Reseda High School Class of 1966 Web Site
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Reseda High School Class of 1966 Web Site
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| To my surprise, on February 26, 2004, I found myself invited to accept an award given by the Christopher Society to Art Linkletter. I received the invitation through the help of this website, plus a recommendation from Gary, and also because I just happen to be living reasonably close to the place where the award ceremony was located: New York City. The Christopher Society was founded 55 years ago by a Jesuit priest who worried about the power of the media to promote violence and negativity. So he and some like-minded friends started this group to honor people in the worlds of books, TV and films who manage to do creative, high-quality work that's also positive and uplifting. They decided to give Art Linkletter a lifetime achievement award because of all his projects "that promote the highest values of the human spirit," in their words. I was one of the kids Art interviewed on his "House Party" program, and since Art was unable to attend the award ceremony in person, the Christophers asked me to give a little speech on his behalf. In order to do this, I arranged a brief phone conversation with Art at his home in Los Angeles. He's 91 now but still seemed alert and lively, and his voice was strong. Based on what he told me, here's the speech I delivered to the gathering of the society on the 26th, in the Time-Life building in Manhattan: |
As one of the nearly 27,000 children who appeared on the "House Party" during its 26-year run and on behalf of Art Linkletter himself, I am pleased to accept this award. He is in Europe on business and unable to be here tonight. (How's that for life at 91?) But when I spoke with him on Monday, he said he preferred that one of "his kids," as he calls us, the kids he interviewed, represent him here -- because of all the things he's done, he's proudest of his work with children.
He has written 27 books, received 17 honorary degrees, served on numerous Presidential commissions and as Ambassador to Australia, pursued all sorts of business ventures. But he wants to be remembered, he said, as the guy who first gave kids a presence and a voice on television -- not as little actors or budding professional performers but just as themselves, before a live audience, spontaneous, uncoaxed, unrehearsed.
He was an orphan, a poor kid who hung out mainly at the local YMCA, he told me, and he thought perhaps one day he'd head some branch of the Y. As he grew older, he did all sorts of jobs to support himself and his young family, including a part-time gig as a radio announcer. One day he decided to interview his 5-year-old son, Jack, after his first day in school. Man-on-the-street style interviews were still a novelty then, and the listeners' response to his chat with Jack was overwhelming. They loved it!
He began doing more candid interviews on radio and eventually on television. His favorites were always his conversations with children. He found to his delight that they said the darnedest things.
For the "House Party" program, he let schools pick the participants. He asked only that they be reasonably smart and extroverted 5-to-10 year olds (old enough to be articulate and frank, he had concluded, but not so old that they're coy or cynical.) "Send me the kids you'd most like to get out of the classroom for a few hours," he told teachers who asked. They never sent him one he couldn't handle.
I met Art when I was 8 years old. A long black limousine pulled up to our elementary school on April 2, 1957, and what everyone involved, including some folks on Art's staff, still remembers about that day is that I was so excited that I lost my breakfast on the way to the CBS studios in Hollywood. I remember how kind the House Party people were at what was obviously an embarrassing moment for me. But this was Art's version of reality TV, no pre-taping allowed. The staff just managed to clean and dry my dress before the program began.
And then there was Art and the live studio audience. The four of us from Vanalden Avenue Elementary School in Reseda, California -- Gary Mussell, Ronnell Seveland, Jonathan Lee and me -- were perched on chairs on an elevated platform on which Art sat, at our eye level. He had the look of a playful and comic uncle who was enjoying himself, and hoped we were, too.
Near the end of our interview, he asked me, "What would you like to be when you grow up?" "A writer," I replied. "So if I were Prince Charming and you were Sleeping Beauty, and I awakened you in your castle and said, 'Will you marry me?' what would you say, he asked? And I burst out, "No, you're too old!!!"
If it seems odd, in light of all this, that I'm the one representing Art Linkletter tonight, I would just say what he himself knew better than almost anyone. "People are funny!" And Art, who loved us warts and all, is pleased and honored to accept your lifetime achievement award.
-- Judith Gaines,
February 26, 2004