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36-580: After an appearance on The Hollywood Palace in May 1964 drew a reported 53,000 letters, ABC decided to give the Kings their own hour-long special. The Family is King aired on August 29, 1964 to great ratings. More letters poured into ABC and the King Family was given their own hour-long weekly musical variety series (replacing The Outer Limits ), debuting on Saturday, January 23, 1965 (the King Family made

72-511: A disaster as most of the new equipment failed, making a shambles of the proceedings. The opening night served as an omen; Lewis remained unable to find his footing as a 2-hour live talk show host during the ensuing weeks. On November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas, Texas . Network news coverage of the assassination and the events that followed pre-empted all scheduled programing between

108-571: A few weeks of its release in 1965. During their 1964 appearance, the Rolling Stones were repeatedly ridiculed, before and after their performance of Muddy Waters ' " I Just Want To Make Love To You ", by Martin. At the time, they were relatively unknown in the U.S., and a second song recorded in the same session, Buddy Holly 's " Not Fade Away ", was not shown until the second episode of the second season, hosted by Ed Wynn , that aired on September 26, 1964. The February 25, 1967, edition featured

144-472: A lead-in of The Lawrence Welk Show at 8:30 pm, at 9:30, The Hollywood Palace enjoyed consistently respectable ratings, although it never made the top 30 programs. By the start of the 1969-1970 season (its seventh), the ratings had slipped, and ABC canceled the series in February 1970. Bing Crosby hosted the final episode, sans audience, which consisted of clips from previous shows. On December 16, 2004,

180-577: A midseason replacement for The Jerry Lewis Show , another variety show, which lasted only three months. It was staged in Hollywood at the former Hollywood Playhouse (where Lewis's series had originated, temporarily renamed "The Jerry Lewis Theater" from September through December 1963) on Vine Street, which was renamed the Hollywood Palace during its duration and subsequently renamed Avalon Hollywood . A little-known starlet, Raquel Welch ,

216-517: A substitute host of The Tonight Show for two weeks after Jack Paar quit the show and before Johnny Carson took over, in 1962. Lewis' stint was successful, garnering huge ratings for the time period and a bidding war between the networks for his services as a talk show host. ABC gave him everything he asked for, including two hours live every Saturday night. In 1963, the American Broadcasting Company (ABC), purchased

252-451: A television special titled Christmas at the Hollywood Palace was broadcast on PBS. It included performances by Crosby and 15 clips from past Christmas shows of the series. It also included interviews with Bing's wife Kathryn Crosby, Bing's children Harry and Mary Crosby, and Hollywood Palace producer Bill Harbach. The Hollywood Palace won one Emmy out of eight nominations, for James Trittipo for art direction in 1966. The same year, it

288-548: A third Hollywood Palace appearance a week before the debut of their own series in order to promote it). Bing Crosby introduced the premiere episode. The series was full of songs from Broadway, film, The Great American Songbook and contemporary pop hits of the day. The show starred the Grammy nominated vocal group The King Sisters (Yvonne, Alyce, Luise and Marilyn), along with their husbands, siblings, and children and The Alvino Rey Orchestra. In all, some thirty-nine members of

324-478: The 7:30 pm time slot was not successful either. Jeannie moved to Mondays and finished #26 in the Nielsen ratings , while Lewis lost his potential viewers to The Mod Squad on ABC. NBC cancelled the program, airing its last episode on May 27, 1969. Alan Thicke created his own late night talk show to compete against NBC's highly rated The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson . The series, entitled Thicke of

360-729: The American television debut of the Beatles ' music videos for " Penny Lane " and " Strawberry Fields Forever ", introduced by guest host Van Johnson . The show, as well as all the ABC's Talmadge Main Lot programming, was televised in black and white until September 1965, when color telecasts began. The facility was the first color studio renovated by ABC Television on the West Coast, converted during The Hollywood Palace's summer hiatus. Sharing

396-609: The Hollywood and Vine Street Theatre, also known as the El Capitan Theatre (not to be confused with the present-day El Capitan Theatre on Hollywood Blvd.). The theater had been used in previous years for broadcasting radio shows for the Mutual Broadcasting System and for NBC television shows. ABC decided to renovate the theater so to be used for several ABC television shows. The entire theater

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432-814: The King Family , and The New Sounds of the Fabulous King Sisters. After observing the successes of the King Family syndicated television specials, in March 1969, after the extremely controversial program Turn-On was cancelled after a single airing , ABC brought back a somewhat pared-down version of the King Family Show that focused on a sub-group of the family, the Four King Cousins (which consisted of family members Tina and sister Cathy Cole, and their cousins Candy Brand and Carolyn Cameron). This new color half-hour program occupied

