Your Mental Sorbet: Bates Motel (1987)

Here is another "Mental Sorbet"

A little spark of madness

that we could use to momentarily forget about those things that leave a bad taste in our mouths.

Bates Motel is a 1987 American made-for-television psychological horror film and a spin-off of the 1960 suspense horror film Psycho starring Bud Cort, Lori Petty, Moses Gunn and Jason Bateman which premiered onNBC on July 5, 1987.

The film is about Alex West, a mentally disturbed youth who was admitted to an asylum after killing his abusive stepfather. There he befriends Norman Bates and ends up inheriting the Bates Motel. The film was originally produced as a pilot for a TV series set in the Bates Motel, but it was not picked up by the network.

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Dark Shadows and The Magic Castle: Next on TVC

Actress and author Kathryn Leigh Scott and Milt Larsen, founder of The Magic Castle, will join us on the next edition of TV CONFIDENTIAL, airing Oct. 21-24 at the following times and venues:

Share-a-Vision Radio
San Francisco Bay Area
Friday 10/21
7pm ET, 4pm PT
10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Listen Live button at KSAV.org
Use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in KSAV
Hear us on the KSAV channel on CX Radio Brazil
Hear us on your cell phone or landline number by dialing 712-432-4235

Indiana Talks
Marion, IN
Saturday 10/22
8pm ET, 5pm PT
Sunday 10/23
6pm ET, 3pm PT
Click on the player at IndianaTalks.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in Indiana Talks

KSCO-AM 1080
San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA
KOMY-AM 1340
La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA
Sunday 10/23
9am ET, 6am PT
Also streaming at KSCO.com

KHMB AM-1710
KHMV-LP 100.9 FM
Half Moon Bay, CA
Sunday 10/23
9pm PT
Monday 10/24
Midnight ET
Click on the Listen Live button at KHMBRadio.com

RadioSlot.com
San Francisco, CA
Monday 10/24
10pm ET, 7pm PT
with replays Tuesday thru Friday at 10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Talk Slot button at RadioSlot.com

PWRNetwork
Ann Arbor, MI
Various times throughout the week
on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork.com
and the PWR channel on TuneIn

This week’s program will include a return visit from Kathryn Leigh Scott. Though most of you know Kathryn for playing Maggie Evans on Dark Shadows, she is also a prolific author and accomplished independent publisher who has written and/or published many books, covering many genres in fiction and nonfiction. Kathryn’s latest book, Last Dance at the Savoy: Life, Love and Caring for Someone With Pro..., is a personal story about her husband Geoff Miller, the founding editor of Los Angeles magazine, who lived life fully despite having a terminal illness (progressive supranuclear palsy, a neurological condition), and the insights Kathryn learned while dealing with the day-to-day issues of caring for him. Kathryn Leigh Scott will join us in our second hour.



Kathryn Leigh Scott will be joining Lara Parker, John Karlen, Roger Davis, Emmy and Grammy nominated composer Robert Cobert and other Dark Shadows alumni at the Dark Shadows 50^th Anniversary Halloween in Hollywood celebration on Saturday, Oct. 29 from Noon to Midnight at the Woman’s Club of Hollywood, 1749 N. La Brea Avenue in Hollywood. An all-day event, The Dark Shadows 50^th Anniversary Halloween in Hollywood will allow fans to meet the actors, receive complimentary autographs, enjoy a cast reunion with a Q & A session, dramatic and musical performances by the stars, rare video screenings, a memorabilia flea market, a Halloween costume event with the guests, and a whole lot more. Admission for the twelve-hour event is $20 for adults, $10 for children. Tickets can be purchased at the door or by going to the event site, DarkShadowsFestival.com.

Our first hour will include a return appearance by Milt Larsen, founder of the world-famous Magic Castle in Hollywood, the private club for magicians that has also been featured in dozens of movies and TV shows, including Bedknobs & Broomsticks, Houdini, Hart to Hart, Murder She Wrote, Perry Mason and The Magician. Milt also wrote for Ralph Edwards Productions for many years (including eighteen years on Truth or Consequences), plus he hosts a popular weekly radio show for CRN. .

