Beatles 50th Sullivan Anniversary Count Down…18 Days
Beatles 50th Sullivan Anniversary Count Down…18 Days
February 9, 1964 was The Beatles debut on American television but it was more than just a performance…it was a turning point for a country that was still in shock over the assassination of President Kennedy just a few short months before. We’ll count down till the celebration with photos and back stories that I hope you’ll share. In the photo below, we see Ed Sullivan conversing with the control room during rehearsal. There were actually four performances on February 9th….a 12 noon dress rehearsal and a 2 o’clock taping of two sets of songs that would air February 23rd. Then there was the 5 o’clock dress rehearsal for the 8 o’clock live show. There were three audiences that day as the noon rehearsal was closed. 50,000 ticket requests came in but only three audiences of 700 were able to be there live. Notice in this photo, Ed has a spare Q card lashed to the boom stand…he also reads from a paper toll teleprompter on the front of Camera 1, but just to make sure he doesn’t flub is intro, he had it put in two places. It was quite a day.
They are still used for every SNL, Christina. In fact, they use multiple sets of cue cards so that different cast members can see them from different directions on the set. Also Dave Letterman and Jimmy Fallon use hand-held hand-written cards too. I wouldn’t be surprised if Jay Leno and Jimmy Kimmel do as well.
Over here in the U.K. cue cards used to be called ‘idiot boards’.
Wow, hand written cue cards!