The Jerry Springer Show

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The Jerry Springer Show
The current logo of the Jerry Springer Show
Genre	Talk show
Creator(s)	Richard Dominick
Starring	Jerry Springer
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	3000+
Production
Running time	approx. 44 min (without adverts)
Broadcast
Original channel	Syndication
Picture format	480i (SDTV), 720p (HDTV)
Original run	September 20, 1991 – present
Links
Official website
IMDb profile
TV.com summary

The Jerry Springer Show (first aired September 20, 1991) is an internationally known television tabloid talk show, hosted by Jerry Springer, a former politician. It is videotaped at the NBC Tower studios of WMAQ-TV in Chicago and is distributed by NBC Universal, although it does not currently air on any NBC-owned stations. A popular show, it has aired during the high morning, afternoon, and late night hours of many syndicated TV stations since the early 1990s.

The Jerry Springer Show is ostensibly a talk show where troubled or dysfunctional families come to discuss their problems before a studio audience so that the audience or host can offer suggestions on what can be done to resolve their situations. In actuality, the show has come to epitomize the so-called "trash TV talk show," as each episode of the show focuses on a lurid topic that usually involves sex, racism, marital jealousy, the Ku Klux Klan, and other prurient subjects. Typical topics of discussion on the show include unusual extra-marital affairs, vicious rivalries between families, rebellious and promiscuous teenagers, strippers and adult movie stars, and the like. Some of the strangest confessions include when a man admitted that he had married his horse, or a man who had a dedicated fetish for vomiting. The show proudly boasts that it was once voted the "Worst TV Show Ever" by TV Guide. Many considered it one of the most disgraceful shows in television history.

[edit] Format

The "discussion" of each episode's subject usually involves an insult-laden verbal exchange between members of the studio audience and the featured "guests" on the show, who trade barbs throughout the length of the episode. Due to the emotional topics covered on the show, and the tendency of the crowd to encourage the guests, minor fights between guests are commonplace. As a result, the show has several security guards to break up fights, and the director of security, Steve Wilkos, has become a fixture on the show. Each show usually features a series of several groups of people with problems organized along the same theme. After the individual segments, all the guests are brought together on stage for a question-and-answer session with the audience. The audience questions are generally insults towards the guests and the security staff occasionally has to keep the audience and guests from fighting. Springer wraps up each show with a moralizing sermon on the subject entitled "Final Thought," often finishing his speech with "Take care of yourselves and each other." In contrast to the chaos and absurdity exhibited by the guests, Springer's "final thought" is typically succinct and rational advice for the subject featured on the show.

[edit] History

[edit] Early years

The Jerry Springer Show logo from the early seasons.

The Jerry Springer Show debuted on September 20, 1991, with fellow talk-show host Sally Jessy Raphael as its first guest. Initially, both Springer and Sally were distributed by Multimedia Entertainment, before Sally was sold to Universal in the mid '90s, with Springer at first going to the former Universal and later to StudiosUSA.

It started as a politically-oriented talk show, a longer version of the commentary Springer had gained local fame for giving as reporter and anchor. Guests early on included Oliver North and Jesse Jackson, and the topics included homelessness and gun politics. Low ratings led it to be picked up by a new producer. The search for higher ratings led Springer towards tawdry and provocative topics, becoming more and more successful as the show turned more and more lowbrow (although even then it successfully focused on more sensitive and less sensational issues). It became, through Springer's own admittance, a "freak show" where guests seek their 15 minutes of fame through discussion and demonstrations of deviant behavior. Its extraordinary success has led it to be broadcast in dozens of countries. The show gained so much popularity that for a while it was the number one daytime talk show in the United States.

In the early years, Springer presided over a talk show that was no different from the rest; conservative and somewhat political. It was said that "The original set was sleek but cold, and that Jerry exuded the appearence of a banker or an accountant."

A major turning point of Springer's show was in 1993 when he invited notorious punk rocker GG Allin on the show.