Milt Larsen is also the producer of It's Magic!, the dazzling live stage show that has entertained audience across the U.S. since 1956. The 60th anniversary performance of It’s Magic will take place on Saturday, Oct. 29 at The Wilshire Ebell Theatre in Los Angeles. Among the magician scheduled to perform that night are Jonathan Pendragon, Goldfinger & Dove, Jeff McBride, Darren Romeo, and Tony Award winner Jay Johnson. For tickets and more information go to the Schedule page at ItsMagicShow.com.

Also this week: Phil Gries will join us for more highlights of our October 2011 tribute to the early television career of Woody Allen. Phil’s personal and profession association with Allen dates back to 1997, as a result of Archival Television Audio.

TV CONFIDENTIAL: A radio talk show about television
Fri 7pm ET and PT on Share-a-Vision Radio, KSAV.org and CX Radio Brazil
Sat 8pm ET, 5pm PT and Sun 6pm ET, 3pm PT on Indiana Talks
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KSCO-AM 1080 (San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA)
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KOMY-AM 1340 (La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA)
Sun 9pm PT, Mon Mid ET on KHMB-AM and FM (Half Moon Bay, CA)
Mon 10pm ET, 7pm PT on The Radio Slot Network
Replays various times throughout the week on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork
Tape us now, listen to us later, using DAR.fm/tvconfidential
Also available as a podcast via iTunes, FeedBurner
and now on your mobile phone via Stitcher.com
Follow us online at www.tvconfidential.net
Follow us now on Twitter: Twitter.com/tvconfidential
Like our Fan Page at www.facebook.com/tvconfidential

If you listen to TV CONFIDENTIAL, and like what you’ve heard, please consider supporting our efforts by becoming a patron of our show through Patreon. It’s easy to do, it does not cost much, plus you can receive some cool rewards (such as coupons that will allow you to download up to six free programs every month from the TV CONFIDENTIAL Archives store). For more information, please visit www.Patreon.com/tvconfidential... and thanks!

This Week in Television History: October 2016 PART III

As always, the further we go back in Hollywood history,
the more that fact and legend become intertwined.
It's hard to say where the truth really lies.

October 20, 1991

The movie "I Still Dream of Jeannie" aired.

The made-for-television comedy film produced by Columbia Pictures Television which premiered on NBC. It is the second and final reunion film based on the 1965–70 sitcom I Dream of Jeannie.

Barbara Eden and Bill Daily are the only two regular cast members of the original series to reprise their roles in this movie. Once again, Larry Hagman was unavailable to reprise his role of Tony Nelson, as he had just completed a 14½ season run on Dallas and was taking a vacation with his family. Although the character Tony Nelson is mentioned throughout the film, and briefly appears in the animated opening sequence, he remains unseen for the rest of the movie.

Ironically, one of his Dallas co-stars, Ken Kercheval, appears in the film. The irony is further emphasized by the fact that Hagman and Kercheval played enemies on Dallas and the character that Kercheval plays in I Still Dream of Jeannie is one that fills in the spot that would have gone to Hagman if he had been able to play Tony Nelson again for this film.

The film was directed by Joseph Scanlan and the teleplay was written by April Kelly.

CLICK HERE for a list of Stations

To quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Your Mental Sorbet: The United Monster Talent Agency

Here is another "Mental Sorbet"

A little spark of madness

that we could use to momentarily forget about those things that leave a bad taste in our mouths.

