TV Host Lloyd Thaxton, Dies

Feedback.pdxradio.com message board: Archives: Portland radio archives: 2008: Oct, Nov, Dec -- 2008: TV Host Lloyd Thaxton, Dies
Author: Craig_adams
Wednesday, October 08, 2008 - 8:07 pm
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The Lloyd Thaxton Show was seen on KPTV weekday afternoons in 1964 at 4:30 and in 1965 at 5pm. The show ran an hour and was in ways like American Bandstand.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Lloyd Thaxton, an Emmy Award-winning producer and host of a popular Los Angeles television dance show that went national in the 1960s, died Sunday. He was 81.

Thaxton died of multiple myeloma at his home in Los Angeles, said his wife Barbara Thaxton.

Lloyd Thaxton was known for his comic lip-synching to rock 'n' roll songs on KCOP's "Lloyd Thaxton's Record Shop," which launched in 1959 and became a hit despite its limited budget and cardboard set. He used puppets, costumes, mime and "finger people" he drew on his thumb.

Three years later his show was revamped and renamed "Thaxton's Hop," before going national in 1964. The show was eventually renamed "The Lloyd Thaxton Show" and featured teenagers dancing to records and guest appearances by top recording artists such as Sonny and Cher and the Righteous Brothers.

He always signed off his shows by saying, "My name is Lloyd Thaxton," to which the teenage dancers would yell, "So what?"

He also worked as an Emmy Award-winning producer with the consumer advocacy program "Fight Back! With David Horowitz" and NBC's "The Today Show."
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This from All Access:

Lloyd Thaxton Dies At 81

Condolences to family and friends of LOS ANGELES television personality and producer LLOYD THAXTON, who died SUNDAY of multiple myeloma at his home in STUDIO CITY, CA at 81.

THAXTON, best known for his daily dance show "THE LLOYD THAXTON SHOW" on KCOP-TV/LOS ANGELES and in national syndication, on which he and guests comically lip-synced the hits, did a talk show for KABC-A/LOS ANGELES in 1973-74 and produced a series of radio dramas for MOBIL OIL. He was also the writer/producer/director for the syndicated TV show "FIGHT BACK! WITH DAVID HOROWITZ," hosted the ABC game show "FUNNY YOU SHOULD ASK" in 1968, and produced segments for NBC's "TODAY."
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From the oldies music news page:

Television dance host Lloyd Thaxton passed away Sunday (October 6) from multiple myeloma. He was 81. His career began in Toledo but he moved to Los Angeles in 1957 where he hosted “Lloyd Thaxton’s Record Shop” (later “Thaxton’s Hop” and then simply “The Lloyd Thaxton Show”) on KCOP. The show-- which featured dancing, but also lip synching, finger puppets and comedy-- entered syndication in 1964, where it lasted for eight years. His signature ending consisted of his saying, “I’m Lloyd Thaxton” before the audience shouted, “So what!”. Lloyd also founded Tiger Beat magazine and later produced the syndicated consumer program “Fight Back! With David Horowitz”.
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Special Thanks to Dirty Dave for giving me the heads up on his passing.

The Byrds on The Lloyd Thaxton Show:

http://www.laobserved.com/images/byrdsthaxton.jpg

Lloyd Thaxton:

http://www.metnews.com/articles/lloyd_thaxton.gif

Author: Littlesongs
Wednesday, October 08, 2008 - 9:44 pm
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The Lloyd Thaxton Show featured many acts including Peter, Paul & Mary in 1965, the Shangri-Las and a young Raquel Welch. As Craig posted, Lloyd was also the host of "Funny You Should Ask" in 1968.

By all accounts, he was a pioneer and a legend. Until very recently, Lloyd blogged quite a bit about his long and fascinating career. It included the May 5th entry, "THE DO-IT-YOURSELF-OBIT."

Yesterday, veteran television writer/director/producer Ken Levine wrote a very touching tribute to his old friend.

Author: Semoochie
Thursday, October 09, 2008 - 1:43 am
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"So What?" was the name of Lloyd Thaxton's theme song, which started right after the audience shouted the words. Later, he went for a college crowd and changed the theme to Herb Alpert's "So What's New?".

Author: Warner
Thursday, October 09, 2008 - 9:51 am
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The Lloyd Thaxton Show was so great! He was really funny, he had great guests, and I'll never forget the way he would take an album cover, cut the artists mouth, put the mouth on a paper tab, and then move the mouth to the artists song. (Really, it's way better than it sounds).

Thanks for the memories Lloyd!

Author: Bhone2000
Thursday, October 09, 2008 - 10:26 am
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Wow, so sad. I've been "blogging" with Lloyd off and on for a couple of years. His blogs were full of fun and trivia and clips of his shows. His last entry was in late July and then they suddenly stopped. Everyone has been really worried and of course our worst fears have been confirmed. Lloyd was readying a DVD set/retrospective of his 60's shows. He had been working on this for the last couple of years and from what I understand was very close to making it happen. I hope that his family or business partners make that dream a reality for all of us that grew up watching that crazy show. RIP Uncle Lloyd.

