Always, Always Read The Comments!
Oh. My. God.
Fake Steve Jobs does it again.
In the Comments to the above, there was this jewel:
I watched some old television shows ( Mike Wallace Interviews: http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/collections/film/hold… ) and was struck by how great the shows were – real questions asked of interesting people with few or no distractions (eg: no goddamn “ticker” or onscreen graphics). The contrast with current “interviews” is amazing, both in format and content matter.
Of course I went and clicked on that link.
And it’s like a Christmas morning for me!
Interviews with, among others: Gloria Swanson, Steve Allen, Frank Lloyd Wright, George Jessel, Margaret Sanger, Malcolm Muggeridge, Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Roosevelt, Bennett Cerf, Jean Seberg, Walter Reuther, Pearl Buck, Rudy Vallee, Oscar Hammerstein II, Tony Perkins, Peter Ustinov, Lillian Roth, Salvador Dali, Reinhold Niebuhr, Aldous Huxley, Erich Fromm, and Mortimer Adler!
But the one I’m now going away to watch right now is with writer Philip Wylie.
See you all later.
No clicky. Screensnap.
Mike Cane 2008 
April 23, 2008 at 11:03 am
OMG is right! Oh my god. This is a treasure trove, Mike, for many reasons. I’m watching Wallace’s interview with Pearl Buck, who at that time was already the Pulitzer and Nobel laureate, and can’t get over his pompous ass demeanor (not to mention his servile crooning over the cigarettes’ he advertises — oh boy…) What a jerk. I can’t wait to see whether he treats all his guests with such arrogance and not-so-subtle contempt, or he reserves them only for women (or, er, feminists). Very enlightening. (Tough now I have to get me some of that mental health advice to deal with the internal tension — nah, close frikkin’ rage, really ;) — caused by watching Wallace in action.)
April 23, 2008 at 11:07 am
Wallace made it known that he absolutely *hated* doing those cigarette ads. That’s what TV was like back then — and what the bastard Money Uber Alles crowd would have *return* — craven obedience to sponsors.
Wallace’s interview with Wylie wasn’t very intelligent. He didn’t listen to Wylie’s replies at least twice and barreled on with his next check-off item.
What’s sad about all this is that was some of the *best* interviewing on TV back then.
Today, with Barbara Walters, Oprah, et al, we’ve sunk even lower!