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Deborah Pearl and Chris Korman: Next on TVC

Writer/director Deborah Pearl and comedy scholar Chris Korman will join us on the next edition of TV CONFIDENTIAL, airing Oct. 14-17 at the following times and venues:

Share-a-Vision Radio
San Francisco Bay Area
Friday 10/14
7pm ET, 4pm PT
10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Listen Live button at KSAV.org
Use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in KSAV
Hear us on the KSAV channel on CX Radio Brazil
Hear us on your cell phone or landline number by dialing 712-432-4235

Indiana Talks
Marion, IN
Saturday 10/15
8pm ET, 5pm PT
Sunday 10/16
6pm ET, 3pm PT
Click on the player at IndianaTalks.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in Indiana Talks

KSCO-AM 1080
San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA
KOMY-AM 1340
La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA
Sunday 10/16
9am ET, 6am PT
Also streaming at KSCO.com

KHMB AM-1710
KHMV-LP 100.9 FM
Half Moon Bay, CA
Sunday 10/16
9pm PT
Monday 10/17
Midnight ET
Click on the Listen Live button at KHMBRadio.com

RadioSlot.com
San Francisco, CA
Monday 10/17
10pm ET, 7pm PT
with replays Tuesday thru Friday at 10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Talk Slot button at RadioSlot.com

PWRNetwork
Ann Arbor, MI
Various times throughout the week
on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork.com
and the PWR channel on TuneIn

Our first hour will include Part 2 of our conversation with writer/director Deborah Pearl. Once described as an “embarrassment of talents,” Deborah is also an accomplished singer, songwriter, and playwright whose credits writing for film and television include Head of the Class, 227 and Designing Women, while her CD Souvenir of You: New Lyrics to Benny Carter Classics pays tribute to the music of jazz legend Benny Carter while also featuring original lyrics written by Deborah herself.

Deborah Pearl is also the writer/director of Getting Ed Laid, the award-winning coming of “old age” story starring Ed Asner and Jean Smart that will be screened on Sunday, Oct. 23 at 1:30pm as part of the Washin... in the Washington, D.C. area. Both Ed and Deborah will appear at the screening and participate in a Q&A session afterward. For more information on the Oct. 23 event, as well as news on any future screenings, go to www.wwfilmfest.com, as well as GettingEdLaid.com or the Getting Ed Laid fan page on Facebook.

Our second hour will include a return appearance by Chris Korman, son of actor/comedian Harvey Korman (The Carol Burnett Show), and the stepson of character actor George DiCenzo (Dark Shadows, McClain’s Law, Vincent Bugliosi in the original Helter Skelter). Chris will talk about DiCenzo’s career in film, television and voice work, while also sharing some more stories about his father’s work with Danny Kaye and Carol Burnett.

Also this week: In light of the recent premiere of Crisis in Six Scenes, the much anticipated television series that Woody Allen made for Amazon Prime, Phil Gries will join us for a replay of our October 2011 tribute to the early television career of Allen. Phil’s personal and profession association with Allen dates back twenty years, as a result of Archival Television Audio. This week’s segment will focus on Allen’s various appearances on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.

TV CONFIDENTIAL: A radio talk show about television
Fri 7pm ET and PT on Share-a-Vision Radio, KSAV.org and CX Radio Brazil
Sat 8pm ET, 5pm PT and Sun 6pm ET, 3pm PT on Indiana Talks
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KSCO-AM 1080 (San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA)
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KOMY-AM 1340 (La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA)
Sun 9pm PT, Mon Mid ET on KHMB-AM and FM (Half Moon Bay, CA)
Mon 10pm ET, 7pm PT on The Radio Slot Network
Replays various times throughout the week on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork
Tape us now, listen to us later, using DAR.fm/tvconfidential
Also available as a podcast via iTunes, FeedBurner
and now on your mobile phone via Stitcher.com
Follow us online at www.tvconfidential.net
Follow us now on Twitter: Twitter.com/tvconfidential
Like our Fan Page at www.facebook.com/tvconfidential

If you listen to TV CONFIDENTIAL, and like what you’ve heard, please consider supporting our efforts by becoming a patron of our show through Patreon. It’s easy to do, it does not cost much, plus you can receive some cool rewards (such as coupons that will allow you to download up to six free programs every month from the TV CONFIDENTIAL Archives store). For more information, please visit www.Patreon.com/tvconfidential... and thanks!

This Week in Television History: October 2016 PART II

As always, the further we go back in Hollywood history,
the more that fact and legend become intertwined.
It's hard to say where the truth really lies.

