List of flops in entertainment

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Most of the items listed below are ones that had high expectations, large amounts of money or widespread publicity, but fell far short of success. Obviously, due to the subjective nature of "success" and "meeting expectations", there can be disagreement about what constitutes a "major flop". Plus, lack of success is not always indicative of lack of quality or recognition. For example, one of the biggest film "flops" of the 1960s was the 1962 remake of Mutiny on the Bounty, which nonetheless received an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture; even the notorious Heaven's Gate was still nominated for an Oscar in a technical category.

Contents

[edit] Musical comebacks gone awry

  • MC Hammer's failed restyling as a gangsta rapper.
  • New Kids on the Block's attempt to return with a more mature sound as "NKOTB".
  • Diana Ross and the Supremes' Return to Love tour, which was cancelled for lack of strong ticket sales and because she had refused to include other original members of the Supremes in the tour; 23 scheduled appearances were cut off.
  • Vanilla Ice's multiple returns, such as his gangsta rap and nu metal phases, though his career has seen a sort of resurgence in 2005 due to his winning performance on Hit Me Baby One More Time.
  • Victoria Beckham's attempts to launch a solo pop career after the break up of the Spice Girls. All the other former members had managed a UK Number One record. Her first solo album was released under the name 'V.B.' a la Jennifer Lopez's nickname "J-Lo" and after poor sales she was dropped. A second album was recorded with another label Telstar Records but when the first single release failed to make No. 1, the album was shelved after the collapse of her label.
  • Peter Andre's eventual flop on stage after he tried to revitalise his career on I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!. Andre was pelted with fruit and cans/bottles until forced to stop singing.
  • Garth Brooks failed "Chris Gaines" persona. Chris Gaines' material was more alternative rock than country. Gaines' only album met with disappointing sales and reviews.
  • Genesis' attempted comeback in 1997 with Ray Wilson after the departure of lead singer/drummer Phil Collins. With Wilson, the group only recorded one album, Calling All Stations, which gained moderate success in Europe, but failed miserably in the United States. Wilson was released not long after that, and the band hasn't recorded since.
  • Guns N' Roses frontman Axl Rose had a brief comeback in 2002 after being virtually MIA for nine years with a newer version of Guns N' Roses. Every original member of the band except Rose had either been fired or quit. After a surprise performance at the 2002 Video Music Awards the new band went on tour, but due to cancelled dates and no-shows by Rose the tour was cancelled. The latest rumour as of February 2006 is that the album Chinese Democracy could finally be released sometime in 2006, after almost 15 years of recording sessions. It remains to be seen if Rose's new Guns N' Roses will be able to find commercial and/or critical success. Well received concerts and mostly positive reviews of new song leaks (in both NME and Rolling Stone) are promising signs.
  • Van Halen's comeback album Van Halen III, with new singer Gary Cherone, was a massive flop compared to the multi-platinum-selling albums it followed. Cherone left on good terms during the recording of their subsequent album, which was never released.
  • Michael Jackson was fired by Sony BMG in 2002 after the relatively slow sales of his 2001 album Invincible and after a series of personal scandals. Jackson subsequently tried to revive his career by inviting the British documentary filmmaker Martin Bashir to follow him around for several months. The resulting film, Living with Michael Jackson, portrayed him as a pedophile and a shameless egomaniac. Even before the film came out, Bashir's crews captured Jackson inexplicably dangling a baby (evidently his son Blanket) over the edge of a hotel balcony in Berlin: the footage was replayed on TV newscasts worldwide. From 2003 to 2005 Jackson was tried in California for endangering a minor (not his son.) After he was acquitted, he repeatedly announced plans to make a record (with numerous guest stars) to benefit the survivors of Hurricane Katrina: as of November 2, 2006, no such record has appeared.
  • The 1985 performance by Led Zeppelin at Live Aid.

[edit] Flops in professional wrestling

Many gimmicks and storylines in professional wrestling have failed, but a select few have failed resoundingly. Examples:

  • The Gobbledygooker - A wrestler dressed in a turkey outfit that was "hatched" during the 1990 Survivor Series, after months of hype. "Mean" Gene Okerlund frolicked in the ring with the giant turkey, even dancing to The Funky Chicken. The entire segment lasted upwards of 15 minutes, much to the fans' utter disinterest and even repulsion. Due to the overwhelming negative reaction, the character was scrapped. It did resurface once more, at WrestleMania X-Seven for the gimmick Battle Royal, under the name "Gobbly Gooker" (the misspelling possibly due to the production team's uneducation of the gimmick).
  • The Shockmaster Incident - A new wrestler who was heavily hyped in World Championship Wrestling (WCW), but tripped during his grand entrance. He killed any chance of being taken seriously.
  • Xanta Klaus - At the WWF's December In Your House PPV, Savio Vega and 'Santa Claus' were at ringside handing out presents and playing to the fans. Heel manager The Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase then appeared. DiBiase proclaimed that he can buy off Savio Vega. As Vega argued with DiBiase, 'Santa' jumped him from behind and attacked him. DiBiase did his trademark laugh and introduced this warped Santa as Xanta Klaus. Xanta would go on to have one more appearance (on the following night's Monday Night RAW), before never being mentioned again. The problem with the Xanta Klaus gimmick was that it was a seasonal thing and there was no use for a wrestler that could only be used for a certain time of the year. The man who played Xanta would resurface again in Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) more famously as Balls Mahoney.

