TV Confidential with Ed Robertson

TVC 682.1: Ed welcomes Elva Green, author of The Jeffersons: A fresh look back at The Jeffersons (CBS, 1975-1985), Norman Lear’s longest-running sitcom, starring Isabel Sanford, Sherman Hemsley, an Marla Gibbs, and Eddie Green: The Rise of an Early 1900s Black American Entertainment Pioneer. Chuck Harter co-hosts. Topics this segment include how, while The Jeffersons was an immediate hit among viewers, reviews of the show during its first few years on the air were split—both among white critics and black critics—over whether the show was funny or not.

TVC 682.2: Elva Green, author of The Jeffersons: A fresh look back, talks to Ed and guest co-host Chuck Harter about such notable episodes of The Jeffersons as “George’s First Dollar” and “And The Doorknobs Shone Like Diamonds,” plus she gives a preview of her upcoming book on Good Times. The Jeffersons: A fresh look back is available through Bear Manor Media.

TVC 682.3: Ed and guest co-host Chuck Harter welcome award-winning producer, director, writer, journalist, and author Burt Kearns. Burt’s latest book, SHEMP! The Biography of The Three Stooges’ Shemp Howard: The Face of Film Comedy, not only takes a deep dive into the life and career of Shemp Howard—one of the original members of The Three Stooges and, in real life, the older brother of Moe Howard and Curly Howard—but debunks many myths both about Shemp’s career before and during The Three Stooges and about Shemp’s personal life, including some myths that were perpetuated by either Moe Howard or members of Moe’s family. SHEMP! is available through Applause Books.

TVC 682.5: Burt Kearns, author of SHEMP! The Biography of The Three Stooges’ Shemp Howard: The Face of Film Comedy, talks to Ed and guest co-host Chuck Harter about how the repeated blows to the head that Shemp Howard, Curly Howard, and Larry Fine all took during the many live appearances that The Three Stooges made every year during their annual hiatus from Columbia Pictures resulted in cerebral hemorrhages that proved to be fatal for all three actors. SHEMP! is available through Applause Books.

We'll be back with a brand new edition of TV Confidential later this week. In the meantime, please enjoy this clip from March 2012 in which Tony, Donna and Ed remember “A House Divided,” the famous episode of Dallas that launched the “Who Shot J.R.?” phenomenon of 1980. “A House Divided” originally aired Mar. 21, 1980.

We'll be back with a brand new edition of TV Confidential later this week. In the meantime, please enjoy this clip from March 2013 in which Tony, Donna, and Ed remember the first nationally televised broadcast of the Academy Awards ceremony, which took place on Mar. 19, 1953 during This Week in TV History.

TVC 681.1: Music journalist A. Scott Galloway joins Ed as TV Confidential remembers the life and legacy of Grammy Award-winning recording artist Roberta Flack. Scott interviewed Flack in 1988 for her comeback album, Oasis, plus he wrote a very eloquent essay on his Facebook page that captures why the news of her death struck a chord with music lovers around the world, particularly those of us who grew up listening to her songs playing on the radio throughout the 1970s. Roberta Flack passed away Monday, Feb. 24 at the age of eighty-eight. Topics this segment include how Flack was a “full, 360-degree” artist; her tireless activism on behalf of gay rights, women’s rights, people’s rights, and liberty as an American human being; how Clint Eastwood changed the trajectory of Flack’s life and career by integrating “First Time Ever I Saw Face” in the pivotal love sequence between Eastwood and Donna Mills in Play Misty for Me; and how the success of Oasis was a “buoyant, wonderful surprise.”

TVC 681.2: From October 2010: Charles Fox, the Grammy Award-winning and Emmy Award-winning composer who co-wrote “Killing Me Softly with His Song” along with Norman Gimbel, talks to Ed about the phone call he received from Roberta Flack in 1972, asking if she could perform “Killing Me Softly,” and how that call changed Charles’ life. Nearly forty years later, Flack wrote the foreword to Charles’ memoir, Killing Me Softly: My Life in Music (Scarecrow Press, 2010). Roberta Flack passed away Monday, Feb. 24 at the age of eighty-eight.