[edit] 1996-1999

In its heyday (the late 1990s) the show was quite popular (and controversial), so much so that it caused contemporaries like Jenny Jones, Maury Povich, and Ricki Lake to "revamp" their own shows in order to improve ratings. Incidentally, the popularity of the "trash TV" talk shows led to a decline in the number of game shows that had traditionally been broadcast on weekday mornings.

By 1996 to early 1998, when the show reached its peak, the show was nonstop fighting between guests so after a FCC probe was done; for a while the fighting was taken off on the show. However, it came back by popular demands and lowering of ratings. In fact, while the show was being investigated in 1998, classic episodes from 1992 to 1994 were shown until it came back.

In 1999, the Chicago City Council suggested that if the fist fights and chair-throwing were real, then the guests should be arrested for committing acts of violence in the city. When asked whether the fights were genuine, Springer said, "They look real to me." He then criticized council members for not distinguishing between "violence on the streets of their city" and "rough-housing in our studios." Ultimately, the city council chose not to pursue the matter.

[edit] Authenticity controversy

Springer's 1995-2000 logo, most identified with the show's peak in popularity.

With the increasingly ridiculous nature of his guests' dilemmas (for example, stories such as "Daddy, will you marry me?"), some critics even thought the stories and the guests were unreal and created by the show to gain ratings. There was a story that circulated that they paid actors, but that was proven untrue. Springer supposedly "swears on his life" that all his guests are real. The authenticity of Springer's guests is still being brought into question to this day. At least one "actor," professional wrestler Jamie Crookshanks, (better known as J.C. Ice) has appeared on the show as a "guest." Other professional Wrestlers such as Pitbull #2 appeared under a different name along side the Iron Sheik on the program.

In reality, the show flies groups of guests in from around the country based on phone conversations after retrieving messages from the show's phone line, 1-800-96-JERRY. Guests are usually not paid for their appearances on the show, but they do receive complimentary meals and hotel accommodations. Strippers and little people are sometimes called upon to be guests on the show, and instead of being paid, the businesses they work for are given free mention in the credits at the end of the show. During taping season, six shows are taped per week.

[edit] "Too Hot for TV"

During the show's most popular era in the late 1990s, The Jerry Springer Show started releasing video tapes and later DVDs marketed as Too Hot for TV. They contained uncensored clips from the show including nudity, profanity, and the more violent fights taped for the program. The series continued to feature the more popular segments from the show.

[edit] 2000s

In 2000, Springer was given a five year, $30 million contract extension paying him $6 million per year.

Beginning in 2002, audience members were rewarded for flashing with a set of plastic beads commonly called "Jerry Beads." Around this time numerous sound effects were added such as a "fight bell", a cow mooing, a cash register dinging, a fart noise, a wrong answer buzzer sounding, a cricket chirping, a pig oinking, dinner bell chimes, a police car siren, a BOING!, and a baby crying.

In 2003 a stripper named Angie and a pole were added, however the stripper was dropped by the end of the season, replaced at the pole by audience members. This is notable in the show titled Two Fat Men on a Pole.

Starting with the 2005 season, director of security Steve Wilkos has occasionally hosted the show claiming that Jerry is sick although the opening bit for these shows depicts Jerry with a pair of girls as part of an excuse for time away from his hosting duties. These shows usually feature Steve ripping lowdown men to shreds. Prior to 2005, Steve hosted special episodes which usually were retrospectives of the best segments from previous shows.

On January 16, 2006, it was announced that Springer signed a "multi year" contract with NBC Universal, renewing the show until at least the 2007-2008 syndicated season.

On May 12, 2006, Springer celebrated his shows 3,000th episode by throwing a party on the show, and showed many clips, including rare excerpts from the first episode.

In early 2007, the show began using more strict censoring techniques and bouncers are now warning guests to stop swearing or they will have to stop the show.

