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Mister Rogers' Neighborhood or Mister Rogers is an American children's television series that was created and hosted by Fred Rogers. Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was produced by Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania public broadcaster WQED and Rogers' non-profit production company Family Communications, Inc. (named Small World Enterprises prior to 1971). It is the second longest running series on PBS.
HistoryThe series began in 1962 as MisteRogers, a 15-minute program on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Ernie Coombs, a.k.a. Mister Dressup, got his start as a puppeteer on MisteRogers. Image:Net.JPG The NET logo, from the opening sequence of MisteRogers (1969-1970).
The first series of episodes were produced and aired from 1968 to 1976. The second series of episodes were produced and aired from 1979 to 2001 (modern series). The series changed to its 3-worded name, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, in 1970. As of August 11, 1995, all of the episodes of the first half are no longer shown on television, since there is already an ample supply of the second series in circulation, and since many of the episodes of the first series have become outdated. Most episodes from the first half exist in the Museum of Television & Radio including the first episode of the series and the first color episode. When PBS began rerunning the first 460 color episodes of the series in 1976, some of the early color episodes from 1969 and 1970 were re-edited with new voice-overs or footage. For example, in one 1969 episode where Mister Rogers demonstrates the noise-proof ear protectors that airport workers use on the tarmac, the film footage used featured a worker directing a United Airlines jet with its stylised "U" logo—which wasn't introduced until 1974. All of the episodes revised from the first series also included an extra segment following the closing credits, mentioning the episode number and additional companies that provided funding since these episodes originally aired, even though they had not provided funding at the time of original production.
Almost all of the 1979-2001 episodes are in active rotation on PBS. The only exception is the week-long "Conflict" series (episodes #1521–#1525, first aired in November of 1983), which covered the topics of war, bombs, and an arms race. The "Conflict" series was last aired in April 1-5 1996, due to the bombing in Oklahoma City in 1995. In that week of episodes, Cornie's factory was making oddly-shaped parts for a project in Southwood. The king originally determined that they were parts for a bomb, so he ordered Cornie to make extra "bomb" parts for the Neighborhood of Make Believe. Furthermore, King Friday had most of the human characters of the Neighborhood of Make Believe trained as generals, but forgot to train regular soldiers. In the end, they found out that the parts were for a bridge that the Southwooders were building. At the end of the Friday episode, instead of Mister Rogers singing the Good Feeling song, he sang a lullaby, Peace and Quiet, wishing his television friends "peace". This was followed by an on-screen display of Isaiah 2:4:
About the seriesImage:Fred Rodgers.jpg Fred Rogers on the set of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was characterized by its quiet simplicity and gentleness. Episodes usually eschewed a defined plot, and instead consisted of Rogers speaking directly to children about various issues, taking them on tours of factories, demonstrating experiments and crafts, and interacting with his friends. The half-hour episodes were punctuated by a puppet segment chronicling occurrences in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe. Rogers covered a broad range of topics over the years, and the series did not gloss over issues that other children's programming avoided. For example, the series dealt with competition, divorce, death, and war. Rogers returned to the topic of anger regularly and focused on peaceful ways of dealing with angry feelings. In a Make-Believe segment from 1983 that depicted an arms race against the neighboring Southwood, King Friday said, "Yes, so here is your assignment, Handyman Negri: you are to order a million of these from Cornflake S. Pecially and conscript everyone in the neighborhood to help put the bombs together." Later, Friday added, "If Southwood has a million, we will have a million and one." By the end of the week-long series, other inhabitants of the Neighborhood encourage the King to explore more diplomatic options, and the end result is peace.[citations needed] Starting in 1979, episodes were grouped into week-long series, with each series focused on a particular topic. Rogers' monologues throughout the week explore various facets of the topic, and the ongoing story from the Neighborhood of Make-Believe serves as illustration. Mister Rogers always made a clear distinction between the realistic world of his television neighborhood and the fantasy world of Make-Believe. He often discussed what was going to happen in Make-Believe before the next fantasy segment was shown ("Let's pretend that Prince Tuesday has been having scary dreams..."), and sometimes acted out bits of Make-Believe with models on a table before the camera transitioned to the live-action puppet rendition. The miniature motorized trolley, with its accompanying piano theme music, was the only element that appeared in both the realistic world and Make-Believe: it was used to transport viewers from one realm to the other. Rogers, however, was mentioned from time to time in Make-Believe, particularly by Mr. McFeeley, who seemed to form a link between the two worlds. This reality/fantasy distinction put Rogers' series in sharp contrast with other children's series, such as fellow PBS program Sesame Street, which freely mixed realistic and fantastic elements. The series was also notable for its use of jazz-inspired music, mostly arranged and performed by Rogers' long-time friend Johnny Costa, until Costa's death in 1996, when he was succeeded by Michael Moricz for the remainder of the series. The music was unique in its simplicity and flow that blended with the series' sketches and features. The music was usually played live during taping. Lyrics and melodies were written and sung by Rogers—in total, he created more than 200 original songs. At the beginning of each episode, Fred Rogers enters his television studio house, singing "Won't You Be My Neighbor?" He hangs his coat in a closet and puts on a cardigan sweater and removes his dress shoes to put on sneakers. One of Rogers' sweaters now hangs in the Smithsonian Institution, a testament to the cultural influence of his simple daily ritual.