October 11, 1971

Hugh Downs left the Today show and Concentration. He later became the host of ABC's 20/20.

October 15, 1951

TV's first long-running sitcom hit, I Love Lucy first aired.

Ball starred as a ditzy wife on the radio show My Favorite Husband from 1948 to 1951. CBS decided to launch the popular series on the relatively new medium of TV. Lucy insisted Desi be cast as her husband in the TV version, though the network executives said no one would believe the couple were married. Desi and Lucy performed before live audiences and filmed a pilot, convincing network executives that audiences responded well to their act, and CBS cast Desi for the show.

At the time, most television shows were broadcast live from New York City, and a low-quality 35mm or 16mm kinescope print was made of the show to broadcast it in other time zones. Because Ball was pregnant, she and Arnaz insisted on filming the show in Hollywood. The duo, along with co-creator Jess Oppenheimer, then decided to shoot the show on 35 mm film in front of a studio audience, with three cameras, a technique now standard for most present-day sitcoms. The result was a much sharper image than other shows of the time, and the audience reactions were far more authentic than the "canned laughter" used on most filmed sitcoms of the time. The technique was not completely new — another CBS comedy series, Amos 'n' Andy, which debuted four months earlier, was already being filmed at Hal Roach Studios with three 35mm cameras to save time and money. Hal Roach Studios was also used for filming at least two other TV comedies as early as 1950, both airing on ABC, namely Stu Erwin's The Trouble with Father, and the TV version of Beulah; the original 1949/50 Jackie Gleason TV version of The Life of Riley on NBC was also done on film, not live. There were also some dramatic TV shows pre-dating I Love Lucy which were also filmed, not live. But I Love Lucy was the first show to use this film technique in front of a studio audience.

Arnaz persuaded Karl Freund, an Academy Award -winning cinematographer of such films as Metropolis (1927), Dracula (1931), and The Good Earth (1937), as well as director of The Mummy (1932), to be the series' cinematographer.

Scenes were often performed in sequence, as a play would be, which was unusual for comedies at that time. Retakes were rare and dialogue mistakes were often played off for the sake of continuity.

I Love Lucy became one of the most popular TV situation comedies in history, ranking in the top three shows for six years and turning the couple's production company, Desilu, into a multimillion-dollar business. Ball became president of the company in 1960, after she and Desi divorced. She also starred in several other "Lucy" shows, including The Lucy Show, which debuted in 1962 and ran for six seasons, and Here's Lucy, in which she starred with her two children until the show was cancelled in 1974. A later show, Life with Lucy, featuring Lucy as a grandmother, was cancelled after only eight episodes. Ball worked little in the last years of her life. She died of congestive heart failure following open-heart surgery in 1989.

October 16, 1946

Suzanne Somers is born Suzanne Marie Mahoney.

Actress, author and businesswoman, best known for her roles on Three's Company and Step by Step. Somers later became the author of a series of best-selling self-help books, including Ageless: The Naked Truth About Bioidentical Hormones (2006), a book about bioidentical hormone replacement therapy. She has also released two autobiographies, four diet books, and a book of poetry entitled "Touch Me" (1980). She currently features items of her design on the Home Shopping Network. During the 1980s, Somers became a Las Vegas entertainer. She was the spokeswoman for the Thighmaster, a piece of exercise equipment that is squeezed between one's thighs. Thighmaster was one of the first products responsible for launching the infomercial concept. During this period of her career, she also performed for U.S. servicemen overseas. 

CLICK HERE for a list of Stations

To quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Your Mental Sorbet: Ursula voice Pat Carroll does The Haunted Mansion

Here is another "Mental Sorbet"

A little spark of madness

that we could use to momentarily forget about those things that leave a bad taste in our mouths.

