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Toast of the Town

The Ed Sullivan Show
Ed Sullivan.jpg
Ed Sullivan
Also known as Toast of the Town
Genre Variety
Sketch Comedy
Presented by Ed Sullivan
Narrated by
(announcer)
Theme music composer Ray Bloch
Opening theme "Toast of the Town"
Country of origin United States
Original language(s) English
No. of seasons 24
No. of episodes 1068
Production
Executive producer(s) Ed Sullivan
Producer(s)
Location(s) Ed Sullivan Theater
New York
Camera setup Multi-camera
Running time 48–50 minutes
Release
Original network CBS
Picture format
Audio format Monaural
Original release June 20, 1948 (1948-06-20) – June 6, 1971 (1971-06-06) (22 years, 11 months, and 17 days)

The Ed Sullivan Show is an American TV variety show that ran on CBS from Sunday June 20, 1948, to Sunday June 6, 1971, and was hosted by New York entertainment columnist Ed Sullivan. It was replaced in September 1971 by the CBS Sunday Night Movie, a single season failure.

In 2002, The Ed Sullivan Show was ranked #15 on TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time. In 2013, the series finished No. 31 in TV Guide Magazine's 60 Best Series of All Time.

From 1948 until its cancellation in 1971, the show ran on CBS every Sunday night from 8–9 p.m. E.T., and is one of the few entertainment shows to have run in the same weekly time slot on the same network for more than two decades. (During its first season, it ran from 9 to 10 p.m. E.T.) Virtually every type of entertainment appeared on the show; opera singers, popular artists, songwriters, comedians, ballet dancers, dramatic actors performing monologues from plays, and circus acts were regularly featured. The format was essentially the same as vaudeville, and although vaudeville had died a generation earlier, Sullivan presented many ex-vaudevillians on his show.

Originally co-created and produced by Marlo Lewis, the show was first titled Toast of the Town, but was widely referred to as The Ed Sullivan Show for years before September 25, 1955, when that became its official name. In the show's June 20, 1948 debut, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis performed along with singer Monica Lewis and Broadway composers Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II previewing the score to their then-new show South Pacific, which opened on Broadway in 1949.


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