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#14107: "LIVE AND LET LIVE" A WBAI RADIO SPECIAL

1963-05-19, WBAI, 93 min.

A repeat of a rare July 15, 1962 broadcast for its time. A round table discussion by eight male homosexuals discussing their lives and loves.

Moderator: WBAI Public Affairs Director, Dick Elman.

To humanize homosexuality, Randolfe Wicker brought together a panel of eight homosexuals to speak as they would speak to each other. WBAI public affairs director, Dick Elman moderates a discussion recorded at a Brownstone home in NYC on the West Side.

NOTE:

In early 1962, WBAI New York’s listener-supported “progressive" radio station aired an hour-long special, “The Homosexual In America.” It featured a panel of psychiatrists who described gay people as sick and in need of a cure — a cure that they could provide with just a few hours of therapy.

Gay Activist and founder of the “Homosexual League of New York” Randy Wicker was livid, not only at the ignorance of these so-called “experts,” but also because, once again, there was a panel of straight people talking about gay people they didn’t even know.

Wicker went to the WBAI studios and confronted Dick Elman, the station’s public affairs director. “Why do you have these people on that don’t know a damn thing about homosexuality? They don’t live it and breathe it the way I do. … I spend my whole life in gay society.” Wicker demanded equal time and Elman agreed, provided Wicker find other gay people willing to go on the air as part of a panel. When plans for the program were announced, the New York Journal-American went ballistic. Jack O’Brian, the paper’s radio-TV columnist, wrote that the station should change its callsign to WSICK for agreeing to air an “arrogant card-carrying swish.”

The broadcast titled “Live and Let Live,” featured Wicker and seven other gay men, identified only as Harry, Jack, Bill, Peter, Marty, and two others, talking for ninety minutes about what it was like to be gay. They talked about their difficulties in maintaining careers, the problems of police harassment, and the social responsibility of gays and straights alike. The program’s host guided the programs with questions to the panel. “Is there harassment?” he asked. One panelist described some of the police harassment he had experienced, when one officer “roared up, jumped out of the car, grabbed me, and started giving me this big thing about ‘What are you doing here, you know there are a lot of queers around this neighborhood.’ He said, ‘You know, there’s only one thing worse than a queer, and that’s a nigger’.” (Remember this was 1962.)

The New York Times’s called the program “the most extensive consideration of the subject to be heard on American radio” —

A week before the broadcast, Jack O'Brian, a "right-wing" columnist for the New York Journal American, attacked it as an attempt to present "the ease of living the gay life." Wicker made the rounds to Variety, Newsweek, and The New York Times informing them of the broadcast and the attack on it by O'Brian. The 90-minute program, believed to be the first such in the United States, aired on July 15, 1962. Several mainstream media outlets, alerted by Wicker, covered the broadcast, which received favorable treatment in The New York Times, The Realist, Newsweek, the New York Herald Tribune, and Variety.

As a result of the publicity, from 1962 through 1964 Wicker was one of the most visible gay people in New York. He spoke to countless church groups and college classes and, in 1964, became the first openly gay person to appear on East Coast television with a January 31st appearance on The Les Crane Show which was recorded at the time of the original broadcast by Phil Gries founder and owner of Archival Television Audio.

Wicker is credited with organizing the first known gay rights demonstration in the United States.

#532: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1963-10-26, WABC, 42 min.

September 16, 1963 - July 31, 1964 (WABC N.Y.)
August 3 - 8, 1964 (ABC)
November 9, 1964 - February 26, 1965 (ABC)
June 28, 1965 - October 22, 1965 (Nightlife ABC)
January 15, 1968 - September 6, 1968 (WNEW N.Y.)

Les Crane hosts this live 1:00 AM late night phone-in talk show with guests Milt Kamen, Jack E. Leonard and Joyce Davidson. Rudy Vallee phones the show and talks to the guests.
He especially criticizes Leonard for using incorrect grammar when speaking on the show. This was the fifth LES CRANE SHOW (new title) to be broadcast after this series was originally called NIGHT LINE...LES CRANE.

Debut of program was September 16, 1963. For the first month the title of the telecast was NIGHT LINE...LES CRANE. Beginning on October 22, 1963 the title was changed to THE LES CRANE SHOW.

These late night LIVE broadcasts were aired Monday thru Friday. on local station WABC New York. Beginning December 6, 1963 late night broadcasts aired Tuesday thru Saturday. Also, another time slot opened for Crane with a similar format airing on WABC in the afternoon...a one hour version broadcast from 1:30-2:30pm, five days a week, and again returning to late night broadcasting usually 1am to 2:00am after the WABC late movie, THE BEST OF BROADWAY. This TALK SHOW / PHONE IN version of The Les Crane Show concluded its final broadcast on July 31, 1964.

