Word: cavett
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...followings ye shall know the talk-show hosts. When CBS canceled Merv Griffin's nightly program last December, Merv's late-night fans seemed barely ruffled. When Westinghouse dropped David Frost in May the Frost constituency kept its cool. But when ABC announced in April that Dick Cavett would get the ax unless his ratings improved by July 28, Cavett's admirers raised a howl of protest that was immediate, loud and long. At stake, they charged with some justice, was the last haven of wit and urbanity in the wilderness of late-night network...
...apartment on Upper Fifth Avenue, Woody Allen remains as curious as the next man-and the next man, he worries, is tapping the phone and peering through the keyhole. The pad is neoclassic Allen. The windows have been widened, the duplex thoroughly decorated ("It looks," says Cavett, "like the set for the George Arliss movie, The Man Who Played God"). On the terrace, the meticulously arranged Japanese garden features live plants and coiled-up rubber snakes to frighten away the pigeons. One afternoon, a rubber snake fell from the terrace and landed on a lady below. She sued, of course...
Because of the coolness with which he shields an implied commitment. Cavett may be on the verge of becoming an exemplar, and, by extension, a mentor, of the high school and college generation of Americans; the closest historical analogy might be that cited by William H. Whyte, Jr., author of "The Organization Man," who said that many of his Class of 1939 Princeton undergraduates modelled their actions on the cool stylishness of Fred Astaire...
...without reason did Sissman identify Cavett's current residence as "East Egg, Long Island," for Cavett is a modern-day Gatsby who this time has really made it all the way, coming out of the Midwest and through the back door (show biz, instead of bootlegging) to genuine social and financial success in the East. What aspiring Harvard undergrad, watching the show stoned during exam period, could ask for more...
...MOST damaging charge against the Cavett show seems to be that it's "intellectual." This, of course, is absurd. If anything, it is anti-intellectual in that it degrades intellectuals by treating them like movie stars. ("Tell me, Mr. Auden, when did you write your first poem?") But to keep ABC from thinking that the show is appealing to intellectuals, you'd better misspell a few words and mail from outside Cambridge when you write them to say how much you enjoy...