Charles Collingwood interviews Chuck Connors.             

Charles Collingwood interviews Claire Trevor.             

July 14, 1961-September 22, 1961. 
Pilot TV shows for potential series. Eleven half-hour series. Benny Goodman, "The King of Swing," is seen with his band at a dance session taped at Disneyland. Joining in are the Yachtsmen vocal quartet and a Dixieland group and a swing quintet, made up of members of the band.    
On this broadcast, "Let's Dance," "Ridin' High," 'Stealin' Apples," "Roll 'em," "You Turned the Tables on Me," and "That's A-Plenty."                     

Talk show heard on WFMT-FM in Chicago.

Guest: James Baldwin            

Substitute host Fred Robbins chats with 20 year old Jim Mitchum, who also introduces his first recording "Lonely Birthday."             

September 26, 1960 - December 28, 1962

Helen O'Connell interviews Peter Lorre on location at his Beverly Hills home. Helen remarks that Peter's home reminds her of an old English pub. Peter remarks that he does not scare easily and does not go into such character unless being paid to do so. 

Topics discussed include why Lorre does not like to do interviews. He says "its against his grain." He remarks that his father was very strict and always told Peter it was not polite to talk about oneself. 

Peter remarks and shows off what he can do with his ears (wiggle them) and how it cost him two jobs in his young life...once working in bank and once on stage. 

Peter remembers running away from home to become an actor...first time on stage in Germany as an extra, inventing the word "Kreep," and why acting is no job for a grown up man. However, he does state that is is very proud of his profession which he cannot live without. 

Peter gives his opinion comparing the actor of decades ago with the contemporary actor of today and the studio's  approach of creating publicity for actors. 

A retrospect by Lorre when he first came to Hollywood and would never go to parties which he considers a bore. His friendship with Humphrey Bogart and the few friends he hangs out with today including Burl Ives and Joe E. Lewis. 

After a one minute interruption for n NBC Bulletin, Lorre tells Helen O'Connell how Sidney Bernstein introduced him to Alfred Hitchcock who would love to tell stories and Lorre would automatically laugh at then in the right places, putting him in contention to act in Hitchcock's first talking picture, The Man Who Knew Too Much and Lorre's first English movie success.   


NOTE:
There is a brief Pauline Fredericks NBC bulletin from the United Nations, related to conflict between Tunisia and France, interrupting the program for one minute.      

  Here's Hollywood (568 broadcasts) aired as a half-hour interview program, weekday afternoons on NBC at 4:30pm. On October 2, 1961 the show was reduced five minutes giving way to a live news broadcast with Sander Vanocur which aired at 4:55pm.

Here's Hollywood was the leading daytime show for two years. It was the first TV broadcast of its kind, using two mobile vans equipped with 2" video tape equipment which traveled to the homes of celebrities...two locations each day, one star in the morning and one in the afternoon. Most of the interviews aired were ten minutes in length. Two different interviews comprised the full length of the half hour program. Occasionally, one subject would be interviewed for the complete program. Occasionally programs were produced outside of the United States...Hawaii, Germany, France. Five color broadcasts were attempted and then the concept abandoned, due to the complexity of 2" quadruplex video tape at the time.

Dean Miller conducted interviews from September 26, 1960 to September 29, 1961. He was replaced by Jack Linkletter who conducted interviews from October 2, 1961 to December 28, 1962. Joanne Jordan conducted interviews from September 26, 1960 to June 9, 1961. She was replaced by Helen O'Connell who conducted interviews from June 13, 1961 to December 28, 1962.

Note: Only a handful of the 1,100 different interviews survive. Most were erased, discarded, misplaced. NBC Archives have only two surviving kinescopes, one with Joe E. Brown (12-2-61), and one with Linda Darnell (12-4-61). UCLA Film & TV Archive has 46 different subject interview kinescopes on separate negative film and separate optical film.

