“Sunday Best” on Netflix Tells the Fascinating Story of Ed Sullivan

 

Recently I watched one of the best documentaries I have seen in years. I knew very little about Ed Sullivan and his show, since he went off the air 2 years after I was born. When I think of his show, I think of the iconic appearances by The Beatles in the 1960s and Elvis in the 1950s. I have seen clips of The Doors and The Rolling Stones appearing on his show as well. Censorship played a role on this show. Elvis was to be shot only from the waist up, due to his gyrating hips. The Doors were instructed to change the lyric “Girl we couldn’t get much higher” to “Girl, we couldn’t get much better.” Jim Morrison originally said he would do this, but on the show he sang the original lyric, which was viewed as a drug reference. The Doors were banned from doing the show again. The Rolling Stones were told not to sing “Let’s spend the night together” and change it to “Let’s spend some time together.” Mich Jagger gave in, but he rolled his eyes as he sang the sanitized lyrics.  For 23 years, from 1948 to 1971, The Ed Sullivan Show yielded high ratings for CBS, every Sunday night.

Sullivan was born in Harlem New York in 1901. At that point, the neighborhood was largely Jewish and Irish, with Sullivan being the latter. These groups faced discrimination, and Sullivan was one who wanted to stick up for the underdog during his lifetime.

He worked as a newspaper columnist and a radio host before getting into television. His delivery on television was awkward, but he gained a following as someone who provided a forum for all people via his variety show. Many comedians did impressions of his unique posture and peculiar way of talking, including John Byner, Rich Little, Johnny Carson and Joan Rivers.

Even when it was controversial in the 1950s, especially in the Southern states, Sullivan welcomed many black performers to his stage. Over the years, his show featured Bo Diddley, Fats Domino, Nat King Cole, Harry Belafonte, Pearl Bailey and Motown artists such as Stevie Wonder, The Jackson Five and The Supremes. Sullivan said he despised intolerance since as an Irish Catholic he had faced that in his life. So, Sullivan was an important figure in the civil rights movement.

Sullivan’s show went off the air in 1971 and he died in 1974. His venue was named the Ed Sullivan Theater and was the home of David Letterman and Stephen Colbert’s late-night programs.

 

 

 

 

Broadcast networks may cut back on programming

NBC has been struggling ratings-wise and they may make fewer hours of prime time available to their affiliates.

Jeff Zucker, president/CEO of NBC Universal, speaking at the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference, said it was a possibility that NBC might consider trimming prime-time hours--or even a whole night of programming.

"Can we continue to broadcast 22 hours in prime time? Three of our competitors don't," he said during Monday's keynote. "Can we continue to broadcast seven days a week? One of our competitors doesn't."

The competitors he is referring to are My Network, the CW and Fox. My Network does not broadcast on Sundays and all 3 of the aforementioned networks have 2 hours of prime instead of 3. On Sundays, the big 3 networks have 4 hours of primetime. I wonder if we may see a merger of networks in the future. Maybe NBC would merge with CBS, or ABC would merge with Fox? In these tough economic times, merging companies seems to be all the rage. Many cities that used to have 2 newspapers have merged so they have one. The UPN network and WB network merged to form the CW.

NBC has only one soap opera, and that genre has been losing viewers steadily. According to TV Guide, in the past 10 years, daytime soap ratings have fallen as much as 50% for some shows. The top rated soap is CBS' The Young and the Restless and in the past 10 years its ratings have fallen from 7.9 million viewers to 4.9 million. NBC's Days of Our Lives took a steep fall, going from 5.4 million to 2.6 million. Guiding Light on CBS has fallen from 4.5 million to 2.1 million viewers. Longtime soap stars like Susan Lucci and Anthony Geary have had to take pay cuts. NBC fired its most popular soap stars, Deidre Hall and Drake Hogestyn, and the remaining cast has to take a pay cut of 40%.