The death of comedy legend Bob Newhart July 18 had me scrambling for this “From the Vault” conversation with Bill Daily. This was recorded in May of 2014 with the interview arranged to cover the release of The Bob Newhart Show: The Complete Series in a DVD box set from Shout! Factory. I also interviewed
Swiping left or right had a whole other meaning back when Dr. Ruth Westheimer was in her TV prime. The peppery, diminutive sex therapist, who hosted radio and television sex talk shows throughout the ‘80s and into the ‘90s, passed away July 12 in Manhattan. She was 96. To call Westheimer a survivor is an
Harry Belafonte made a lasting impression a dozen years ago on a visit before Television Critics Association reporters. The activist/singer, one of the last Black Civil Rights icons of the 1960s, passed away Tuesday, April 25. He was 96. Back in July of 2011, he stood out as a towering figure from a golden age
I recently was invited to one of the tapings for Season Two of Canada’s Got Talent (returning Tuesday, March 21 on Citytv). When I took my seat inside the large auditorium at Fallsview Casino in Niagara Falls, Ont., Howie Mandel was just making his way to the judges desk. A row or two over, a
Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV+, Paramount+ … so much streaming, so little money. You can spend a tidy sum on streaming services, to be sure. But you can also subscribe to streaming services that won’t cost you anything other than lots and lots of your time. They are the free streaming services, and in terms
Early on in this week’s brioux.tv: the podcast episode with Dave Thomas the St. Catherines, Ont., native talks about his brief career in advertising. One of the things he learned in that business that helped his comedy career, he says, is the importance of brevity or “seconds.” So let me get straight to the point:
Christmas came early for me this year as I got to talk to Dick Cavett about Groucho Marx. The occasion was the American Masters‘ special “Groucho & Cavett,” premiering December 27 on PBS. Dubbed, “the thinking man’s talk show host,” Cavett emerged as a clear alternative to Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show while on ABC from 1969 through 1975.
Bill Maher once said that, “Everybody who ever has done a talk show should pay a royalty to Steve Allen.” Allen would probably have agreed. He was the first host of NBC’s Tonight Show, starting with a local New York version in 1953 and then launching the series nationally in September of 1954. David Letterman,