Nomenclature
Cold opens sometimes employ a segment known as a "teaser". The following memorandum was written on May 2, 1966 as a supplement to the Writer-Director Information Guide for Star Trek, and was authored by Gene Roddenberry, describing the format of a typical episode. This quotation refers to a cold open, commonly known as a teaser:
- a. Teaser, preferably three pages or less. Captain Kirk's voice over opens the show, briefly setting where we are and what's going on. This is usually followed by a short playing scene which ends with the Teaser "hook."
The "hook" of the teaser was some unexplained plot element that was alluded to in the teaser, or cold open, which was intended to keep audiences interested enough in the show to dissuade them from changing stations while the titles and opening commercial roll. Star Trek writer David Gerrold, to tweak William Shatner on set, once joked he was writing a Star Trek episode in which Kirk lost his voice in the teaser (the hook), and didn't get it back until the tag. Gerrold states that Shatner's comment about this suggested episode was unprintable.
In television series, a similar technique called cliffhanger is often placed before commercial breaks, to keep the audience from switching channels during the break. For instance, in Law & Order this second hook is often the arrest of the suspected perpetrator of the crime committed in the cold open.
The teaser is sometimes referred to as the "tease"; the companion closing-scene at the end of the show is the "tag".
Read more about this topic: Cold Open