[edit] See also

[edit] Flops in television

[edit] Dramas

  • 3 lbs, a House, M.D. rip-off starring Stanley Tucci that lasted three weeks in 2006.
  • Automan: A 1983-1984 ABC series with Desi Arnaz, Jr. as a cop with a computer-generated partner.
  • Beacon Hill: CBS's expensive American answer to Upstairs, Downstairs. Many critics and Bostonians alike noted several inaccuracies, and low ratings led the network to cut their losses on the show with two episodes left to air (1975).
  • Central Park West: Heavily hyped soap (a la Dallas and Melrose Place) that flopped during the 1995 televion season.
  • Commander in Chief - Despite premering in high ratings and heavily promoted on ABC, ratings began to drop amid changes in producing, thus ABC yanked it twice and recently yanked it from the May sweeps. The show will not seek a second season, although there might be plans for a TV movie.
  • Cop Rock - Short-lived commercially unsuccessful effort to combine police drama with musical, by Steven Bochco (1990, ABC).
  • Cover Up - The 1984-1985 CBS action series infamous due to the death of its star, Jon-Erik Hexum, in a prop gun accident on the set. He was replaced by Anthony Hamilton, but the show soon ended anyway.
  • Deadline: Heavily hyped NBC legal drama starring Oliver Platt, Bebe Neuwirth and Lili Taylor that was quickly cancelled during the 2000-2001 season.
  • Doctor Simon Locke: A cheaply made syndicated medical drama starring Jack Albertson, who was so appalled by the production values of the final product that he quit in disgust (1971).
  • Grandpa Goes to Washington: In 1978, after the collapse of Chico and the Man due to Freddie Prinze's suicide, NBC gave its co-star Jack Albertson a series in which he played an elderly, newly elected US Senator. It was gone in three and a half months.
  • Head Cases was an American primetime dramedy TV show, best known as the first show cancelled for the 2005-2006 season. It was broadcast by FOX and premiered on September 14, 2005. It was cancelled after two episodes on September 22 after disastrous ratings and critical drubbing.
  • Kidnapped (2006), with Timothy Hutton and Dana Delany as a wealthy Manhattan couple whose son is snatched and Delroy Lindo as the FBI agent assigned to the case, was pulled from its 10:00pm Wednesday slot and shifted to the Saturday night graveyard shortly after its debut. NBC execs advised the producers to tie up all loose ends by the 13th episode, then yanked the show two weeks later.
  • Kodiak, filmed on location, was a 1973 police drama starring Clint Walker as a member of the fictitious Alaska State Patrol. It was cancelled after one month.
  • Lanigan's Rabbi, based on a series of novels by Harry Kemelman, cast Art Carney as the police chief in a small California town and Bruce Solomon as the local rabbi who helped him solve crimes. In 1977, it aired in rotation with Columbo, McCloud, and McMillan and Wife under the umbrella title The NBC Sunday Mystery Movie. It was cancelled after seven months.
  • Law & Order: Trial by Jury was cancelled after two months, and was the first spin-off of the Law & Order series to be taken off the air.
  • The show that replaced it, the fertility drama Inconceivable was a much worse flop, cancelled after two episodes, and replaced by reruns of Law & Order: Criminal Intent. Trial by Jury's set (along with the timeslot) was then reused for the new Dick Wolf series Conviction; again, this program was cancelled after two months. In the fall, the original Law & Order took over the timeslot.
  • LAX this (2004) Heather Locklear drama didn't quite take off with viewers.
  • The Long, Hot Summer was a 1965 primetime soap opera, starring Roy Thinnes, Edmond O'Brien, Ruth Roman, and Lana Wood, based on the writings of William Faulkner. In an effort to improve ratings, ABC changed its time slot in January 1966, then cancelled it at the end of the season.
  • Longstreet (1971) starred James Franciscus as a blind New Orleans insurance company investigator who relied on a guide dog and an electronic cane to get around. It lasted one season.
  • Rob Lowe's legal drama The Lyon's Den, cancelled by NBC in 2003 after six episodes.
  • The Man From Atlantis: Patrick Duffy played the title character in this NBC fantasy series from 1977. Though it flopped in the US, it was the first American TV show sold to the People's Republic of China.
  • MDs: Featuring William Fichtner and John Hannah as maverick doctors, this series was mauled by critics and didn't last long (2002).
  • Medical Investigation: CSI with germs that barely lasted a season (2004-2005).
  • Misfits of Science: An NBC action series about three young adults (two of them played by Dean Paul Martin and Courtney Cox) with unusual powers who used them to fight crime, this show was blasted by critics and was soundly beaten by CBS's Dallas in the ratings (1985-1986).
  • Models, Inc.: A Fox spin-off of Melrose Place, with Linda Gray as the head of a modeling agency (1994).
  • Nakia, filmed on located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, was a 1974 police drama about a Native American deputy sheriff. It lasted two months.
  • Number 96 was a major soap opera hit for the Australian 0-10 Network in the 1970s but when NBC tried to make an American copy in 1980, it failed to match the chemistry of the sexy original. The US series lasted four weeks.
  • Paper Dolls: This 1984 ABC prime time soap's cast included Morgan Fairchild. Lloyd Bridges, and Dack Rambo.
  • Runaway (2006), about an attorney (Donnie Wahlberg) framed for murder on the lam with his wife and children, disappeared from the schedule a month after its debut.
  • The Senator (1970) starred Hal Holbrook as an idealistic politician whose term in office no doubt lasted longer than the series, which was cancelled at the end of its freshman season.
  • Six Degrees, a 2006 drama about a group of New Yorkers whose lives are intertwined unexpectedly, found itself "on hiatus" by mid-November of its first season.
  • Skin: Fox heavily hyped this Ron Silver and Kevin Anderson drama during the Super Bowl, but it was yanked after 3 episodes.
  • Smith starred Ray Liotta as a suburban family man whose wife (Virginia Madsen) was oblivious to the fact he was the ringleader of a gang of thieves. After three broadcasts, it earned the distinction of being the first new show of the Fall 2006 season to be cancelled.
  • Supertrain - Usually cited as the worst television flop ever that brought NBC to the brink of bankruptcy, due to its high (for 1979) cost of a million dollars per episode, not justified by its meager ratings.
  • Tattinger's - This highly-touted 1988 NBC comedy-drama from the producers of St. Elsewhere was plagued by production problems and poor ratings; it was retooled as a 1989 sitcom called Nick and Hillary, and still did poorly.
  • Trinity (TV series): Promoted as the 'next great drama', it failed to capture viewers and was quickly canceled (1998).
  • V (TV series) was an ambitious 1984 science fiction series that served as an allegory of the 1930s takeover of Germany by the Nazis. NBC scheduled it in four different time slots before cancelling it at the end of its first season.