Archival Television Audio has 82 broadcasts on audio tape, originally recorded by Phil Gries at the time the broadcasts first aired. Most of them are complete interviews. These television Audio Air Checks represent the greatest number of known surviving HERE'S HOLLYWOOD broadcast episodes.
UCLA FILM & Television Archives retains, in their vaults, the greatest number of individual original HERE'S HOLLYWOOD separate 16mm Kinescopes and coinciding separate optical and magnetic sound tracks, representing approximately four dozen shows. Almost ALL of these broadcasts remain in analog form, and not view-able as composite video and audio.                  

Charles Collingwood interviews Kim Novak. Rebroadcast of October 6, 1960.

Many topics are explored including Kim's love of hats, the many projects she is currently enamored with including her paintings and construction of a fallout shelter which in her opinion is vital to create.

Kim Novak's long time childhood friend, Barbara Mellon, is introduced. She assists Kim with her many projects.

Other topics are discussed including Kim's opportunity, through her actor friend Cantinflas to actually fight a bull for real.

Kim's latest film Strangers in the Night is mentioned (a working title, "Strangers Underneath," is  mentioned), and more thoughts on her passion of painting and one she did of a painter painting Kim Novak herself entitled, "An artist painting Kim."


Miss Novak relates her father and his personality...love of sculpting frames...making a snowman with her nephews out of clay...priorities in life.

Kim states that she has little social life, reads four scripts a day...
personally a frustrated writer, and her best way of choosing a role is to see if she can add dimension to the character she is playing.

Kim agrees that her career has developed very rapidly, and it has been challenging to evolve into the celebrity she has become, for she is actually a very shy person.

           

Charles Collingwood Interviews Andy Williams. Rebroadcast of December 15, 1960.             

There is a wild and uninhibited night of comedy ad lib with guests Jonathan Winters, Cliff Arquette, Shelley Berman and Art Carney.

A re-run of an original broadcast May 15, 1961. 

An example of how expensive 2" Quad Video Tapes were saved briefly for one re-run and then eventually erased and re-used for other broadcasts.                                         

Special Report pilot Virgil "Gus" Grissom  on the "Liberty Bell 7" sub-orbital space flight.                          

SPECIAL REPORT of Highlights: Space flight by Virgil "Guss" Grissom.

Astronaut Gus Grissom becomes the second American to be launched into space.            

Astronaut Gus Grissom becomes the second American to be launched into space.        

Duplicate of 8506.     

July 29, 1957- March 30,1962. 

For four years and eight months Jack Paar reigned supreme as host of the Tonight Show with a crew of regulars, but only two stayed with him for the entire run; announcer Hugh Downs and band leader Jose Melies, a former army buddy. Familiar faces who appeared many times with Jack included Dody Goodman, Betty Johnson, Elsa Maxwell, Alexander King, Genevieve, Jack Douglas; and wife Reiko, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Hans Conried, Peggy Cass, Cliff (Charley Weaver) Arquette, and Johnathan Winters. Hugh Downs substituted for Jack Paar 79 times, more than any other substitute host there were 20 different performers over the period of the series run. Joey Bishop substituted for Paar 31 times. Arlene Francis, 30 times, Jonathan Winters, 26 times, Orson Bean, 21 times, and Johnny Carson 15 times. Altogether there were 243 broadcasts that had substitute hosts filling in for Paar during Jack Paar's TONIGHT SHOW tenure. The title of the late-night broadcast changed to THE JACK PAAR SHOW which took effect on February 3, 1958. The first videotaped broadcast aired on January 5, 1959. "Best of Paar " Re-runs began on July 10, 1959. The first color broadcast aired on September 19, 1960.  

Jonathan Winters is the guest host. Opening only.                                                                                                                                                                                                  

President John F. Kennedy addresses the nation regarding the Berlin crisis.                          

Helen O'Connell interviews Tony Young (only television interview in his career) now starring in a one-hour mid-season replacement Western series, GUNSLINGER.                                                             

Dean Miller interviews motion picture comedian Edward Everett Horton.            

October 1, 1952 - September 10, 1961 (NBC TV). January 21, 1971 - May 7, 1973 (Syndicated - 56 episodes).

