Everyone’s been getting it wrong all along.
Producer Jim Janicek, who created the popular 1990s TV programming block “TGIF” on ABC, recently revealed that — contrary to popular belief — the acronym doesn’t mean “Thank God it’s Friday.”
During a recent appearance on the “Pod Meets World” podcast with former “Boy Meets World” stars Danielle Fishel, Rider Strong, and Will Friedle, Janicek said “TGIF” really stood for, “Thank Goodness it’s Funny.”
He recalled workshopping possible names.
“We were talking about things like the ‘Friday Fun Club.’ There’s a whole list somewhere I probably could dig up, but I remember that one. You know, ‘It’s Friday Night.’ Lots of little short-isms.”
The producer said that initially there was some concern that “TGIF” was too close to the name of the restaurant chain TGI Friday’s, but ABC execs decided to proceed with using that acronym.
“We were animating the open. And then [fellow ABC executives] Stu Brower and Bob Iger called and said, ‘We’ve landed on TGIF. We wanna call it TGIF.’ So that’s where we got the name, and we started animating those letters into the open and went from there,” Janicek continued.
He added, “Bob, I believe, came up with ‘Thank Goodness it’s Funny’ to avoid any conflict with any restaurant.”
The programming block aired on ABC from the late ‘80s to the early 2000s.
At its peak, the “TGIF” programming block included a slew of iconic shows, such as “Boy Meets World,” “Family Matters,” “Sister Sister,” “Perfect Strangers,” “8 Simple Rules,” “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” and “Full House.”
“Friday night used to be what was considered the death slot,” he explained.
“They would kind of put shows there that were on their last legs because the network always believed that most people were out going on dates, things like that.”
But Janicek recalled that during his childhood on Fridays, he would have dinner with his family “and then would sit and watch TV.”
His experience pushed him to try to make Friday programming big.
Janicek said that it eventually stopped because, “I think they had gone, ‘we’re kinda tired of this and, you know, maybe we should try something different.’”
But during the heyday of the “TGIF” programming block, Strong said, “It was a juggernaut. It was amazing.”