[edit] Daytime Soaps

  • 90-minute installments of the NBC soap opera Another World, which were reduced back to one hour after sixteen months (March 1979 to August 1980) and a 50% ratings decline, from which the show never recovered.
  • The City: ABC's soap opera successor to Loving (1995-1997).
  • Generations: This NBC soap opera was the first with an African-American core family, but it ran only two years (1989-1991).
  • Texas: This NBC soap opera was originally made as a springboard for popular actress Beverlee McKinsey, who left the show after one year; this plus a time-slot move from 3 PM to 11 AM (against The Price is Right) caused the show's cancellation the following season (1980-1982).
  • How to Survive a Marriage: A socially relevant NBC soap opera starring Rosemary Prinz; audiences found the attempts at social relevance off-putting, and at 3:30 PM it was no match for Match Game on CBS and One Life to Live on ABC; it was moved to 1:30 (against CBS's #1 soap As The World Turns), and three months later was axed when Days of Our Lives expanded to one hour. (1974-1975).

[edit] Sitcoms

  • All-American Girl, the 1994 Margaret Cho ABC sitcom. The network continuously meddled with the format (even going so far as to hire an "Asian consultant" to work with the star); this along with Cho's rapid dieting took a toll on the show and the health of its star.
  • All That Glitters: a syndicated serial comedy from Norman Lear set in a world where women were dominant and men were second-class citizens. The cast included Eileen Brennan, Gary Sandy and Linda Gray as a transgender model (1977).
  • Amanda's, ABC's unsuccessful American remake of Fawlty Towers starring Beatrice Arthur. In the US translation there was no equivalent of Basil Fawlty, and up against Magnum, P.I. and Fame the show lasted a month (1983).
  • Apple Pie, This 1978 ABC sitcom, produced by Norman Lear and set during the Great Depression, starred Rue McClanahan as a woman who picked a family out of the want ads (one of them was played by Dabney Coleman). Detested by critics, it was gone in two weeks.
  • Baby Bob: 2002 CBS sitcom about a talking baby.
  • Baby, I'm Back: Demond Wilson's 1978 CBS sitcom in which he was a husband who had disappeared seven years ago; having been declared dead, his wife was now free to remarry. Kim Fields played their daughter.
  • Baby Talk: 1991 ABC series loosely based on the hit film Look Who's Talking. Here, Julia Duffy played the mother and Tony Danza was the voice of the baby's thoughts. Duffy quit and was replaced by Mary Page Keller.
  • The Baxters: A 1979 syndicated attempt by Norman Lear to mix situation comedy with public affairs.
  • Bless This House: A CBS sitcom intended to clean up the image of raunchy comedian Andrew Dice Clay, without his middle name, and without many viewers (1995).
  • Can't Hurry Love: CBS insisted that this Nancy McKeon sitcom was not a copy of Friends, but within a few months the show was gone and the point was moot (1995-1996).
  • The Charmings: The 1987-1988 ABC sitcom which saw the domestic life of Snow White and Prince Charming after they married. Paul Winfield played the Magic Mirror. In the fall of 1987 ABC unwisely put it on Thursdays, where NBC was dominant.
  • Coupling, the U.S. version of the BBC's hit sitcom saw high promotion but extremely low ratings.
  • Dreams: In 1984, CBS attempted a sitcom built around a fictional rock group (fronted by John Stamos), and even a record of the group was released commercially, but competition from The Fall Guy and Highway to Heaven dashed this show's dreams of success.
  • The Duck Factory was a 1984 sitcom starring Jim Carrey as a Midwestern cartoonist who finds work at a small, rundown Hollywood animation studio that produces a children's TV series called Dippy Duck. It was cancelled after three months.
  • Dusty's Trail: 1973 syndicated western sitcom by Sherwood Schwartz, starring Bob Denver and Forrest Tucker. Many TV reference books which usually maintain a neutral point of view could not keep themselves from calling it one of the worst shows ever.
  • Easy Street was a 1986 sitcom starring Loni Anderson as a former Las Vegas showgirl who inherits a Beverly Hills mansion when her husband unexpectedly dies. Most plot lines revolved around her pretentious sister-in-law's efforts to oust her from the property. It lasted one season.
  • Emily's Reasons Why Not - A Heather Graham sitcom that was to usher in ABC's new post-Monday Night Football Monday schedule, and was green-lighted with only the basic idea for the show, and no pilot. Heavily promoted through December 2005 with print, radio, TV and outdoor ads, and through ABC's Bowl Championship Series coverage, the series aired for one episode to disappointing ratings, critical lambasting and unflattering comparisons to Sex and the City, and was pulled shortly thereafter for reruns of The Bachelor.
  • E/R, a 1984 CBS sitcom set in Chicago's Clark Street Hospital, featured Elliot Gould, Mary McDonnell, Conchata Ferrell, Jason Alexander, and George Clooney as its emergency room staff. The network changed the show's time slot five times before finally cancelling it at the end of its freshman season.
