Big Tragedy in TV History

Freaks and Geeks

"The dance is tomorrow. She's a cheerleader. You've seen Star Wars 47 times. You do the math." ~ Neal Schweiber

Bad Reputation theme song clip

I don’t think I can begin to express the awesomeness of this show, and the tragedy that it is not still around. NBC really f&%ed it all up. It was not even on for one full season in 1999 before they pulled the plug on it. Originally, the show was aired on Saturday nights and then moved to Monday. The next year, the Fox Family Channel (now the ABC Family Channel, I believe) bought all of the episodes and aired them in 2000. I taped every episode. Since I now have the dvds, the VHS tapes are up for grabs if anyone wants them.

The “dramedy” is about some kids in high school in 1980. The main character, Lindsay Weir (played by Linda Cardellini), had been a big nerd her whole life (she was a star on her school’s Mathletes team). When we first meet her, her grandmother has just died, and she starts questioning everything. She begins hanging out with the “freaks” because she has a big crush on Daniel Desario (played by James Franco, who is now getting to be quite the star…). The characters and the actors are so real in a refreshing way that is so rarely seen on television. Like, Bill Haverchuck, with his obsession with nighttime soap Dallas (played by Martin Starr)? My mom would come in the room when I was watching it, and comment that he was so geeky that he was painful to look at. The show captured a very accurate view of high school that isn’t always seen. All of the characters were pretty multi-faceted; even though they had labels, they didn’t embody all of the stereotypes that go along with being a called a “freak” or a “geek.”

There was a lot of drama surrounding the dvd release, because of the copyrights for the songs played throughout the episodes. The soundtrack plays a pretty integral role in the series, and the creators didn’t want to release the show without the songs. (One of the writers was The Good Girl and School of Rock writer Mike White) In order for them to break even, they would have had to charge something crazy, like, $200 for each set of the dvds. But, somehow, they ended up making it work, and now you can buy the regular copy for just $52.49 . You can also buy a deluxe copy with all kinds of sweet extras, like a script they never shot, a faux yearbook, and biographies of the actors and creators. I was super close to getting the deluxe, but, being po’ and in school, I could only afford the regular version :-( Maybe someday :-) .

The web site is really well-maintained. There’s an audition video of Samm Levine doing an impression of William Shatner and promo spots and an SAT test and all kinds of freakish and geekish fun.

One of the standout characters is Harris, played by Stephen Lea Sheppard (you might remember him as Dudley from The Royal Tenenbaums).

Another classic quote from Lindsay’s dad that fits in quite nicely with yesterday’s post…

Mr. Weir: Elvis didn't expectorate on his fans.
Sam: No. But he died on the toilet.
Mr. Weir: Well, that's paradise compared to where the Sex Pistols are gonna end up.

Side Note: On a related Mike White/shows being cancelled note, did anyone else ever watch that show on Fox called Cracking Up? I used to watch it because I had a minor obsession with Jason Schwartzman (and by minor, I of course mean major), but it was cancelled after only a few episodes.