1971-72 Television Season 50th Anniversary: New Dick Van Dyke Show ['74 Van Dyke Interview (Pt 1)]

This Thanksgiving weekend we are doing our annual tribute to a television series or special of merit, having paid tribute to Ironside, The Elvis Presley '68 Comeback Special, The Brady Bunch and The Partridge Family in past years. This holiday season, we look back at Dick Van Dyke and his comeback series from the 1971 season, The New Dick Van Dyke Show.
This evening, we kick off a four part interview with Dick Van Dyke of The DIck Cavett Show, circa 1974.
With the success of The Mary Tyler Moore Show during the 1970-1971 season, CBS began thinking of bringing back Dick Van Dyke to weekly CBS television. He had done some television specials over the years, and they had been successful. A new television series for Mr. Van Dyke made good sense.
And so began The New Dick Van Dyke Show, which was unique in that it was filmed at a small television studio in Prescott Arizona, near Van Dyke's house. Van Dyke didn't want to move back to Southern California to film the new series, so CBS allowed the show to be filmed remotely in Arizona. The show also reunited Van Dyke with Carl Reiner, who was on board the new series to write and direct. This first version of the series was based upon Van Dyke playing a talk show, variety show host named Dick Preston in the Arizona area. The cast was lead by the lovely (and one of our favorites) Hope Lange as Dick Preston's wife. The supporting cast was solid, and included Mary Brill, Nancy Dessault, Fannie Flagg, Michael Shea, David Doyle (pre-Charlie's Angels) and Angela Powell, playing the Preston's daughter. All the pieces were in place for success.
This first season debuted on the CBS Saturday night schedule at 9pm, just ahead of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. CBS was slowing building its 1970's Saturday Night juggernaut of a schedule. The first piece was The Mary Tyler Moore Show in the 1970-1971 season. For the 1971-72 season, CBS programming chief Fred Silverman added All in the Family in the 8pm slot, followed by new series Funny Face with Sandy Duncan, and the Van Dyke show.
Ratings were good for the two new Duncan and Van Dyke series, but not as good as that of All in the Family and The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Hence, for the 1972-73 season, both the Funny Face series (now titled The Sandy Duncan Show) and The New Dick Van Dyke Show were moved to Sunday nights for their second seasons, replaced with M*A*S*H and The Bob Newhart Show on Saturday nights. The Carol Burnett Show was moved over from Monday night to the 10pm slot on Saturday, and the rest (with The Jefferson's joining the lineup a couple of years later) is great television history. With comedies on Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights, CBS began the process of reloading their network for the 1970's, particularly in comedy.
However, alone now on the Sunday Night lineup without hit shows All in the Family and The MTM Show close by, ratings fell both both Van Dyke and Duncan's shows during that 1972-73 season.
By the third season of 1973-74, the Van Dyke show was revamped to having Van Dyke's character Dick Preston, moving to Hollywood to work on a television series. This video clip is from a CBS promo for that third season, as The New Dick Van Dyke Show would have a new spot on the Monday Night lineup following the final season of Here's Lucy.
The only other cast members making the move to the new third season Hollywood premise were wife Hope Lange and daughter Angela Powell's characters. New cast members included yet another solid list of performers: Dick Van Patten (pre-Eight is Enough), Henry Darrow, Barry Gordon, Richard Dawson, and two of our favorite ladies here at Television Vanguard, Chita Rivera and Barbara Rush. Another really wonderful supporting cast.
This video clip is presented here on UA-cam for the entertainment and informational value of the viewer, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Enjoy!
Coming up later this Thanksgiving weekend... parts 2-4 of this interview with Dick Van Dyke on The Dick Cavett Show from 1974.

[@kennysherrill6542]

I grew up with Dick Van dyke and I don't remember him having this problem. I've been through a lot since 72, I'm always glad to see him because it's like seeing an old family friend. Happy Thanksgiving all.👍❤🇺🇸😀