  • The Famous Teddy Z: A 1989-1990 CBS sitcom starring Jon Cryer and Alex Rocco set at a talent agency. Despite critical praise and being slotted between Murphy Brown and Designing Women, the show did not last, but it did earn Rocco an Emmy.
  • Grand: This 1990 NBC sitcom, produced by Carsey-Werner and given the time slot inbetween Cheers and L.A. Law, attempted a serialized show similar in format to the 1970s hit Soap, but it washed out quickly.
  • Hail to the Chief: The 1985 Patty Duke sitcom for ABC in which she portrayed the first woman President of the United States. From the producers of Soap, who copied that show's serialized format here. Creator Susan Harris said that the network's interference ruined the show.
  • Hanging In, A 1979 Norman Lear sitcom for CBS, starring Bill Macy; From the ashes of Maude, whose title character became a member of the US House of Representatives when star Bea Arthur left it, Lear intended to create a sitcom about a black congressman, to be played by Cleavon Little. Real black congressman saw the show and disliked it so much that Lear pulled it and retooled it as this show, now set in a university. After all the hullabaloo, the revised show ran only a month.
  • The Hathaways: ABC sitcom about a couple who takes in a family of performing chimps (1961-1962).
  • High Society: CBS attempted an American version of Absolutely Fabulous, but the resulting series lasted four months (1995-1996).
  • Jake in Progress - A 2005 sitcom starring John Stamos. First season ratings were disappointing but ABC renewed it. Its second season premiere appeared after the pilot of Emily's Reasons Why Not, to very disappointing ratings. ABC then scaled back show production, cancelled Emily's, and pulled Jake from the timeslot with The Bachelor taking place of the two show's timeslots. No episode aired afterwards, and in May 2006 ABC announced that the show had been cancelled.
  • The Jackie Thomas Show: Tom Arnold's heavily-hyped ABC sitcom was sure to benefit from having his then-wife's sitcom, Roseanne, as a lead in. The expected ratings windfall never happened (1993).
  • The Last Resort, a 1979 CBS sitcom set in the Catskills, was pulled from the schedule after three episodes. It returned two months later for a brief run before being cancelled.
  • The Lucie Arnaz Show (1985) featured Lucille Ball's daughter as a psychologist who wrote an advice column and co-hosted a radio call-in program. In this case, the apple fell far from the tree - the younger Lucie's series was cancelled after two months.
  • Makin' It: A 1979 David Naughton disco sitcom on ABC, loosely based on Saturday Night Fever, complete with Bee Gees music. Although Naughton's recording the theme song went to #5 on the charts, it lasted that number of episodes up against The Incredible Hulk and Diff'rent Strokes, plus its run coincided with a a growing backlash against disco music.
  • Me and the Chimp: Critically derided CBS sitcom in which Ted Bessell played second fiddle to a chimpanzee (1972).
  • The Nutt House: An expensive Mel Brooks-produced NBC sitcom from 1989, starring Harvey Korman and Cloris Leachman. Reviews and ratings were very bad, and the show was soon the punchline of a joke on ALF.
  • Phyl and Mikhy: A CBS sitcom about an American athlete married to a Russian athlete who defected. This show was intended to air on NBC to tie in with their broadcast of the 1980 Summer Olympics, but when then-President Jimmy Carter pulled out, NBC dropped their coverage in May, and this show (1980).
  • The Second Hundred Years: An ABC series starring Monte Markham in a dual role as both a frozen gold prospector thawed out in the present day and his grandson who found him (1967-1968).
  • The Six O'Clock Follies: An irregularly scheduled NBC sitcom set during the Vietnam War, which audiences felt was too recent in memory to be made into a comedy (1980).
  • South Central: A grim 1994 Fox sitcom about a black family in South Los Angeles.
  • Temperatures Rising, a 1972 ABC medical comedy, went through three different casts (including James Whitmore, Paul Lynde, Cleavon Little, and Alice Ghostley) and two different formats before the network pulled the plug midway through the second season. Undaunted by its failure, it brought it back in the summer of 1974 with yet more changes before finally abandoning it completely.
  • Twenty Good Years paired John Lithgow and Jeffrey Tambor as longtime friends who decide to throw caution to the wind and live their later years to the fullest. This 2006 NBC sitcom was pulled from the schedule a few weeks after its debut.
  • The Ugliest Girl in Town: Critically lambasted ABC sitcom in which Peter Kastner played an agent who posed as a female model to be nearer to his girlfriend (1968-1969).
  • The Waverly Wonders: A three-episode NBC sitcom starring Joe Namath as a high school basketball coach. Easily defeated in the ratings by Donny and Marie and Wonder Woman, Namath got the part after Larry Hagman turned down this show to star in Dallas (1978).
  • Women of the House: A spin-off of Designing Women in which Delta Burke's character served in her late husband's seat in the US House of Representatives (1995).
  • Woops!: A Fox sitcom about six survivors of a nuclear holocaust (1992).

