The Smothers Brothers Show was an
American sitcom featuring the
Smothers Brothers that aired on
CBS on Friday nights at 9:30 p.m. ET from September 17, 1965 to September 9, 1966, co-sponsored by
Alberto-Culver's
VO5 hairdressing products and
American Tobacco (
Tareyton). It lasted one season, consisting of 32 episodes.
It was also the network's last situation comedy filmed in black and white; shortly after its final telecast, all CBS prime-time series were transmitted in color.
Synopsis
Dick Smothers played himself as a rising young executive at Pandora Publications, working for publisher Leonard J. Costello (
Roland Winters). Brother
Tom had been lost at
sea two years earlier and now shows up as an
apprentice angel assigned to do good deeds on
Earth to become a full-fledged regular angel. Of course, Tom's efforts to help people never seem to work as planned and Dick had to help him clean up the mess. Tom received his orders from Ralph, his unseen and unheard boss. The series also featured
Harriet MacGibbon as Mrs. Costello and, on occasion, Ann Elder as Dick's co-worker and girl friend, Janet (Eileen O'Neill also appeared in several episodes as another of Dick's girl friends, Wanda). As was typical of the Smothers Brothers in their later show,
The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, Dick was typically the straight man to Tom's humorous antics.