Name: Talk-Radio Profiles: Larry King & Tom Snyder, April 1989
Uploaded: 2021-01-24T03:08:31.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Talk-Radio Profiles: Larry King & Tom Snyder, April 1989' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-01-24. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Talk-Radio Profiles: Larry King & Tom Snyder, April 1989' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-01-24. Transcript available.

And its late-night national audience is estimated at three to four million.
Ali could tell you who hits harder between Foreman and Lister.
King's popularity led to a separate television program on CNN.
But that dark, lonely radio studio near Washington, D.C. is the place where he
seems most at home.
It's the only way that his life seems to make sense.
If he doesn't have this outlet, his life is virtually meaningless.
I've never heard Batman frame quite so well.
Thank you, sir.
In radio, we're just sort of letting it happen.
A Batmanologist.
I've never screened a call in my life.
I like interviewing. I like that openness. I like the wacko who gets in
occasionally.
You're really kind of a freak.
What do you mean a freak?
That's complimentary.
I like someone who's a little off the market. It's kind of like a slice of life.
Now that's a Hummer.
This renaissance of radio conversation in the 80s includes another nationally
known host,
who first became famous on late-night television in the 70s.
Tom Snyder.
He still works the late shift, although since October of 1987,
he's done it from an ABC radio studio in Los Angeles, coast to coast on 180
stations.
On television, I never know what's on their minds.
I don't know what they're thinking when they're watching.
Here, I can tell immediately if they're with it or against it.
I've got to say that I'm immensely dissatisfied with the state of our nation
right now.
We're cutting down the roads for us.
We're...
Poverty's going on.
I'll tell you something, my friend.
There's something going on on AM radio.
I don't know what it is, but it's doing real good.
We'll be right back after these messages.
In fact, from broadcasting towers around the country,
you can hear the voices of an estimated 40 talk hosts syndicated on radio
networks
and 1,000 others talking night and day at local radio stations.
Do you feel power from this show?
Yes.
Do you think this show is a powerful media approach for you?
It's more powerful than you could possibly imagine
because powerful people in this country hear the least powerful in this country
and they respond.
Whereas anyone has a voice and wants getting...
Because they preside over national audiences,
linking listeners as if they were all meeting in the same backyard,
we sat in with King on the East Coast
and Snyder on the West Coast
to see how the process works.
You know, you had your show there.
In the first hours, live guests,
Smokey Robinson on this night,
helped draw in the listeners.
Rap on, brother.
But the nightly mix inevitably boils down to dialogue
between the hosts and the callers.
Two questions regarding...
And so, with the help of the show's producers,
we also placed camera crews with the people who complete the connection.
Hello, Tom.
Hi, Mary Lou. You're on.
And what we got was a picture of a late-night subculture
that is talk radio's heart and soul.
You've had some good shows this last week,
and I've had more fun listening to them.
Mary Lou Hathaway, who's a regular caller to Tom Snyder,
usually dials in from a phone booth in Yucca Valley, California.
She has no home phone.
You're out in the country here tonight, aren't you, Mary Lou?
You're outside at a phone booth.
He is filling a void that has been in my life the last few months.
I'm in the middle of a divorce.
A lot of times I'm lonely in the evening.
I don't have that much money to go out and do whatever single people do.
He's like a big brother and a friend at a time in my life when I need that.
I'm lucky in that I can connect with situations.
I can connect with people's predicaments
because I've heard about them before.
It's just a more relaxed and a far more intimate way of broadcasting.
There's something about people who stay up late at night
that is different from people who get up earlier in the morning.
They're loyal to a fault.
They're loyal to me here as Larry's are to him.
I'm Worcester, Massachusetts.
Hello.
Hi, Larry.
Hi.
Once in a while, you know, you hear about this airplane going down.
And I think, you know, they're getting too old.
While some people listen for the companionship,
others are in it for the debate and the education.
It's to me working plus, you know, coming here,
it's like a night school because I learn a lot.
At the Treat Me Donuts Bakery in Worcester, Massachusetts,
a Lebanese immigrant named Sade Sade is making donuts
for the next morning's customers.
And on this night, mulling over the connections
between international politics and airplane maintenance.
If you compare the states with the Aeroflot,
you know, the Soviet airlines...
If Aeroflot had an accident, you'd hear about it.
They report that now.
Yeah, right, but, I mean, they don't have it as much...
It's a topic that could go down like a lead balloon
in the interest of a few million other listeners,
but that's where King's skill comes in,
turning the conversation another direction
and adding a twist of humor.
What are you doing right now?
Uh, I'm making the donuts.
You're a donut baker.