[edit] Failed Spinoffs of Successful Shows

[edit] All in the Family spin-offs

  • 704 Hauser, a 1994 CBS sitcom in which a black family (headed by John Amos) now lived in Archie Bunker's house. None of the original All in the Family characters ever appeared except Joey Stivic.
  • Gloria, which saw Sally Struthers's character a divorced mother. Even though it ranked in the Nielsen Top 25, it was cancelled after a year (1982-1983).
    • Checking In: A four-episode April 1981 spinoff of The Jeffersons (itself a spin-off of All in the Family) in which Marla Gibbs's character of Florence Johnston was now working at a luxury hotel. Larry Linville played her boss; Gibbs would return to the parent show next fall.

[edit] The Brady Bunch spin-offs

[edit] Sanford and Son spin-offs

[edit] Three's Company spin-offs

[edit] Failed Star Vehicles

  • Bette: This sitcom was a heavily hyped star vehicle for Bette Midler, but poor reviews, several recasts, production problems, and low ratings doomed the series to a five-month run on CBS (2000-2001).
  • The Chevy Chase Show - While heavily hyped, it was cancelled after five weeks and remains one of the most notorious failures in the history of broadcast television. It is known as the "Edsel of Television."
  • Dolly Parton's two variety series, from 1976 and 1987.
  • The Ellen Show (2001), comedienne Ellen DeGeneres' second series, cast her as an Internet exec who returned to her rural home town after her business failed. Although it was established the character was gay, this aspect of her personal life was played down considerably. The supporting cast included Cloris Leachman as her addle-brained mother and Jim Gaffigan as her former high school beau. Eighteen episodes were filmed, but the network pulled the plug after only thirteen aired. Eventually, the remaining 5 episodes were broadcast by the Paramount Comedy Channel in the UK.
  • The Ellen Burstyn Show cast the film star as a successful author sharing a Baltimore brownstone with her acerbic mother (Elaine Stritch) and divorced daughter (Megan Mullaly). The series lasted from September through November 1986.
  • Emeril, A 2001 sitcom starring Emeril Lagasse that was cancelled after 4 episodes.
  • Good Sports: A reteaming of Farrah Fawcett and Ryan O'Neal in 1991. It didn't work.
  • Life With Lucy: This 1986 ABC sitcom was the fourth and final series for Lucille Ball, who died three years later. Lucy's heavily-promoted return to series television was excoriated by critics, and due to its dismal ratings it was withdrawn after eight episodes (out of thirteen that were filmed) had aired.
  • Mr. President: George C. Scott starred in this early Fox sitcom as a fictional Commander in Chief. Also starring Madeline Kahn and Conrad Bain, it was gone before the actual US President at the time, Ronald Reagan, left office (1987).
  • The Richard Pryor Show: The comedian's 1977 NBC variety series was put against ABC's mega-hits Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley, and Pryor himself, fed up with network interference, halted the show after five episodes taped.