Ralph Edward's surprises  Robert Stack. 
A video tape re-broadcast, televised originally
November 27, 1960. 

 Those who surprise Robert are his mother, brother, James, and wife, Rosemarie, children, Robert and Elizabeth Stack and producer Joe Pasternak who discovered Robert Stack, and director of Stack's favorite film, "The High and the Mighty," William Wellman. Mrs. Eliot Ness (Elisabeth Lee) is also on hand to compliment Stack on his true portrayal of her husband in the hit ABC TV series "The Untouchables," which premiered on ABC television as a two part pilot, April 20, and April 27, 1959.  

THIS IS YOUR LIFE was hosted by Ralph Edwards. It was a sentimental human interest show which he began on radio in 1948. Each week a special guest was lured to the studio by a ruse and then surprised as Edward's announced, "This is your Life!" Long lost friends and relatives materialized during the ensuing half hour to relive long-forgotten incidents going back to early childhood. The programs were broadcast LIVE and reverted to Video Tape at the start of the 1959-1960 season, at which time most of the telecasts were pre-recorded. 
Bob Warren announcer.
 The surprised guest received a 16mm film of the program and a Bell & Howell projector. 
                                                                                                   

Helen O'Connell interviews William Demarest, and his wife, Lucille Demarest.                                       

    Dean Miller interviews Gene Kelly on the set of "Gigot,"currently filming in Paris,  He is directing the film starring Jackie Gleason whom he praises.                    

Charles Collingwood interviews Jane Powell.             

Charles Collingwood interviews Connie Francis, who is joined by her mother.                         

Dean Miller interviews John Cassavetes.             

A wild "study in depth" of the vulnerable American Married Man.  

Dupe Of Number 114.                         

     September 26, 1960 - December 28, 1962 

Dean Miller interviews Buster Keaton in his home in Woodland Hills, California where he has lived the past almost six years with his wife Eleanor and dog Elmer. Keaton explains how Paramount bought this house when they made the Buster Keaton Story with Donald O'Connor in 1955. 

Buster describes his toy trains and other mechanical "toys" he has always had a fascination for. He describes to Dean Miller a modernized Chicken Coop he has made. Keaton's love for everything mechanical helped him master many of his stunts used in his films. 

Buster Keaton talks about his relationship with Ed Wynn and how they met in 1905 at the Temple theater in Detroit. He mentions that today's non-stunt-oriented comedy will return. "Comedy comes and goes in cycles."

Buster Keaton remembers when he began to be a member in his father's vaudeville act, his father throwing him around at every opportunity and how Buster would get even with his dad, having props fall on him. 
All physical comedy in those days and little related to sentimental. 

Keaton tell Miller how Harry Houdini tagged him with the name "Buster" after he fell down a flight of stairs. He shows Dean a picture of himself dating back to 1899 when he began performing. He states that he loved every day because every day was different.

Keaton describes how his mother would school teach him and his sisters. How he attended only one day of formal school in his life after he was kicked out for misbehaving. 

Concluding the interview Buster Keaton remembers coming to Hollywood in 1917 and the wildest stunt he ever performed. The plot required for Keaton to be depressed after losing his girl to Bull Montana. Buster then jumps from a high board on top of a swimming pool, only to miss the pool entirely. 

NOTE:

This rare ("lost") television audio air check was personally recorded off the air on Phil Gries' 1949 16"Andrea Television set when is was originally broadcast, August 10, 1961. The audio track was donated to the Museum of Television & Radio in 1996 (now known as The Paley Center for Media) just prior to the major retrospective the museum was offering to the public from September 6 thru December 8, 1996, entitled THE RETURN OF THE MAN IN THE PORKPIE HAT: BUSTER KEATON ON TELEVISION. 

Screened during this Buster Keaton retrospective were 42 individual clips that had been archived of Buster Keaton appearances on television, except for his HERE'S HOLLWOOD appearance which was not archived by NBC television. 

