Events
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| January 3 | ABC and CBS simultaneously air their own movies based on the Amy Fisher saga, with Fisher played by Drew Barrymore (on ABC) and Alyssa Milano (on CBS); NBC had aired its own version of the Fisher saga six days earlier (December 28, 1992). |
| January 19 | For the first time, Fox expands its regular prime-time schedule to seven days per week; the network premieres two dramas on this Tuesday, Class of '96 and Key West. |
| January 20 | Prime Time Entertainment Network, most notably known as PTEN, is launched on some stations. Time Trax debuted as a 2-hour premiere along with the following week as Kung Fu: The Legend Continues. |
| January 31 | The Super Bowl, broadcast this time by NBC, has a solo halftime performer for the first time—Michael Jackson, who performs a medley of his hits. |
| February 10 | Oprah Winfrey interviews Michael Jackson during a live prime time special, hosted at Jackson's ranch, Neverland. This was Jackson's first TV interview since a 1979 conversation with Barbara Walters on 20/20. The 90-minute special is the highest-rated special of the 1992–1993 TV season. |
| February 24 | Ten days after the infamous interviews with Barbara Walters and Oprah Winfrey, Michael Jackson receives the Grammy Legend Award at the 35th Grammy Awards, presented by his little sister, Janet. |
| February 26 | The Days of our Lives nighttime special Night Sins airs on NBC. |
| March 26 | CBS broadcasts the last new episode of Family Feud with host Ray Combs. The show would go into reruns the following Monday until September 10. |
| April 29 | An animated version of Barry White appears on an episode of The Simpsons. |
| May 5 | Senior As the World Turns cast member Don Hastings hosts a memorial tribute to Douglas Marland. Marland, who died in March after an abdominal surgery procedure, had been the series' head writer since 1985 and was responsible for several groundbreaking story lines on the show. |
| May 14 | Jaimee Foxworth (Judy) and Telma Hopkins (Rachel) make their final regular appearances on Family Matters; though Hopkins would later make return appearances on the show as Rachel, Judy's disappearance from the show is never resolved. Michelle Thomas would join the cast as fan-favorite antagonist Myra Monkhouse in the series' fifth season the following fall. |
| May 20 | Seinfeld's 4th season finale, expanded to 60 minutes, concludes a season-long story arc involving a television pilot written by Jerry and George, with the pilot finally coming to fruition only to be passed on by NBC executives. |
| 80.4 million people tune in to the series finale of Cheers. | |
| May 22 | Saved by the Bell airs its graduation episode for the series finale on NBC. It aired this final episode before it was a spin-off, Saved by the Bell: The College Years, debuted 3 months later. |
| May 23 | One month after federal agents make an infamous raid on David Koresh's Waco, Texas compound, NBC airs a hastily-produced telefilm based on the incident, In the Line of Duty: Ambush in Waco; Tim Daly plays Koresh in the film. |
| June 25 | David Letterman marks his last late-night talk show on NBC. |
| August 30 | David Letterman returns to his CBS late-night talk show, featuring guests from Bill Murray, plus musical guest Billy Joel. |
| September 12 | Perry Mason actor Raymond Burr dies after a long fight with liver cancer at his ranch home in California at the age of 76. |
| September 13 | Conan O'Brien begins his late-night talk show after David Letterman leaves on NBC. |
| September 16 | Marc Wilmore, Reggie McFadden, Jay Leggett, Carol Rosenthal and Anne-Marie Johnson join the cast of In Living Color for its final season. None of the Wayans Family are involved at all during the season. |
| September 19 | The 45th Primetime Emmy Awards were handed out by ABC. |
| September 24 | Raven-Symoné, Nell Carter and Saundra Quarterman join the cast of Hangin' with Mr. Cooper on ABC. |
| October 1 | The secondary ESPN channel, ESPN 2 (known as The Deuce), is launched. |
| October 15 | Jewelry TV launches in America as American Collectable Network, a home shopping network. |
| October 23 | CBS's four-year broadcast relationship with Major League Baseball ends with Blue Jay Joe Carter's walk-off home run to win the World Series. (Bob Seger's "The Famous Final Scene" plays during the broadcast's closing credits.) |
| October 25 | The Rocky Horror Picture Show makes its TV debut on Fox; the film is intercut with a live cast performance. |
| October 29 | The first Got Milk? commercial airs on TV. Directed by Michael Bay, a guy, obsessed by the history of the duel, hears the voice on the radio asking a $10,000 question, "Who shot Alexander Hamilton in that famous duel?", while making and eating a peanut butter sandwich. The question was transferred to the phone, answers the correct answer "Aaron Burr", but the person on the phone can't hear it clearly with his mouth full of peanut butter sandwich before time runs out, and only has a few drops of milk left. |
| November 15 | Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake, and Christina Aguilera join the cast of The New Mickey Mouse Club. |
| November 23 | Food Network is launched. |
| December 18 | CBS (which had been home to National Football League games for 38 years) lost their rights to the then-fledging Fox Network. Fox offered a then-record $1.58 billion to the NFL over four years for the rights to the National Football Conference package, significantly more than the $290 million per year CBS was willing to pay. |
Read more about this topic: 1993 In American Television
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