ULTRA RARE! Joan Rivers Debuts Her Own Show…September 1968

ULTRA RARE! Joan Rivers Debuts Her Own Show…September 1968

Until yesterday, Joan Rivers was a pioneer in every way and we will miss her! 46 years ago this month, ‘That Show With Joan Rivers’ debuted as one of daytime television’s first ever syndicated talk shows. Like Joan, the show was a bit ahead of it’s time and only lasted one season. This was her first solo enterprise on television.

This video is the debut episode…the topic is one that opens itself to “a river” of double entendres and puns, nudism. Joan’s guests are a lady who owns a nudist camp and her great friend, Johnny Carson. Her emotional intro of Johnny comes around 4:40.

This was shot at NBC New York and I think was done on the third floor in either 3A, 3B or 3K. It could have also come from 8G as at the time, I don’t think there was permanent seating in these studios. Anyone know?

The show’s producer, JEM Productions was owned by Joan and her husband Edgar Rosenberg. Joan often made fun of Edgar for being so cheap, and in this case, the story is true! It takes a lot of expensive video tape to syndicate a show and as the story goes, every couple of days, Edgar and company went dumpster diving for old video tape at the networks and production houses in New York.

Sorry for all the commercials here, but this Hulu video is the only place on the net this rare gem is available. In the monologue, you can see a couple of the RCA TK41s, but later in the Q&A session there are some good shots of the cameras around 17 minutes in. Enjoy and share because this is the only place you’ll ever see this! – Bobby Ellerbee

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dw5RNYi5Vg&ab_channel=WOLFTV-VIDEO

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