America's Funniest Home Videos (partially found international season of Vin Di Bona clip show; 1999-2000)

A photo of Kerri and Mike Kasem during the filming of an episode.

Status: Partially Found

America's Funniest Home Video is an American clip show based on the Japanese variety show Fun TV with Kato-chan and Ken-chan that features humorous homemade videos sent in by viewers who get a chance at winning a cash prize. The show premiered on ABC (originally as a special) on November 26, 1989, and became a huge hit for the network that it was picked up as a weekly series starting January 14, 1990. The show is currently hosted by actor Alfonso Ribeiro after he replaced Tom Bergeron in 2015. Bob Saget, John Fugelsang and Daisy Fuentes also hosted the show previously. While the show has been a fixture on ABC since 1989, it was briefly discontinued as a weekly series between August 1999 and February 2001 due to the poor ratings it received when Fugelsang and Fuentes were the hosts and the only content produced during that period were specials hosted by actors D. L. Hughley and Richard Kind, though there was a season recorded during that period intended only for overseas markets.

History

The show went through a massive overhaul after Bob Saget left the show in 1997, due to being tired of the show, the change in ABC's ownership from Capital Cities to Disney and its sinking ratings. While the visual overhaul would remain until 2004, the new hosts John Fugelsang and Daisy Fuentes didn't click with viewers and the constantly changing timeslots only made the ratings declined further than they were when Saget's last season was airing. Fugelsang and Fuentes would be let go from the show after their final episode aired on August 28, 1999 and the show would be put on hiatus in the United States.

Outside of the specials that would be produced and aired during the hiatus, a season of either 24 one-hour long episodes (according to writer Roger Eschbacher) or 25 half-hour long episodes (according to the Entertainment Identifier Registry) was recorded for overseas markets (which were still rerunning the show) with Kerri and Mike Kasem (the daughter and son of legendary radio DJ Casey Kasem) as hosts. The season was filmed on the same set that was used for the specials with no studio audience. The season, which was in production from October 1999 to April 2000 (according to head writer Jeff Zimmer), is said to have premiered on September 17, 1999. While it's unknown when the season stopped airing, it is known that the season aired on TVNorge in Norway and DTV in Russia. The season would all be forgotten about after it aired as ABC announced in October 2000 that the show would return as a weekly series with Hollywood Squares host Tom Bergeron taking over duties. The show would return on February 3, 2001 and despite the show airing on Friday nights, it did better in the ratings and by 2003 it would return to Sunday nights (where it aired from 1990 to 1997) and is still airing today.

Availability

Many of the show's episodes have received heavy airplay in syndication since 1995, though the Kasem episodes were not aired in North America, though they are known to have been reran on TVNorge from 2007 to 2010. A few clips can be seen in both Kerri and Mike's reel and several photos from the set can be found today. Given its obscurity and that the show doesn't acknowledge this season, it's highly unlikely that the season will ever resurface.

Gallery

Kerri Kasem's hosting reel (America's Funniest Home Videos clips at 3:54)

Mike Kasem's hosting reel (America's Funniest Home Videos clip at 1:56)