TV Confidential with Ed Robertson

TVC 653.3: Robert Crane and Christopher Fryer tell Ed how Bob's experience working with director Paul Schrader on Auto Focus (Schrader's depiction of the Bob Crane murder case) spurred Bob to work with Chris in telling his own account of what happened in their book Crane: Sex, Celebrity, and My Father's Unsolved Murder . Other topics this segment include a poignant memory that Bruce Dern shared ab...

TVC 653.4: From June 2014: Tony, Donna, and Ed discuss how TMZ's coverage of the death of Michael Jackson on June 25, 2009 put TMZ on the map as a credible news source. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 654.5: Ed welcomes back esteemed music journalist and music historian Jon Burlingame ( Music for Prime Time: A History of American Television Themes and Scoring ). Jon's latest book, Dreamsville: Henry Mancini , Peter Gunn, and Music for TV Noir , is a combination history of Peter Gunn (NBC/ABC, 1958-1961) on television; biography of Grammy Award-winning and Academy Award-winning composer Henr...

TVC 654.6: Music journalist Jon Burlingame ( Music for Prime Time , Dreamsville: Henry Mancini , Peter Gunn, and Music for TV Noir ) discusses some of the many innovations that Blake Edwards and Peter Gunn brought to network television (including "night for night" shooting, one year before Quinn Martin would make that into an art form), and how the romance between Peter Gunn and Edie Hart was very...

TVC 652.1: Ed welcomes Joel Thurm, former Vice President of Talent and Casting for both Paramount Television and NBC, and one of the most accomplished and most respected casting directors in the film and TV industry. Joel's memoir, Sex, Drugs, and Pilot Season: Confessions of a Casting Director , provides both a backstage look at the boardrooms of New York and the executive suites in Hollywood (pa...

TVC 652.2: Legendary casting director Joel Thurm shares a few stories about his experience working with CBS executive Ethel Winant in the early 1970s, including how he discovered Georgia Engel for The Mary Tyler Moore Show ; how he lobbied both CBS and MTM to cast Farrah Fawcett-Majors to play Bill Daily's girlfriend on The Bob Newhart Show ; and how Joel became responsible casting every segment o...

TVC 652.3: From June 2014: Tony, Donna, and Ed provide a brief rundown of the circumstances surrounding the murder of Hogan's Heroes star Bob Crane on June 29, 1978. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 652.4: Ed welcomes back Robert Crane and Christopher Fryer, co-authors of Jack Nicholson: The Early Years (the first authorized filmography of Oscar winner Jack Nicholson, covering Nicholson's early film career through 1974), Bruce Dern: Things I've Said, But Probably Shouldn't Have: An Unrepentant Memoir (a three-way collaboration between Dern, Bob, and Chris), and Crane: Sex, Celebrity, and...

TVC 652.5: Film historians Robert Crane and Christopher Fryer talk to Ed about how they first connected with Bruce Dern while researching Jack Nicholson: The Early Years and how that led to a series of subsequent interviews with Dern for various publications over the ensuing thirty years, culminating with their collaborating with Dern on his memoir. Both Jack Nicholson: The Early Years and Bruce D...

TVC 652.6: Bruce Dern biographers Robert Crane and Christopher Fryer talk to Ed about "Dernseys," a phrase that Jack Nicholson coined to describe Dern's unerring knack for knowing what a character might say, or might think, in any given scene, regardless of whether it's in the pages of the script. Jack Nicholson: The Early Years and Bruce Dern: Things I've Said, But Probably Shouldn't Have: An Unr...

TVC 651.1: Part 2 of a conversation that began last week with Marc Cushman, author of Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of The Moody Blues, a two-volume, total-immersion experience into the six-decade career of The Moody Blues, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame group that not only was the first rock group to champion the "concept album," but influenced such other groups as Yes, Deep Purple, and ELO....

TVC 651.2: Marc Cushman, author of Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of The Moody Blues , talks to Ed about the many contributions of Ray Thomas to the sound of the Moody Blues (including his trilogy of songs at the end of the Long Distance Voyager album), and why the Moody Blues took a hiatus from each other around 1974. Volumes 1 and 2 of Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of The Moody Blues are...

