Family Classics

{{Use mdy dates|date=March 2025}} {{Infobox television | image = Family Classics edited.jpg | alt = Set of Family Classics and host Frazier Thomas | caption = The set of ''Family Classics'' and host Frazier Thomas. | alt_name = | genre = Classic Films | creator = Fred Silverman<br>Frazier Thomas | developer = | writer = | director = | creative_director = | presenter = Frazier Thomas<br>Roy Leonard<br>Dean Richards<br>Steve Sanders | starring = | judges = | voices = | narrator = | theme_music_composer = Dennis Berry | open_theme = "Moviescope" | end_theme = "Moviescope" | composer = | country = United States | language = English | num_seasons = 40 | num_episodes = 1001<ref>{{cite web|title=WGN 9 Chicago "Family Classics" Movie Timeline|url=http://wgntv.com/family-classics/|website=WGN 9 Chicago|date=27 January 2017 }}</ref> | list_episodes = | executive_producer = | producer = | editor = | location = | cinematography = | camera = | runtime = | company = | channel = WGN-TV | first_aired = {{Start date|1962|09|14}}<ref name=Classics>{{cite web |url=http://epguides.com/FamilyClassics |title=Family Classics-titles and air dates |author=Tufts, Chris |publisher=epguides |access-date=13 March 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110228055750/http://epguides.com/FamilyClassics/ |archive-date=28 February 2011 }}</ref> | last_aired = {{End date|2000|12|25}}<ref name=Classics/> | first_aired2 = {{Start date|2017|12|08}} | last_aired2 = {{End date|2020|1|5}} | related = | image_alt = | network = | released = }}

'''''Family Classics''''' is a Chicago television series which began in 1962 when Frazier Thomas was added to another program at WGN-TV. Thomas not only hosted classic films, but also selected the titles and personally edited them to remove those scenes which he thought were not fit for family viewing.{{sfn|Okuda|Mulqueen|2004|pp=60-62}} After Thomas' death in 1985, Roy Leonard took over the program.<ref name=Feder/> The series continued sporadically until its initial cancellation in 2000.<ref name=Feder/><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/1998/04/03/at-50-wgn-finds-the-tv-picture-and-audiences-have-changed/|title=At 50, WGN Finds The TV Picture and Audiences Have Changed|author=Johnson, Allan|date=3 April 1988|publisher=Chicago Tribune|access-date=17 February 2011}}</ref>

On November 10, 2017, WGN announced that ''Family Classics'' would be returning after a 17-year hiatus with a presentation of the 1951 version of ''Scrooge'' to air on Friday, December 8, 2017, and announced that its longtime entertainment reporter, Dean Richards, would be the new host.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://wgntv.com/2017/11/10/wgn-tv-becomes-chicagos-merry-own-for-the-holidays-family-classics-returns-for-special-holiday-showing-of-scrooge-hosted-by-dean-richards/|title=Chicago's Merry Own: 'Family Classics' returns to WGN-TV for special holiday showing of 'Scrooge' hosted by Dean Richards|date=11 November 2017|website=WGN 9 Chicago|access-date=26 November 2017|archive-date=18 January 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180118101927/http://wgntv.com/2017/11/10/wgn-tv-becomes-chicagos-merry-own-for-the-holidays-family-classics-returns-for-special-holiday-showing-of-scrooge-hosted-by-dean-richards/|url-status=dead}}</ref> Since then, it would continue to air each holiday season.

==History== In 1962, Fred Silverman, then a WGN-TV executive, conceived the idea of the show by scheduling classic family films at a prime time Friday night position rather than a late show slot where children wouldn't see them. The show was a huge ratings success and inspired the networks to schedule recently released films in prime time. When the networks began showing first-run films in prime time, the show was rescheduled to Sunday afternoons.{{sfn|Okuda|Mulqueen|2004|pp=60-62}}<ref name=Thomas>{{cite web|url=http://www.chicagotelevision.com/frazier.htm|title=Frazier Thomas|publisher=Chicago Television|access-date=6 February 2011}}</ref>

For the series' December 2019 airing of the 1942 film ''Holiday Inn'', and New Year's Eve airings of the Marx Brothers' ''Monkey Business'' & ''Animal Crackers'', WGN veteran anchor, Steve Sanders, filled in as host as current host Dean Richards was recovering from a fractured wrist and facial abrasions before the episode's taping.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.robertfeder.com/2019/12/12/robservations-steve-sanders-saves-day-wgns-family-classics/|title=Robservations: Steve Sanders saves the day on WGN's 'Family Classics'|last=Feder|first=Robert|date=12 December 2019|website=Robert Feder|access-date=22 December 2019}}</ref>

==The set== The theme music was a piece of library music recorded on the Berry/Conroy label, entitled ''Moviescope'', and was written by Dennis Berry. The camera would slowly zoom in on the set designed by Thomas that resembled a study with a painting on the wall of Garfield Goose done by Roy Brown, a model sailing ship sitting on top of a shelf of books with the titles of the films to be shown that were repainted encyclopedias and dictionaries also done by Anthony M Sulla as credited in the final credits, that Frazier would introduce.<ref name=Feder>{{cite web|url=http://www.wbez.org/blog/robert-feder/remembering-chicago-classic-frazier-thomas|title=Remembering a Chicago Classic:Frazier Thomas|author=Feder, Robert|date=2 May 2010|publisher=WBEZ Radio|access-date=6 February 2011|archive-date=28 July 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110728171724/http://www.wbez.org/blog/robert-feder/remembering-chicago-classic-frazier-thomas|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D83ACkuGv_gC&q=family+classics+museum+of+broadcast+communications&pg=PA76|title=Chicago Television|editor-last=Berger|editor-first=Daniel|editor2-last=Jajkowski|editor2-first=Steve|others=For the Museum of Broadcast Communications; Foreword by Bob Sirott|year=2010|publisher=Arcadia Publishing|pages=168|isbn=978-0-7385-7713-5|access-date=18 February 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.latimes.com/wgntv-timeline-60simage19,0,6400592.photo|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121105194223/http://www.latimes.com/wgntv-timeline-60simage19,0,6400592.photo|url-status=dead|archive-date=5 November 2012|title=This classy portrait by Roy Brown of Garfield Goose adorned a wall on the set of "Family Classics."|newspaper=LA Times|access-date=26 June 2011}}</ref>{{sfn|Okuda|Mulqueen|2004|p=61}}

==Notes== {{reflist}}

==Bibliography== *{{cite book|title=The Golden Age of Chicago Children's Television|last1=Okuda|first1=Ted|last2=Mulqueen|first2=Jack|publisher=Lake Claremont Press|year=2004|isbn=978-1-893-12117-1}}

==External links== *{{epguides|FamilyClassics}} * [http://www.fuzzymemories.tv/index.php?m=xxfcxx&c=4605 Various original ''Family Classics'' openings] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150211090001/http://www.fuzzymemories.tv/index.php?m=xxfcxx&c=4605 |date=2015-02-11 }}, courtesy The Museum of Classic Chicago Television

Category:Local children's television programming in the United States Category:Original programming by local channels in Chicago Category:Local motion picture television series Category:1962 American television series debuts Category:2000 American television series endings Category:2020 American television series endings Category:1960s American children's television series Category:1970s American children's television series Category:1980s American children's television series Category:1990s American children's television series Category:2000s American children's television series Category:2010s American children's television series Category:2020s American children's television series Category:English-language American television shows Category:American television series revived after cancellation Category:American motion picture television series