Anthony Jaymes was the first of several folks who wrote today with this question based on this post…
I was intrigued to hear that that TV show you worked on aired on ABC but was taped at NBC. Why would they do it? Wouldn't it have been cheaper to tape at ABC instead of paying NBC to use their facilities?
The series was produced by Dick Clark's company and I assure you: If it had been cheaper to tape it somewhere else, it would have been taped somewhere else. I was very fond of Dick and I enjoyed working for and with him a few times…but if a dime could be saved, it was saved. If you ever see an episode of The Half-Hour Comedy Hour — and I don't know how you could unless you drop by my house — you just might notice who did the opening voiceover. It was our Executive Producer, Mr. Dick Clark, because that saved the cost of paying someone else.
And by the way: I should have mentioned that there was another, later TV series called The Half-Hour Comedy Hour. The one I worked on that had Rod Hull and Emu in its cast aired on ABC for five weeks starting July 5, 1983. It had no connection to the other show with that name that ran on MTV in 1991.
You seem to think that if you tape an ABC show at the ABC studios, you don't have to pay ABC. Not so. You pay wherever you go and you negotiate the best deal you can get. They will sometimes give priority and better terms to a show that airs on their network but not always.
I was not involved in the decision of where The Half-Hour Comedy Hour would tape but I would guess that at the time we needed a place to do the show, NBC had a studio that otherwise would have been sitting empty…and therefore costing the network instead of earning money. So they offered us a great price — and there was also this financial advantage…
If we'd taped at one of ABC's facilities, we'd not only have had to rent studio space but also office space to house the writers, producers, production people, etc., who need to be close to where the show is rehearsed and taped. By taping at NBC, that was not necessary. Most of those people could work in the office of Dick Clark Productions, which was then in this building in Burbank —
— because that building was directly across the street from the NBC Studios in Burbank.
