Years and years ago, TV shows used to have custom "Be right back" bumpers that were narrated by a cast member from the show. My question is, are they part of the original 35mm negatives (for filmed shows) and first-generation tape masters (for videotaped shows)? Or are they inserted by the stations? Below are a couple of examples: WKRP in Cincinnati bumper narrated by Gary Sandy (Andy Travis) ALF bumper narrated by Paul Fusco (ALF) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2tIcsoyv5M
I'm guessing the copyright holders asked the actors to do the voice-overs for syndication while the show was still being shot. The only thing I ever heard actors say on bumpers or credits in the 1960s and 1970s was, "this show was filmed before a live audience" or "This has been a Filmways presentation!" or something like that. I've seen them grab quickie wild lines like this on a set during a lull in production, so it's not always even done in a voice-over booth or something. Some networks were promo-happy and would cajole the actors into recording free liners like "Stay tuned for M*A*S*H, next on this CBS station!" or "next on channel 13!" or "We'll return to Welcome Back Kotter right after this, so stick around!" Some actors are very negative about doing this kind of extra work -- Jim Belushi is one that I've seen balk at doing extra promo work.
Then they did it for the network. Often, hour-long shows would do a "mid-break" bumper, where the star would say, "stay tuned! We'll have more right after this."
This is about Radio, not TV, but this makes me think of Howard Stern complaining about the bumpers that local stations put into his show to replace his own bumpers. One was "Welcome back to the land of Stern", and another was "We'll be back to the Howard Shhhhtern Show".
These ones were for Saturday morning cartoons on ABC and were used well into the 90s from what I remember as a kid.
I remember one for Happy Days with the show's title logo in front of the spinning record, and Erin Moran's voice saying something like "Happy Days will be right back after these messages...I think...." (This was during the ABC run.) I remember watching an episode of Mission: Impossible on WFLD-Channel 32 in the late 1980s, and they were running it from 16mm film. In the middle of a commercial break was a show bumper right from the film reel, like they would have had during the original run. My guess is that stuff would be there in the 16mm days, but not necessarily the later video masters (which tended to be edited for time anyway, so it stands to reason that would be the first thing they'd drop). It would be nice to have that stuff included with DVD releases, even if only as extras. But I wonder how many of them were even saved?
That's my own edit from my VHS tapes of The Bugs Bunny And Tweety Show from the late 1980s/early 1990s. After I posted it I regretted that I had missed one -- another one with the three singers where they take a bow and their heads are interchanged. Other than that, I think that's "the set" (best I can remember, anyway). Also, normally they'd go into the break with these, and then back to the show with a bumper that was specific to the show being interrupted. But I seem to recall one season later on, they also had a set of "now back to the show" bumpers with these same characters. Of course, I don't think I ever recorded any of those. I am pretty sure I didn't hallucinate this, though.
This is still being done today, not just years and years ago. When we watch Big Bang re-runs in syndication, they use the actors voices over a photo of the entire Big Bang cast, saying "Close captioning of the Big Bang Theory is provided by...." and then they cut to a commercial. I'm not sure if the commercial sponsor is the one who is actually providing funding for the close captioning, but they use the current actors to do it. I don't know who inserts them, the station doing the re-runs or if they were on the originals.
Lot's of bumpers in this VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA video, including one from Richard Basehart imploring us to stay tuned:
The "Be right backs" have been replaced by "Previously on...". It's always interesting to hear who does those from week to week on any given show. Some shows switch up the actors, others just use the main star.
I would see these pop up from time to time when Cheers was on MeTV. Most recently I saw these bumpers again on some of the shows on Amazon Prime or Netflix (forget which one since both have Cheers available for streaming)
"I don't know why these people keep comparing themselves to RAPE!!" That was off topic, but I couldn't resist. Actually, I always thought that the constant use of bumpers on kids' shows was an insult to kids' intelligence, as if they couldn't tell the difference between shows and commercials.