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Two Eds and a Deb: Next on TVC

Emmy Award-winning actor Ed Asner and writer/director Deborah Pearl will join us on the next edition of TV CONFIDENTIAL, airing Oct. 7-10 at the following times and venues:

Share-a-Vision Radio
San Francisco Bay Area
Friday 10/7
7pm ET, 4pm PT
10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Listen Live button at KSAV.org
Use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in KSAV
Hear us on the KSAV channel on CX Radio Brazil
Hear us on your cell phone or landline number by dialing 712-432-4235

Indiana Talks
Marion, IN
Saturday 10/8
8pm ET, 5pm PT
Sunday 10/9
6pm ET, 3pm PT
Click on the player at IndianaTalks.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in Indiana Talks

KSCO-AM 1080
San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA
KOMY-AM 1340
La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA
Sunday 10/9
9am ET, 6am PT
Also streaming at KSCO.com

KHMB AM-1710
KHMV-LP 100.9 FM
Half Moon Bay, CA
Sunday 10/9
9pm PT
Monday 10/10
Midnight ET
Click on the Listen Live button at KHMBRadio.com

RadioSlot.com
San Francisco, CA
Monday 10/10
10pm ET, 7pm PT
with replays Tuesday thru Friday at 10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Talk Slot button at RadioSlot.com

PWRNetwork
Ann Arbor, MI
Various times throughout the week
on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork.com
and the PWR channel on TuneIn



An enduring presence in stage, film and television for more than sixty years, Ed Asner established himself as a solid, versatile performer in many top films and TV series throughout the 1960s before becoming a star in his own right in the 1970s, first on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, then on his own hour-long drama, Lou Grant. Ed not only won five Emmy Awards playing Lou Grant (three on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, two on Lou Grant), but is the only actor to have won an Emmy for the same role in both a comedy and a dramatic series. He also won two other Emmy Awards for his performances in Roots and Rich Man, Poor Man.


Ed co-stars with Jean Smart in Getting Ed Laid, a coming of “old age” story that reminds you that life can surprise you, no matter what your age. He’ll be also be bringing his critically acclaimed one-man show, A Man and His Prostate, to the New York stage in November. Ed Asner will join us in our second hour.

Our second hour will also include a return appearance by the writer and director of Getting Ed Laid, Deborah Pearl. Once described as an “embarrassment of talents,” Deborah is an accomplished singer, songwriter, and playwright whose credits writing for film and television include Head of the Class, 227 and Designing Women, plus the short film Waiting for Yvette with Wendie Malick and her own critically acclaimed one-woman show, Chick Singers. Deborah will take us behind the scenes of the making of Getting Ed Laid, plus we’ll ask her about her longtime friendships with Ed Asner and Jean Smart, and more.

For our listeners on the East Coast, Getting Ed Laid will be screened on Sunday, Oct. 23 at 1:30pm as part of the Washin... in the Washington, D.C. area. Both Ed Asner and Deborah Pearl will appear at the screening and participate in a Q&A session afterward. For more information on the Oct. 23 event, as well as news and updates on any future screenings, go to www.wwfilmfest.com, as well as GettingEdLaid.com or the Getting Ed Laid fan page on Facebook.

Our first hour will include This Week in History, a new DVD report, and a surprise segment.

TV CONFIDENTIAL: A radio talk show about television
Fri 7pm ET and PT on Share-a-Vision Radio, KSAV.org and CX Radio Brazil
Sat 8pm ET, 5pm PT and Sun 6pm ET, 3pm PT on Indiana Talks
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KSCO-AM 1080 (San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA)
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KOMY-AM 1340 (La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA)
Sun 9pm PT, Mon Mid ET on KHMB-AM and FM (Half Moon Bay, CA)
Mon 10pm ET, 7pm PT on The Radio Slot Network
Replays various times throughout the week on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork
Tape us now, listen to us later, using DAR.fm/tvconfidential
Also available as a podcast via iTunes, FeedBurner
and now on your mobile phone via Stitcher.com
Follow us online at www.tvconfidential.net
Follow us now on Twitter: Twitter.com/tvconfidential
Like our Fan Page at www.facebook.com/tvconfidential

If you listen to TV CONFIDENTIAL, and like what you’ve heard, please consider supporting our efforts by becoming a patron of our show through Patreon. It’s easy to do, it does not cost much, plus you can receive some cool rewards (such as coupons that will allow you to download up to six free programs every month from the TV CONFIDENTIAL Archives store). For more information, please visit www.Patreon.com/tvconfidential... and thanks!

