck again!  In reflecting on Bing's TV career, we don't want to forget things like his amazing playing against type in "Dr. Cook's Garden" or his terrific character role in "Stagecoach."  Then, too, besides his Christmas specials and many variety show appearances, we also don't want to forget Bing Crosby Productions and their role in producing shows like "Hogan's Heroes" which I think stands up to viewing again today better than most sitcoms that were ever made.

Last edited by Steve Fay (21/1/2015 4:03 pm)

I Saw one episode several months ago Bing should have left the sitcoms to Dick Van Dyke.

I always liked that sitcom.
 The Bing Crosby Show was always very nice, cute and funny but of course It wasn’t a masterpiece. The cast and specially the children were very good and the guest list was very impressive, although I haven’t seen the episodes with Joan Fontaine and Kathryn Crosby-the most famous guest stars of the TV series.
Still it’s nice that new episodes come to light.

Australians were able to watch The Bing Crosby Show from October 1964. It had been publicised for  months beforehand, one article headlined 'BING CROSBY HAS ANOTHER WIFE'. After the second episode was shown, one newspaper critic wrote described it as  a good, safe vehicle, pleasant and innocuous. That series was scheduled for Friday evenings until April 1965 and repeated on weekday afternoons the following year.

I don't mind the sit-com. I mean, its not my go-to Bing opus. But still its okay.

Measured against so many other of his films and projects, yes it is weak.

However, family sit-coms are pretty low-brow really. And when you measure The Bing Crosby Show against things like Leave it to Beaver before it, The Brady Bunch after it and My Three Sons contemporaneous to it, then The Bing Crosby Show is a masterpiece. The kids, the wife and the buddy are all interesting characters for Bing to bounce off. The plot lines are fairly progressive for their day too.
If Bing really wanted to do a sit-com he should have had something fashioned for him around some sort of occupation and the supporting characters were quirky folks he knew in his work and in his broader community. If he played a theatre manager and Frank McHugh was his stagehand, it would have been more believeable that his character could sing and dance. He would have also been better cast for his age than playing a father. I know Bing had children in real life the same age as the children in the sit-com...but that is unusual for a man his age.

But, Ian, Bilko is another league all together. This is a masterpiece!

Last edited by Aaron Tickner (Yesterday 11:32 am)

Yes, upon reflection what has been said, here by all makes sense and is fair.

I must admit, though - other than admiring Lucy (but not her cancelled and unwise final series of 1986) and "Frasier", I've generally avoided family sitcoms.
I much prefer the densley scripted, farcical  and fast paced "Bilko" (glad you appreciate it, Aaron) and "Fawlty Towers" against such "worthies" as the UK's "My Family" and "The Cosby Show", with all their "positive" "Life Lessons" and "Learning", where everyone is so ultimately winningly wise, sunshiny bright and as "keen as kids".

Even things which were supposed to be so edgy or alternative such as Rosanne made me feel as if I was being force-fed boxes of peppermint creams. The messages of the cod-reassurance of "we may be slothful and loud and brash but hey, we all still love each other" has me reaching for the remote control ... to hurl at the television set. I should have admired "The Golden Girls" with all that talent involved but it just felt as if they were performing separate stand up comedy routines and cued one liners with each other. Hell, aren't I hard to please????

Give me Gary Shandling's talk show host character Larry Sanders' Johnny Carson-inspired neurosis anyday, Larry David's (in "Curb Your Enthusiasm") sociopathic tendencies and cheap, bitter landlord Rigsby of "Rising Damp's" hopeless romantic ambitions. 
"Porridge" (set in a prison), Tony Hancock (the perpetual loser) and the mutual familial loathing of "Steptoe and Son" are three others whose downcast surroundings and hopelessness keep me so cheerful!!!

 

Last edited by Ian Kerstein (Yesterday 11:39 pm)