Author: Waynes_world
Thursday, October 09, 2008 - 12:23 pm
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I remember watching Lloyd on tv and was trying to remember what time it was on and what station.

Author: Scott_young
Thursday, October 09, 2008 - 7:14 pm
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Seems to me his show was on KPTV...?

Author: Robin_mitchell
Thursday, October 09, 2008 - 8:52 pm
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I recall first seeing Lloyd Thaxton on KPTV in the afternoon, around the time Addie Bobkins left to become "Bongo Bobby" at KCOP in L.A.

Author: Receptional
Thursday, October 09, 2008 - 10:21 pm
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http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0857191

Author: Valerie_ring
Friday, October 10, 2008 - 8:04 am
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Lloyd Thaxton had to straddle the line between bringing Top 40 music to a TV audience and conservative television management. Somehow he did it. I will always remember the longhair "thingy" that held a sign between commercial breaks saying "We'll be right back."

Author: Semoochie
Friday, October 10, 2008 - 10:10 am
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It's a "dawk" and I had one sitting on my dresser. I changed the signs about once a week.

Author: Bhone2000
Friday, October 10, 2008 - 10:17 am
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Here's a link to a photo of the "Dawk". My sister still has her's too.

http://bp1.blogger.com/_-seJHCmeNOE/Rjzm3B-vHNI/AAAAAAAAAEA/w4BC-DzwQds/s1600-h/ BLOG+-+DAWK+FOR+SALE.jpg

Author: Warner
Friday, October 10, 2008 - 1:36 pm
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I'm pretty sure it was Channel 12, and I think it was around 4pm or so.

Dang, I wish I had gotten a "Dawk"!

Author: Craig_adams
Friday, October 10, 2008 - 8:27 pm
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Scott, Robin & Warner: The answer to your question was posted in my first sentence when I began his thread. Let's review:

"The Lloyd Thaxton Show was seen on KPTV weekday afternoons in 1964 at 4:30 and in 1965 at 5pm. The show ran an hour and was in ways like American Bandstand."

Author: Scott_young
Friday, October 10, 2008 - 9:12 pm
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Well Craig...now you know how my wife feels! She often says I don't listen...

Author: Robin_mitchell
Friday, October 10, 2008 - 11:33 pm
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I saw your post, Craig. Knew you were right. I was merely adding color. I would never question your research.

Author: Craig_adams
Saturday, October 11, 2008 - 12:19 am
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Yeh, I forgot to post that yesterday. I got caught up answering a bunch of E-Mail questions from Barry Mishkind about early Portland radio. We were E-Mailing back and forth and it slipped my mind until I read Warner's post the next day. I thought, my god are we still not sure about KPTV !

Author: Bob_clarke
Saturday, October 11, 2008 - 12:59 am
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I remember going on the show in L.A. with a group of kids from my school and dancing. Fun.

Author: Jimbo
Saturday, October 11, 2008 - 2:47 am
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Actually, Robin wasn't questioning or wondering. He just stated what he remembered about the time and added an additional comment which had not been stated.

Author: Don_from_salem
Saturday, October 11, 2008 - 1:02 pm
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My favorite Lloyd Thaxton memory was when he would put a rubber mask over his hand and have it lip-sync to the deep parts of Johnny Cymbal's "Mr. Bass Man"...and one other that I can't recall at this moment.

Author: Waynes_world
Saturday, October 11, 2008 - 1:20 pm
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I know Addie Bobkins had guests on who lip synced the hits of the day. One I remember is the Beatles "You can't do that" was quite good. Did Lloyd do that too?

Author: Warner
Saturday, October 11, 2008 - 5:06 pm
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So Chris, I apologize. I was suffering from "paragraphitis", which is not completely reading and understanding any email or posting that is over 2 sentences.

I run into this syndrome all the time at work. Now, I'm guilty of it as well.

"Why me?"

Author: Semoochie
Sunday, October 12, 2008 - 1:43 am
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It seems like the "dawk" picture looks different than the one I had. It may have been an earlier or later generation. Mine looked like the one on the show.

Author: Jbm
Monday, October 13, 2008 - 11:10 am
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I remember watching Lloyd in the mid-60s when I came home from first or second grade. I grew up in suburban Detroit at a time when that new technology called UHF came into being, and the new UHF station WKBD needed programming to fill the time. Wasn't it just yesterday that he was a pretty young guy himself? It's sad to see these legends go away.

Author: Semoochie
Monday, October 13, 2008 - 7:56 pm
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First UHF station: KPTV channel 27, 1952

Author: Craig_adams
Monday, October 13, 2008 - 8:09 pm
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In The world.

Author: Semoochie
Monday, October 13, 2008 - 8:15 pm
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...and it's right there in the FCC Regs!

Author: Jimbo
Monday, October 13, 2008 - 10:11 pm
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Yeah, I was wondering about that new technology, UHF, in the mid-60's.
I remember when KPTV came on the air. We did not have a set but would gather in front of the local hardware store and watch it. Our first set was an old Capehart B/W my dad bought at the Meier & Frank Warehouse sale. It had only a VHF tuner and there was a channel 27 slug in the CH3 spot.


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