This Week in Television History: October 2016 PART I

As always, the further we go back in Hollywood history,
the more that fact and legend become intertwined.
It's hard to say where the truth really lies.

October 3, 1951

CBS-TV aired the first coast-to-coast telecast of a prizefight. Dave Sands defeated Carl Olson at Soldier Field in Chicago.

 

October 3, 1961

The Dick Van Dyke Show preimeired on CBS. 

The Dick Van Dyke Show is an American television sitcom that initially aired on the Columbia Broadcasting System from October 3, 1961, until June 1, 1966. The show was created by Carl Reiner and starred Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore. It was produced by Reiner with Bill Persky and Sam Denoff. The music for the show's theme song was written by Earle Hagen. A three-camera/studio audience format was used during production.

The series won 15 Emmy Awards. In 2002, it was ranked #13 on TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time.

October 3, 1976

Quincy, M.E. (also called Quincy) first aired. 

The television series from Universal Studios  aired on NBC. It starsJack Klugman in the title role, a Los Angeles County medical examiner.

Inspired by the book Where Death Delights by Marshall Houts, a former FBI agent, the show also resembled the earlier Canadian television series Wojeck, broadcast by CBC Television. John Vernon, who played the Wojeck title role, later guest starred in the third-season episode “Requiem For The Living”. Quincy’s character is loosely modelled on Los Angeles’ “Coroner to the Stars” Thomas Noguchi.

October 4, 1976

Barbara Walters joined Harry Reasoner at the anchor desk of the "ABC Evening News" for the first time.

Harry Reasoner, formerly of CBS News and 60 Minutes, joined ABC News in 1970 to co-anchor the relaunchedABC Evening News with Smith, beginning that December, replacing Reynolds. In 1975, Howard K. Smith was moved to a commentator role, and Reasoner briefly assumed sole-anchor responsibilities until he was paired with Barbara Walters, who became the first female network anchor when she joined the program in 1976.Ratings for the nightly news broadcast declined shortly thereafter, possibly due in part to the lack of chemistry between Reasoner and Walters. Reasoner would eventually return to CBS and 60 Minutes, while Walters became a regular on the newsmagazine 20/20.

October 4, 1981

Bruce Jenner and Harry Belafonte debuted in their first dramatic roles in NBC-TV's Grambling's White Tiger (also released as White Tiger in Europe). 

The true story of Jim Gregory (played by Bruce Jenner) the first white quarterback at Grambling College, a historically black college in 1962. The movie covers Gregory's freshman year. Harry Belafonte stars as Coach Eddie Robinson and LeVar Burton (already famous from Roots and later to be known for Reading Rainbow and Star Trek: The Next Generation) appears as Charles 'Tank' Smith, the first friend Jim Gregory makes on the team. The film is directed by Georg Stanford Brown.

October 4, 1986

Two men mugged Dan Rather in New York City, NY. 

While walking along Park Avenue to his apartment in Manhattan, Rather was attacked and punched from behind by a man who demanded to know "Kenneth, what is the frequency?" while a second assailant chased and beat him. As the assailant pummeled and kicked Rather, he kept repeating the question. In describing the incident, Rather said, "I got mugged. Who understands these things? I didn't and I don't now. I didn't make a lot of it at the time and I don't now. I wish I knew who did it and why, but I have no idea." Until the crime was resolved years later, Rather's description of the bizarre crime led some to doubt the veracity of his account, although the doorman and building supervisor who rescued Rather fully confirmed his version of events.

