Art Linkletter, TV Legend and "Pied Piper to Kids" Has Died

Art Linkletter became a television icon in the 1950s, for his famed interactions interviewing children, and as the host of a string of successful series including Art Linkletter's House Party and People Are Funny. Linkletter has died at the age of 97.

Art Linkletter was interviewed by the Archive of American Television on September 15, 1997; his full interview can be viewed at emmytvlegends.org.

Interview Description:
Art Linkletter discusses his early years in radio and his business partnership with John Guedel which resulted in many popular programs including Groucho Marx's You Bet Your Life. He talks about his start, in 1950, in his first television series, Life with Linkletter. Linkletter then recounts some of his most memorable stories from the two television series he is most associated with, Art Linkletter's House Party and People Are Funny. For these series, he talks about the shows' universal appeal and his humorous interviews with over twenty-seven thousand children. He also discusses his notable appearance as host of the opening of Disneyland (Walt Disney was a family friend) on the live televised broadcast in July of 1955. The three-hour interview was conducted in Bel Air, California by Sam Denoff.

"The Adventures of Robin Hood" -- Classic 1950s TV, served Blacklisted Writers

With a new Robin Hood in theaters, the Archive has created a show page for the classic 1950s TV series The Adventures of Robin Hood. Produced in England, the series ran on CBS from 1955 to 1958 and starred Richard Greene in the title role. Harry and Wally's Favorite TV Shows describes the series as "a well-done staging of the familiar swashbuckling tale, with excellent performances from the central cast, an authentic setting, good guest stars, and reasonably clever plots [with] Richard Greene... an able champion of the people." Reviewing the series opener, Daily Variety raved: "the series... stacks up as one of the superior foreign TV pix imports.... producer Hannah Weinstein has given the vehicle fancy trappings production-wise [and] her choice of Greene for the lead was a good one."

What was not known at the time to American audiences was that producer Weinstein actively employed writers who had been blacklisted in the US. Among those writers was Archive interviewee and one of the famed "Hollywood Ten"— Ring Lardner Jr., who along with Ian McLellan Hunter, wrote under the pseudonym "Paul Symonds" for the series. When Lardner emerged from the blacklist, he was awarded the Academy Award for his screenplay of M*A*S*H (1970). Click here to watch The Adventures of Robin Hood (embedded from the Internet Archive) and watch Ring Lardner Jr. discussing how he and other blacklisted writers worked on the series.

"The Virginian" Season One on DVD

The Virginian was one of the last of the early classic adult TV westerns. Airing from 1962-71, the epic 90-minutes-per-episode color series starred James Drury as the mysterious defender of law and order. Although Variety's review of the series opener was unenthusiastic at best, particularly in regard to lead Drury ("If Drury didn't hurt, he certainly didn't help"), The Virginian became the third longest-running western series of all-time and peaked at #10 in the year-end Nielsen ratings in its 1966-67 season. Tomorrow, the "fully restored and digitally remastered" first season on The Virginian gets its DVD debut.


The premiere episode of The Virginian featured another iconic TV western star— The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp's Hugh O'Brian. O'Brian spoke about the fight scene he did with star James Drury in his Archive of American Television interview-- both the scene and O'Brian's interview are highlighted on the Archive's Virginian show page.

Bob Newhart Has a Dream: 20 Years Ago Today

Considered one of the finest moments in scripted TV history, Newhart ended its eight season run with a brilliant TV in-joke. TV Land to Go: The Big Book of TV Lists, TV Lore, and TV Bests by Tom Hill describes the episode as "a bizarre final chapter in the strange tale of Bob's life in Vermont, and an ending that immediately became a television legend."

The Archive of American Television celebrates the 20th anniversary of the Newhart finale two ways. Tune in tonight to the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric, which features a final segment with Bob Newhart himself (and a clip of our interview with Suzanne Pleshette) discussing the landmark show. Plus, see the Archive's new show page for Newhart: "The Last Newhart" featuring behind-the-scenes stories from Bob Newhart, Suzanne Pleshette, Tom Poston, and director Dick Martin.

