Trivia for
"Punky Brewster" (1984)

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• Fred Gwynne was originally to play Henry but backed out when, in an audition for the title character, he was identified Herman Munster, as his role on "The Munsters" (1964).
  
  
• Because the show had many young viewers and was scheduled after football games which tended to run overtime, six fifteen-minute episodes were produced. This was done rather than joining a full-length episode in progress, because that would disappoint children watching the program, and showing it later tended to put them up at a time parents may have considered too late for their children.
  
  
• The program-producing unit of the NBC network produced the first two seasons. When it was cancelled, the show was sold to Columbia Pictures Television for $60 million. Columbia produced the latter two seasons (though there is a one year interval between them) without NBC's involvement.
  
  

• 'Cherie Johnson (I)' was the niece of the show's creator and producer, David W. Duclon, who named the character for her. Nevertheless, she auditioned for the role like everyone else and was picked by the network to play the role.
  
  
• When the Challenger shuttle, which was helped piloted by history teacher Christa McAuliffe, exploded the executives at NBC knew a lot of children would be devastated by her loss as the shuttle launch was shown in many schools. A script was immediately written in which the character of Punky had to come to terms with what the shuttle explosion meant.
  
  
• The episode "Fenster Hall" was a failed attempt to create a spin-off of "Punky Brewster". It was originally a one hour episode, but was cut into two shows for syndication.
  
  
• Melissa Joan Hart was one who originally auditioned for the part of Punky Brewster.
  
  
• The name of the title character comes from that of a childhood sweetheart of then-NBC programming chief Brandon Tartikoff.
  
  
• Punky's dog Brandon was named after then-NBC programming chief Brandon Tartikoff.
  
  
• During the whole run of the show, Henry's bedroom is not shown, the Johnsons' apartment is shown only once, and Margeaux's house is shown only once.
  
  
• During the second season, several of the interiors of the set were altered. The beige couch from the first season was replaced with a blue plaid couch. The bathroom and the hallway were altered, and the front door of Henry's apartment was changed as well.
  
  
• Henry's and Punky's phone number is 555-1566.
  
  
• In the episode The Perils of Punky (Part 1), the license plate on Henry's car reads P. POWER.
  
  

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