Jack Paar was not the first TV talk show host, but he revolutionized the genre with a brilliant mix of interesting guests and his own peculiar personality that was equal parts cerebral and emotional. This three-disc collection provides a stunning tribute to Paar's tenure on The Tonight Show and his subsequent weekly primetime specials. Disc one features the recent PBS documentary Jack Paar: Smart Television which includes Paar's extraordinary Havana interview with Fidel Castro and a rollicking musical comedy sequence with Paar playfully mixing up cue cards while Judy Garland and Robert Goulet belt out a medley. The second disc provides Paar's classic monologues (including his hilarious dark humor on the Cuban missile crisis) and his complete interviews with Richard Nixon, Barry Goldwater, Billy Graham, and Robert Kennedy, as well as a very unlikely (but pricelessly funny) piano-and-poetry recital by Liberace and Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali). The third disc offers three complete episodes of the weekly show The Jack Paar Program and features Richard Burton, Bill Cosby, and the classic moment when Bette Davis watches Jonathan Winters' wicked imitation of her acting (and her response: “Oh, Jonathan, drop dead!”). The material may be decades old, but much of it is truly timeless. Highly recommended. Editor's Choice. (P. Hall)
The Jack Paar Collection
Shout! Factory, 3 discs, 384 min., not rated, DVD: $29.98 Volume 19, Issue 5
The Jack Paar Collection
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