On August 3, 4, 5, 6, & 8, 1964 THE NEW LES CRANE SHOW premiered...a five program trial rivaling Johnny Carson's TONIGHT SHOW. It was Nationally televised and it is considered the FIRST network talk show program to compete with THE TONIGHT SHOW STARRING JOHNNY CARSON.

On November 9, 1964 THE LES CRANE SHOW premiered and aired regularly weeknights on the ABC network, opposite Johnny Carson's TONIGHT SHOW.
After 14 weeks, and low ratings, this series ended with its last telecast airing on February 26, 1965. Les Crane's late night network career was over, as a solo host, and never to be resumed Nationally.

ABC renamed their late night time slot NIGHTLIFE, premiering on March 1, 1965.This one hour forty five minute weekly late night talk series showcased guest hosts. This series run lasted four months, the last broadcast airing on June 25, 1965. Guest hosts included: Shelley Berman, Pat Boone, Jack Carter, Allan Sherman, Dave Garroway, Bill Cullen, William B. Williams (announcer of this series run), Eddy Arnold, Dale Robertson, Dick Shawn, Louis Nye, & Jan Murray.

Form June 28 to October 22, 1965 Les Crane returned to this time slot...the series title remaining, NIGHTLIFE. Les Crane no longer was a solo host. He co-hosted with Dave Garroway, and Nipsy Russell.

Two years later, Les Crane returned to local late night television appearing for eight months on WNEW channel 5 in New York 11:15pm - 12:15am from January 15, 1968 changing time slots on July 8, 1968, 11:45pm - 12:45pm. Final show aired on September 6, 1968, and it was the last time Les Crane would host a late night television talk show.

NOTE: A two hour radio broadcast profiling Les Crane, including TV Audio Air Check Crane highlights from the ATA archive can be listened to in its entirety. It appears on the ATA website under the link TV CONFIDENTIAL. The segment (SOUNDS OF LOST TELEVISION) was recorded in Pasadena California and aired in 2014 with host Ed Robertson, and guest Phil Gries.

NOTE: Most all of Les Crane's cumulative 26 months of broadcasting as a talk show host is today non-existent. Tapes were destroyed, erased and whereabouts unknown. The 27 LES CRANE SHOW television air checks archived in the Archival Television Audio, Inc. library is the largest collection known to exist of extant Les Crane broadcasts in the country.

Extant examples existing elsewhere include two broadcast kinescopes archived by The Paley Center for Media (one from 1967, and the other, a broadcast from January 31, 1968 titled "Rich Jews." There is archived at UCLA FILM & TV ARCHIVE four extant examples related to Les Crane, including a preserved 41:36 minute compilation demo/presentation kinescope reel with clips from the New Les Crane Show five night trial run (August 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 1964).
The content of what the UCLA Film & TV Archive's has related to the above programs include the first show with Les Crane introducing his show and Robert Preston (2:53), a bullfighting segment with Ricardo Montalbaum (6:32), a Jackie Robinson segment debating William F. Buckley with Shelley Winters on the panel (5:40),a Pamela Mason and Artie Shaw segment (3:50), a segment related to New York City cab drivers with Les Crane interviewing a number of them (5:59), guest Irving Schulmen, Adela Rogers St.John and two other guests discussing the legendary actress Jean Harlow (4:18), a segment related to "Deathtraps related to playgrounds in New York" and interviewed comments from women on the street (3:11), an in studio interview segment with Marguerite Oswald, mother of Lee Harvey Oswald (4:14), and an in studio interview with Richard Burton and Les Crane sign off (6:03).

Of interest, as to the quality of the video and audio, it is noted many variations exist including tinny sound reproduction, at times, poor audio clarity, at times, echo effect, tinny effect, at times, occasional video glitches, dark, high contrast segments at times, overexposed ("milky") segments. at times.

NOTE: The Les Crane Show late night talk program on ABC during the 1964-65 television season pioneered a format of television later embraced by icon Phil Donahue, Crane fell to NBC’s The Tonight Show, a national brand with a decade of broadcasting tenure, proved its dominance. Donahue began his legendary career in Dayton in 1967, evolving into a daytime programming staple for nearly 30 years.

Les Crane’s daughter Caprice points out that her father used journalism to cover topics and people that others feared to explore. “He created the shotgun mike,” says Crane of her dad, who passed away in 2008. “He had guests who did not provide the typical fluff, for example, Malcolm X, Bob Dylan, and the mother of Lee Harvey Oswald. He had the first publicly gay man on his show. He was also an amazing listener who helped create a new television format that demanded more information for the listener.
The Les Crane Show didn’t last long because the person who tries the new thing always gets penalized. People are afraid of the unknown until it becomes mainstream.”

A renaissance media man for the second half of the 20th century, Crane held interests and influences beyond journalism. “My dad gave The Mamas and the Papas group its name,” reminds Caprice Crane. “Casey Kasem credited him with inventing the Top 40 radio format at KRLA. He also got into the computer business before it was big. His company was Software Tool Works, which produced the Chess Master computer program. He was always before his time.”

