TV Confidential with Ed Robertson

TVC 499.4: From June 2011: Tony, Donna, and Ed remember the finalization of Sonny & Cher’s divorce on June 27, 1975, and how the couple’s separation impacted not only The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour (CBS, 1971-1974), but their respective solo variety hours during the 1974-1975 television season. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 499.5: Part 4 of Ed’s four-part conversation with five-time Emmy Award-winning talk show host, comedian, critic at large, and documentary film maker John Barbour, creator, producer, principal writer, and one of the original co-hosts of Real People (NBC, 1979-1984). Topics this segment include what a valuable commodity Real People T-shirts were during the show’s original network run. John Barbour’s memoir, Your Mother’s Not a Virgin: The Bumpy Life and Times of the Canadian Dropout Who Changed the Face of American TV, is available wherever books are sold online, while select videos of John reading chapters from Your Mother’s Not a Virgin are available for free viewing on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. John’s film The American Media and the Second Assassination of John F. Kennedy is available at Amazon.com for $1.99 to watch and $4.99 to own. His documentaries The Garrison Tapes and Ernie Kovacs: Television’s Original Genius are both available for free on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 499.6: John Barbour provides Ed with the back story of his guest appearance opposite Tim Conway in the “Take My Life, Please” episode of the original CSI, and the events that led John to write and produce Ernie Kovacs: Television’s Original Genius, the 1982 Showtime documentary that is still considered the definitive look at Kovacs’ life and career. John Barbour’s memoir, Your Mother’s Not a Virgin: The Bumpy Life and Times of the Canadian Dropout Who Changed the Face of American TV, is available wherever books are sold online, while select videos of John reading chapters from Your Mother’s Not a Virgin are available for free viewing on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. John’s film The American Media and the Second Assassination of John F. Kennedy is available at Amazon.com for $1.99 to watch and $4.99 to own. His documentaries The Garrison Tapes and Ernie Kovacs: Television’s Original Genius are both available for free on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 499.8: From June 2011: Tony, Donna, and Ed remember the first TV commercial to be sanctioned by the FCC—a ten-second spot for Bulova watches (“America runs on Bulova time”), which NBC affiliate WNBT (now WNBC) aired on July 1, 1941 before the start of the broadcast of a Major League Baseball game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Philadelphia Phillies. The price of the ad was nine dollars—four dollars for the air time, five dollars for station charges, according to Advertising Age magazine.  Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From November 2015: Part 3 of our roundtable discussion with Anne Serling (As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling), Joseph Dougherty (Pretty Little Liars), Dan Farren (Story Salon), and Tony Figueroa about the legacy of Rod Serling and episodes of The Twilight Zone and Night Gallery that continue to resonate with us. Topics this segment include Anne's thoughts on what particularly makes a good Twilight Zone story. A poignant memoir of growing up with Rod Serling that also humanizes the man whom many of us think of as an icon, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling is also a book, as Joseph Dougherty put it, "for anyone who has ever had a dad." Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From November 2015: Part 2 of our roundtable discussion on the legacy of Rod Serling featuring Anne Serling, Rod's daughter, and the author of As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling. Topics this segment include the Night Gallery episode "They're Tearing Down Tim Riley's Bar" (one of the best scripts Serling ever wrote), and the sheer number of people who became writers because of Serling, despite Serling's fear that his body of work would not stand the test of time.  Joining Anne, Ed, and Tony Figueroa are Joseph Dougherty, Emmy Award-winning writer, producer, and director of such shows as thirtysomething and Pretty Little Liars, and Dan Farren, one of the producers of Story Salon. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TV Confidential commemorates the fortieth anniversary of the death of Rod Serling with a special multi-part minisode edition of our November 2015 conversation with Anne Serling, Rod's daughter. Anne joins Joseph Dougherty, Dan Farren, and Tony Figueroa for a special roundtable discussion of the legacy of Rod Serling, his impact on three generations of television writers, and episodes of Twilight Zone and Night Gallery that continue to stay with us. Anne’s book, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling, is a poignant memoir of growing up with Rod Serling that also humanizes the man whom many of us think of as an icon. Joseph Dougherty is the Emmy Award-winning writer, producer, and director of such shows as thirtysomething, Saving Grace, and Pretty Little Liars. (He is also one of the biggest Twilight Zone fans that we know.) Dan Farren is one of the producers of Story Salon. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From June 2011: Tony, Donna, and Ed discuss the premiere of the television adaptation of Amos 'n' Andy (CBS, 1951-1953) on June 28, 1951; the controversy that preceded and followed the series, as it aired during the era of segregation in the U.S. that led to the Civil Rights Movement; why CBS pulled the series from syndication in 1966; and how some of the stereotypes in casting the series—particularly, that Alvin Childress and Spencer Williams, the African-American actors who played the title roles, were instructed to pattern their voices and delivery after Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll, the two white actors who created Amos 'n' Andy for CBS and played the characters on radio—still exist in the industry today. Also discussed this segment: The TV version of Amos 'n' Andy was among the first shows to be filmed using a three-camera setup (implementing that technique four months before I Love Lucy did, when that show premiered in October 1951), while the writers of Amos 'n' Andy included Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher, the future creators of Leave It to Beaver and The Munsters.  Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 498.1: Ed welcomes four-time Emmy Award-winning talk show host, producer, author and entrepreneur Bill Boggs (Midday Live, My Generation, Bill Boggs Corner Table, Comedy Tonight, The Morton Downey Jr. Show). Bill’s latest book, The Adventures of Spike the Wonder Dog, is a comic novel loosely based on Bill’s TV career that also satirizes today’s media and political culture. With many of us still sheltered in place for the foreseeable future, and looking for ways to escaping the COVID-19 news cycle, The Adventures of Spike the Wonder Dog may provide some welcome laughs. Proceeds from the sales of Bill’s book will support animal rescue organizations. Topics this segment include a look at Bill’s early career as a comedy writer (during which time he met and managed the careers of Jay Tarses and Tom Patchett, two of the creative forces behind The Bob Newhart Show) and a important life lesson that Bill learned from his dad after a mishap involving a slice of blueberry pie. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 498.2: Four-time Emmy Award-winning talk show host and producer Bill Boggs (Midday Live, My Generation, Bill Boggs Corner Table) talks to Ed about his experiences working with such legends as Dick Clark, Frank Sinatra, and John “the voice of NFL Films” Facenda, and why a good talk show host also think like a producer. Bill’s latest book, The Adventures of Spike the Wonder Dog, is a comic novel loosely based on Bill’s TV career that also satirizes today’s media and political culture. Proceeds from the sales of Bill’s book will support animal rescue organizations. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 498.3: A brief segment about James Garner’s passion for golf that includes a clip from a conversation with Jon Winokur, co-author of The Garner Files (Garner’s memoir), that originally aired in November 2011. Bonhams Auction House will auction select personal items from James Garner, including a golf club once presented to Jim by President Bill Clinton, through Monday 6/29. Proceeds from sales will support the James Garner Animal Rescue Fund.  Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 498.4: Part 1 of a two-part segment in which Tony, Donna, and Ed remember actor, comedian, singer, and jazz trumpeter extraordinaire Jack Sheldon (The Merv Griffin Show), with a particular focus on his contributions to the iconic Saturday morning educational series Schoolhouse Rock. Sheldon wrote and performed seven tunes for Schoolhouse Rock, including “Conjunction Junction” and “I’m Just a Bill.” Part 2 airs at the end of our second hour. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 498.5: Part 3 of a conversation that began earlier this spring with John Barbour, the five-time Emmy Award-winning talk show host, comedian, critic at large, and documentary film maker who is also the creator, producer, principal writer, and one of the original co-hosts of Real People (NBC, 1979-1984). In this segment, John shares a few more stories about his show business career (including his years as Bobby Darin’s opening act in Las Vegas), plus we learn the connection between the title of John’s memoir, Your Mother’s Not a Virgin, and his relationship with Kevin Garrison, the former D.A. of New Orleans known for his investigations into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.  John Barbour’s memoir, Your Mother’s Not a Virgin: The Bumpy Life and Times of the Canadian Dropout Who Changed the Face of American TV, is available wherever books are sold online, while select videos of John reading chapters from Your Mother’s Not a Virgin are available for free viewing on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. John’s film The American Media and the Second Assassination of John F. Kennedy is available at Amazon.com for $1.99 to watch and $4.99 to own. His documentaries The Garrison Tapes and Ernie Kovacs: TV’s Original Genius are both available for free on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 498.6: John Barbour, creator, producer, principal writer, and one of the original co-hosts of Real People (NBC, 1979-1984), talks to Ed about the impact that Real People continues to have on our culture, including the role it played in establishing the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the platform of future America’s Most Wanted host John Walsh. John Barbour’s memoir, Your Mother’s Not a Virgin: The Bumpy Life and Times of the Canadian Dropout Who Changed the Face of American TV, is available wherever books are sold online, while select videos of John reading chapters from Your Mother’s Not a Virgin are available for free viewing on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. John’s film The American Media and the Second Assassination of John F. Kennedy is available at Amazon.com for $1.99 to watch and $4.99 to own. His documentaries The Garrison Tapes and Ernie Kovacs: TV’s Original Genius are both available for free on his YouTube channel and at JohnBarboursWorld.com. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 498.7: Part 2 of a special edition of This Week in TV History that remembers the contributions of Jack Sheldon to the iconic Saturday morning series Schoolhouse Rock. Sheldon wrote and performed seven songs for Schoolhouse Rock, including “The Tale of Mr. Morton,” “Energy Blues,” “Where the Money Goes,” and, of course, “Conjunction Junction” and “I’m Just a Bill.” Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast to handle advertising/sponsorship requests for the podcast edition of our program. They’re great to work with and will help you advertise on our show. Please email sales@advertisecast.com or click the link below to get started: https://www.advertisecast.com/TVConfidentialAradiotalkshowabout Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices