50 Fun Facts About The Dick Van Dyke Show

Which network aired The Dick Van Dyke Show from 1961 to 1966?

Carl Reiner created it from his own life as a TV comedy writer, and played the show-within-the-show's star, Alan Brady, a blend of Milton Berle and Jackie Gleason (and, he insisted, not Sid Caesar).

How many episodes of The Dick Van Dyke Show were made over its five seasons?

All were shot in black and white before a live audience at Desilu Studios, which was unusual for a sitcom of the era.

What was the title of the 1960 pilot in which Carl Reiner himself played Rob Petrie?

Barbara Britton played Laura, Morty Gunty was Buddy and Sylvia Miles was Sally. Sheldon Leonard liked the script but told Reiner to recast the lead.

Which future late-night host was a finalist for the role of Rob Petrie before Dick Van Dyke got it?

Sheldon Leonard chose Van Dyke after seeing him on Broadway in Bye Bye Birdie, the role that won him a Tony in 1961.

What does Rob Petrie do for a living?

He runs the writers' room of The Alan Brady Show in New York with Buddy Sorrell and Sally Rogers, then commutes home to New Rochelle.

In which New York suburb do Rob and Laura Petrie live?

Carl Reiner had lived there himself while writing for television, and their neighbours Jerry and Millie Helper are next door.

What was Laura Petrie's maiden name?

Rob met her at Camp Crowder in Missouri while he was in the Army and she was a USO dancer.

Roughly how many actresses auditioned for the part of Laura Petrie before Mary Tyler Moore was signed?

Her look on the show was partly modelled on First Lady Jackie Kennedy, and her fitted capri pants started a fashion.

Which First Lady influenced the look of Laura Petrie?

Mary Tyler Moore's capri pants became her signature; the sponsor reportedly wanted her in dresses more often.

Which former child performer played wisecracking writer Sally Rogers?

Sally is the perpetually single member of the writing staff. Morey Amsterdam played her partner in insults, Buddy Sorrell.

Who played Buddy Sorrell, the joke-a-second writer who torments producer Mel Cooley?

Amsterdam was a real-life 'human joke machine' from vaudeville and radio, and many of Buddy's zingers were his own.

How is bald producer Mel Cooley related to the star, Alan Brady?

That family connection is the only reason the writers put up with him. Richard Deacon played the part.

What is the profession of Jerry Helper, the Petries' next-door neighbour?

Jerry Paris, who played him, went on to direct most of Happy Days. Ann Morgan Guilbert played his wife Millie.

What piece of furniture does Rob famously trip over, or sidestep, in the opening credits?

Two versions of the titles were shot: in one he falls over it, in the other he neatly steps around it. Viewers never knew which they would get.

How many Emmy Awards did The Dick Van Dyke Show win in total?

That included Outstanding Comedy Series four years running from 1963 to 1966, plus three lead-actor Emmys for Van Dyke himself.

Which sponsor threatened to pull CBS daytime ads to stop the show being cancelled after its low-rated first season?

CBS relented, and by the third episode of season two the show was in the Nielsen top ten, helped by following The Beverly Hillbillies.

Which number one show served as The Dick Van Dyke Show's lead-in when its ratings took off in season two?

CBS had come close to cancelling the series after year one; the new time slot changed everything.

Why did The Dick Van Dyke Show end in 1966?

'We wanted to quit while we were still proud of it,' Van Dyke said. It was still a top-rated show at the time.

Calvada Productions was named for Carl Reiner, Sheldon Leonard, Dick Van Dyke and who else?

CA-rl, L-eonard, VA-n Dyke, DA-nny. Thomas, star of Make Room for Daddy, was Leonard's producing partner.

Who composed the show's jaunty theme tune?

He also wrote the whistled theme for The Andy Griffith Show, among many others.

How did Rob first meet Laura, according to the show's flashback episodes?

Rob was a sergeant in the Army Special Services at the Missouri base when he fell for the dancer named Laura Meehan.

What is Ritchie Petrie's unusual middle name?

It is an acronym stitched together from names suggested by every relative who wanted a say.

Who played Stacey Petrie, Rob's sibling?

Jerry Van Dyke later starred in Coach; Stacey was a sleepwalking banjo player when first introduced.

In the episode 'It May Look Like a Walnut', where does the alien Kolak come from?

Rob dreams the whole thing after a late-night sci-fi movie: Kolak uses walnuts filled with absorb-a-tron to steal Earthlings' thumbs and imaginations. Danny Thomas played Kolak.

What secret does Laura blurt out on national television in 'Coast to Coast Big Mouth'?

TV Guide ranked it the eighth greatest episode of all time in 1997. It was one of two episodes CBS colourised for a 2016 special.

