Bozo's Circus: The 1960s on WGN 2/17/2019

WGN-TV TO PREMIERE “BOZO’S CIRCUS: THE 1960s” SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 17 AT 7PM

Ever since WGN aired the special "Bozo's Circus: The Lost Tape" (consisting of segments of two 1971 shows recently rediscovered) I have wished they would do a similar 1960s themed show.

This will be awesome. If it's like the "Lost Tape" special, these skits will play in real time as originally aired. There is less than three hours of professional video in existence from this era. I'm glad this will be two hours long. It will be interesting to see what's included.

Can't wait!

 

I was a huge fan of BOZO! maybe we'll get a home video release...

 

I was a Chicago Bozo kid, a very large part of my 5 day a week childhood experience.

 

I would love that. But according to those in the know, the obstacle (besides 99% of the shows having been erased) is that the Bozo trademark is owned by the Larry Harmon estate, and the cost of licensing the rights would be astronomical. (Apparently they have looked into it.) But a few clips did make it into an installment of the PBS "Pioneers Of Television" series called "Local Kids TV," and that's available on DVD. It's something, I guess.

The nationally syndicated Bozo (produced in Boston in the mid-1960s) has two DVD sets comprising 59 episodes between them. But Boston's Bozo is very different from Chicago's.

 

thanks for the info...that is just too bad for us. : (

 

Non Chicagoans never had a Bozo as great as ours.

 

It will be streamed on WGN.com

 

We had two different Bozos. The original, Bob McNeo, on WWJ and then when his franchise was suddenly pulled By Harmon, then it was handed to Art Cervi on Windsor CKLW. He then reinvented himself as "Oopsie the Clown" and remained beloved. He just never said "Whoa Nellie" anymore.
Detroit Kid Show Page!

 

Here is the only surviving COMPLETE 1960s "Bozo's Circus" on professional color video. Airdate: March 27, 1968.

(There is one extant "Big Top" -- weekly evening version of the show with taped repeated skits. It is the final show dated January 4, 1967. A third tape consists of segments from various shows.)

Miraculously, the "Fuzzy Memories" Facebook page has THREE additional shows posted, one each from 1969, 1970 and 1971, which have only recently been found. But they are black and white home recordings, and the technical quality leaves something to be desired. But it's incredible that they exist at all.

 

I used to watch this in the early 90's when I was a young teenager just because it was so entertaining.

 

Yes, it aired from 1961 to 2001. Quite a run.

 

I get WGN and love all those shows about their old shows! Garfield Goose and the old Christmas/Hardrock/Suzy Snowflake shorts come to mind.

And anyway, aren't we all really on the Bozo bus if you think about it?

 

It was great when you were sick and stayed home from school in those days you could watch Bozo at 12:00. Also got to watch all of The Ray Rayner Show and Garfield Goose.

 

I lived in Grand Rapids Michigan and we had our own Bozo the Clown on WZZM channel 13 from the 60's to the 90's.

 

Thanks for the updates on the few shows surviving in Color and B&W online.

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Just curious but any idea which version we would have gotten in New York in the 60s?

 

Growing up in Chicago I got to go to a live Bozo show or two around 1964-ish. My friend got to squeeze his nose but it didn't honk. Later at school several classmates saw us "on TV" - where his nose gave a big honk when my friend squeezed it. Funny looking back on it now. One thing I remember too, and a bit of a disappointment - where'd the cartoons go?

 

A bunch of them were released on VHS. Also, there were two sets of the 1965-66 "Bozo's Big Top" shows (produced in Boston) released on DVD, and each show has a Bozo cartoon.

WGN ran the cartoons, I think three days a week or something, until the early 1980s when they only appeared occasionally. Maybe there was a minimum requirement, because it seemed like a few would be on, maybe all in the same week, and then they'd disappear again. I do remember they were brought back weekly after the show moved to Sunday mornings.

 

Bozo the Clown / NYC's Bozo ShowNew York City Local TV Stars

 

No problem. It seems that like lost silent films, they can be written off but then once in a great while, there is a surprise rediscovery.

 

Willard Scott also portrayed Bozo for a few years in DC

 

Johnny Jellybean!

 

Here's some background information on Bozo I got from www.skooldays.com while looking for information on the Los Angeles area Bozo show from the late '50s and '60s:

"In 1946, creator Alan W. Livingston and Capitol Records introduced Bozo the Clown to the world in a children’s record entitled Bozo at the Circus. The album, which featured an illustrative read-along book set (the first of its kind), lasted for an astounding 200 weeks on Billboard’s Best Selling Children’s Records Chart, and a clown star was born.

The first version of the TV show, Bozo's Circus, appeared on KTTV in Los Angeles in 1949 and starred Pinto Colvig, the voice of Bozo on the records. The clown wore white face makeup, a red nose, tufts of red hair and a blue one-piece suit on this live half-hour circus show. This version of the show aired until 1950.

Capitol Records' new TV head Elmo Williams produced 13 half-hour Bozo episodes which starred Syd Saylor as Bozo and Alan Livingston as the ringmaster.

In 1956, Larry Harmon bought the franchise rights to Bozo, which by this time had generated record sales in excess of $20 million. Harmon adopted the idea of a daily half-hour show with a live Bozo, a studio audience of children, and five-minute cartoons, packaged and franchised to different markets across the country. In 1959 the idea took hold, and Harmon soon had 100 Bozos in the U.S. with additional clowns in Germany, France and Japan. The new Bozos had to learn such phrases as “What are you doodly-do-doing?” and “Wowie kazowee!” ("Kazowee" loosely translated in Japanese is "kazowee." Really.)

By the mid 1960’s, Bozo was grossing over $150 million in merchandise worldwide.

The most successful Bozo in the franchise debuted at WGN in Chicago in 1960, and has been airing continuously since 1961. The show’s popularity created a ten-year waiting list and celebrated The Bozo 25th Aniversary Special in 1986.

The Los Angeles version of Bozo featured his sidekick “Butch” from the cartoons, but with a twist; one audience member won the coveted role of “Butch For a Day.” The lucky tyke was given a Butch suit and got to assist the great clown on stage for the duration of the episode. This usually guaranteed the child great success on the school playground for many weeks afterward. Ironically, KTLA chose Vance Colvig, Jr., son of original Bozo Pinto Colvig, to portray the character.

Over the decades, dozens of men have donned the big shoes, rubber nose and bright red wig. The most famous graduate of the University of Bozo was former Today Show weatherman Willard Scott, but producer Larry Harmon’s preference was for Boston’s Bozo, Frank Avruch. Harmon tried to market Avruch as the only Bozo in 1965, but met with resistance from half of the stations as they all wanted to keep their own Bozos.

The most successful portrayer of Bozo to date is Bob Bell, who starred as WGN's Bozo from 1960 until 1984. Joey D'Auria took over the role and continues to do so, as WGN plans to keep the laughs coming well into the new century."

 

And they did. The show lasted until 2001.