468-604: The King family, ranging in age from seven months to 79 years, appeared on the show. Yvonne King's daughter Tina Cole , later featured on My Three Sons , also regularly appeared. At the beginning of the series, King Family patriarch William King Driggs appeared in every episode, but suffered a stroke on set and died a week later on April 6, 1965. The series crew consisted of director and choreographer Marc Breaux with choreographer Dee Dee Wood (known for Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music ) and costumer Bob Mackie . This series

504-559: The Knickerbocker Hotel's electric sign atop the rear building, behind the Palace Theater, was a unique advertisement shown in every parking lot act. Like The Ed Sullivan Show on CBS , all of the episodes of The Hollywood Palace (save its final episode in 1970) were taped before a live audience; a laugh and applause track was also used for "sweetening" purposes. During the 1967 season, studies were made to convert

540-572: The Night , was syndicated and only ran for one season before being crushed by Carson and cancelled in June 1984. Needing a replacement program, series distributor Metromedia gave Lewis an on-air tryout in Thicke's former slot. During the week of June 11, 1984, Lewis hosted The Jerry Lewis Show , with Charlie Callas as Lewis' announcer/sidekick. Metromedia decided not to go forward with the project after

576-604: The Tuesday 8:00 pm time slot. Lewis was given access to the Osmond Brothers , featured musicians on the recently ended The Andy Williams Show , as regular performers. The 60 minute program continuously lost viewers at the half-hour point to The Red Skelton Show , ranked #7 on CBS and #28 rated It Takes a Thief on ABC. The following September as the series entered its second season, NBC decided to switch time slots with I Dream of Jeannie which starred Eden, but

612-551: The Wednesday 8:30-9:00 timeslot until September of that year. 13 episodes were produced and aired from March 12 thru June 11, 1969 then the entire run of the series was repeated from June 18 until September 10, 1969. The King Family began producing their own syndicated holiday specials beginning with Thanksgiving with the King Family , which first aired on November 19, 1967. In all, the King Family produced 17 specials from 1964 to 1974: The King Family recorded albums that reflected

648-400: The afternoon of the 22nd and the late evening of the 25th. All series, specials and sporting events were delayed, put on hiatus or cancelled. Episodes of competing series on CBS , The New Phil Silvers Show and Gunsmoke were delayed until January and April 1964, respectively. The NBC Saturday Night Movie was also delayed until January 1964. The Jerry Lewis Show scheduled for the 23rd

684-500: The commercial break occurring far into the show's first 15-minute segment. A number of popular music performers got their start on the show; among them were The Rolling Stones , who made their first US television appearance on the June 6, 1964, episode, and The Jackson 5 , who made their first national television appearance on the October 18, 1969, episode. The folk-rock group We Five performed their hit " You Were on My Mind " within

720-552: The duo of " Martin and Lewis ", first formed in July 1946. In 1956, after 17 films, a radio series , 29 Colgate shows and many night club appearances, they parted ways bitterly. Both Martin and Lewis continued as successful, but separate superstars. Between 1957 and 1962, Lewis headlined several well received solo specials for the NBC and ABC networks. "The Jerry Lewis Show" was the comedian's first foray into weekly television. Lewis had been

756-407: The first season, with Mitchell Ayres and his Orchestra taking over until Ayres death in 1969. Joe Lipman served as the show's primary orchestrator and arranger (46 episodes). The off-screen announcer for each program was Dick Tufeld . Grey Lockwood served as director for the show's entire run. The opening set framing the host established a unique show opening with Jim Trittipo's stage set. After

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792-500: The hotel into a residential retirement facility. Moving the show to a Culver City soundstage was considered, but scuttled because of the expense. Vanoff later used this format concept for the 1980 NBC variety series The Big Show , using a soundstage on the Sunset Gower Studios lot, which included a three-ring stage, ice rink, swimming pool for aquatic staging, and an audience area. For most of its television run, with

828-436: The opening, the set transformed into a second set, with set pieces either splitting apart or turning around and additional flying set pieces dropping in or flying out on camera, as well as scenic theatrical magic act transforming before the camera while each new act was introduced. This novelty was established as The Hollywood Palace' s specialty. This opening transition broke the normal scheduled commercial time-slot breaks, with

864-443: The series aired on ABC from September 21, 1963 – December 21, 1963. A second series of the same name aired on NBC from September 12, 1967 – May 27, 1969. A final version also of the same name aired in first-run syndication for one week in June 1984. Before The Jerry Lewis Show premiered in 1963, Lewis made several films and television appearances, notably as host on The Colgate Comedy Hour , with vocalist Dean Martin as

900-454: The series premiere, ABC gave Lewis $ 4.5 million to renovate the stage even after the $ 400,000 renovation done to the whole theater just months before. That was also part of the contract used to get Lewis to do the show. The other, main part of the contract, had Lewis agree to film 40 episodes for the network in exchange for $ 8 million, making Lewis, at the time, the highest paid television actor in history. The first episode, broadcast live, became

