It's About Time

I found the common thread through most of the member comments for IT'S ABOUT TIME to be hilarious: three pages of comments from startled people who all thought they were the ONLY ones who remember the show! And everyone can still whistle the theme song. The thing that captivated me about this show when I was a kid were the dinosaurs, lifted mostly from the movies DINOSAURUS! and THE BEAST OF HOLLOW MOUNTAIN. In fact in one scene where a tyrannosaurus (from DINOSAURUS!) is supposed to be trying to attack some cave men hiding in a cave you can clearly see that it's actually digging away at the entrance to a mine, complete with supporting timbers and a sign warning people to keep out. Later on when (I assume) the show wasn't doing too well in the rating and the producers decided to bring cave people back to the future in a sort of BEVERLY HILLBILIES scenario I quickly lost interest. The only other things about the show that really stand out in my memory are the goofy cast of cave people (Mike Mazurki, Joe E. "Ooh! Ooh!" Ross, Imogene Coca, and a sort of prehistoric Daisy Duke who always wore nylons under her animal skins) and the fact that one of the two astronauts (I think if was Frank Aletter, although I'm not sure) had to dye his hand blonde because the producers didn't want two brunettes in the leads.

You know, that's a lot to stick in one's memory after forty years!

I could easily see this show being resurrected as a big budget theatrical comedy (replacing "cheesy" stop-motion dinos with cheesier CGI effects), with Tom Arnold as the leader of the cave family and Will Farrell and Greg Kinnear as the astronauts. Ugghhhh.......

Mostly because of the theme song this TV show has stayed with me for 32 years. Yet, if I ever asked anyone else if they remembered it (singing the song in hopes of loosening a memory) they would look at me as though I was truly mad. It was a silly, stupid show ... like a mutant creation through the coupling of Gilligan's Island and Lost In Space ... and I loved it! I was nine, what did I know? Still, I would like to see it again to find out if the pictures in my head match.

Later in this forum someone calling themselves Mariner719 will mention that the rendition of the theme song was twisted among his/her peers to, "It's about time, it's about space, it's about time to slap your face." No fear Mariner719, I had equally bizarre peers. :)

I remember this show only vaguely, but the theme song was a big hit with the school kids (I was in the 3rd grade when it came out) because we changed it as a joke on our friends. We'd sing: It's about time It's about space It's about time To slap your face (smack!) Then we'd run. Okay, it's juvenile, but we were only 8 years old! Nevertheless, that tune has stuck with me all these years. Did anyone else come up with this variation? For that matter, I believe the actual theme went: It's about time, it's about space, it's about two men in the strangest place...here is the tale of the brave crew, and through some very (ancient?) times they flew...past the fighting minuteman...past the armored knight...past the Roman warrior...to this ancient site. Let me know if I have that wrong, but I think that's how it was SUPPOSED to go, and no face slapping involved!

...created by the same person who created Gilligan's Island, Sherwood Schwartz, at the same time Gilligan's Island was still on the air. Although I'm not sure it would have caught on had Gilligan's Island not been on the air.

Basically you have the two astronauts doubling for the Skipper and Gilligan although not in such an extreme relationship as those two had, with one astronaut just being jumpier and more scatter brained than the other.

Rather than a bunch of fellow castaways, the two astronauts have to deal with prehistoric man. And you have dinosaurs and man existing at the same time in this prehistoric world.

The topic got tired in a hurry and was cancelled after one season, even after the astronauts find a way to return to 1966 earth but end up bringing the cavemen with them.

The thing that I remember most about this show was the very catchy theme song that it had. It seems I'm not alone as many fellow reviewers are saying that they found it most memorable as well.

A few episodes, including the series premiere, show up on youtube from time to time.

My sister was 8-9, I was 7-8, and my bother 5-6 when the show ran and we still talk about it today. We got so into the show that our father threatened to ban us from it. I became Boss, my sister Shadd and my brother Grunk. It was our reversion to cave man language that almost led to the ban. The show disappeared without any notice or information. We were devastated. We maintained our characters for several years after the show and we still call each other Shadd, Boss and Grunk sometimes today.

We are 45, 44, and 42 now. Between us we have 7 children ages (18, 17, 17, 15, 12, 3, and 1). For years we have told them about the show and no could find information on it. Worse, none of our friend had heard of the show either. So finally I did an exhaustive Internet search and found lots of cool information including this site. From the comments on the show, CBS missed the boat for not running it longer. Like another favorite Star Trek, I believe the loyalty of the viewers would have generated grass root support to be enjoyed by generations. It would have been another Gilligan Island in reruns - but for only 26 episodes.

In my search I found someone with 20 of 26 episodes. I paid to have them duplicated and should receive them this week. We are having an It's About Time party on Jan 10th, 2004 with all the kids required to attend under penalty of no future support or food. I will let you know with a posting how it went. Also I will list the episodes that I have.

Emails about the show are welcome!

Rick Stoppe, Natick MA