On December 27 Bunny Gibson, American Bandstand Regular from 1959-1962, married Duke Tirschel in Chattanooga , Tennessee. Broadcast only on Saturdays after 1963, American Bandstand lost the homegrown vitality of the daily program in West Philadelphia. 2023 Viacom International Inc. All Rights Reserved. Sullivan says Bandstand host Dick Clark knew most of the cast was gay, but was determined to keep it under wraps for the sake of the show. So fearful of the kids real behavior, [Clark] imposed a strict dress code: jackets and ties for boys, and nothing tight for girls. One older brother survives Norman. The rest, as they say, is history. So Bandstand really did change her life in many ways. [36] Clark remained as executive producer. , Puppy love I never had a crush on her. I went to coffee shops, but I also hung out in Rittenhouse Square and so did many of the dancers. Black & White/Color (9/9/1967), Dick Clarks first day as host: 7/9/1956 Thats why Elvis Presley and Ricky Nelson would never appear on the show, but movie stars Jeff Chandler, Tab Hunter, Sal Mineo came., Dancing came naturally to Sullivan, the way it did to all Regulars, she says. Weekday afternoons were spent with the kids in Philly, the kids on American Bandstand. Bandstand began as a local program on WFIL-TV (now WPVI), Channel 6 in Philadelphia on October 7, 1952. "I kissed a girl, and I liked it!. Browse celebrity nostalgia on our website. Clark decided to pitch the show to ABC president Thomas W. Moore, and after some negotiations the show was picked up nationally, becoming American Bandstand on August 5, 1957. He fell in love with her. She was one of five brothers and sisters; had a huge family vacation home in Sea Isle City where Regulars visited: and dated Frank Levins and Denny Dziena. This investigation targeted the practice of payola, and it was most likely triggered by rumors circulating that charged Dick Clark with promoting records in which he held a financial stake onAmerican Bandstandand taking kickbacks from record companies to include their records on the shows playlist. [18][19][20] Dubbed as The New American Bandstand and distributed by LBS Communications, the series' tapings were moved from the ABC Television Center to the Hollywood studios of Los Angeles's PBS member station KCET,[21] with a new set was similar to that of Soul Train. 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved. In a nice way, he'd discipline us.". In other parts of the country, if you were a gay kid growing up, you were probably the only one in town who was gay, Sullivan said. Hosted by Bob Horn as a television adjunct to his radio show of the same name on WFIL radio, Bandstand featured short musical films produced by Snader Telescriptions and Official Films, with occasional studio guests. The 1960 amendments to the 1934 Federal Communications Act put heavy constraints on payola, requiring full public disclosure when a record company or its agent pays a broadcaster to play records on the air. The 1960 amendments criminalized any action that breached the disclosure rule. How a Beloved Tori Amos B-Side Transformed 'Of An Age'. The big teenybopper magazines of the era Sixteen and Teen plastered Bandstand dancers on their covers and wrote glowing, gossipy stories about their lives in Philadelphia, where Dick Clark produced the show. Don Cornelius, the creator and host of Soul Train, along with Jesse Jackson, entered into a dispute with Clark over this upstart program, and it was canceled within a few weeks. Carole Ann Scaldeferri Spada, 70, of Newtown Square, a regular dancer on American Bandstand from 1957 to 1961, died Sunday, Dec. 8, of congestive heart failure at a Springfield hospital. Then it was hosted by Bob Horn and was called Bob Horns Bandstand.On July 9 of 1956 the show got a new host, a clean-cut 26 year old named Dick Clark. . Television host Dick Clark presides over the set of his show American Bandstand in 1957. Ray Smith was one of the shows secretly gay dancers. Arlene Sullivan, one of the most popularAmerican Bandstandregulars, presents another perspective on the shows closeted world. LOS ANGELES - APRIL 1960: Host of the television show 'American Bandstand' Dick Clark appears in a scene with Michael Callan from the movie 'Because They're Young' which was released in April 1960. As previously mentioned, during the 1978 season of Bandstand, Donna Summer became the only music artist in Bandstand's history to co-host the program. I was a preteen, which is to say, I was a teenage wannabe. The show, hosted by Dick Clark, sounds like it was both a community of welcome amongst the teens and a repressive construct from higher ups. EARLY BANDSTAND VIDEOS. He was six weeks shy of his 47th birthday. Horn, however, was disenchanted with the program, and wanted to change the show to a dance program with teenagers dancing along on camera as records played, based on an idea that came from a radio show on WPEN, The 950 Club, hosted by Joe Grady and Ed Hurst. The bashing of Bandstand regulars, gay and straight, happened all the time, Sullivan and Smith reveal. Once the program went national upon its move to Los Angeles, new host Dick Clark decided that integration was the most responsible move. They were hurting him. Oddly enough, I have never checked with the other Regulars to get their feedback. Words by Barry Manilow and Bruse Sussman, Were goin hoppin (Hop!) "My heart hurts," said Gibson, a regular from 1959 to 1961. WFIL reverted to the TK-10s two weeks later when ABC refused to carry the