If You Give a Dance, You Gotta Pay the Band
1972 American TV series or program
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
If You Give a Dance You Gotta Pay the Band is a 1972 American TV movie. It was the first program shown under the umbrella ABC Theater.[1][2]
James Broderick
Georgia Burke
| If You Give a Dance, You Gotta Pay the Band | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Drama |
| Written by | Stanley L. Gray |
| Directed by | Fred Coe |
| Starring | Donna M. Bryan James Broderick Georgia Burke |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language | English |
| Production | |
| Producer | David Susskind |
| Cinematography | Mike Liberman Jake Ostroff |
| Editor | Arline Garson |
| Running time | 73 minutes |
| Original release | |
| Release | December 19, 1972 |
The production (at the time referred to as a "dramatic special" or "teleplay" rather than a made-for-TV movie) was the first screen credit for Laurence Fishburne and led to him getting a role later on in the soap opera One Life to Live.[3][4][5]
The teleplay first aired on ABC at 8:30pm ET on Tuesday, December 19, 1972[3] and was rerun on Wednesday, June 6, 1973 at 9:00pm ET.[5] In TV listings of the era, the title was generally given as If You Give a Dance You Gotta Pay the Band without a comma.
Plot
The story of ghetto boy and girl trying to raise money for the girl to visit her father in prison. It was shot on videotape in November 1972.[6]