The David Susskind Show

"Open End" redirects here. For the outdoor sculpture in Cincinnati, Ohio, see Open End (sculpture).

The David Susskind Show
Genre	Talk show
Presented by	David Susskind
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
No. of seasons	29
Production
Production company	Pamandia
Original release
Network	WNTA (1958–1961) Syndicated (1961–1986)
Release	1958 – 1986

The David Susskind Show is an American television talk show hosted by David Susskind. The program began in 1958 as Open End, and was broadcast by WNTA-TV (now WNET) in New York City. The title referred to the fact that the program continued until Susskind or his guests were too tired to continue late on a Sunday night.

Overview

Susskind's interview of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, which aired in October 1960, during the height of the Cold War, generated national attention. It is one of the very few talk show telecasts from that long ago that was preserved and can be viewed today.

In 1961, Open End was limited to two hours and went into national syndication. Susskind did a two-hour interview including commercials with Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1963, two months before the civil rights leader delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech. The New York Times reported what it considered the highlight of the interview on its front page: "The civil rights approach of the Kennedy Administration as compared with that of the Eisenhower Administration has merely substituted 'an inadequate approach for a miserable one,' the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. declared yesterday." Few people have seen the video, which belongs to Historic Films Archive, since 1963.

The title of Susskind's talk show was changed from Open End to The David Susskind Show for its telecast on Sunday night, October 2, 1966.

On October 10th, 1971, the show invited seven lesbian women to be on a panel for a segment called "Women Who Love Women". One of the panelists was Barbara Gittings, including her as the first out lesbians ever to appear on a national broadcast. This segment is remembered for Gittings saying, “Homosexuals today are taking it for granted that their homosexuality is not at all something dreadful – it’s good, it’s right, it’s natural, it’s moral, and this is the way they are going to be!”.

In May 1973, to acknowledge Digestive Disease Week, the show invited three gastroenterologists to discuss therapies for peptic ulcer. Viewer William Dufty had bet that "These three distinguished specialists could go on for the entire ninety minutes without ever mentioning the word sugar." Afterward he noted, "In ninety minutes, they were unable to come up with a single constructive suggestion for the average person to manage their diet in a way that might prevent ulcers."

A December 16, 1981 debate on chiropractic had as participants, among others, Stephen Barrett, a psychiatrist, consumer activist, medical writer and skeptic nowadays mostly known as the webmaster of Quackwatch, and Chester Wilk, a chiropractor who was the plaintiff in Wilk v. American Medical Ass'n.

The show continued until its New York outlet cancelled it in 1986, approximately six months before Susskind died.

References

• "SUSSKIND, DAVID: U.S. Producer and Talk Show Host". Museum of Broadcast Communications
• [1]. Council of the City of Philadelphia

External links

• Open End/The David Susskind Show at IMDb
• Sound recordings of the Open End television program are available for listening at the Hoover Institution Archives