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Top Row (left to right): Nate, Dave, Mike, Sean. Middle: Pat, Nick, Newfie. Bottom: Matt, Josh. Not Pictured: Jeremy C.
"What is YRU-Up," you ask. Well you may not of actually asked it but good question anyway. There's a very simple answer to that. It's a late night cable access show that takes calls and shows pre-taped skits. Unfortunately, for me the writer, the simplest answers aren't always the best. I guess I'll start from the beginning. It's a good place to start. Some people start from the middle, and I think those people are way off base. Starting from the middle, that's so stupid, well anyway, I'll start.
YRU-Up (Why are you up?) began in concept back in 1991. A young man named Andrew Starks decided to turn on the cameras late at night in the BEC-TV (Bloomington Educational Cable) studio, and see what happens. He got bored of just rambling about his hair loss problems, and decided to take some calls. NOT BEC was born. Note I didn't say YRU-Up was born. Not BEC was the programs original title. It was a quasi-funny way of saying the crap they did was not associated with the rest of BEC-TV. At some point the name was changed to YRU-Up and some other stuff happened. I'm not sure what though. I'm the first to admit I know nothing about the first couple of years of the show because I was not there. I suppose I could lie to you and make up some interesting stories about the "good old days" but I won't. That would be wrong…..Okay, maybe a couple. This one will now explain the story of how they came up with the YRU-Up name. It's a rather odd tail. It was just another Friday at Not BEC when the usually smooth running, and may I say damn funny, ran into a little snag. A caller called in, as most callers do, and asked a question. "What the hell is this thing I'm watching," the caller slurred. The instant response was, as expected, Not BEC. What followed was the inevitable response to anything that is named what it is not, such as non-parielles, and I can't believe it's not butter. You may know what it is not, but you still don't know what it is. The members of the cast soon realized the shortcoming of their title. They needed to come up with a show name that contained the essence of what the show was. Something that once said left no questions about what the show was. Unfortunately for them, no such title existed. Instead they settled for some thing they thought would be amusing. This led to the next question. What title could properly express the humor level that was always present on the show? The answer, most anything could. They finally came up with YRU-Up because it fit in those clever call letters and it was on late at night. Good story, huh? It might have actually happened that way. How the hell would I know? All I know was during that time of a couple years; they churned out a couple of decent skits and got some type of audience. The stage was ripe for a change. I will from now on refer to this "olden times," as the Bronze Age.
The change came when me (Sean Hall) and my friends (Pat Casey, Matt Sell, and Luke Grohovsky-See Show scandal section) came into BEC to try and get our own show. We were young freshmen in high school and we thought we could do anything. This was back in September of 1993. We were trying to get our own show called the Idiot Show (don't ask). Maybe you'll find out if I go into some show pre-history( I did do that so see Pre-History). Only time will tell if I get that bored. But to make a long story about the same length, we went in and met with the man who ran the station Tom Ringdal. He was nice to us and he put up with us for some reason. I'm sure we were idiots. I guess the show name fit. In fact I'm sure it still fits. Anyway, he said that we could do this skit show we wanted. We soon of course realized that a have hour weekly skit show was just too much for us to take on. Somehow through ways I still don't understand we ended up doing skits for, you guessed it, YRU-Up. We were the freshman four, and the Bronze Age people treated us like crap. We paid our dues, that's for sure (see Jeremy Davis). Soon came a new member of our unpopular group of show youngins. His name was Pat Fisher a.k.a. Fish. Fish was at the time an eighth grader. Fish was also a boy of considerable station (he was plump). The next to parade in was another of my contemporaries Josh Miller. Josh came in actuality to start is own show as well but got roped into this one. What a coincidence. This was now about February of 1994. The particulars of the story of his first time coming to YRU-Up is an interesting story that I or Josh might tell later, but back to the tale at hand. This was about when all us guys actually got to start hosting. Josh got to host before I did. What the Hell? Anyway, the show slowly started to become more ours every week. Bronze Age people left. Clem and Dan got kicked off for bringing drunks to the show. "Did I miss something?" you say. No, I never mentioned them before. They were old hosts, enough said. Finally, we were in the driver's seat. But not all was well in Whoville. The better butter battle had yet to be fought (if I may mix my Seuss). Factions were battling for control. New people joined the fight, and old veterans fell to the wayside. Details, you ask, maybe later. I'm not in the mood. Let's just say the victory went to those to whom it belonged. Soon after, more cast members showed their face. Newfie came, as well as Nick Stukas, Nate Morales, Dave Prestwood, and Mike Gregiore. Others came and left (Steve Johnson, Stinky-poo), and others just left (Luke and Fish). Basically, the show continued without too much trouble. We got better. The show got better. We got in trouble with the school board. Parents didn't like us, nothing too bad. The show went on to become a thing of greatness. I'm willing to say it was not everyone's cup of tea. Hell, tea's not my cup of tea. That's not the point. The point is that it was a show, a bunch of talented guys, and sometimes girls put on every week, with no money and not a lot of time and turned out something damn good. It was fun, It was hard, it was the best experience of my life till now. I only hope to reach that level again.
As they say, all good things, you know the rest. We grew old, it was now time to move on. We all had college to go to (well not all but that's a different story, for others to tell). We all had a new chapter to start. The final show took place on August 15th 1997. It was twelve hours long, from 8:00 P.M. to 8:00 A.M. We had callers the whole time. We showed every skit we wanted. It was great, and a sight to see. The next week the show went on with new kids. Us new old timers packed up our bags, and moved on. My only hope I give to the "new class" is that they have as much fun as we had and that they try not to ruin our show. We worked hard.
"What'd I miss?"
The New YRU-Up
Friday nights 12:30
BEC-TV channel 14
Bloomington, MN
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© 1997 ditchhall@hotmail.com
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