Talk show. The daytime disaster of 1978 was America Alive, originating “live from New York,” as debut guest Chevy Chase would say. Like many other TV failures, the hype was much greater than the sum of its parts. Its much-vaunted screen that let people talk back and forth with one another, for example, was nothing more than the same process producer Woody Fraser used when he started Good Morning America. Host Jack Linkletter was fine, but the show had Bruce Jenner, Pat Mitchell, and Janet Langhart, the latter a co-host of the daily Good Day series on WCVB Boston, file choppy reports outside the studio that often set an uneasy pace.
Also awkwardly mixed were segments on shopping advice by David Horowitz, sex talk from Masters and Johnson, comic bits from Orkin and Berdis, and entertainment news and reviews from David Sheehan in Hollywood.
Regulars included Virginia Graham (1978), David Horowitz, Brace Jenner, Janet Langhart, Jack Linkletter, [Dr. William H.] Masters and [Virginia] Johnson, Pat Mitchell, Dick Orkin and Bert Berdis, David Sheehan
USA | NBC | x60 minutes | July 24, 1978-January 4, 1979
Broadcast Mon-Fri. Noon-1 p.m.