Right.
Basically, you don't like donuts, do you, sir?
Not really.
In fact, you're the kind of guy that likes Aeroflot airliners.
And you hate donuts.
No, no, no.
In fact, sir, I think you're a KGB agent.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, come on.
You fight me out, Larry.
Leave it between you and me.
Okay.
Thank you.
There he goes.
Because all this happens late at night,
rating surveys are limited,
and there is no standard profile of who the average listener is.
It's why are you up tonight?
But Larry King does his own informal survey once a year,
and it turns up an assortment of fiercely loyal fans.
55-year-old Shirley Duffy even takes tapes of the King's show on vacation with
her
when she leaves the country.
Winchester, Massachusetts, why are you up?
I'm up specifically to listen to you, as I do every night.
It's very nice to talk to you.
I'm a long-time admirer.
Would you say you're addicted?
I'm afraid so.
My guess used to be that the person calling was a good bet to be alone.
Lately, I hear a lot of people with people in the background,
or, keep quiet, Martha, I'm on the phone.
My husband goes to sleep early.
He doesn't say that damn Larry King shut him off.
He says you're there.
He's glad, oh, hey.
The thing I'm most surprised at on my show
is the amount of young callers
and the amount of college students who listen.
Larry.
I've always been fascinated how you know which city.
New York City, hello.
Okay, Minnesota.
Cocoa, Florida, hello.
I just thought you did it off the top of your head,
or you added some kind of a Ouija microphone.
Roanoke, hello.
There are producers who answer the phones first
and take down basic information.
Selma, turn down your radio and hang on, please.
It's UNTS all alone on the telephone.
For instance, on Tom Snyder's show,
a producer takes the name and location of each caller
and then types them onto a computer screen,
first come, first served,
that Snyder can read in the studio.
Here's Chip in Washington, D.C.
Hi, Chip, you're on.
Many of the names are familiar.
Snyder knows that if a call comes in
from Washington, D.C. actor Chip Brienza,
it may mean a little craziness.
Can you hear that now, Tom?
Yes, it's popping.
We got popcorn.
We're getting a little bit of smoke, yeah?
That's all right, all right.
Sometimes it'll be too serious,
and I'll call to say something funny, I hope.
If you hear someone like Brienza fairly regularly,
it's not because he knows any secrets
about how to get on a talk show.
Delicious, Tom.
It's because, surprisingly,
only about 2% of the talk radio listeners
ever actually call in.
And among that subculture of a subculture,
Brienza says there are unwritten rules of behavior.
You get the feeling that people are really saying
what they feel and what they think
and what they believe,
a kind of respect for other people's ideas.
But more importantly than that,
there's a kind of code of conduct.
What?
You don't sound Christian-like.
When our children are threatened by you Jews,
you walk with that mayor, that Jewish mayor,
I get extremely mad.
What happens when the code of conduct is broken?
What is the point of this?
There's a tape delay of a few seconds,
so profanity can be bleeped before it hits the air.
But short of that,
knowing how to keep control of the spontaneity
is how the hosts earn their money.
I get the call, it says, Cincinnati.
And the guy says, this is God.
And I want to talk to America through your show.
And I said, what are you doing in Cincinnati?
I mean, if you said Vegas,
okay, you know, Cincinnati.
Well, one of the qualities that people seem to like
about those talk shows late at night
is that they do draw an imaginary picture
of other places and other people.
And from listening,
Jim Blackwell, who drives a cab in New York City,
can concoct descriptions of a land he doesn't see
and a light that's shining somewhere else.
It's kind of a beacon in the night.
The callers come from all different backgrounds,
all different places.
And yet, uh, there's a kind of closeness
in that everybody is listening to the same show
in the middle of the night.
I don't care if I never get back for it.
Let him finish opera.
I have $1.86.
She'll give it to you right away
and let him finish the song.
We're on the air.
Go ahead.
When New York had a lot of children,
they didn't know what to do it.
They put them on the train
and sent them out here with...
Did they know that you were coming on the train?
Yeah.
Oh, that's terrific.
I will tell you...
I'm not here to save the world.
I'm here to inform and entertain
as many people as want to click on the old radio at night
and turn off the television.
Okay, good night, Tom.
Maybe I've laughed a little
or maybe felt like crying.
So I'm coming away with maybe learning something, too.
Tomorrow night, Tom,
we're going to make something very simple,
very quick, very easy, coffee.
Okay.
All you need is a pot, some water.
I'm Tom Snyder,
and you've been on the radio show now
in Los Angeles, California.
Sweet dreams and sleep tight, America.
Good night, everybody.