"Law & Order" Ends its Long Run on May 24

NBC announced last week that Law & Order will end its 20-year run this season. Law & Order is the longest running crime drama on American prime time television and is tied with Gunsmoke for longest-running drama series. (Technically, Law & Order [Sept. 13, 1990 to May 24, 2010] outdistanced Gunsmoke [Sept 10, 1955 - March 31, 1975].)


Created by Dick Wolf, the series is known for its two-part narrative approach: in the first half-hour, the criminal investigation and in the second half-hour, the prosecution. Dick Wolf revealed why this approach was taken in his Archive of American Television Interview:

In 1990, there were virtually no hour shows in syndication. Syndication was sold in half hour blocks. There were comedies, comedies, more comedies. No hours. There was a decided interest on the part of Universal and me and everybody who was trying to make money in television to figure out a way to be able to split hour shows into half hours for syndication. Nobody had ever figured out, though, that since syndication was five days a week - if you started [splitting Law & Order episodes] on Monday, you'd have Monday, Tuesday; Wednesday, Thursday; Friday, Monday - you'd never have a week that worked. Luckily, we never had to go to that extreme. It never became an issue, the hour shows came back.... It was a decision that was pragmatic rather than creative, then it turned out to be a situation that was enormously creatively freeing.

Watch Dick Wolf's full Archive of American Television Interview to hear more about this landmark series that started a TV series franchise.

Don Knotts' Only Dramatic Role-- on '50s Soap Opera "Search for Tomorrow"

Don Knotts will forever be know as the comic sidekick "Barney Fife" on The Andy Griffith Show, as Mr. Furley on Three's Company, and as the star of a series of funny family friendly '60s films including The Incredible Mr. Limpet and The Ghost and Mr. Chicken. His first TV series role, however, may not be that familiar. From 1953-54 he played Wilbur Peterson on the soap opera Search for Tomorrow (which ran from 1951-84). His mostly-mute character has a rare few lines in an episode that is currently posted on the Internet Archive, with Wilbur in a dream-filled delirium.

This rare episode also features series star Mary Stuart, plus Coe Norton and Cliff Hall (unfortunately, Lee Grant who played Knotts' sister "Rose" on the soap doesn't make an appearance in this one). At the end is a commercial for Cheer with spokesperson Irene Manning (1912-2004), who appeared in Yankee Doodle Dandy with James Cagney.

Listen to Don Knotts talk about Search for Tomorrow and watch an episode in which he appears (SCROLL down to the "featured content") on his Archive of American Television interview page.


Don Knotts spoke about his stint on Search for Tomorrow in his Archive of American Television Interview:

"It was the only serious role I ever played professionally. I haven’t played on since. Wilbur was a very neurotic guy who wouldn’t talk to anybody. Very shy. He would only talk to his sister... we had an actor named Les Damon on the show, and I was sweeping up one day, had a broom and I was sweeping and he was ranting and raving about something and I wasn’t allowed to talk because I was supposed to be afraid, and suddenly he went off and I couldn’t help it. He looked at me and I’m like, I can’t help you. And he was totally gone. So I heard him say, 'What’s the line?' And I think the stage manager was terrified. He couldn’t imagine anybody asking for a line now on live TV. He sort of whispered and I knew he couldn’t hear him because I couldn’t hear him. Finally Les said, 'WHAT?' I thought, geez, are we on, or is this rehearsal?"

Betty White Triumphs on "SNL"

The reviews and ratings are golden for Betty White's turn as guest host on Saturday Night Live. With Betty's latest TV success, the Archive looks back on her Emmy-winning role as Sue Ann Nivens- the Happy Homemaker, on The Mary Tyler Moore Show.

