Merv Griffin / Mike Douglas Slapdown

by Charles Dee Mitchell August 15, 2007

Merv Griffin’s death last week has set me thinking.

Merv in his prime

I was never much of a Merv Griffin fan. His most distinguishing characteristic for me — and remember this was when I was in junior high and high school — was that at least he was better than Joey Bishop.

I was a Mike Douglas fan. The Mike Douglas Show was on the air, five afternoons a week, for 6,000 episodes between the years of 1961 and 1982. It came on about the time I would get home from school and I watched it with at least some regularity. I don’t remember the final years, but of course I was working by then and not around the house at 4pm when it aired. But I was surprised to see that the one episode I remember the most was in 1974, much later than I have placed it in my mind. More on it later.

Mike Douglas interviews Tiny Tim…and his daugher Tulip, 1972

For those who don’t remember, Mike Douglas was a minor TV personality from Cleveland, Ohio who moved his daytime talk show, syndicated by Westinghouse in the mid-1960’s, to a Philadelphia basement studio where it played to an audience of 140 or so people five days a week. The show was live until one day when Zsa Zsa Gabor referred to Morey Amsterdam as a “son of bitch,” and the producers switched to taping. In the late 1970’s it moved again to Los Angeles.

( I by the way, am not a scholar of the Mike Douglas show. I remember it fondly but vaguely and most of these details have come from very easy internet searches.)

Douglas hosted a line up of guests that was a remarkable range of 1960’s and 70’s personalities to make their way to a basement in Philadelphia. Frank Zappa, The Supremes, The Turtles and an array of hip musical talents stopped by to perform and chat. But he also hosted Malcom X,  Angela Davis, Morey Amsterdam — that son of a bitch — and Totie Fields both before and after she lost a leg to diabetes.

Totie Fields with Mike Douglas and all the surviving Tarzans, 1971

Douglas’ brilliant innovation was to have a different co-host every week, and so you actually felt you got to know these people. I confess I no longer remember who any of them were, with the exception of Richard Pryor, who had been on the show off and on since 1965, but sat in as co-host for week in 1974.

Douglas loved funny men, and although he believed that Pryor was “too black” for daytime TV, (he wrote this in his memoir of his career) he wanted him on the show. (If Richard Pryor was too black, imagine how Malcom X and Angela Davis came off.) I think I watched the show all five days that week. I was out of school and “between jobs.” Pryor was a riot, improvising, ribbing the guests, and doing some classic routines, but to this day I remember his brief confrontation with Milton Berle as one of the most unnerving moments I have ever seen on television.

Richard Pryor

Berle, who was 68 at the time, entered in grand style. He was confident in his status as one of the greats of American comedy. I knew him only as someone who occasionally wore a dress and that my parents found amusing. Berle pontificated on the nature of comedy, and Douglas, unfailingly polite, let him ramble on. Soon, from just off camera, there started to come the unmistakable sound of stifled laughter, the type you might hear in church. Pryor, who I suspect was high as a kite, was losing it. He was scrunching down in his seat, his hand over his mouth, tears of laughter coming from his eyes. Eventually Berle has to stop and address the situation. Douglas the unflappable was suffering.

I don’t remember the conversation in detail. I do remember Pryor trying to apologize, writing himself off as “just crazy,” but barely able to pull himself together in the presence of this old windbag.

I found this quote on the internet, and I think it is accurate. Berle turned to Pryor and said, “You better watch yourself, son.”

Uncle Miltie

Berle’s comment was not an old man’s silly threat. Looking back on it now, and on Pryor’s later history, with its drug use that culminated in his setting himself on fire while freebasing, I think it was a genuine expression of concern, fueled equally by irritation, show biz experience, and a recognition of the younger comedian’s brilliance. It was great television, and no one felt the need of invoking the seven second delay.

Douglas said it was time to hear from the sponsors.

 

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JB December 10, 2022 - 12:23

I have to admit that I never could keep Mike Douglas and Merv Griffin straight. In my mind they combine to equal “daytime talkshow”. Apparently there was a real difference.
I enjoyed Jack Parr & Steve Allen at night, and could certainly tell them apart. I was never a Johnny Carson fan, and went to be earlier when his era started. (I was hoping Orson Bean would get that slot.)

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