arts & entertainment
When The (Jewish)
Star* Came Out
Relive classic musical and comedic performances
from TV's The Midnight Special.
Matt Robinson
I JNS.org
rom Neil Diamond to Maroon 5's
Adam Levine to Frozen's "Let It
Go" singer Idina Menzel, Jews have
always been at the forefront of the music
scene.
Burt Sugarman and Mark Goodman are
no different.
As one of the pre-eminent television and
film producers in history, Sugarman's rolo-
dex of connections would make any A-lister
blush. Goodman, one of the first on-air per-
sonalities for the MTV network, has had his
finger on the pulse of pop music for years.
The two industry icons spoke to JNS.org
about the recent release of DVDs (StarVista
Entertainment/Time Life) of Sugarman's
pioneering television program, The Midnight
Special.
From August 1972 to May 1981, the
program offered a live look at virtually all
of the top performing artists of the day,
from Sugarman's beloved country music to
comedy. Among the hundreds of Grammy-
winning and chart-topping guests were
Jewish recording artists Billy Joel, Barry
Manilow, Randy Newman, John "Bowzer"
Bauman and Sha Na Na, and the KISS duo
of Stanley Eisen and Chaim Witz (a.k.a. Paul
Stanley and Gene Simmons).
F
The Midnight Special also featured leg-
endary comic talents like George
Burns, Billy Crystal, Andy
Kaufman, Robert Klein
and Joan Rivers.
Sugarman, 75, currently
married to television host
Mary Hart of Entertainment
Tonight fame, had the ears
of the network executives
because of his successful work
with programs such as Celebrity
Sweepstakes and The Newlywed
Game.
Even so, getting The Midnight Special to
sell was an uphill battle.
"I had trouble getting any of the networks:'
Sugarman says, noting how his goal was to
land at NBC in the spot after Johnny Carson's
Tonight Show.
"Johnny was a next-door neighbor of
mine says Sugarman. "We played tennis all
the time together. I knew that the Tonight
Show and its ratings would be a terrific lead-
in to something."
Yet the network execs were not inter-
ested in the audience demographic they
assumed would go for a late-night music
show. Unwilling to give up, Sugarman took
a risk and offered to finance the first show
himself.
"That's pretty hard [for a network] to turn
down:' he says.
The next challenge was finding
artists who were willing to come
The Bee Gees perform on The Midnight Special
on the new show.
television program in 1973.
"Some of the mainline art-
ists:' Sugarman explains,
refusing to give names,
"were panicked to walk out on
"without The Midnight Special as a precursor."
stage and see a red light on
Recalling the experience of watching The
three or four cameras and start Midnight Special, Goodman says, "Some of
to sing or talk."
the performances are so incredible because
Since The Midnight Special
they're live."
did not use lip-syncing
Once the show took off, the artists began
(unlike other popular shows at the
to line up to perform. Some came on repeat-
time), the artists had to be at their best and
edly, taking full advantage of the publicity
had no second chances to make an impres-
offered by this new platform.
sion on the viewing audience.
Sugarman says one performer even "want-
"All that made it very interesting:'
ed to present me with a gold album for being
Sugarman says. "But we got through it and
responsible for selling all the records."
loved every second of it."
Despite having a "who's who" of music
Asked what links the musically, culturally
legends on The Midnight Special, Sugarman
and racially diverse talents on The Midnight
always regrets the one that got away: Elvis
Special, Goodman, 62, suggests that "the
Presley.
basic thing they all have in common is that
"I knew [Elvis] quite well and played foot-
ball on weekends with him, and spent a lot of
they were musical pioneers, and they were
time with him, so that made it even harder
artists.
not to have him on the show:' Sugarman says.
"They were trying to do things that were
Asked what first sparked his interest in
going to make people spark to the music and
music, Goodman recalls growing up in
were current with the times, and in many
Philadelphia, listening to his parents' jazz
cases, even forward-looking," Goodman says.
heroes and the soulful sounds of the bands
The MTV network launched in August
in the City of Brotherly Love.
1981, just a few months after The Midnight
"As a young teenager, while all my friends
Special went off the air. Goodman says he
were listening to pop music, I was listening
doesn't believe MTV could have existed
Jews
Nate Bloom
Special to the Jewish News
At The Movies
There is something for everyone
among the following films, all open-
ing Friday, Dec.19.
Annie, a "reimagining" of the hit
1976 stage musical, includes most
the original Broadway songs, penned
by Martin Charnin, 80, and Charles
Strouse, 86.
The new version, starring Jamie
Foxx and Quvenzhane Wallis, features
three new songs co-written by Greg
Kurstin, 47, who last year wrote the
X-mas hit song "Underneath the
Tree" for Kelly Clarkson.
The screenplay was written by
Emma Thompson, Aline Brosh
McKenna (The Devil Wears Prada),
47, and Annie director Will Gluck,
44
December 18 • 2014
fig
42, a longtime TV comedy writer
who broke into the movie business
as the director of the "rom-com"
hits Easy A (2010) and Friends with
Benefits (2011), which Gluck also co-
wrote.
Night at the Museum: Secret of the
Tomb, directed by Shawn Levy, 46, is
the third and final pic in this series.
When the magic
powers of the Tablet
of Ahkmenrah begin
to die out, Larry
Daley (Ben Stiller,
49) spans the globe,
uniting his son Nicky
(Skyler Gisondo, 18),
Theodore Roosevelt
Gisondo
(Robin Williams),
Jedadiah (Owen Wilson) and a new
Neanderthal named Laa (also played
by Stiller) on an epic quest to save
the magic before it is gone forever.
By the way, Gisondo's last name
comes from his non-Jewish paternal
Italian grandfather (his other grand-
parents are Jewish). Gisondo replac-
es Jake Cherry, 18, as Nicky.
Foxcatcher closely tracks real
events. In 1996, John DuPont (Steve
Carrell), an heir to the DuPont for-
tune, shot dead Dave Schultz (Mark
Ruffalo) in the driveway of a house
that Schultz had lived in on DuPont's
Pittsburgh-area estate. The murder
was witnessed by Schultz's wife,
Nancy (Sienna Miller).
Schultz (1959-1996) and his young-
er brother, Mark Schultz (Channing
Tatum), both won gold medals in
wrestling at the 1984 Olympics. (The
brothers were the sons of a Jewish
father and a non-Jewish mother.)
DuPont, who never become the top
wrestler he hoped to be, bankrolled
amateur athletics and provided lav-
ish training facilities at his estate.
His amateur wrestling team was
called "Team Foxcatcher," and Dave
Schultz spent six years living on the
estate as he coached the Foxcatcher
team.
The film's director, Bennett Miller,
47, won the Palme
D'Or at the Cannes
Film festival for
Foxcatcher. The
Foxcatcher screen-
play was co-written
by Dan Futterman,
47, who also wrote
Miller's Capote.
Miller
Futterman is a vir-
tually retired actor
whose roles include playing Robin
Williams' son in Birdcage.
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