In 1935, a young actor, screenwriter, and dancer had an idea.
He started a weekly amateur night competition at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, in New York City. And before long, Ralph Cooper and his amateur night at the Apollo became a major influence in Black Entertainment.
Over the next five decades, Cooper’s amateur night made hundreds of previously unknown performers into Stars.
I met Ralph Cooper in 1991, when he wrote A Memoir of his many years at the Apollo.
Remember those ads in the back of magazines and comic books back in the day, promising to show you how to do tricks that will Amaze your family and friends?
Well, fast forward to the 1990s, when magicians Penn & Teller start revealing a few of the old magician’s tricks. And then, in 1992, they actually wrote a book of their own, called Penn & teller’s how to play with your food.
And that’s when I had the chance to meet the talking half of the duo, Penn Jillette.
And something happened during this interview that has never happened before, and has never happened since. Was it something Penn Jillette put together, as a practical joke?
So here now, from 1992, Penn Jillette
Penn Jillette is 66 now. Penn and Teller remain one of the most popular acts in Las Vegas.
If you were a regular viewer of NBC’s popular soap opera Days of Our Lives in the 1970s and 80s, you know instantly who I’m talking about when I simply say Doug and Julie.
Actress Susan Seaforth joined the cast in 1968, followed by Bill Hayes two years later. And 4 years after that, their on-screen romance turned into reality, when they married in real life.
And while Bill and Susan Hayes have lived happily ever after, unfortunately the same was not true for Doug and Julie. Oh yes, they suffered the usual soap opera tribulations, but then in the mid-1980s, MBC decided to take it soap operas – including Days of Our Lives – in a new, much younger Direction.
Doug and Julie – I mean, Bill and Susan Hayes – were fired.
I met them in 2006, when they wrote a dual autobiography called like Sands Through The Hourglass.
So here now, from 2006, Bill and Susan Hayes.
Bill Hayes is 96 now. Susan Seaforth Hayes is 78. And both still appear from time to time on Days of Our Lives.
One of the most bankable female movie stars of the last 50 years is also one of the most influential figures in Hollywood.
And she got her big break when she was barely old enough to have a legal drink, 1 quickly becoming one of the most popular stars of the Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In show.
It seems like everything she has touched has turned to Gold – or, should we say, Goldie. By age 25 she already had an Academy Award, for her role in “Cactus Flower.”
Then came a long and reliable series of hit movies.
In 2005, Goldie Hawn took some time out from her acting to right a book about her life, although she’s careful not to call it an autobiography.
Unfortunately, the day I was to interview were in studio, traffic in our area was horrible. She and her media escort realize she was not going to make it to my studio in time, so we found it in.
Ginger Rogers is one of those Hollywood figures who transcended mere stardom, and became a cultural icon.
In the 1930s she and her dance partner Fred Astaire dominated American film.
Her talent was apparent early on. At age 14, she wanted Charleston dance contest.
And before long she was in vaudeville, then Broadway, and finally the movies.
And then RKO Pictures paired her with Fred Astaire, and the rest, as they say, is history.
And it was famously said of her that she could do everything Fred Astaire could do, but backwards and in high heels. You’ll hear more about that in this interview…
Finally, in 1991 at age 80 Ginger Rogers wrote her autobiography. And that’s when I met her.
Wheelchair-bound, and looking a bit frail, Rogers nevertheless melted my heart.
So here now, from 1991, Ginger Rogers.
Ginger Rogers died in 1995, at the age of 84. But had she lived, she would have marked her 110th birthday today, July 16th.
His first big break in the movies came with a film called The Heartbreak Kid.
But that was just the beginning for Charles Grodin.
Then came Midnight Run. Seems Like Old Times. The Lonely Guy. And, finally, a new generation discovered him in the Beethoven movies.
It looks like the classic success story. But in his 1989 book called It Would Be So Nice if You Weren’t Here, Grodin wanted to reveal how about 1% success overshadowed the 99% rejection actors suffer.
This interview was actually the first of several I had over the years with Charles Grodin, before he went on to become a successful late night TV talk show host.
He was one of the hottest young movie stars in the 1950s…
Tab Hunter — who grew up as Artt Gelien — was a figure skater as a teenager. As a young man, a friend introduced him to a Hollywood agent who specialized in beefcake actors like Rock Hudson and Rober/ Wagner. That agent dubbed Art Gelien “Tab Hunter” and by 1950 he was in the movies.
And by the mid 1950s was major star, the strapping blond hunk of a man every girl wanted. Hunter made over 40 movies, and even recorded a hit song.
Hunger was also a witness to, and a participant in, the end of the Hollywood studio contract era. His movie and TV roles were fewer, until his last film role in 1992.
Then, in 2005, Tab Hunter wrote a memoir called Tab Hunter Confidential. In that book, he acknowledged publicly, for the first time, that he was gay. Turns out those gossip rags back in the day that had him romantically linked with various starlets were all fiction.
So here now, from 2005, Tab Hunter…
Tab Hunter died in 2018, just three days befopre his 87th birthdayl.
Robert Osbourne Denver graduated from college with a degree in political science, then caoched physical education and even taught math and history at a California elementary school.
But today, this well-educated, smart, soft-spoken man is best remembered for this…
Gilligan’s Island only lasted three seasons in the mid-1960s, but thanks to reruns and syndication the show has effectively never been off the air since.
And, like so many other popular TV actors, Bob Denver found himself typecast.
So, like many of his peers, Denver stopped resisting the Typecast and embraced it, appearing in several made-for-tv Gilligan’s Island movies, as well as other walk-on roles in which he played Gilligan.
In 1993, Denver wrote a book called “Gilligan, Maynard, and Me,” a reference to the other popular TV series he co-starred in, The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis.
The day I met him, the day before Thanksgiving in 1993, I brought my 13- and 11-year-old daughters to meet the man they knew only as Gilligan.
