With the recent announcement that the producers of the Chicago-based Steve Harvey Show are contemplating a move out of Chicago, the Chicago Tribune recently ran an article in their Sunday entertainment section (January 24,) chronicling Chicago’s history in the talk show, or gabfest, genre which will have ended with the departure of the Steve Harvey Show.
The article bespoke as much about Chicago journalist’s approach to the entertainment business as it did to the history of Chicago talk show production. The article began with the Phil Donahue Show in 1974, although Chicago’s history in the talk genre far precedes Donahue, and included nine other shows that followed Donahue from the long-running Oprah Winfrey Show to the quickly forgotten Rosie Show and ended with the the Steve Harvey Show, the last remaining Chicago originated show. The article provided a brief description of each show and their most memorable moments, if any, but nothing about their business structures, why they left or how they came to be here in the first place.
All of the ten talk shows were independently produced and nationally syndicated. In fact, the syndicated program industry was started in Chicago early in the radio era even as the dominant network, NBC, tried to crush it aborning. Ironically, the syndicator of the Steve Harvey Show is NBC Universal. The network that tried to kill syndication is now a syndicator. It was also NBC Universal that syndicated the Jerry Springer Show and the Steve Wilkos Show which they moved to Connecticut in 2009. Why? Generous tax credits! It was crony capitalism. Play it or lose. Chicago couldn’t or wouldn’t match, so Chicago’s television production industry atrophied.
As for Steve Harvey, it doesn’t seem logical that he ever was here. He has a radio program in LA, he hosts a game show in LA, he is the co-producer with Ellen DeGeneres of a new LA based NBC variety show for children, his producer is Endemol which is based in LA and his syndicator, NBC Universal, has most of their operations in LA or Connecticut. His purported reason for wanting to move to LA, the lack of celebrities in Chicago, makes no sense unless he changes the show format into something that appeals to celebrities. Considering his workload, it seems more logical to assume he is just tired of the long commute for one show.
For more about Chicago’s once thriving program production industry, read Chicago’s Radio and Television Industry History.
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