Jeff Howard writes to ask…
Maybe you can help me out with something. Like you, I like to read the end credits on TV shows I watch, especially on old shows where you sometimes see names you recognize from other, later programs. On a lot of old shows when I see them, the end credits have weird spacing on them. The names at the top of a title card and either centered or flush left whereas the names at the bottom of the card are all indented to the right. Was there a reason they did this?
Yes. You're referring to a show where a blank space was created in the lower left of one of those title cards like this…
That was because when the show was first run on network television, it was linked to a particular sponsor and the sponsor wanted to display its product on the show for which they were paying. So on the original prints they made up for exhibition, they'd put an image of their product on the lower left of the title card and then the credits would be formatted around that image like this…
Later on when the show was rerun and that sponsor was no longer funding the enterprise, they would use prints that didn't display the sponsor's product. Sometimes, they'd leave the space blank as with the image above. Sometimes, they'd replace it with an image relevant to the show…
These images, in case you haven't figured it out by now, are from The Dick Van Dyke Show and some of the prints of the show have that smiling image of Dick where a sponsor's product used to be. On others, they'd leave it blank. What they usually wouldn't do (because it cost money) was to go back and redo the credits to fit the whole area.
These days, you don't see anything like this because, first of all, sponsors rarely sponsor an entire show. And second of all, most channels want the credits done so fast and so small, there's no time to read them, let alone see a product displayed along with the names.
A lady I know who works on the new Press Your Luck told me she had to record an episode on her DVR, freeze-frame the half-a-second her credit was on the screen, take a photo of the image and enlarge it so her father could see his daughter's name on the screen. It was impossible for him to see it while watching the actual show. I wish all the networks would get together and agree to make all credits legible.
