In American television in 2000, notable events included television series debuts, finales, cancellations, and channel initiations, closures and rebrandings, as well as information about controversies and disputes.
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 5 | All My Children celebrates its 30th anniversary on ABC. |
| 8 | The series finale of Saved by the Bell: The New Class airs on NBC, ending a consecutive run for the Saved by the Bell franchise that began on July 11, 1987, when NBC broadcast the pilot for Good Morning, Miss Bliss. The franchise would remain dormant until 2020. |
| 10 | Bret Hart defends the WCW World Heavyweight Championship against Kevin Nash on WCW Monday Nitro. |
| 15 | David Letterman undergoes quintuple heart bypass surgery in New York-Presbyterian Hospital, following an angiogram that revealed that one of his arteries was constricted seriously. |
| 17 | Robin Givens replaces Mother Love as host of the talk show series Forgive or Forget. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 8 | Chris-Craft Broadcasting (the 50% owner of UPN) filed a lawsuit against Viacom in the New York Supreme Court to block it's partner's merger with CBS, claiming that a pact signed between the two partners in 1997 had prevented either from owning "any interest, financial or otherwise" in "any competing network," including CBS, for a four-year period through January 2001. The following month, New York Supreme Court ruled against Chris-Craft's move for a permanent injunction to curtail the Viacom-CBS merger and the enforcement of Viacom's ultimatum. |
| 15 | Rick Rockwell marries stranger Darva Conger watched by 22 million viewers on the Fox reality show Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire? While he and Darva are honeymooning, it becomes apparent that Rockwell—who is sometimes a comedian—had a restraining order against a former girlfriend, and he was not really a multi-millionaire. As a result, Fox cancels a rerun scheduled the next week, and does not broadcast any new installments. In addition the couple end their relationship soon after the show's taping. |
| David Legler wins a combined $1,765,000 from the six episodes he appeared on the NBC game show, Twenty One, surpassing Curtis Warren's total of $1,546,988, and becoming, at the time, the largest winner in game show winnings totals. (Warren had set the record 4 days earlier on Fox's Greed, winning $1,000,000 by correctly answering a special Million Dollar Moment question.) | |
| 21 | David Letterman resumes hosting Late Show with David Letterman on CBS following his quintuple heart bypass surgery in January. On the show, Letterman (whose father died of heart failure in his 50s) brings all of the doctors that had performed the operation out on stage with him, including Dr. O. Wayne Isom and physician Louis Aronne, who makes frequent appearances on the show. In an unusual show of emotion, Letterman is nearly in tears as he thanks the doctors. The episode will earn an Emmy Award nomination. |
| 18 | Just as FCC's duopoly rules relaxed, Fox Television Stations buy out KDFI from Dallas Media Inventors, creating the first television duopoly to be owned by Fox (the same strategy was used when Fox bought the Chris-Craft company and WPWR-TV the following year). |
| 22 | Paramount Stations Group and ACME Communications sign an agreement to broadcast shared WB and UPN affiliations in markets without competition. This results in UPN affiliates WWHO in Columbus, Ohio, WTVX in West Palm Beach, Florida and WLWC in Providence, Rhode Island taking secondary WB affiliations, and WB affiliates WBUI-TV in Champaign, Illinois, WBXX in Knoxville, Tennessee, and KPLR-TV in St. Louis, Missouri taking secondary UPN affiliations. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 20 | Viacom finally acquired Chris-Craft Broadcasting's 50% share of UPN for $5 million. Meaning that UPN is fully owned by Viacom, and Chris-Craft's UPN stations (including New York and Los Angeles) lost their statuses as O&Os and automatically became affiliates of the network, with the network's de facto owned-and-operated flagship stations that Viacom owned. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 1 | Boomerang, a programming block from Cartoon Network, spins-off as a cable channel. |
| 3 | WWHO in Columbus, Ohio and WLWC in Providence, Rhode Island became primary UPN affiliates, and eventually these stations becoming secondary WB affiliates. |
| 12 | The Fox series Get Real airs its 20th and final aired episode (leaving 2 more unaired). Both Annie Hathaway and Jesse Eisenberg subsequently appeared in successful movie roles. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 1 | The WWF garners the 2nd highest rated episode of Raw is War with a 7.4 rating, where The Rock defeated Shane McMahon.[1] |