936-528: The show was cancelled in January 1966. Season One consisted of 22 hour-long episodes from January to June 1965. Season Two consisted of 17 half-hour episodes from September 1965 to January 1966. During the run of the initial show in 1965, Warner Bros. Records released six albums, The King Family Show, The King Family Album, The King Family Live! In the Round, Christmas with the King Family, Sunday with

972-589: The show's many performers and hosts were Bing Crosby (who hosted the series' first and final episodes and had the most appearances as guest host: 31 in all, including his family on several of the annual Christmas shows), Dean Martin , Liberace , Frank Sinatra , Milton Berle , Sammy Davis Jr. , Sid Caesar , Peter Lawford , The Rolling Stones , Groucho Marx , Joan Crawford , Bette Davis , Tony Bennett , Judy Garland , Jimmy Durante , The Supremes , Ginger Rogers , The Temptations , Dusty Springfield , Phyllis Diller , and Elizabeth Montgomery . (Martin's hosting

1008-476: The songs presented in the shows. Some of the albums were balanced out with performers regularly associated with the television show. The Hollywood Palace The Hollywood Palace was an hourlong American television variety show broadcast Saturday nights (except September 1967 to January 1968, when it aired on Tuesday nights) on ABC from January 4, 1964, to February 7, 1970. Titled The Saturday Night Hollywood Palace for its first few weeks, it began as

1044-475: The stage, which would have a swimming pool beneath a sliding stage floor that would cover the pool, with a third ice rink floor that could slide atop the stage floor. Storing these sliding floors required owning the property behind the theater building. The Knickerbocker Hotel was directly behind the building, but ABC could not purchase the hotel property from the Methodist Church , which had converted

1080-823: The studio, scheduling Sunday through Wednesday, The Lawrence Welk Show was moved to Vine Street to broadcast in color at Welk's request, but the Welk Orchestra had to be reduced to fit on the stage. Given the orchestra plan, Welk drew a pencil line on the right side of the plan, announcing, "lose them!" The adjacent parking lot became an outdoor staging area for high-wire and trapeze performers, circus animal acts with elephants, lions, tigers, chimps, and performer acts that could not be booked on The Ed Sullivan Show . The producers could schedule Las Vegas and Reno casino performers, comedians, musicians, specialty acts by flying performers into Los Angeles via Burbank Airport for appearances on The Hollywood Palace . Exposure of

1116-495: Was Bob Mackie's first credit on his own. While the show was somewhat successful in its initial season, the network trimmed it to a half-hour on September 18, 1965 and the ratings declined—up against Jackie Gleason on CBS and I Dream of Jeannie on NBC —but the show did inspire an intensely loyal following. One letter to ABC enthused, "the King Family was beautiful, talented, and completely entertaining. We are buying [the sponsor's products] Wisk and Clairol tomorrow." Still,

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1152-461: Was a bit ironic, given that the slot had been vacated by his ex-partner Jerry Lewis . Martin alluded to this in the March 7, 1964, episode, thanking Lewis for "building me this theater". He enjoyed the gig enough to subsequently agree to star in his own variety series, The Dean Martin Show , which premiered on NBC in 1965 and ran for nine years.) Les Brown and his Orchestra served as house band for

1188-404: Was cast during the first season as the "Billboard Girl", who placed the names of the acts on a placard (similar to that of a vaudeville house). The show's musical theme was a fast-paced instrumental rendition of " Put On a Happy Face " from the 1960 Broadway musical Bye Bye Birdie . Unlike similar programs such as The Ed Sullivan Show , the series used a different host each week. Among

1224-595: Was nominated for a variety series, arranging ( Joe Lipman ), costume design (Ed Smith), and conducting (Mitchell Ayres). Ayres received another Emmy nomination for his work on the series in 1968, when two more nominations for the series went to Nick V. Giordano and Herb Weiss, both for individual achievement in electronic production. The Jerry Lewis Show The Jerry Lewis Show is the name of several separate but similar American variety , talk and comedy programs starring comedian Jerry Lewis that aired non-consecutively between 1963 and 1984. The original version of

1260-477: Was renovated at a cost of $ 400,000. The same year of the renovation, ABC decided to promote Elton Rule to head of the network. Rule had previously worked as general manager of programming for ABC's Los Angeles affiliate KABC . Rule and other executives at ABC hired comedian Jerry Lewis to do a show for the network and videotape it at the newly renovated theater. The first version of The Jerry Lewis Show premiered on Saturday September 21, 1963 on ABC. Before

1296-408: Was suspended and did not return until early December. Its final episode, the thirteenth of the promised forty, aired on December 21, 1963. Director and producer Bob Finkel decided to revise The Jerry Lewis Show nearly four years after the original ABC version ended its run. A revision of the series premiered on NBC on September 12, 1967, with guest Barbara Eden . NBC introduced the show in

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