[citation needed]. The final episode of the series aired on August 31, 2001. When Fred Rogers died in 2003, PBS' website communicated some ways to make children not be scared about Mr. Rogers' passing away; it presented suggestions to parents on what to say to them about Mr. Rogers and how to approach a child who asks about him. PBS stated that the parents would have to say that although Mr. Rogers is no longer with us, he shall live on in the television series.[citations needed] GuestsImage:Fred Rogers and Yo Yo Ma.jpg Fred Rogers and Yo-Yo Ma discuss how music can be used to deal with angry feelings. Guests on Mister Rogers' Neighborhood were often surprised to find that although Rogers was just as gentle and patient as he was on his series, he was nevertheless a perfectionist who did not allow ad-libbing;[citation needed]he believed that children were thoughtful people who deserved programming as good as anything produced for adults on television.[citation needed] Rogers appeared as a guest on some other series. On the children's animated cartoon series Arthur, for example, Rogers plays himself as an aardvark like Arthur. Prior to this, Arthur appears as a guest in hand-puppet form in an episode of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. Bill Nye (the Science Guy) and Rogers also exchanged appearances on each other's series, as did Rogers and Captain Kangaroo. Rogers appeared in an episode of Sesame Street where he explains to Big Bird, that after he beat out Mr. Snufflelupagus in a running race, that even if one loses the race, that there are no hard feelings to ever break the two of them apart. SpecialsA Christmas special aired in 1978. This special had Francois Clemmons introducing a storyteller and flutist friend to Rogers. They filmed a couple of narrated segments of the stories Francois' friend told. The special also had the Neighborhood of Make-Believe segment which shows how they celebrated Christmas. Even the trolley had a banner on the roof that said "Merry Christmas" on one side, and "Happy Hannukah" on the other. This special was aired every Christmas season until 1982. This special's opening and close have Rogers walking through a real neighborhood while the titles roll rather than the model neighborhood used in the series. In 1994 Rogers created another one-time special for PBS called "Fred Rogers' Heroes" which consisted of documentary portraits of four real-life people whose work helped make their communities better. Rogers, uncharacteristically dressed in a suit and tie, hosted in wraparound segments which did not use the "Neighborhood" set. For a time Rogers produced specials for the parents as a precursor to the subject of the week on the Neighborhood called "Mister Rogers Talk To Parents About (whatever the topic was)". Rogers didn't host those specials though as other people like Joan Lunden, who hosted the Conflict special, and other news announcers played MC duties in front of a gallery of parents while Rogers answered questions from them. These specials were made to prep the parents for any questions the children might ask after watching the episodes on that topic of the week. CharactersCharacters on the series include: Mr. McFeely the delivery man (David Newell, whose fictional "McFeely" surname was actually Fred Rogers' middle name), Neighbor Aber (Chuck Aber), Lady Aberlin (Betty Aberlin), Marilyn Barnett, Chef Brockett (Don Brockett), Tony Chiroldes, Jose Cisneros, Officer Clemmons (François Clemmons), Music Director from 1968 - 1996 (Johnny Costa), Keith David, Music Director from 1996 - 2001 (Michael Morciz), Betsy Nadas, Handy Man Negri (Joe Negri), John Reardon, Audry Roth, Maggie Stewart, Sergio Pinto, Bob Trow. Other regular puppeteers included Michael Horton, Lenny Meledandri, and Carole Switala. Pittsburgh-area native Michael Keaton got his first major acting break as a "Neighborhood of Make-Believe" character in 1975. Keaton played an acrobat in a troup called The Flying Zookeenies that performed for King Friday's birthday. He was also in charge of running the Trolley.[1] Many of the puppet characters appearing in the "Neighborhood of Make-Believe" segment were developed by Rogers years earlier for the The Children's Corner, an educational program that he co-produced with Josie Carey. Rogers was the puppeteer behind many of the characters in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe, including:
Other characters include:
The series produced occasional in-series "operas" during the course of the series. The operas always take place within the Make-Believe segments, and many of them feature American baritone John Reardon as a main character. Among these operas are
The mailman Mr McFeely — named after the middle name of Fred Rogers — appears in both Mister Roger's Neighborhood and the Neighborhood of Make Believe. Mister Rogers in popular cultureFred Rogers and his television series is often parodied for their gentleness and kind demeanor.
SponsorsFrom 1968 to 1976, the sponsor credits were part of the series credits; the ones used in the opening are silent other than the theme, and an announcer or Fred Rogers reads the sponsor credits aloud during the closing credits. From 1976 onward, repeats of episodes from 1969 to 1974 have additional closing sponsor credits over a still of the trolley with the series logo and episode number. From 1979 onward, the sponsor credits were in a separate segment at the start and end of each episode, announced by Fred Rogers. Only the sponsors' names were shown on screen. Credited sponsors include:
The series does not use the "Viewers Like You" credit but adds "We thank you" at the end on the sponsor credits in episodes from 2000 and 2001, to partially comply with PBS regulations. See also
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