My Brother the Angel

Tom Smothers (32 episodes, 1965-1966)

Dick Smothers (32 episodes, 1965-1966)

Leonard J. Costello (10 episodes, 1965-1966)

This program was originally up for renewal when CBS had the idea to put them in a 1 hour variety show format on Sunday nights. The brothers Smothers agreed to move on to the new format, which gave a whole different set of catch phrases. Had the half hour continued, that generation wouldn't have said "Mom always liked you best", but, instead, would be saying "Ralph wouldn't like that."

The theme song, sung by Tom Smothers and Dick Smothers, would have been the first sitcom theme song ever sung by stars of the show, but it missed that distinction by only one day: Green Acres (1965), featuring a theme song sung by its stars Eddie Albert and Eva Gabor, premiered the night before.

Visionary producer Aaron Spelling saw something in the Smothers Brothers that no one else had seen before and decided to give them a chance with this show. The show didn't quite take off, but it was their first big break on TV. Spelling wrote that later he felt like saying "I told you so!" after the Smothers Brothers hit it big on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (1967).