[edit] The show in popular culture

• In an episode of Married with Children ("No Ma'am" - 1993 Season 8, Ep 9) Jerry Springer makes an appearance by playing himself and hosting an "episode" of the Jerry Springer Show, where he is bound and gagged by Al Bundy and his misogynistic friends. In the episode Springer is known as "Jerry Springer the Masculine Feminist."

• In an episode of Survivor ("The Big Lie" - 2003 Season 7, Ep 13) Contestant Jon Dalton commented in a confessional that his grandmother is home watching Jerry Springer after he lied to the other players in the game claiming that his grandma had died.

• In a 1996 episode from the 9th and final season of Roseanne (entitled "What a Day for a Daydream"), recent lottery winner Roseanne daydreams and sees her and the family on an "episode" of The Jerry Springer Show. The segment includes all the typical chaos of most any real episode of the talk show, including Dan attempting to fight an audience member to defend his wife from being insulted.

• In the 1996 comedy The Cable Guy, Jim Carrey's character quotes one of Springer's "Final Thoughts."

• In a 1998 episode from Season 4 of The Wayans Bros., Shawn and Marlon appear as guests on The Jerry Springer Show, and the host surprises the brothers by airing some dirty laundry about their new girlfriend Jasmine.

• In 1998, Jerry Springer starred in a fictionalized version of the show in the movie Ringmaster, which flopped at the box office and with critics and Springer fans alike.

• In 1999, "Weird Al" Yankovic released his album Running With Scissors, which included the song "Jerry Springer," a parody of "One Week" by Barenaked Ladies. The song lists various outrageous people and acts watched on the show.

• The 1999 comedy Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me featured the show in its opening scene (the reunion of Dr. Evil and his son Scott) and closing credits (Scott's discovery that his mother is Frau Farbissina).

• In 2002, on the NBC soap opera Passions, in a storyline that seemed ripped from TJS, the character Eve feared that her daughter Whitney was having an affair with Chad, whom she believed was her son from a previous relationship at the time. Jerry Springer and his show would make a cameo appearance on Passions as The Larry Winger Show (the rights to the show's real name could not be secured), with Eve - in a dream sequence appearing as Jerry's guest and being heckled by his audience.

• In a Halloween-themed episode of The Simpsons, the family appear on the show upon discovering that an alien character is really the father of Maggie Simpson. Springer ends up being killed at the hands of Maggie.

• The Canadian sketch comedy History Bites parodied the Jerry Springer Show in an episode called "Queen takes Queen, Checkmate" which centered around the rivalry between Mary, Queen of Scots and Elizabeth I.

• Springer parodied the "Final Thoughts" portion of his show in the VH1 series of specials I Love the 90s, appearing at the end of each year's segment to summarize the events that had taken place.

• In an episode of NBC's Most Outrageous TV Moments, a clip from The Jerry Springer Show' was shown in which a guest called another a whore, spelling it "H O R E." Springer corrected her saying "On our show, there's a W there."

• Jerry Springer also made an appearance on an episode of Sabrina, the Teenage Witch. In the episode, Hilda and Zelda were arguing over a man, which prompted them to appear in a Springer-esque situation. When Hilda or Zelda spoke, it was permeated by various censored beeps. Sabrina then tells Jerry "But they're not swearing." To this he responded "Yeah, but this makes it sound like they are.", referencing the often exorbitant amount of profanity on the show.

• Animated TV show Family Guy parioded the show as a husband reveals to his wife that he is actually a woman. After being surprised he then reveals he is a horse and then a broomstick.

[edit] Trivia

• A ventriloquist dummy can be seen as an audience member, often turning its head as Jerry talks.

[edit] See also

• Jerry Springer - The Opera - A British opera based on the show.

[edit] External links

• Official Site
• Universal TV Site
• Jump The Shark - The Jerry Springer Show
• The Jerry Springer Show at the Internet Movie Database
• The Jerry Springer Show at TV.com