TVC 651.3: Marc Cushman, author of Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of The Moody Blues , talks to Ed about some of the many parallels between Ray Thomas of The Moody Blues and George Harrison of The Beatles (particularly with regard to the albums of their respective bands) and how Keys to the Kingdom , the Moody Blues album released in 1991, both marked a return to the band's roots and reflected...

TVC 650.1: Ed welcomes award-winning screenwriter, director, producer, and documentary maker Marc Cushman, author of These Are the Voyages, a three-volume history of Star Trek: The Original Series. Marc's latest book, Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of The Moody Blues is a two-volume, total-immersion experience in the six-decade career of The Moody Blues, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame group tha...

TVC 650.2: From June 2014: Tony, Donna, and Ed look back at June 17, 1994, the night of the famous low-speed white Bronco police chase that captivated television audiences, and how TV news coverage of the O.J. Simpson murder case continues to impact us today Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 650.4: Part 2 of a conversation that began last week with trailblazing actress, author, and designed Irene Tsu ( Flower Drum Song, Paradise Hawaiian Style, Take Her She's Mine, The Green Berets, Caprice, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, Down and Out in Beverly Hills ). Topics this segment include how Irene got her independent spirit from her mother; why faith has always been central to Irene's life...

TVC 650.2: From June 2014: Tony, Donna, and Ed look back at June 17, 1994, the night of the famous low-speed white Bronco police chase that captivated television audiences, and how TV news coverage of the O.J. Simpson murder case continues to impact us today Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TVC 650.5: Actress and author Irene Tsu shares a few memories of working with Raymond Burr on both Perry Mason and Ironside and with James Garner on "Irving the Explainer," the famous episode of The Rockford Files that was also directed by James Colburn. Irene's memoir, A Walter Color Dream: The Many Lives of Irene Tsu, is available now through Bear Manor Media, Amazon.com, and IreneTsu-Entertainm...

TVC 650.6: Marc Cushman, author of Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of The Moody Blues , talks to Ed about the emergence of FM radio circa 1972 helped the Moody Blues surge in popularity (and, particularly, the success of "Nights in White Satin," four years after its original release in 1968. Volumes 1 and 2 of Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of The Moody Blues are available now wherever books...

TVC 649.1: From November 2011: Greg Ehrbar discusses the Sherman Brothers' many contributions to Walt Disney Records (above and beyond their Oscar-winning music for Mary Poppins ), including how they helped composer Tutti Camarata develop "the Annette sound" for Annette Funicello, the back story behind "It's a Small World," and, later, their work on Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Charlotte's Web . Ri...

TVC 649.2: Greg Ehrbar discusses the recent Kino Lorber Blu-ray release of Flower Drum Song , the 1961 film adaptation of the Tony Award-winning musical by Rodgers and Hammerstein starring Nancy Kwan, Jack Soo, Miyoshi Umeki, James Shigeta, Juanita Hall, Benson Fong, Reiko Sato, Patrick Adiarte, Kam Tong, Victor Sen Yung, and Irene Tsu. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partn...

TVC 649.3: Ed welcomes trailblazing actress, author, and designed Irene Tsu ( Flower Drum Song, Paradise Hawaiian Style, Take Her She's Mine, The Green Berets, Caprice, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, Down and Out in Beverly Hills ). Irene not only worked steadily in movies and television for more than four decades, but in many instances broke ground for other Asian-American by playing characters that...

TVC 649.4: Actress and author Irene Tsu talks to Ed about how composer Oscar-winning Bronislaw Kaper ( Lili, The FBI ) became a lifelong father figure when she first came to Hollywood; what she uses for inspiration when she creates a new water color painting; and why Frank Sinatra was always a much better host than he was a guest. Irene's memoir, A Walter Color Dream: The Many Lives of Irene Tsu,...

TVC 649.5: From January 2012: Tony, Donna, and Ed discuss the life and career of film and television icon Dabney Coleman ( 9 to 5, Tootsie, Buffalo Bill, The "Slap" Maxwell Story, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman ) on the occasion of his eightieth birthday. Dabney Coleman passed away on Friday, May 17 at age ninety-two. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with AdvertiseCast...

TVC 648.1: May 1939 marks the eighty-fifth anniversary of the publication of Issue 27 of Detective Comics , the issue that marked the debut appearance of the Batman character. TV Confidential marks this occasion by playing highlights of some of our conversation with actors who appeared in the Batman television series from 1966. Want to advertise/sponsor our show? TV Confidential has partnered with...