'Park Street Under' Sitcom?

[concordgirl]

I think, what with the pedestrian island btwn tracks at Park, the potential for carnage if they installed a bar would be exponential

[diburning]

I think, what with the pedestrian island btwn tracks at Park, the potential for carnage if they installed a bar would be exponential

or just put it where that little conveneience/tourist store is on the inbound side.

[concordgirl]

trust me, drunk people crossing in front of green line trains would not be a good scene

[FP10]

go to harvard ave on a saturday night, it doesnt turn out as badly as you would think.

[RedLantern]

Was the show actually shot in part of the station? I'd imagine there might be some room in the tunnel from Park Street to Downtown Crossing. Did the show ever show people entering the bar, and give any indication of where in the station it might be?

Most likely the show would've been shot on a sound stage somewhere with scenes showing parts of the station.

[A320]

Was the show actually shot in part of the station? I'd imagine there might be some room in the tunnel from Park Street to Downtown Crossing. Did the show ever show people entering the bar, and give any indication of where in the station it might be?

Most likely the show would've been shot on a sound stage somewhere with scenes showing parts of the station.

It's been almost 30 years, but I only remember all of the scenes being inside the cozy confines of the bar itself -- much like 90% of "The Honeymooners" scenes were in the small apartment kitchen. I honestly don't remember any outside scenes, even during the open and close of the program.

That's another reason I would love to see tapes of the show surface, to fill out my memory.

If I were to guess, I'd say that the show was probably shot at the Ch. 5 studios in Needham.

BTW, I believe WCVB-TV did a 35th Anniversary show some time last year. That should still be on tape (or DVD) at the station. When they do those shows, they usually look back nostalgically at many of the programs the station has produced since 1972. I didn't catch that show, but I wonder if any mention was made of "Park St. Under" during it. (Or if the lawyers at NBC have told the station ownership to forget that the program ever existed.)

[Ron Newman]

(Or if the lawyers at NBC have told the station ownership to forget that the program ever existed.)

I don't know why they would, since WCVB-5 has always been an ABC station.

[caduceus]

(Or if the lawyers at NBC have told the station ownership to forget that the program ever existed.)

I don't know why they would, since WCVB-5 has always been an ABC station.

Actually, WCVB is not now nor has ever been owned by the network - it is only an affiliate. It in fact became an ABC affiliate when WCVB replaced WHDH as the licensee for channel 5, and CBS, of which WHDH was an affiliate, did not want to be preempted by the local programming WCVB was promising, and ABC was the only other alternative.

ABC would not have a say in what WCVB did for its own local anniversary program.

[A320]

(Or if the lawyers at NBC have told the station ownership to forget that the program ever existed.)

I don't know why they would, since WCVB-5 has always been an ABC station.

Sorry for the confusion, but I was referring to my post earlier in this thread about the producers of "Park Street Under" suing the producers of "Cheers" for theft of intellectual property, and not having a chance against the battalion of NBC lawyers. I don't know if there was ever a "shut up" settlement or not.

True, Ch. 5 was never an NBC station. As WHDH-TV, it was the CBS station in Boston for years. WBZ-TV Ch. 4 was NBC, and WNAC-TV Ch. 7 was ABC. Confused yet?

In 1972, when the license for Ch. 5 was taken from the once powerful Herald-Traveler Corp (which published the Herald and also owned WHDH AM and FM, and the afternoon Traveler, which stopped publishing in the late 60's), CBS was at its height of popularity, with all the hit shows from "The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite" to "All In The Family", and didn't necessarily want to be affiliated with a "novice" TV station in a major market like Boston. Thus, the switch of Ch. 5 to ABC and Ch. 7 to CBS, with 4 and 7 swapping networks many years later.

[DigbyScallop]

As I remember, one of the actors in "Park Street Under" was also the actor who drove the bread delivery wagon in the Pepperidge Farm commercials in the 1980s, and who ended each commercial the the tag-line, "Pepperidge Farm Remembers" (pronounced "Pepridge Fahm Remebuhs").

[#5 - Dyre Ave]

Wow, I wish I could have been old enough to have seen Park Street Under. Unfortunately, I was 1 and living in New York, so I didn't. It sounds like the kind of show I like. Cheers (supposedly influenced by PSU) is one of my all-time favorite shows.

[mattl]

On the occasion of Bull & Finch pub owner Thomas Kershaw's opening another Cheers bar in Faneuil Hall, reader Mitchell Myers questions the Globe's account of why the Hollywood producers decided to set their famous sitcom at Kershaw's pub. We reported that series cocreator Glen Charles stopped in Boston en route to a Maine vacation, and fell in love with the Bull & Finch. "That may or may not be true," Myers writes, "but it still avoids discussing the true origins of `Cheers' in WCVB's `Park Street Under.' "

Ah, yes. The story that will not die. Myers is right that 'CVB (Channel 5) producer Hubert Jessup had launched a successful sitcom set in a Boston bar a couple of years before "Cheers" came on the air. Jessup's show, "Park Street Under," has remarkable similarities to the eventual NBC product: a talented comedian-bartender (Steve Sweeney), "the long-suffering yet quick-witted waitress" - a quote from Monica Collins's 1979 Herald review - and so on. It is also true that 'CVB had sold Jessup's earlier sitcom, "The Baxters," to Norman Lear for national production. And yes, 'CVB was shopping "Park Street Under" to Hollywood production companies just before James Burrows and Glen and Les Charles came up with the "Cheers" concept.

If someone wants to pay for the full article -- http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/boston/acce ... 07,%202001

[3rdrail]

Sounds like multiple layers of B.S. to me. Let's see, how many can we count - Well, there's Hollywood, land of the phoney baloney and the casting couch. We have Channel 5, the station beloved by people in Cambridge who drive Volvos and almost explode with their big heads and egos, with smarmy Ed Harding to make everyone else want to puke, we have a non-existant bar with a different name and interior than it's TV counterpart that's a tourist trap which every tourist "just has to" visit (and either comes out googly-eyed or feeling violated), and last, but not least, a fictitious MBTA bar which never existed in any name or form in which it's premise was being totted to phoney Hollywood. I guess what goes around, comes around. (Gag.)

[caduceus]

Wow, someone at some bad Wheaties this morning...

One story I heard was that in the original spec script/treatment, it wasn't even supposed to be set in Boston. It was set in LA, and had a former football player tending the bar (and former pros working in bars is not that unusual a concept.) It was when they cast Danson they realized his stature didn't fit as a baseball player, and made adjustments. Only then I would assume they scouted for a "twin" location.

[upperco]

Was this Boston sitcom, which ran for one season (1979-80) on the ambitious WCVB during its halcyon days, the real inspiration for CHEERS? Check out the internet's FIRST EVER in depth look at the locally produced PARK ST. UNDER here: http://jacksonupperco.com/2016/03/30/be ... -st-under/