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| Joan Rivers in 1987. Getty Images. |
The recent death of Joan Rivers has brought to light the contribution she
has made to the cause of women in entertainment – and she did it in her own way
and she did it in the ‘80s.
Tonight show regular
My first introduction to Joan Rivers was on “Entertainment Tonight” where
it seemed they regularly talked about her appearances on “The Tonight Show with
Johnny Carson”. By the mid-80s she had become a regular guest host, especially
when Carson was on a break. That would all change with one fateful decision.
Experiment with Fox
It was 1986 when 20th Century Fox was planning to launch a
new television network, America’s fourth, in 1987. They approached Rivers to do
a late-night talk show, obviously based on the success she had achieved on “The
Tonight Show”. She would become the first woman to have her own talk show on a
major network. Unfortunately, nobody bothered to tell Carson.
“The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers” debuted in 1987 with the launch
of the new network, and it was directly opposite “The Tonight Show”. By then,
Carson had banned Rivers from “The Tonight Show”, something that was honoured
by Carson’s next two successors Jay Leno and Conan O’Brien. Worse yet, it was a
short-lived experiment. After challenging Fox executives, she and her husband
who was the show’s producer, were both fired in May of 1987.
She would rebound before the end of the decade with a daytime
talk-show entry called “The Joan Rivers Show”, which won her an Emmy soon
after.
Book ‘em
The other outstanding thing from the 1980s was a best seller she
penned called “The Life and Hard Times of Heidi Abramowitz”, which was a book
about her fictional stand-up character of the same name. It went on to become a best seller that
was eventually made into a TV special. Again, I heard about much of this on
“Entertainment Tonight”, because we rarely got any of this stuff on peasant
vision.
Still, Joan Rivers was a well-known commodity, and we did get to see
her in action during our summer holidays when she guest hosted “The Tonight Show”.
The years after
She went on to do more TV, some of it with her daughter Melissa, more
stand-up, and she hosted pre-awards shows for the Golden Globes and the Oscars.
The last few times I saw her, she was guest hosting on The Shopping Channel,
selling her own lines of cosmetics, clothing, and jewellery. The day after her
death, one of the TSC hosts dedicated his show to her memory.
Parting thoughts
Although I did not really hear a lot of Joan Rivers in the 1980s, and
actually saw her more the past decade or so, I was left with one lasting
impression: she said whatever was on her mind and really was not afraid to
offend anyone. It may have got her in trouble – and even fired – but it also
made her a leader and a trailblazer.
Much has been written about the talk show wars, revolving around
personalities such as Carson, Leno, David Letterman, and more. Since then there
have been others such as Conan O’Brien, Jimmy Fallon, and the like. Absent from
all these conversations, and the lists of hosts, are any notable women.
Joan Rivers was the first to have her own late-night show on a major
network. Sadly, she remains one of the only, and maybe the only. Yet her legacy
in this arena is unmistakable. She set the stage, and for that all aspiring
women in the entertainment industry should be thankful.
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