- When PBS was first formed, Mr. Rogers’ passionate speech before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Communications in 1969 nearly single handedly managed to up PBS’s funding from a likely $10 million to the original $20 million they had been supposed to receive before cuts were purposed.
- Michael Keaton was once a stagehand on Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. He eventually quit his job there to pursue acting full time.
- Mr. Rogers famously didn’t mind if people recorded his show with a VCR, arguing for people’s right to do so in a 1979 case Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc. At the time, it was being argued by the opposition that this constituted a copyright infringement. Mr. Rogers was one of the few involved in television that did not believe so and felt people should be allowed to record programs. The Supreme Court noted that Mr. Rogers’ testimony was a significant piece of evidence that helped lead them to their ultimate decision. Specifically, Mr. Rogers’ stated: “Some public stations, as well as commercial stations, program the ‘Neighborhood’ at hours when some children cannot use it … I have always felt that with the advent of all of this new technology that allows people to tape the ‘Neighborhood’ off-the-air, and I’m speaking for the ‘Neighborhood’ because that’s what I produce, that they then become much more active in the programming of their family’s television life. Very frankly, I am opposed to people being programmed by others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been ‘You are an important person just the way you are. You can make healthy decisions.’ Maybe I’m going on too long, but I just feel that anything that allows a person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a healthy way, is important.”
- Mr. Rogers was a vegetarian. He didn’t smoke or drink or seem to have any major vices. He also stayed married to the same woman until his death; their marriage lasted 47 years. About the only even slightly “scandalous” thing Mr. Rogers seemed to do, which he revealed in an interview, was that he swam laps completely in the buff nearly every morning of his adult life at various clubs that allowed nude swimming at certain times of the day.
- Mr. Rogers once appeared as preacher, Reverend Thomas, on an episode of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman called “Deal with the Devil”.
- The reason Mr. Rogers started wearing sneakers on the show was because they made less noise than normal dress shoes when moving around behind the sets.
- Many of Mr. Rogers’ famous sweaters he wore on the show were made by his mother.
- 895 episodes of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood were filmed with the first episode broadcasting in 1968 and the last episode shot on December of 2000 and was subsequently aired in August of 2001.
- Interestingly, unlike on most children’s shows, Mr. Rogers played himself not just in name, but also in personality and mannerisms, changing nothing about how he acted off camera to how he acted on camera. His reasons for this were that: “One of the greatest gifts you can give anybody is the gift of your honest self. I also believe that kids can spot a phony a mile away.”
- Mr. Rogers did the voices on the show for: King Friday XIII, Queen Sara Saturday, Henrietta Pussycat, Daniel Striped Tiger, Lady Elaine Fairchild and Larry Horse, among others. He also composed all of the music on the show.
- Queen Sara Saturday was named after Mr. Roger’s wife, Sara Joanne Byrd.
- Mr. Rogers didn’t just try to teach children important life lessons and the like, but he also produced a series of specials intended for parents called “Mister Rogers Talks to Parents About X”, where X was whatever the topic of the day was. These shows were meant to help parents be able to answer any questions their child might have after watching a particular Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood episode.
- Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood saw its best ratings in the mid 1980s, being watched by nearly 8% of all U.S. households regularly.
- Mr. Rogers was red/green colorblind.
- Contrary to rumors spread about on the Internet, Mr. Rogers was never a sniper in the military nor was the reason he wore sweaters because he had tattoos all over his arms and body, one for each person he killed. These, and other similar rumors, first started on the Internet around 1994 and saw a surge in popularity after his death. Mr. Rogers never served in the military.
- Mr. Rogers once appeared on the Soviet Union children’s show Spokoynoy nochi, malyshi (Good Night, Little Ones) and was the first foreign guest to do so. That show has been on the air since 1964.
- The goal of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, as put forth by Mr. Rogers was to promote: good self esteem, self control, imagination, creativity, curiosity, appreciation of diversity, cooperation, patience, and persistence.
- Mr. Rogers ultimately died of stomach cancer at the age of 74 years old on February 27, 2003.
Nearly every morning of his life,
Mister Rogers has gone swimming, and now, here he is, standing in a locker
room, seventy years old and as white as the Easter Bunny, rimed with frost
wherever he has hair, gnawed pink in the spots where his dry skin has gone to
flaking, slightly waddled at the neck, slightly stooped at the shoulder,
slightly sunken in the chest, slightly curvy at the hips, slightly pigeoned at
the toes, slightly a swing at the fine bobbing nest of himself... and yet when
he speaks, it is in that voice, his voice, the famous one, the unmistakable
one, the televised one, the voice dressed in sweater and sneakers, the soft
one, the reassuring one, the curious and expository one, the sly voice that
sounds adult to the ears of children and childish to the ears of adults, and
what he says, in the midst of all his bobbing-nudity, is as understated as it
is obvious: "Well, Tom, I guess you've already gotten a deeper glimpse
into my daily routine than most people have."
ONCE UPON A TIME, a long time ago, a
man took off his jacket and put on a sweater. Then he took off his shoes and
put on a pair of sneakers. His name was Fred Rogers. He was starting a
television program, aimed at children, called Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. He
had been on television before, but only as the voices and movements of puppets,
on a program called The Children's Corner. Now he was stepping in front of the
camera as Mister Rogers, and he wanted to do things right, and whatever he did
right, he wanted to repeat. And so, once upon a time, Fred Rogers took off his
jacket and put on a sweater his mother had made him, a cardigan with a zipper.
Then he took off his shoes and put on a pair of navy-blue canvas boating sneakers.
He did the same thing the next day, and then the next... until he had done the
same things, those things, 865 times, at the beginning of 865 television
programs, over a span of thirty-one years. The first time I met Mister Rogers,
he told me a story of how deeply his simple gestures had been felt, and
received. He had just come back from visiting Koko, the gorilla who has
learned--or who has been taught--American Sign Language. Koko watches
television. Koko watches Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, and when Mister Rogers,
in his sweater and sneakers, entered the place where she lives, Koko
immediately folded him in her long, black arms, as though he were a child, and
then... "She took my shoes off, Tom," Mister Rogers said.
Koko was much bigger than Mister
Rogers. She weighed 280 pounds, and Mister Rogers weighed 143. Koko weighed 280
pounds because she is a gorilla, and Mister Rogers weighed 143 pounds because
he has weighed 143 pounds as long as he has been Mister Rogers, because once
upon a time, around thirty-one years ago, Mister Rogers stepped on a scale, and
the scale told him that Mister Rogers weighs 143 pounds. No, not that he
weighed 143 pounds, but that he weighs 143 pounds.... And so, every day, Mister
Rogers refuses to do anything that would make his weight change--he neither
drinks, nor smokes, nor eats flesh of any kind, nor goes to bed late at night,
nor sleeps late in the morning, nor even watches television--and every morning,
when he swims, he steps on a scale in his bathing suit and his bathing cap and
his goggles, and the scale tells him he weighs 143 pounds. This has happened so
many times that Mister Rogers has come to see that number as a gift, as a
destiny fulfilled, because, as he says, "the number 143 means `I love
you.' It takes one letter to say 'I' and four letters to say `love' and three
letters to say `you.' One hundred and forty-three. `I love you.' Isn't that
wonderful?"
THE FIRST TIME I CALLED MISTER
ROGERS on the telephone, I woke him up from his nap. He takes a nap every day
in the late afternoon--just as he wakes up every morning at five-thirty to read
and study and write and pray for the legions who have requested his prayers;
just as he goes to bed at nine-thirty at night and sleeps eight hours without
interruption.
No comments:
Post a Comment