Word: m
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...elected me as a new late-night talk-show host," he says enthusiastically. "I've worked all my life preparing for it, putting together a platform -- my kind of guests, my kind of music, what I think is funny. I've been warming up in the '80s, but I'm really for the '90s. I'm the talk-show host for the MTV generation...
With his all-gums smile, flattop hairdo and exuberant, affable manner, Hall seems like an overgrown kid surveying a roomful of candy. His conversation is frank, unaffected, headlong. "When I'm on the air, I'm happy," he says, relaxing in his mirrored office on the Paramount lot, a muted TV set overhead tuned in to MTV. He is dressed in his typical off-hours duds: baseball cap, Reebok T shirt and unlaced sneakers. "I was born to do this. When I'm in the spotlight, I'm gone. I love it more than anything in the world. When everyone...
Hall bridles at the criticisms his show has received. "One critic accused me of fawning over second-rate talent. How dare he! In the ghetto the game is respect. If I book you, I'm committed to you. I'm an entertainer, not a tough interviewer. My philosophy is to leave my ego at the door and get the best out of my guests." Yet Hall concedes that his interviewing skills need work. He is currently being coached by New York City-based media consultant Virginia Sherwood. Among her tips: ask more follow-up questions and avoid overusing words like...
...press's fixation on race nettles Hall even more. Though he takes pride in giving exposure to many black performers ("I have a commitment to correcting the wrongs of TV history"), Hall insists he is doing a show for everybody, black and white. "I'm out to bring the ghetto to the suburbs and the suburbs to the ghetto. I want ((rapper)) Tone-Loc and Major Ferguson, Fergie's dad, on the same couch. Most white people have never been to a party at a black person's house. I hope they say, 'This one looks nice -- maybe...
...give 110%. I resent the fact that ((for some white critics)) I have to be whiter to be a star. And then there are the jabs from my own people, the implication that I have to be unfair to whites to make + blacks happy. I am angry. I'm on a tightrope, and people are punching me from every direction...