| 14 | After four years (since KEVN-TV left the network to join Fox in 1996), NBC returns to the Black Hills area of South Dakota when KNBN signs-on from Rapid City. |
| 17 | 16.8 million American viewers watch the 2-hour final episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 on FOX. |
| 19 | The 27th Daytime Emmy Awards presentation is broadcast by ABC. |
| 24 | The WB broadcasts the third-season finale of Dawson's Creek, entitled "True Love". The episode features the first male gay kiss on U.S. primetime television, which has been called "a milestone in the timeline of gay representation in pop culture".[2] |
| 31 | The first season of CBS's long-running reality competition of Survivor, titled Survivor: Borneo, based on Sweden's game show Expedition Robinson, premieres its first episode. Sonja Christopher was the first contestant to be eliminated. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 3 | KNTV (channel 11) in San Jose, California drops its ABC affiliation for the Monterey Bay area and begins carrying minimal programming from The WB. (At that time, The WB affiliate for the Bay Area was KBWB channel 20). |
| 5 | The first season of CBS's long-running reality competition of Big Brother, based on the Dutch series of the same name, premieres its first episode. It was the only televised U.S. season to use the traditional format to eliminate contestants via televoting, however, as the season received negative reception. |
| 11 | The Major League Baseball All-Game from Atlanta's Turner Field is broadcast on NBC. This ultimately proved to be NBC's final telecast of the "Midsummer Classic" to date. All subsequent Major League Baseball All-Games would air on Fox. |
| 14 | After over a year of rotating guest critics, Buena Vista Television announces that Richard Roeper, columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, will become permanent co-host alongside Roger Ebert on the newly renamed program Ebert & Roeper and the Movies (renamed to Ebert & Roeper the following year) as the late Gene Siskel's (who passed away from complications following his May 1998 brain surgery early in 1999) successor. |
| 15 | CBS broadcasts its final NASCAR event, the Chevy Silverado 200. Dennis Setzer would win the race. |
| 20 | Will & Grace moves permanently to Thursday nights, ending two years of airing the series on different nights. On July 25, Frasier moves back to Tuesday nights after two years on Thursday nights due to competition from Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, confirming the swap NBC had discussed their schedule in May. |
| 28 | Kathie Lee Gifford made her final appearance as co-host on Live!, after 17 years (eleven and a half years for national syndication). Regis Philbin will continue to serve the only host until Kelly Ripa introduced as new co-host the following year. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 3 | KBEJ Channel 2, (now KCWX) commences programming in Fredericksburg, Texas, taking the Austin market's UPN affiliation from low-powered station KVC 13 and returning full-time UPN service to San Antonio (between KRRT (now KMYS)'s switch to The WB in 1998 and KBEJ's sign-on, NBC affiliate KMOL-TV aired UPN programming on a secondary basis). |
| 23 | In CBS, corporate trainer Richard Hatch was declared the inaugural "Sole Survivor" in Survivor and won the $1,000,000 grand prize; Kelly Wiglesworth was named the runner-up. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 10 | The 52nd Primetime Emmy Awards presentation is broadcast on ABC. |
| 15 | The 2000 Summer Olympics are televised by NBC. Opening ceremonies are watched by 27 and a half million viewers. |
| 16 | After the completion of Viacom's $37 billion merger with the CBS Corporation, CBS Kidshow ended its run and replaces it with Nick Jr. on CBS, programmed by new corporate sister Nickelodeon. |
| 21 | ABC Sports celebrates the 30th anniversary of Monday Night Football on this night. |
| 26 | NBC declines to renew its broadcast agreement with Major League Baseball. After 50 seasons — 1947–1989 and 1994–2000 — Game 6 of the 2000 American League Championship Series is the last Major League Baseball game that NBC would televise for the next 22 years. The New York Yankees would defeat the Seattle Mariners 9–7 to advance to the World Series (which they would beat the New York Mets in five games). In Houston, due to the coverage of the 2000 Presidential Debate, KPRC-TV elected to carry NBC News' coverage of the debate while KNWS-TV carried NBC's final baseball game. |
| 29 | Eddie McGee wins the first U.S. season of Big Brother and won the $500,000 grand prize. It is the only season at the time the final vote was determined by public viewers instead of a Jury vote. |
