Anyone remember or have a fascination with... (bomb, 90s, kings)

[CelticViking]

I remember growing up in the 90s and waking up around 200-400am and turning on the non cable tv stations and seeing the strange late night movies...the un heard of movies...i remember certain old stuff would come on dealing with nat king cole, old perry mason shows in black and white...

any one remember these types of movies or broadccasting programs that would dedicate itself to the "late night movies"

[DewDropInn]

I grew up in the L.A. area during the sixties. Not only did we have the late night movies we had the (drum roll, please) "Million Dollar Movie". It was on Channel 9 KHJ (now KCAL). The Million Dollar Movie was the same movie every single day and twice on the weekends. At least.

The week I had the chicken pox I'm pretty sure I saw "The Spirit of St. Louis" with Jimmy Stewart nine times.

[Grandstander]

In the early '70's, when I was teaching the rest of the year, I got a summer job working the graveyard shift at a San Francisco motel. Except for the periodic holdups, there wasn't much to do, so I watched "Nightowl Theater" hosted by J. Brown of Spartan Dodge in San Jose. This was a UHF station in San Jose and the picture came in pretty fuzzy and broken, but it was the only station active throughout the night.

J. Brown was a friendly sort who called his viewers "Night people" and after a time, I came to feel like part of a cult...the Night People...and appreciated how J. Brown had gone to so much trouble to entertain me while he sold Dodge cars.

The movies were typically low budget stinkers, Ed Wood had an audience here, but I also recall the showing of some of those cheapjack Karl May German Westerns that featured the characters Old Surehand/Shatterhand/Sureshot (it changed from film to film) and the Indian Winnetou. Lots of '50's sci fi stuff with crappy monsters, terrible screenplays and lousy acting. Around 5 am they reran old tv shows like "Topper" and "The Millionare."

The people who ran the motel hated me because they were extreme right wing religious conservatives....and I wasn't. I later learned that they spent the whole summer looking for someone to replace me, but couldn't find anyone who could do the night audit properly. It was a stinker of as job with weird hours that distorted normality for all aspects of my life, but the one island of refuge for me was good old J. Brown and his program.

He really seemed like he cared about his audience. His set was decorated by dozens of stuffed or toy owls, and if you sent one in, Brown would make a big production of opening the package on the air and adding it to the collection. If you sent him a letter, he would read it outloud on the air. I wrote and asked if he could possibly rerun the show "The Defenders" and he read it on the air, followed by a genuine sounding apology that he couldn't afford to rent that particular series. "Sorry old pardner" he said to me and he really seemed like he was sorry.

[gardener34]

Sounds cool. I do remember watching a lot of late night movies - but in the 70s. all kinds of weird sci-fi movies were popular then.

[CelticViking]

thanks for the responses...grandstander...thats exactly what i was talking about...the commercial that i can remember that showed the title of the night program would either be a dark street showing the night scene...or sometimes showed someone working a late shift and would be titled whatever it was called...just seems to neat to me to reminisce on those times(for me it was the 90s)...

anyone remember a program that would come on in i believe a black and white(maybe not) where it would list a bunch of actors/song writers name all over the screen...i remember seeing nat kings cole name, but thats it...?

thanks for the responses...neat stuff.

[Cali BassMan]

Grandstander you must remember "Creature Features" it came on channel 2 out of Oakland and was hosted by some little guy with glasses and a cigar. Bob Something I think...They played all the old Horror and Sci Fi stuff.. I think eventually Elvira replaced Bob....
and Wasn't nightowl theater on "The Perfect 36 in San Jose" with Carol Dodda

[Grandstander]

Originally Posted by Cali BassMan

Grandstander you must remember "Creature Features" it came on channel 2 out of Oakland and was hosted by some little guy with glasses and a cigar. Bob Something I think...They played all the old Horror and Sci Fi stuff.. I think eventually Elvira replaced Bob....
and Wasn't nightowl theater on "The Perfect 36 in San Jose" with Carol Dodda

That was Bob Wilkins, later he was replaced by John Stanley.

J. Brown's Nightowl Theater was indeed on San Jose's channel 36, but unfortunately, Carol Doda wasn't part of that program...unless you count the station identification spots.

The difference between the shows was that if "Plan Nine From Outer Space" was being shown on Creature Features, it was introduced and talked about as the classic bomb that it was. If it turned up on Nightowl Theater, J. Brown would pass it off as just one more entertaining flick for his "Night People."

[LinaJo76]

I remember back when it was midnight (12am) and the national anthem would come on (you see a fighter jet flying through the clouds and stuff) and then the very colorful t.v. bar codes would come on with an annoying hum noise. That WAS a long time ago!! No shows would come on again until 5am (normally the morning news shows, like TODAY on NBC).

And I remember getting up on Saturday mornings at 5am! That's when the cartoons would start. I'd watch all the way to 12 noon (I was addicted to cartoons when I was a small child).

[Dd714]

Well that had Elvira's Movie Macrabe, with Elvira as host and really bad horror movies, in the 80's. That became a nationally sindicated franchise and found it's way to the local stations.

Other than that, I think each local station had their own versions of late night TV movies based on the city you lived in. It seems to have died out in the 90s as cable became more prominent and late night talk shows or sindicated re-runs took over.

[noetsi]

I watched many. They tended either to movies from the thirties or forties or horror/sci fi.