Crane’s innovative format allowed one of baseball’s biggest heroes, Jackie Robinson, to debate one of conservatism’s biggest allies, William F. Buckley. Nowhere on television in the mid-1960s could audiences see this type of television fodder. Unfortunately, The Les Crane Show fell victim to a common policy of television networks destroying tapes because of the shortsighted view that future generations would not be interested. How wrong they were.

#14367N: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1963-11-27, ABC, 13 min.

   LATE NIGHT 1AM television  talk and phone in broadcast with guests Rudy Valleee, Robert Reed and Rhoda Brown. 

Opening and first 13 minutes of the broadcast.

#19394: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1963-12-27, , min.

Guest is Carleton Fredericks who discusses nutrition.

#587: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-01-08, WABC, 51 min.

On this telephone talk show, guests are Dave Garroway, Barry Sullivan and Jan Sterling.

#598: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-01-31, WABC, 38 min.

Les Crane's guests Randolph Wicker, Morton Getman, and Dr. Sandor Loran take phone calls related to homosexuality.

NOTE: This broadcast also archived (possibly longer version, TBD) on another master tape (George Vlasto Collection).

Wicker was one of the most visible homosexuals in New York. During the early 1960's he spoke at countless Church groups and College classes. He became the first openly gay person to appear on East Coast television on this Les Crane television talk show. This telecast is not extant in any broadcast form in any museum, or private collection, except for this TV audio excerpt recorded off the air at the time of the telecast by archivist Phil Gries, founder and owner of Archival Television Audio, Inc.

NOTE: 98% of all Les Crane television broadcasts (1963-1968) are considered lost, wiped or destroyed.

2017 Interview with Randolfe Wicker
LGBTQ Nation

You appeared on “The Les Crane Show” and answered questions about homosexuality, where you were believed to be the first gay person to appear openly on East Coast TV without a disguise or a fake name.

RW: They contacted me and Les Crane was the cutting edge new show and homosexuality was one of the taboo topics. I had to answer call-in questions and some of them were pretty direct. I had one woman call in and say she had a cousin or an uncle who she knew was gay. She worried about him being in contact with her children. I told her I thought the chances of any problems like that would be very minor, especially if she let him know that she knew he was gay, knew that he would not do anything nefarious.

QN: What kind of reactions did you receive after that TV appearance?

RW: Generally very good. When I opened my [art deco] store in 1974, I’d say for a period of maybe 10 years, there would be several people who would come through that door every week and they always said the same thing. They said, “You changed my life.”

People don’t realize that, in those days, you thought you were the only one. Then, they saw me on “The Les Crane Show” and it made them realize there were others like themselves.

#609: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-02-17, WABC, 53 min.

Guests on this live telephone talk show are Jack E. Leonard and Bobby Darin. Merv Griffin phones in as well as viewers with questions for Les Crane's guests.

#628: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-03-00, WABC, 51 min.

Dr. Lena Levine takes phone calls relating to the subject of "The Frigid Wife."

#628A: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-03-00, WABC, 51 min.

Author Gail Greene, psychotherapist Dr. Tilla Vahanian and Miss Lynn Cher take phone calls related to the subject: "Sex And The College Girl."

#635A: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-03-00, WABC, 6 min.

      Les Crane welcomes guests Mercedes McCambridge and Lou Antonio on his afternoon broadcast. Discussion about current young movie stars.

#635: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-03-01, WABC, 51 min.

Guest Otto Preminger and Keir Dullea answer phone calls from viewers.

#638: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-03-28, WABC, 60 min.

Les Crane's guests are Merv Griffin and Don Knotts who answer phone calls from viewers including Andy Griffith and Milt Kamen.

#656: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-05-22, WABC, 51 min.

The subject for this show is "The John Birch Society." Les Crane's guests are William Haddad, former director of the Peace Core, and Scott Stanley, managing editor of the magazine, "American Opinion," published by the John Birch Society.

#661: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-05-30, WABC, 54 min.

Jayne Mansfield, who replaces scheduled guest Abbe Lane, joins other guests, Merv Griffin and Milt Kamen on this late night phone-in live talk show.

#682: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-07-11, WABC, 54 min.

Guests on this live day time phone-in talk show are Joanne Woodward and Sydney Chaplin. The mother of Della Reese calls the show.

#688: LES CRANE SHOW, THE

1964-07-25, WABC, 50 min.

A follow-up to her previous appearance in March, Psychiatrist and Gynecologist Dr. Lena Levine takes phone calls related to "The Frigid Wife."

#693: LES CRANE SHOW, THE NEW

1964-08-03, WABC, 62 min.

The Premiere Pilot show on National Nighttime ABC Television is broadcast. Les Crane's guests include Harry Belafonte, Ricardo Montalban, Robert Preston, Celeste Holm and Mel Brooks, who does a satirical recap of tonight's broadcast.

Television History of the LES CRANE SHOW