Television
Colonna left the Hope show as a regular in 1950, but he continued appearing with Hope on holiday television specials and live shows. He hosted his own television comedy series, The Jerry Colonna Show which lasted a single season.
He was host of the "Revenge with Music" episode on The Colgate Comedy Hour in 1954. His TV work also included serving as the second and last ringmaster/host/performer on Super Circus (1955–56), The Gale Storm Show (1959), a version of Babes in Toyland on Shirley Temple's Storybook in 1960 and a guest role as Dr. Mann in "Don't Look a Gift Horse in the Mouth," a 1966 episode of The Monkees. Jerry Colonna also appeared in a 1965 episode of McHale's Navy. In the episode "Hello McHale?-Colonna" McHale's men meet the famous WWII troubadour who promises to do a show for them at their Tarratupa base. However, when the men learn that shows are limited to bases that have a 50-bed hospital, they take steps to correct the shortage. This disrupts Captain Binghamton's base hospital inspection by the Admiral who is looking for overcrowded hospitals and malingering patients, thereby putting Binghamton in the hot seat again.
Colonna also appeared in one of the oldest surviving kinescope recordings of a live television broadcast, from 1947
Read more about this topic: Jerry Colonna (entertainer)
Famous quotes containing the word television:
“Television is an excellent system when one has nothing to lose, as is the case with a nomadic and rootless country like the United States, but in Europe the affect of television is that of a bulldozer which reduces culture to the lowest possible denominator.”
—Marc Fumaroli (b. 1932)
“In full view of his television audience, he preached a new religion—or a new form of Christianity—based on faith in financial miracles and in a Heaven here on earth with a water slide and luxury hotels. It was a religion of celebrity and showmanship and fun, which made a mockery of all puritanical standards and all canons of good taste. Its standard was excess, and its doctrines were tolerance and freedom from accountability.”
—New Yorker (April 23, 1990)
“The technological landscape of the present day has enfranchised its own electorates—the inhabitants of marketing zones in the consumer goods society, television audiences and news magazine readerships... vote with money at the cash counter rather than with the ballot paper at the polling booth.”
—J.G. (James Graham)