TVC 681.2a: From January 2012: Television writer/producer Larry Brody takes Ed and his listeners behind the scenes of Police Story (NBC, 1973-1979), the Emmy Award-winning police anthology series created by Joseph Wambaugh and executive produced by David Gerber. Larry received one of his first breaks in television working with Gerber. Topics this segment include Gerber’s peculiar mandate that discouraged writers on his shows from ever allowing characters to show any positive emotion. Joseph Wambaugh passed away Friday, Feb. 28 at the age of eighty-eight. Also in this segment: A remembrance of Gene Hackman, the Academy Award-winning actor who was found dead in his home in Santa Fe, New Mexico, along with his wife Betsy Arakawa, on Wednesday, Feb. 26.

TVC 681.3: Ed welcomes back singer/actress Linda Purl (Happy Days, Matlock, The Office). Linda is about to star in Crazy Mama, a riveting one-woman play that not only sheds light on the issue of mental illness with Southern-style humor and directness, but will feature Linda playing sixteen different characters. Ed asks Linda what first attracted her to the play and how she approaches to taking on the various personalities she must assume over the course of the story, plus Linda shares a few memories about working with Garry Marshall, including the many ways that Marshall kept the cast of Happy Days grounded despite the show’s enormous success. Written by Sharon Scott Williams and directed by Linda's fellow Happy Days alumnus Anson Williams, Crazy Mama makes its world premiere at the Rubicon Theatre in Ventura, California on Wednesday, Mar. 26 through Sunday, Apr. 6. For tickets and more information, call (805) 667-2900 or go to RubiconTheatre.org. Linda Purl will also perform at the Catalina Jazz Club in Hollywood, California for one night only, Sunday, Mar. 16, beginning at 7:30pm. Click here for tickets and more information.

TVC 681.4: Part 2 of a conversation that began last week with Anne Serling and Jodi Serling, the daughters of Rod Serling, and Marc Scott Zicree, longtime television writer/producer and the author of The Twilight Zone Companion. Dec. 25, 2024 marked the 100 anniversary of the birth of Rod Serling, while the 2024-2025 television season marks the 65th anniversary of the premiere of The Twilight Zone on CBS. In this segment, Anne and Jodi share a few examples of the “many moments of helpless hilarity” that they often experienced while growing up with their dad; Marc talks about how Serling, like many good writers, “listened more than he talked”; while Anne and Jodi both discuss Serling’s experience as a teacher at Ithaca College in New York, and how he often learned more from his students that they did from him. Both The Twilight Zone Companion and Anne’s book, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling, are available wherever books are sold.

TVC 681.5: Anne Serling and Jodi Serling, the daughters of Rod Serling, and Marc Scott Zicree, author of The Twilight Zone Companion, share some final thoughts with Ed about the legacy of Rod Serling, including how Serling never “saw the signpost up ahead” with regard to the tremendous impact that his writing continues to have. Both The Twilight Zone Companion and Anne’s book, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling, are available wherever books are sold.

TVC 680.3: Part 2 of a conversation that began last week with Harrison Page, the actor known around the world as Joshua in Lionheart, Captain Trunk on Sledge Hammer!, CPO Robinson on CPO Sharkey, and Niles in Russ Meyer’s Vixen! Topics this segment include how Harrison approached playing Niles when he first read the script for Vixen; why it’s important for every actor to know the difference between listening and hearing every time they take the stage or work; and the success of Vixen at the box office led Meyer to cast Harrison in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, after he had sent Harrison the script for Beyond in advance and asked for his input.