| 30 | PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch debuts. The block is programmed for PBS by Canada-based Nelvana, which had programmed the CBS Kidshow until the block was cancelled by CBS on September 16.[3] |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 17 | NBC broadcasts Game 6 of the American League Championship Series between the New York Yankees and Seattle Mariners. With Bob Costas and Joe Morgan at the call, the Yankees would defeat the Mariners 9–7, to advance to the World Series against their cross–town rivals, the Mets. As previously mentioned, this proved to be NBC's final Major League Baseball telecast until the 2022 season. |
| 26 | The Game 5 of the World Series airs on Fox. The New York Yankees win their third consecutive title (and first since the Oakland Athletics from 1972 to 1974) and 26th in franchise history, defeating their crosstown opponent the New York Mets 4–2. |
| 30 | Lancaster, Pennsylvania's college student Brad Rutter made his historical first appearance in the Jeopardy! game show, and he would go on set a record for its largest J! career winnings as of 2005 ($4,788,440), and as of 2020, becoming one of the largest winners in American game show history with winnings accumulating over $5,000,000, including $100,000 he won from Million Dollar Mind Game in 2014. |
| 31 | Charles Barkley makes his debut as an analyst on TBS/TNT's Inside the NBA. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 4 | The final episode of All That's first-run airs on Nickelodeon. After 13 episodes the show was put on hiatus. To keep the show running, the producers compiled a series called Best of All That. Eventually, Nickelodeon canceled All That, due to crew disputes and a general desire to move on. However, All That still had a strong following and was one of the most popular shows on the network. Nickelodeon planned to revive the show, starting from scratch. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 14 | Barker's Beauties Janice Pennington and Kathleen Bradley both quit CBS' series The Price Is Right. (On her broadcast run, Pennington has been on the series since its premiere during 1972.) Starting the following day, auditions to find new Barker's Beauties are held for several months. In the end, Claudia Jordan and Heather Kozar are selected as permanent models. |
| 22 | Bianca Montgomery, played by Eden Riegel for the soap opera All My Children, reveals herself as a lesbian to her mother, Erica Kane (played by Susan Lucci). |
| 31 | ABC broadcasts "Dick Clark's Primetime New Year's Rockin' Eve" at 10 p.m. ET for the first time ever, followed by local news or programming and then the main "New Year's Rockin' Eve". |
| Show | Last aired | Previous network | New title | New network | Returning |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Twenty One | 1958 | NBC | Same | NBC | January 9 |
| Ripley's Believe It or Not! | 1986 | ABC | TBS | January 12 | |
| Double Dare | 1993 | Nickelodeon, Fox | Double Dare 2000 | Same | January 24 |
| Grapevine | 1992 | CBS | Same | February 28 | |
| Supermarket Sweep | 1995 | Lifetime | PAX TV | April 3 | |
| Shop 'til You Drop | 1998 | The Family Channel | |||
| Cartoon Cartoon Weekend | 1999 | Cartoon Network | The Cartoon Cartoon Show (Cartoon Cartoons or The Big Pick) | Same | June 9 |
| This Week in Baseball | 1998 | Syndication | Same | Fox | July 12 |
| To Tell the Truth | 1991 | NBC | Syndication | September 18 | |
| The Critic | 1995 | Fox | Comedy Central | November |
| Show | Seasons | In Production | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 7th Heaven | 4 | Yes | [4][page needed][full citation needed] |
| Cosby | 4 | No | [5][page needed][full citation needed] |
| Early Edition | 4 | No | [6][page needed][full citation needed] |
| The Jamie Foxx Show | 5 | Yes | |
| Moesha | 5 | Yes | [7][page needed][full citation needed] |
| Nash Bridges | 5 | Yes | [8][page needed][full citation needed] |
| The Pretender | 4 | No | [9][page needed][full citation needed] |
| Sabrina the Teenage Witch | 4 | Yes | [10][page needed][full citation needed] |
| Spin City | 4 | Yes | [11][page needed][full citation needed] |
| Suddenly Susan | 4 | No | [12][page needed][full citation needed] |
| Show | Moved from | Moved to |
|---|---|---|
| Forensic Files | TLC | Court TV |
| Budgie the Little Helicopter | Fox Kids | Fox Family |
| The Hughleys | ABC | UPN |
| Ripley's Believe It or Not! | TBS | |
| Sabrina the Teenage Witch | The WB | |
| The PJs | Fox | The WB |
| This Week in Baseball | Syndication | Fox |
| Macy's Fourth of July Fireworks Spectacular | NBC | |
| Twenty One | NBC | Pax TV |
| Supermarket Sweep | Lifetime | |