[edit] Redd Foxx

The star of Sanford and Son had three flops after its demise:

    • The Redd Foxx Comedy Hour: Foxx left his NBC sitcom to star in this short-lived ABC sketch comedy. On his first show he joked that ABC stood for "A Bigger Check," but those checks stopped coming after four months up against Barnaby Jones (1977-1978).
    • The Redd Foxx Show: Foxx's 1986 ABC sitcom placed a distant third in the ratings versus Airwolf on CBS and Gimme a Break! on NBC; attempts to retool the show two months into its run were in vain.
    • The Royal Family: Fox co-starred with Della Reese in this CBS sitcom. He died a month after its premiere; his character died, and an attempt to retool the show with Jackée Harry proved fruitless (1991-1992).

[edit] Mary Tyler Moore

The star had five consecutive failures after the end of The Mary Tyler Moore Show:

  • Mary: A CBS sketch comedy series which was gone after three episodes had aired (1978).
  • The Mary Tyler Moore Hour: An attempt to retool the above series, featuring David Letterman (1979).
  • Mary: A CBS sitcom in which Ms. Moore's character worked at a Chicago tabloid newspaper. Katey Sagal played one of her co-workers (1985-1986).
  • Annie McGuire: A CBS sitcom where Ms. Moore played the title character, who recently remarried (1988). Her former co-star, Dick Van Dyke had a sitcom failure the same year which aired a half-hour before hers on the same network; see below.
  • New York News: A CBS drama where Ms. Moore played the editor-in-chief of a fictional New York City newspaper. It also starred Gregory Harrison and Madeline Kahn (1995).

[edit] McLean Stevenson

All five of the actor's post-M*A*S*H series were failures:

  • The McLean Stevenson Show: McLean played a middle-aged husband and father on this NBC sitcom. (1975-1976)
  • In the Beginning: McLean played a priest in an inner-city church on this one-month CBS sitcom. (1978)
  • Hello, Larry: McLean played Larry Alder, a divorced radio talk show host with two teenage daughters on this NBC sitcom. Despite attempts to create interest in the show by having characters guest star on Diff'rent Strokes, the show never caught on. It became the punchline for McLean's decision to leave a hit CBS sitcom for a string of flops, all of which were attacked by critics and ignored by audiences (1979-1980).
  • Condo: McLean played a man whose WASP son married the daughter of his Hispanic next-door neighbor in this ABC sitcom. (1983)
  • Dirty Dancing: In his final series, McLean played a supporting role as Baby's father in CBS's TV version of the hit 1987 movie of the same name (1988-1989).

[edit] The Seinfeld curse

[edit] Robert Urich

The star of Spenser For Hire had several failed series:

  • Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice: An ABC sitcom version of the hit 1969 movie of the same name (1973).
  • Gavilan: An NBC action series which failed to withstand the competition from Three's Company (1982-1983).
  • American Dreamer: An NBC sitcom that saw Robert as a Chicago magazine reporter (1990).
  • Crossroads: An ABC drama with Robert as an lawyer who quits his practice to go on the road with his teenage son (1992-1993).
  • It Had to be You: This CBS sitcom that paired Robert with Faye Dunaway lasted a month (1993).
  • Vital Signs: An ABC medical documentary hosted by Robert, who was bald due to the chemotherapy treatments he was undergoing at the time (1997).
  • The Love Boat: The Next Wave: A UPN sequel to the 1977-1986 ABC series saw Robert as the new captain (1998).
    • He also co-starred in the aforementioned Emeril, his last series.

[edit] Dick Van Dyke

  • Van Dyke and Company: Dick Van Dyke's 1976 variety series on ABC whose repertory cast included Andy Kaufman.
  • The Van Dyke Show: Dick Van Dyke and his son Barry Van Dyke co-starred in this short-lived CBS sitcom. Dick's former co-star, Mary Tyler Moore, had a sitcom flop at the same time: see above.

[edit] Game Shows

  • The Magnificent Marble Machine, a game show hosted by Art James that aired on NBC from 1975-1976. The show was heavily hyped in part to the pinball craze that was then sweeping the nation, but was critically panned and was a ratings failure. Widely considered one of the legendary flops of the game show genre.
  • The Match Game/Hollywood Squares Hour: An attempt by NBC to combine two of the most popular game shows of the 1970s, but it didn't gel with critics or audiences. Major criticism went to Jon Bauman, formerly "Bowzer" of Sha Na Na, who never hosted a game show before he hosted the Hollywood Squares segment. Being scheduled against General Hospital and Guiding Light made things worse (1983-1984).
  • The 1990 and 1998 revivals of Match Game were both unsuccessful.
  • The Rich List: A 2006 FOX game show about listmaking that promised unlimited winnings. It was pulled after one episode due to disappointing ratings, despite heavy promotion and positive reception among the game show community.