TVC 680.4: Harrison Page talks to Ed about how the success of Vixen led Michael Landon to cast him in “The Wish,” an episode of Bonanza written and directed by Landon that not only aired in 1969, but also marked Harrison’s first network appearance; how, upon completing production of “The Wish,” Landon made a phone call that resulted in Harrison being cast in “Tooth of the Serpent,” an episode of Mannix that also aired in 1969; and how Peter Falk immediately made Harrison feel at ease by paying homage to the character Harrison played in Lionheart on the first day of the shoot for Columbo: Undercover. Harrison Page will be seen opposite Jonathan Majors in Magazine Dreams, the story of a man who looks after his ailing grandfather while trying to succeed in the world of professional bodybuilding. Magazine Dreams is scheduled for release in theaters on Friday, Mar. 21.

TVC 680.5: Ed welcomes Anne Serling and Jodi Serling, the daughters of Rod Serling, and Marc Scott Zicree, longtime television writer/producer and the author of The Twilight Zone Companion, for a celebration of both the 100 anniversary of the birth of Rod Serling and the 65th anniversary of the premiere of The Twilight Zone on CBS television. Anne’s book, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling, is an intimate portrait of the Emmy Award-winning writer/producer that is also a moving testament to the love between fathers and daughters, while The Twilight Zone Companion (now in its third edition) not only has influenced such TV show runners and filmmakers as J.J. Abrams, Vince Gilligan, Brannon Braga, Matthew Weiner, and Ron Moore, but created the genre of books that capture the history of popular television series. Topics this segment include how Serling never let his tremendous notoriety go to his head because he kept himself grounded (and his family kept him grounded).

TVC 680.6: Anne Serling and Jodi Serling, the daughters of Rod Serling, and Marc Scott Zicree, author of The Twilight Zone Companion, talk to Ed about how Rod Serling was not only the first modern-day show runner, in that he was a writer who also served as his own producer, but also the “Leonardo da Vinci of television,” in that he represented the pinnacle of what the medium can do. Other topics this segment include thoughts on such notable Twilight Zone episodes as “Eye of the Beholder,” “Walking Distance,” and “On Thursday We Leave for Home.” Both The Twilight Zone Companion and Anne’s book, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling, are available wherever books are sold.

We'll be back with a brand new edition of TV Confidential later this week. In the meantime, please enjoy this clip from February 2020 in which Tony and Ed remember Pink Lady and Jeff (NBC, 1980), the short-lived and, in many respects, infamous variety series produced by Sid & Marty Krofft, which premiered on Mar. 1, 1980 during This Week in TV History. Tony’s coverage includes first-hand knowledge: He was in the studio audience at NBC/Burbank on the night that the first episode of Pink Lady was taped in December 1979.

We'll be back with a brand new edition of TV Confidential later this week. In the meantime, please enjoy this clip from February 2015 in which Tony, Donna, and Ed remember some of the early TV roles of Howard Hessman, before he became known as Dr. Johnny Fever on WKRP in Cincinnati, as part of This Week in TV History. Howard Hesseman was born on this day in 1940.

TVC 679.1: TV Confidential remembers actor, author, playwright, and decorated U.S. Army veteran James McEachin (Tenafly, Matlock, The Perry Mason Mysteries, Play Misty for Me, The Heroin Factor, Farewell to the Mockingbirds, The Alpha Caper, Above the Call: Beyond the Duty, Reveille, Swing Low, My Sweet Chariot: The Ballad of Jimmy Mack) by bringing you an encore presentation of a conversation with James that originally aired in February 2013. James McEachin passed away on Jan. 11, 2025 at the age of ninety-four. At the time we spoke with James in February 2013, he had just released the audiobook edition of Tell Me a Tale: A Novel of the Old South that delves into the many issues of slavery during the Civil War era while also offering a better understanding of the white man’s view of the times. James’ reading of the Tell Me a Tale audiobook ”is so good,” said Peter Bart of Daily Variety, “it would make Morgan Freeman a fan.” Topics this segment how James originally wrote Tell Me a Tale in 1965, and how the novel generated interest from both Henry Fonda and Hal Holbrook. TV Confidential spoke to James McEachin a second time in November 2014. That conversation is available for listening on demand for free by clicking here.