At the time, Phil Gries received the following letter dated September 19, 1996, from Allen Glover, curator and researcher at the museum. 

Dear Phil, 
Please find enclosed your audio air check of HERE'S HOLLYWOOD with Buster Keaton. We have made a digital master of the interview and it will now become part of the Museum's collection.
Without your lifelong dedication to the practice of recording and preserving television audio tracks, we would surely have lost a vital part of Buster Keaton's legacy. 

The Museum is indebted to collectors such as yourself and your work and devotion to broadcast history are greatly appreciated and admired." 



HISTORY OF HERE'S HOLLYWOOD television series, produced on 2" Quad Video tape broadcast daytime on NBC TV (1960-1962). 

Here's Hollywood (568 broadcasts) aired as a half-hour interview program, weekday afternoons on NBC at 4:30pm. On October 2, 1961, the show was reduced five minutes giving way to a live news broadcast with Sander Vanocur which aired at 4:55pm. 

Here's Hollywood was the leading daytime show for two years. It was the first TV broadcast of its kind, using two mobile vans equipped with 2" video tape equipment which traveled to the homes of celebrities...two locations each day, one star in the morning and one in the afternoon. Most of the interviews aired were ten minutes in length. Two different interviews comprised the full length of the half hour program. Occasionally, one subject would be interviewed for the complete program. Occasionally programs were produced outside of the United States...Hawaii, Germany, France. Five color broadcasts were attempted and then the concept abandoned, due to the complexity of 2" quadruplex video tape at the time.

Dean Miller conducted interviews from September 26, 1960, to September 29, 1961. He was replaced by Jack Linkletter who conducted interviews from October 2, 1961, to December 28, 1962. Joanne Jordan conducted interviews from September 26, 1960, to June 9, 1961. She was replaced by Helen O'Connell who conducted interviews from June 13, 1961, to December 28, 1962.

Note: Only a handful of the 1,100 different interviews survive. Most were erased, discarded, misplaced. NBC Archives have only two surviving kinescopes, one with Joe E. Brown (12-2-61), and one with Linda Darnell (12-4-61). UCLA Film & TV Archive has 46 different subject interview kinescopes on separate negative film and separate optical film. 

Archival Television Audio has 82 broadcasts on audio tape, originally recorded by Phil Gries at the time the broadcasts first aired. Most of them are complete interviews. These television Audio Air Checks represent the greatest number of known surviving HERE'S HOLLYWOOD broadcast episodes. 
UCLA FILM & Television Archives retains, in their vaults, the greatest number of individual original HERE'S HOLLYWOOD separate 16mm Kinescopes and coinciding separate optical and magnetic soundtracks, representing approximately four dozen shows. Almost ALL these broadcasts remain in analog form, separate negative picture and separate negative soundtrack,  and not view-able as composite video and audio. 
                                                                   

Helen O'Connell interviews Bob Denver and wife Maggie Ryan Denver.                           

Joined in Progress, Jack Paar reads amusing letters sent by our armed men in uniform to their mothers concerning army life. 

Guest singer Judy Lynn sings "Hey Look Me Over."

Jack Paar's guest Jack E. Leonard "spars" with Jack and his announcer, Ed Reimers, who is substituting for Hugh Downs tonight. Guest, Virginia Graham is heard briefly. 
Paar demonstrates the latest Golf machine on the market.              

Jack Paar's guest is Liberace. This program is joined in progress as Liberace plays the piano (Latin music melody) and discusses with Jack the origin of his candelabra. Other topics discussed include, remembrances by Liberace of his great welcome when he played the Palladium in England, his elaborate wardrobe and how it developed over the years from conservative to ornate, his vast real estate holdings, his generosity to others in his circle of friends and associates.        

October 1, 1952 - September 10, 1961 (NBC TV). January 21, 1971 - May 7, 1973 (Syndicated - 56 episodes)

Ralph Edwards surprises guest Debbie Reynolds. 
                                      

Charles Collingwood interviews Jim Backus who is joined by his wife Henny Backus.             

Guest is Al Kelly, king of the double talkers.             