[edit] Variety Shows

  • The Big Show was an attempt by NBC to revive the variety series format, with an extravagant multi-performer showcase that aired in a mixture of 90- and 120-minute time slots. The series was cancelled after only a few months on the air in 1980.
  • The Leslie Uggams Show was a 1969 musical variety series that included a weekly segment entitled Sugar Hill, a comedy sketch about a middle-class African-American family living in a large city. The show was cancelled after three months.
  • Pink Lady & Jeff - This Japanese female singing duo's NBC program, co-hosted by Jeff Altman, is considered by many to be one of the worst television shows ever. The girls spoke no English and had to learn their lines phonetically, so rewrites were practically impossible. In the ratings The Dukes of Hazzard easily beat it (1980).
  • Saturday Night Live, the disastrous 1980 season produced by Jean Doumanian. After cast member Charles Rocket said "fuck" live on the air, every performer was fired except Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo.
  • Turn-On, ABC's derivative answer to Laugh-In, became the first show to be cancelled by its network before the first episode had finished airing. In some markets, the show was pulled and went to a commercial break.

[edit] Reality TV

  • Forever Eden - The first so-called "never ending" reality TV series, similar in format to Paradise Hotel. Fox cancelled the show during its first season. However, in Israel it was a huge success.
  • The One: Making a Music Star - Reportedly the most expensive summer series in ABC network history, and based on the successful Star Academy format, this American version was regarded as a ripoff of American Idol and the premiere episode had the second-lowest audience in the history of the major U.S. broadcast networks. It was cancelled after four episodes (two weeks), while the competition was still running. To date, no winner was announced. This was the only version of the Star Academy franchise to have been cancelled before the competition was completed.
  • The Will - A CBS reality show about a bunch of family members competing in challenges to become the heir to a large fortune. Despite heavy promotion, it was canceled after the first episode.
  • Who's Your Daddy? - A reality show that drew heavy controversy while getting less-than-stellar ratings. Fox dropped it after the pilot.

[edit] Talk Shows

[edit] Sports

  • XFL - A joint venture between World Wrestling Federation owner Vince McMahon and NBC which, at the time, had no rights to show professional football. After an initial flurry of interest, the league drew almost no viewership, with one game garnering the second lowest prime time ratings ever recorded by a major network. Although a failure, some of the league's stars went on to play in the NFL (most notably Rod Smart and Tommy Maddox) and some of the technical innovations (most notably, the Sky Cam) were adopted by NFL broadcasters.

[edit] Animation

  • Father of the Pride - A CGI animated series about a pride of white lions owned by stage magicians Siegfried and Roy, which was cancelled early in its first season. It was seen by many as a gimmick and a shill.
  • Little Muppet Monsters was a Jim Henson production for CBS that combined live-action Muppet scenes with cartoons starring Muppet characters. It was paired with the successful Muppet Babies at the beginning of that show's second season in 1985 to form the block Muppets, Babies and Monsters. Although 18 episodes were produced, the show was cancelled after its second episode, at least partially due to Henson's own reservations about the show.

[edit] Failed Networks

  • CBS 2 Information Network, from WCBS-TV New York.
  • CBS Cable Channel: In operation from 1980 to 1982.
  • CNN's specialized channels CNN Sports Illustrated and CNNfn.
  • DuMont Television Network, although it ran 9 years (two short of UPN and The WB), is widely considered a failure for economic reasons.
  • G4techTV was the highly controversial merger of tech channel TechTV and gaming network G4.
  • Overmyer Network: This 1967 attempt at a fourth American TV network lasted one month.
  • Toronto One - An independent TV station that suffered from low ratings and, according to many, poorly-produced programming. Columnist Russell Smith of The Globe and Mail went so far as to call Toronto 1 a "wretched excuse for a television station." The station was later sold and rebranded "Sun TV" after the Toronto Sun newspaper.

[edit] Failed Film-to-TV Adaptations

[edit] Failed Revivals of Old Shows

  • The New Mickey Mouse Club: Disney revived their beloved 1950s show in syndication with a multi-ethnic cast, but no head Mouseketeer. Two future Facts of Life girls got their start on this show (1977-1978).
  • The New Monkees: MTV and Columbia spent more time looking a cast for the 1980s revival of The Monkees then they did actually airing this show (1987).
  • The New Perry Mason: In 1973, CBS attempted to revive Perry Mason with Monte Markham as the title character.
  • Night Stalker: An update of the classic 70's series. Starring Stuart Townsend and the stupefyingly dull Gabrielle Union, it limped on for six episodes in 2005.
  • Ozzie's Girls: A 1973 syndicated sitcom where Ozzie and Harriet rented Ricky and David's old rooms to two college girls.
  • You Bet Your Life with Bill Cosby. After the end of The Cosby Show in 1992, Cosby hosted the revival of the quiz show that was such a ratings disaster that stations moved it to the middle of the night or canceled it altogether during the middle of the season. An earlier remake, which was produced for syndication 12 years earlier and starred Buddy Hackett, was also a failure.
  • Zorro and Son: Disney's attempt at a tongue-in-cheek sequel to its 1950s Zorro series, with Henry Darrow replacing Guy Williams, who left before shooting began because he disliked the show's direction, while The Fall Guy and Real People beat the show in the ratings (1983, CBS).

[edit] NBC Fall 1983 Lineup

During the 1983-1984 TV season NBC launched nine new series, none of which were renewed for a second season:

[edit] British TV flops

  • The BBC soap operas Triangle and Eldorado. Triangle was filmed on a North Sea ferry ship equipped with an edit suite. The weather was uniformly bad making for a very grey series. Eldorado featured an international cast to appeal to foreign television markets but many found the dialogue hard to follow. In both instances the BBC had to bear the full cost of cancellation.
  • The relaunched ITV1 soap Crossroads.
  • The Brighton Belles: A disastrous British remake of The Golden Girls (1993).
  • Days Like These: The British remake of That 70s Show
  • Heil Honey I'm Home! - A UK comedy series on Galaxy, part of BSB, featuring Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun in a stereotypical 1950s sitcom setting, with Jewish neighbours. It remains the only UK television show to be cancelled after its first episode, in 1990.
  • Judgement Day - A 2003 UK Saturday night ITV1 gameshow hosted by Brian Conley. Cancelled after two episodes due to extremely low viewing figures.

[edit] Australian TV flops

See also: Jumping the shark; List of television shows cancelled after one episode

[edit] Turkeys (Flops in theatre)

  • 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (1976): Lyrics by Alan J. Lerner, of My Fair Lady and Brigadoon fame; music by Leonard Bernstein (who had important Broadway successes such as On the Town, Candide, and, most notably West Side Story, to his credit). Closed after only seven performances. There was no cast recording made. An attempt was made to revive it in London in 1997. A reviewer commented: "As exhumations go, this one had its bright moments."
  • Two 1990s attempts at sequels to Annie both saw short runs:
  • Behind the Iron Mask (2005): This was written by John Robinson, who fulfilled his wife's dying wish to spend £500,000 on a West End production on this stage production of the story The Man in the Iron Mask. It was very heavily panned by the critics and closed after running only 18 days.
  • Breakfast at Tiffany's (1966), a musical version of the Truman Capote novella and subsequent film, closed after four previews.
  • Bring Back Birdie (1981): A four-performance sequel to the musical Bye Bye Birdie.
  • The Capeman (1997): Paul Simon 's 1st attempt of doing a Broadway musical based on the infamous "Capeman murders." It was a huge failure because of its dark overtones.
  • Carrie (1988): A Broadway musical adaptation of Stephen King's novel of the same title, starring Betty Buckley, closed after only five performances and 16 previews. One of the many problems plaguing the show was the bucket of pig blood used in a climactic scene in the film. In the play, it was replaced by people dabbing red paint on the actress's face, as actually pouring stage blood on the actress would have interfered with her body microphone. The show was such a notorious turkey it provided the title for Ken Mandelbaum's survey of theatrical disasters, Not Since Carrie: Forty Years of Broadway Musical Flops.
  • Dance of the Vampires (2003): the English language rewrite of the successful Austrian Tanz der Vampire closed after only 56 performances on Broadway.
  • David Henry Hwang's extensive rewrite of the Rodgers & Hammerstein musical Flower Drum Song ran only 169 performances (2002).
  • A Doll's Life (1982), a musical imagining of what may have happened to Nora after she abandoned her husband in Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House, closed after five performances.
  • Got Tu Go Disco (1978): Disco came to Broadway, but left after 8 performances.
  • Lennon (2005): A musical about John Lennon's life, created by Yoko Ono and featuing very few Beatles songs, received bad reviews from Broadway critics and closed after 42 previews and 49 performances.
  • Lestat (2006): Elton John and Bernie Taupin's musicalization of Anne Rice's novel, which closed after 33 previews and 39 performances.
  • Me Jack, You Jill (1976), a Broadway play starring Lisa Kirk and Sylvia Sidney, closed after 16 previews.
  • Miss Moffett, a musical adaptation of The Corn is Green, with a setting transplanted from the Welsh coal mines to a Southern American college town, with Bette Davis in the title role, closed in Philadelphia during its pre-Broadway run.
  • Oscar: In October 2004, a musical by Mike Read about Oscar Wilde closed after just one night at the Shaw Theatre in Euston after a severe critical mauling.
  • Platinum, a 1978 Broadway musical set in a Hollywood recording studio, where a former singing star (Alexis Smith) is attempting a comeback, closed after 12 previews and 33 performances.
  • Prettybelle, a Jule Styne-Bob Merrill musical directed by Gower Champion and starring Angela Lansbury, closed after being crucified by the Boston critics in 1971.
  • Prymate (2004): A play by Mark Medoff which graced the Broadway stage for 23 previews and just five performances.
  • Rachael Lily Rosenbloom and Don't You Ever Forget It, a 1973 Broadway musical revolving around a Bette Midler-type performer played by Ellen Greene, closed after seven previews.
  • The Times They Are A-Changin':- A Broadway production choreographed by Twyla Tharp featuring the music of Bob Dylan closed on 19th November 2006.[2] Some argued that the failure of this venture reflects the hit-or-miss nature of so-called "jukebox musicals": While some, like Mamma Mia! have been worldwide hits, others, like Lennon and a Beach Boys musical called "Good Vibrations," have been flops.

[edit] Flops in film

A movie is most likely a flop if it doesn't perform as expected. A major movie flop might barely (or not even) make back the money it took to finance it. In extreme cases it might put the studio out of business.

[edit] See also

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