The assault remained unsolved for some time, and was referenced multiple times in popular culture. The phrase "What's the frequency, Kenneth?" became a popular-culture reference over the years, such as in a scene in the graphic novel Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron by cartoonist Daniel Clowes. In 1994, the band R.E.M. released the song "What's the Frequency, Kenneth?" on their album Monster. Rather later sang with R.E.M. during a sound check prior to a gig at New York's Madison Square Garden, which was shown the following night on the Late Show with David Letterman before their performance of "Crush with Eyeliner".

In 1997, a TV critic writing in the New York Daily News solved the mystery, publishing a photo of the alleged assailant, William Tager, who received a 12 ¹⁄₂ to 25-year prison sentence for killing NBC stagehand Campbell Montgomery outside The Today Show studio in 1994. Rather confirmed the story: "There's no doubt in my mind that this is the person." New York District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau said, "William Tager's identity as the man who attacked Mr. Rather was established in the course of an investigation by my office." Tager claimed he thought television networks were beaming signals into his brain when he murdered the stagehand, Tager was trying to force his way into a CBS studio with a weapon, in order to find out the frequency the networks were using to attack him, so that he could block it. As to why he said "Kenneth", Tager was Jewish, and may have actually been using the Yiddish word "goniff", meaning "thief". Tager was paroled in October 2010 and is believed to be living in New York City.

October 5, 1951

The Honeymooners was introduced during Jackie Gleason's first variety series Cavalcade of Stars. 

It originally aired on the DuMont network's Cavalcade of Stars, Jackie Gleason's variety show and subsequently on the CBS network's The Jackie Gleason Show, which was filmed in front of a live audience. It debuted as a half-hour series on October 1, 1955. Although initially a ratings success—becoming the #2 show in the United States during its first season—it faced stiff competition from The Perry Como Show, and eventually dropped to #19, ending its production after only 39 episodes (now referred to as the "Classic 39"). The final episode ofThe Honeymooners aired on September 22, 1956. Creator/producer Jackie Gleason revived the series sporadically until 1978.The Honeymooners was one of the first U.S. television shows to portray working-class married couples in a gritty, non-idyllic manner (the show is set mostly in the Kramdens' kitchen, in a neglected Brooklyn apartment building). The program is also popular internationally, particularly in Canada, Poland and Scandinavian countries Norway and Sweden.

October 5, 1986

Business World began airing on ABC-TV.

An ABC News Sunday-morning review of economic and financial stories was the first regularly scheduled weekly business series on network TV.

October 9, 1986

Joan Rivers debuted her new The Late Show on the FOX network.

After a moderate start, ratings for the talk show soon sagged. The ratings struggles also made it hard for Fox to attract affiliates for its primetime launch on April 5, 1987. Some prospective affiliates, such as Milwaukee's WCGV-TV, would only sign with the network if they did not have to carry The Late Show. KPTMin Omaha refused outright out of loyalty to Carson, who hailed from Corning, Iowa, east of Omaha and started his career on local radio and television. The network acquiesced to allow some stations out of that obligation so that the network launched in primetime with as many affiliates as possible, at the cost of ratings and access to The Late Show. For instance, at the time the show launched Fox had not closed on its purchase of its Boston station, WXNE-TV (nowWFXT). That station's previous owners, the Christian Broadcasting Network, objected to the show's content and refused to clear it. As a result, until Fox took control of the station in January, its audio feed aired on a low-rated AM station.

The behind-the-scenes relations between Rivers and network executives quickly eroded, and Rivers was eventually fired in May 1987. For the final show, which aired May 15, 1987, the set was vandalized with toilet paper, slime, and shaving cream. Her guests were Howie Mandel, Pee-Wee Herman, then-fledgling comedian Chris Rock, Wendy O. Williams, and show stage manager Michelle Aller as her alter-ego Mavis Vegas Davis.^[3][4] Soon afterward the program was renamed The Late Show and featured rotating guest hosts including Suzanne Somers, Richard Belzer, and Robert Townsend. After firing prospective guest host Frank Zappa, producer John Scura replaced him with Arsenio Hall, who made his debut as a talk show host. Eventually, Hall was named the permanent replacement host in mid-1987.

CLICK HERE for a list of Stations

To quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa