December 18, 1956…’To Tell The Truth’ Debuts On CBS…Rare Pilot Episode
December 18, 1956…’To Tell The Truth’ Debuts On CBS…Rare Pilot Episode
AMAZING! Here is the pilot for the show and you won’t believe the host and panel! The host was Mike Wallace. On the panel…Dick Van Dyke, John Cameron Swayze, Polly Bergen and actress Hildy Park.
The show, which debuted 60 years ago today, was created by Bob Stewart and produced by Goodson-Todman Productions and was to have premiered on Tuesday, December 18, 1956, in CBS prime time as ‘Nothing But The Truth’, but the program title was changed to ‘To Tell The Truth’ the day before the show’s debut. The show originated from CBS Studio 52, moving to Studio 50 late in its run.
After CBS bought the show, but before it debuted, Bud Collier was chosen to host as Wallace had begun to feel he had rather become a news man and needed to get away from entertainment and commercial roles.
Mark Goodson and Bill Todman were seeking to replicate the success of their ‘What’s My Line’ show, but ‘To Tell the Truth’ was unique in that this was one of the few shows where the home audience didn’t know the answer as the panel asked questions. We at home could play right along.
An odd “vibe” must have been present on the set for some years there. Host Collyer was one of the more outspoken pro-blacklisting voices in AFTRA, the TV performers’ union. He was all for purging TV of performers and staffers with “pinko” connections…but a lot of those folks worked on TTTT. Mark Goodson was among the few producers willing to stand up to demands that he drop performers who’d been fingered as un-American by Red Channels or other such institutions. He’d resisted demands that he fire Henry Morgan off ‘I’ve Got a Secret’ and he often hired panelists like Orson Bean and John Henry Faulk.
Bean and Faulk won a union election over a Collyer-backed slate on these issues and Faulk later won a major lawsuit over his blacklisting. Still, from all reports, Collyer was a professional and a gentleman to all on ‘To Tell the Truth’.
The original TTTT ended its prime-time run on May 22, 1967. A daytime version which had started in June of ’62 continued on until September of ’68. That was the end of the Collyer version but others would follow. You must see some of this video! -Bobby Ellerbee
What fun!
In later years during syndication the show was done at NBC Studio 6A with Gary Moore as host.
The title was changed after the tickets were printed. Here’s a ticket to the second broadcast.
Wallace got his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame before 60 Minutes ever premiered. He was that famous.