| Shop 'til You Drop | Fox Family | |
| WWF Raw Is War | USA Network | TNN |
| WWF LiveWire | ||
| WWF Superstars | ||
| WWF Sunday Night Heat | MTV | |
| To Tell the Truth | NBC | Syndication |
| The Critic | Fox | Comedy Central |
| Title | Channel | Premiere |
|---|---|---|
| The 10th Kingdom | NBC | February 27 |
| The Corner | HBO | April 16 |
| Arabian Nights | ABC | April 30 |
| Jesus | CBS | May 14 |
| Network | Type | Launch date | Notes | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hispanic Television Network | Cable television | Unknown | ||
| VH1 Uno | Cable and satellite | Unknown | ||
| BYU TV | Cable and satellite | January 1 | ||
| PBS YOU | Cable television | January 15 | ||
| Soapnet | Cable and satellite | January 20 | ||
| Oxygen | Cable and satellite | February 2 | ||
| V-Me | Cable television | March 5 | ||
| Boomerang | Cable and satellite | April 1 | ||
| New Urban Entertainment Television | Cable television | July 17 | ||
| Azteca America | Cable television | July 28 | ||
| Venevisión Continental | Cable television | August 28 | ||
| HBO Latino | Cable television | November 1 | ||
| RFD-TV | Cable and satellite | December 1 |
| Old network name | New network name | Type | Conversion Date | Notes | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SportsChannel Florida | Fox Sports Net Florida | Cable television | March 1 | ||
| VH1 Classic Rock | VH1 Classic | Cable and satellite | May 8 | ||
| CBS Telenoticias | Telemundo Internacional | Cable television | September | ||
| ZDTV | TechTV | Cable and satellite | September 18 | ||
| The Nashville Network | The National Network | Cable television | September 25 | ||
| ValueVision | ShopNBC | Cable television | November |
| Network name | Type | Closure Date | Notes | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Discovery People | Cable television | Unknown | ||
| Z Music Television | Cable television | Unknown | ||
| Boyz Channel | Cable television | August 18 | ||
| Girlz Channel | Cable television | August 18 | ||
| Romance Classics | Cable and satellite | December 31 |
| Date | Name | Age | Notability |
|---|---|---|---|
| January 15 | Fran Ryan | 83 | American character actress (Doris Ziffle #2 on Green Acres) |
| January 16 | By Saam | 85 | American sportscaster |
| January 18 | Nancy Coleman | 87 | American film, stage, television and radio actress |
| Jester Hairston | 98 | American composer, songwriter, arranger, choral conductor, and actor (Amen) | |
| February 10 | Jim Varney | 50 | American actor; creator of the Ernest P. Worrell character (Hey Vern, It's Ernest!) |
| February 12 | Charles M. Schulz | 77 | American cartoonist, creator of Peanuts |
| March 11 | Alex Dreier | 83 | American news reporter |
| March 15 | Durward Kirby | 88 | American television host and announcer |
| March 25 | Helen Martin | 90 | American character actress (Pearl Shay on 227) |
| April 10 | Larry Linville | 60 | American actor (Major Frank Burns on M*A*S*H) |
| April 12 | Christopher Pettiet | 24 | American television and film actor (The Young Riders) |
| May 7 | Douglas Fairbanks Jr. | 90 | American actor and producer (Douglas Fairbanks Presents), son of Douglas Fairbanks |
| May 10 | Craig Stevens | 81 | American film and television actor (Peter Gunn) |
| June 18 | Nancy Marchand | 71 | American actress (Livia Soprano on The Sopranos, Mrs. Pynchon on Lou Grant) |
| July 1 | Walter Matthau | 79 | American actor and comedian |
| July 14 | Meredith MacRae | 56 | American actress and singer (Billie Jo Bradley #3 on Petticoat Junction) |
| July 28 | Jaime Cardriche | 32 | American actor (Malcolm & Eddie) |
| August 12 | Loretta Young | 87 | American actress (The Loretta Young Show) |
| September 14 | Beah Richards | 80 | American stage, screen, and television actress |
| September 26 | Richard Mulligan | 67 | American television and film actor (Burt Campbell on Soap, Dr. Harry Weston on Empty Nest) |
| October 6 | Richard Farnsworth | 80 | American actor and stuntman |
| October 9 | David Dukes | 55 | American actor |
| October 16 | Rick Jason | 77 | American actor (Lt. Gil Hanley on Combat!) |
| October 18 | Julie London | 74 | American singer and actress (Nurse Dixie McCall on Emergency!) |
| October 30 | Steve Allen | 78 | American comedian, composer (original The Tonight Show host) |
| December 2 | Gail Fisher | 65 | American actress (Peggy Fair on Mannix) |
| December 6 | Werner Klemperer | 80 | German-American actor (Colonel Wilhelm Klink on Hogan's Heroes) |
| December 12 | George Montgomery | 84 | American actor, director, producer, writer and stuntman |
| December 23 | Victor Borge | 91 | Danish comedian and pianist |
| December 26 | Jason Robards | 78 | American stage, film and television actor (The Day After) |