Before her continued (and possibly greatest) fame as Rose Nylund on The Golden Girls, Betty White had a decades-long career that began in the early 1950s, with a high water mark as a semi-regular on The Mary Tyler Moore Show. When the producers of The Mary Tyler Moore Show sought to find a sickeningly sweet Betty White-type to play WJM's "Happy Homemaker," they cast the real McCoy. Sue Ann Nivens was introduced on the September 15, 1973 episode: "The Lars Affair," wherein she has an affair with Phyllis' (Cloris Leachman) husband. With White's great take on the Happy Homemaker, she soon became a fixture of the series. In reviewing this now-classic episode- the show's fourth season opener- Variety lauded Cloris Leachman's performance (she'd win the Emmy that year) and noted that Betty White satirized the TV homemaker "to a tee" furthering that this "preem's inventiveness indicates that the series is off and running for another successful year."

In ranking the top 100 sitcom episodes of all-time, TV Land To Go: The Big Book of TV Lists, TV Lore, and TV Bests by Tom Hill ranked "The Lars Affair" at #22; in 1997, TV Guide, in its ranking of the Greatest TV episodes, placed it at #27. Take a look at the Archive's new page on The Mary Tyler Moore Show: "The Lars Affair" to watch interview excerpts with Mary Tyler Moore and Betty White.

"Battlestar Galactica" Ended Its Run 30 Years Ago Today

Technically, the original Battlestar Galactica ended its run 31 years ago, when ABC pulled the plug on the show in 1979. But when the fans protested, a ten-episode version entitled Galactica 1980, resulted, with just Lorne Greene remaining from the original cast. However, for what would be the last series episode, Dirk Benedict (later "Face" on The A-Team) reprised his role as "Lt. Starbuck." This episode, airing on May 4, 1980, called "The Return of Starbuck" was the brainchild of series creator Glen A. Larson and featured Starbuck befriending one of the dreaded Cylons.

Larson spoke about this episode in his Archive of American Television Interview:

"I think one of the best episodes we made in all of them was the very last one, the ‘Starbuck’ episode. I said, 'I don’t care, we’re done anyway. So I’m going to do an episode I always wanted to do,' where Starbuck finds himself crashed on a planet with a Cylon and the two bond... They talked about doing that as a play on the West End in London. You know, sometimes you write one for yourself. If I could do it, I’d do a lot of them like this, this would be great. Didn’t require a lot of special effects and things. We had what we needed. And it was a great story."

Watch Galactica 1980: "The Return of Starbuck" (embedded from Hulu) on Glen A. Larson's Interview page, where in Chapter 3 he speaks extensively about this series.

Soap Star Helen Wagner, Matriarch of "As the World Turns," Dies at Age 91- Archive Interview Online

Helen Wagner, listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for her long-running performance as Nancy Hughes on As the World Turns since the show debuted in 1956, has died. She sadly misses the the series' final episode by just a few months-- its planned for a September 17th airdate. Her TV series career began with roles on several early-to-mid '50s shows, including soap The Guiding Light, sitcom The World of Mr. Sweeney, and soap Valiant Lady. Once she landed in Oakdale though, it became her mainstay for 54 years.

Helen Wagner was interviewed by the Archive of American Television on October 6, 2004, viewable in its entirety at emmytvlegends.org.

Interview description:
Helen Wagner was interviewed for nearly two hours in Mt. Kisco, NY. Wagner described breaking into acting on the New York stage and in experimental television. She talked about her appearance as a regular on the short-lived Charlie Ruggles sitcom The World of Mr. Sweeney. She then discussed the role for which she is most associated, that of “Nancy Hughes” on As the World Turns, a role she has played for nearly fifty years, the longest running character to date in the history of television. She described the production of As the World Turns including its transition from “live” to tape, story plot lines, and working with her longtime co-stars. She talked about various moments from the show from uttering the series very first line (“Good morning dear, what would you like for breakfast?”) to playing a scene “live” while unbeknownst to her CBS broke in to announce the shooting of President Kennedy. She talked about her continued work on the series and how the show has evolved over the years. The interview was conducted by Karen Herman on October 6, 2004.