color signal and management realized that the show lost perspective without the extra cameras. On Bandstand, she became lifelong friends with one of the celebrity guests, straight Annette Funicello, of Mickey Mouse Club and Beach Party fame. And while Smith knew he was gay, he was shocked to learn that most of the guys on Bandstand, so many of them, were gay, he told The Post. Jerry Oppenheimer is a best-selling author. American Bandstand only allowed dancers from 14 to 18. . On all the music they play On the Bandstand.! She also mentions a gay dancer who was pushed in the train tracks, and another who was dangled over an elevator shaft. They werent playing football. Many other Bandstand alumni from the show's Philadelphia era were overcome with a rush of memories Wednesday. He will never forget one of his first days on Bandstand. e9.size = "300x250"; One market not telecasting Bandstand was Baltimore, Maryland, as local affiliate WAAM (now WJZ-TV) elected to produce a local dance show in the same afternoon time slot. A show where well-dressed teens gently bop around to the big hits while maintaining an appropriate distance apart hardly seems like it would be a hot bed of sexual experimentation, but American Bandstand apparently featured a crew of Philadelphia kids who had more than dancing in common. JUSTINE AND BOB. Don married Bunny. Sullivan was almost 14, the required age for the show, when she became a Regular. The program was broadcast live, weekday afternoons and, by 1959, the show had a national audience of 20 million. Sullivan was raised in a rowhouse in a working-class neighborhood; we surmise from her writing that it was somewhere in Southwest Philly (she attended John Bartram High School), although Sullivan doesnt specify a home address. I lived in very tough South Philadelphia, he says. A case in point is Arlene Sullivan, a popular Regular who has described her own emerging lesbian sexual orientation, which she says was masked by her dance partnerships with boys. When he became a regular in 1959, Clark was only 30. Fifty years later, Bandstand fan Sharon Sultan Cutler wondered what had become of the "Regulars," the name given to the teens that showed up daily to dance. His name is, Champion Polar Images Namron O My-Joy, as recorded with the AKC. But he vividly recalls that one of his fellow gay dancers was thrown onto the El tracks outside the studio, and another popular regular who was gay and often danced with Sullivan was dangled over an elevator shaft.. [42] American Bandstand was a daily ritual for many teenagers throughout the nation. No way I will get in his way! The followed the trend of solo (open) dancing started by Chubby Checker and The Twist. Some solo dances had animal names, for example, The Pony and The Monkey; others were named for motions, for example, The Mashed Potato and The Loco-Motion. Two of the biggest record hits of the early 1960s, both of which received a huge boost from airtime onAmerican Bandstand, were Dee Dee Sharps Mashed Potato Time and Freddy Cannons Palisades Park.8, YetAmerican Bandstandsseven-year stint in West Philadelphia was about to end. In front of the camera, Clark called the shots. Due to the size of the studio, the need to have as much dance space as possible, and the size of the cumbersome color camera compared to the black-and-white models, it was only possible to have one RCA TK-41 where three RCA TK-10s[4] had been used before. The Saturday show would run until 1960. The kids designated as American Bandstand Regulars in some cases struggled with their sexual identity. View Our Classic TV Shows Directory Squeaky clean commercial pitchman and deejay Dick Clark inherited Bob Horns locally broadcastBandstandin July 1956 and revamped it for a national audience of teenage consumers as ABCsAmerican Bandstand, which first aired in August 1957. The Top 40 hits that everyone heard were matched with fun routines performed by relatable teenagers. Sullivan was most frequently paired with a boy named Kenny Rossi, who was straight, but still subject to attacks for appearing on the show: One time, Kenny and I went to visit one of the other regulars up in North Philadelphia, and we were leaving her apartment and were headed to the El, and I heard car doors slamming, and I looked back, and all these guys were coming up the steps, and they started beating up on Kenny, Sullivan says. One young performer was dangled down an elevator shaft. Wed stay up all night talking about boys, she said. [Clark] was a cool professional with an agenda from the beginning, an agenda for success that made him rich; he was a millionaire by the end of the 1950s. I tried my best to fill your shoes and I hope I have lived up to what you were expecting of me. From that dance on we became steady dance partners until I had to leave the show on my 18th birthday, which was in August of 1961., The Pony Contest 4/8/1989 10/7/1989 Syndicated Variety Shows Dick Clark, wherever you are, we miss you. We sent some 15,000 fan letters each week. Elgart's version was released as a single in March 1954 (Columbia 40180) as well as Curb's theme (by "Mike Curb & The Waterfall") in October 1969 (Forward 124). Out filmmaker Christopher Landon spills the spooky tea on his new movie and working with the 'White Lotus' star. Sullivans last appearance onAmerican Bandstandwas in 1960.7, In the early 1960s, a new collection of teen regulars succeeded Arlene Sullivans generation onAmerican Bandstandsdance floor. 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