      The premiere of OPEN END WITH DAVID SUSSKIND on WNEW TV, now reduced to a two hour weekly Sunday night broadcast time slot from the original open ended time concept as presented since 1958 on WNTA TV. 

On this Premiere show the discussion revolves around the RAT PACK, originally devised by Humphrey Bogart and now comprised of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Joey Bishop and Peter Lawford. 
On the panel discussing this topic with great candor are Jackie Gleason, Ernie Kovacs, Toots Shore, Joe E. Lewis, Marya Mannes, Dick Gehman and Lenore Lemmon, former girlfriend of George Reeves (Superman on TV) at the time of his death in 1959.

NOTE: This Archival TV Audio Air Check began recording when this program was in progress. It contains the entire first 62 minutes of the broadcast with the exception of the original introduction of guests by moderator David Susskind.   
 
HISTORY OF THE SERIES:
Originally scheduled to premiere on October 7, but delayed one week.
October 14, 1958 - August 13, 1961
OPEN END with David Susskind: (WNTA Channel 13 Television)

September 10, 1961-May 5, 1963
OPEN END with David Susskind (WNEW Channel 5 Television)

June 9, 1963 last show of the season broadcast on WPIX TV.

October 13, 1963-September 18, 1966
OPEN END with David Susskind (WPIX Channel 11 Television)

October 2, 1966-September, 1986
DAVID SUSSKIND SHOW (SYNDICATED, PBS, and COMMERCIAL STATIONS, including WNEW, New York). 

After an association of nearly three decades with Channel 5 in New York, the former WNEW-TV, later changed to WNYW-TV, David Susskind stopped producing the program in September 1986 because of its late-night time slot, from 1:30 to 3:30 A.M. Sunday nights. His audience like his iconic talk show dwindled not only in its following but in the ratings. Susskind knew when to quit. His last David Susskind Show aired only five months from the time of his death. 
            
Open End with David Susskind was a break through talk show which literally had no time limit. 

The premiere broadcast reviewed in Variety stated:
"In the blueprint stage, OPEN END was initiated on WNTA-TV on Tuesday October 14th the same night 'The World of Suzie Wong' premiered on Broadway. When the show is going slowly, then Susskind has the right to end it as soon as he likes; when it's going well , he can stretch it the night through since "OPEN END" is the last scheduled WNTA program of the night."

The show ended when host, moderator David Susskind, felt all conversation points were discussed. Some of these marathon telecasts lasted over four hours! Jean Kennedy was the producer during the 28 year run of the series.

The series premiered and aired on WNTA Channel 13 in New York for three years, an independent broadcast station, before it would become a Public Broadcast Station in 1962. A myriad of talk show guests, famous, infamous and unknown, found a forum on OPEN END. Subjects varied focusing on usually one topic...show business, politics, the economy, sex, education, crime, etc. Typically, many guests would discuss a subject sitting around a large table with David Susskind moderating, leading his guests with baited questions. On occasion a solo guest would highlight the show.

For the first three years, of its 28 year existence as a regular series, WNTA TV was home to OPEN END which originally began its broadcasts on Tuesday nights, switching on January 18, 1959 to Sunday nights...a future Sunday evening time slot of the week where it would remain until 1986, for the rest of its run.

After broadcasting with a two hour truncated format on WNEW form September 10, 1961 to May 5, 1963 a falling out and rift occurred between Susskind and WNEW management centered on WNEW's reluctance to air discussions regarding race relations in America. WPIX reacted with interest in bringing OPEN END to their flagship New York channel. For the last OPEN END show of the 1962-1963 season WPIX  TOOK LAST MINUTE EMERGENCY MEASURES TO CLEAR TWO HOURS ON SUNDAY NIGHT  June 9, 1963, featuring solo guest Dr. Martin Luther KIng, pre-empting regular scheduled programming (6:30-8:30 pm).

Open End was later cut by WPIX to one hour time slot. David Susskind not satisfied with the shortened format reconnected with WNEW where he returned to a two hour format with a changed  program name. 
THE DAVID SUSSKIND SHOW  had its return premiere on WNEW TV October 2, 1966. 
 