Where did TV Guide rank 'Coast to Coast Big Mouth' on its 1997 list of 100 greatest episodes?

'It May Look Like a Walnut' made the same list at number 15. The series itself was 13th on the magazine's 50 greatest shows in 2002.

In 'Bank Book 6565696', what does Rob discover Laura has been hiding?

There is more than three hundred dollars in it, and Rob spends the episode imagining what she is saving for.

Which Dick Van Dyke Show opener, where Rob fears the hospital swapped babies, was colourised in 2016?

'That's My Boy??' is the flashback in which Rob is convinced the hospital swapped babies, until the other couple, the Peters, turn out to be Black, to one of the longest audience laughs ever recorded.

Who hosted the 2004 reunion special The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited?

The special caught up with the surviving characters decades on; the show's archives were later donated to the National Comedy Center in Jamestown, New York.

At which studio was The Dick Van Dyke Show filmed?

Desilu was Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz's company; the show shared its Cahuenga lot with The Andy Griffith Show.

Which two comedians did Carl Reiner say he combined to create the abrasive Alan Brady?

Reiner spent years denying the obvious guess, his old boss Sid Caesar of Your Show of Shows.

On what date did The Dick Van Dyke Show premiere on CBS?

It signed off on June 1, 1966, after five seasons.

Which Broadway role won Dick Van Dyke a 1961 Tony and got him cast as Rob Petrie?

He would reprise the part of Albert Peterson in the 1963 film version while the TV show was on the air.

How many Emmys did Dick Van Dyke personally win for playing Rob Petrie?

They came in 1964, 1965 and 1966. Nearly six decades later, at 98, he became the oldest Daytime Emmy winner ever for Days of Our Lives.

Which 1964 Disney film earned Dick Van Dyke a Grammy for its soundtrack and mockery for his accent?

His Cockney as Bert placed second in a 2003 poll of the worst film accents ever. He turned 100 in December 2025.

In which state was Dick Van Dyke born, in December 1925?

He was born in West Plains and grew up in Danville, Illinois, which is why fans often assume he is an Illinois native.

On which 1950s crime series was Mary Tyler Moore seen only from the waist down as receptionist Sam?

Only her legs and hands appeared on camera. Earlier still she had danced as 'Happy Hotpoint', a tiny elf in appliance commercials.

How old was Mary Tyler Moore when she started playing Laura Petrie?

Dick Van Dyke was 35, an age gap the network worried about at first.

On The Dick Van Dyke Show, Ritchie's question 'Where did I come from?' sends Rob into flashbacks about what?

Rob answers with the comic chaos surrounding the day of Ritchie's birth rather than the facts of life.

Where did the WGA place The Dick Van Dyke Show on its 2013 list of the 101 best-written TV series?

Reiner wrote or co-wrote a huge share of the scripts himself, especially in the first two seasons.

Buddy Sorrell's wife, a former showgirl and terrible cook, goes by what nickname?

Fiona Conway Sorrell was played by Barbara Perry and then Joan Shawlee before becoming an off-screen character after season two.

Buddy Sorrell was loosely based on which Your Show of Shows writer?

Sally was a blend of Selma Diamond and Lucille Kallen, two more writers from Sid Caesar's staff.

Which instrument does Buddy Sorrell play, sometimes working it into his comedy routines?

Off screen Buddy also owns a large German Shepherd named Larry, and his birth name turns out to be Moishe Selig.

Sally Rogers has an on-again, off-again romance with which nerdy mama's boy?

Bill Idelson played him. By the 2004 reunion special the two had been married for years.

Future M*A*S*H star Jamie Farr appeared in four season-one episodes as what?

Sally dubbed him 'Ptomaine Charlie'. A second delivery boy, Willie, was later played by Herbie Faye.

What one-word response does Mel Cooley usually give to Buddy's insults about his baldness?

Richard Deacon's Mel may be a yes-man to Alan Brady, but he is also shown as a competent producer who takes the job seriously.

How far into the run did Alan Brady first appear full-face on camera?

Until then Carl Reiner's star was heard but not seen, or shown only from behind, just as in the 1960 pilot.

When sleepwalking, Rob's shy brother Stacey turns gregarious and calls Rob what?

He also wrote love letters to a girl named Julie on behalf of a drummer friend, then kept writing them for himself.

In 2019 the show's archives went to the National Comedy Center in which New York town?

Two years earlier, CBS had aired computer-colourised episodes of the black-and-white series.

Carl Reiner won an Emmy for reviving Alan Brady in a 1995 episode of which sitcom?

Paul Reiser's character interviews Brady for a documentary, and the epilogue debates whether tripping over an ottoman or sidestepping it is funnier.