The David Susskind Show also found syndication across the country and each market would run the program at different times at their own discretion. 

Most all of the telecasts were recorded on video tape, 2" quadruplex. Most shows were kept for a year or two like THE MOVIE MAKERS broadcast which was re-run on August 6, 1961 almost a year after it was first telecast on October 2, 1960. By this time the show was no longer without a time limit. It ran for a finite three hours long. Thus the re-run of the MOVIE MAKERS had some footage deleted from its original run which aired for over three and half hours, including commercials. 

The re-run of "THE MOVIE MAKERS" was the next to last broadcast telecast on WNTA channel 13. On September 10, 1961 the show moved to WNEW Channel 5 METROMEDIA in New York.

Sadly, most all of OPEN END broadcasts (1958-1966), later re titled THE DAVID SUSSKIND SHOW (1966-1986), were wiped erased, destroyed, discarded...whereabouts unknown, representing most shows produced and telecast during the late 1950's, 1960's and early 1970's.   Only a handful of OPEN END / DAVID SUSSKIND  shows are known to survive from 1958 thru 1969. Hundreds of programs survive representing the middle 1970's thru 1986. 

                
Open End with David Susskind was a unique break through talk with no time limit, rare during any time in television broadcast history, and never to be replicated in the future of television broadcasting after 1960. 

On occasion only one guest would be profiled. Mostly shows were comprised of many individuals discussing one topic which  included race relations, the draft, organized crime, the Hollywood scene, the politics of the times, sex-change operations, divorce, clairvoyants, psychoanalysis, prostitution, etc.

Sadly, most all of OPEN END broadcasts, later re titled THE DAVID SUSSKIND SHOW, commencing with the Oct. 2, 1966 broadcast, were wiped (erased), destroyed, discarded...whereabouts unknown, representing most shows produced and telecast during the late 1950's, 1960's and early 1970's. Hundreds of broadcasts circa mid 1970's - 1986 have been archived and are extant.

David Susskind interviews Arthur Godfrey on the status of television. Godfrey comments on the present state of television and its future.  He believes that at one time he had 40% of the TV audience when he was number one. Importance of selling a sponsor.  Susskind believes that the public should be more pro active and demand what content they would prefer to view on TV.  
Arthur  Godfrey states how much he has enjoyed doing the show. It has given him time to think in a studio talk show atmosphere. 

NOTE: This March 15, 1959 show is the second oldest known program, surviving in any broadcast form, to be extant. 

The video tape of this original broadcast would be used again for a repeat TV broadcast on Sunday, September 20, 1959. Then it would be erased. 

The oldest surviving archived remnant is a December 23,1958 kinescope 20 minute segment of a broadcast titled "Method or Madness?" The topic, "method acting" with guests Michael Benthal, Ben Gazarra,  Adolph Green, Betty Comden, Lawrence Harvey, Jule Styne , and Patricia Neal                                                      

On August the Communist East  Berlin command closed the gates into West Berlin and built a 20 mile long wall just inside their borders preventing the escape of East Berliners. However, since that fateful day, freedom loving people have been escaping somehow across the barrier. 

From 11:30-12:27am the following video taped segment was broadcast on this evening's broadcast, hosted by in studio confident, Hugh Downs. 

From Radio Free Berlin Studios and from on site locations, Jack Paar and Peggy Cass broadcast "The Tonight Show," 110 miles from Communist occupied Germany. There are many interviews with soldiers and with the cooperation of the United States Army, Paar tours the many facilities and shares his wit and observations with his American audience. 

Also, included in this air check is a segment from the telecast broadcast the following night, September 13, 1961 on THE TONIGHT SHOW. Jack Paar still in Berlin discusses the aftermath of yesterday's show.  Hugh Downs, form the NBC New York Studios comments and appraises yesterday's broadcast and the controversy of its showing which caused ripples in the press and with Congress in Washington D.C.