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New Film Chronicles The Week A Surprise Host Took Over ‘The Tonight Show’

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It’s something even the most well-versed TV historian may have missed.

For one week in 1968, Harry Belafonte, the actor, singer and activist, took over Johnny Carson’s seat on The Tonight Show. Belafonte put together a diverse lineup of guests, highlighted by interviews conducted with Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy just months before the two leaders were assassinated.

Belafonte shined a light on race and social issues through a lens that Carson’s viewers—largely characterized as white and Midwestern—may not have seen before.

The height of the civil rights movement was arguably the height of Johnny Carson’s power as a late-night host—before cable, social unrest and greater competition encroached on his audience. While the host admittedly didn’t always feel comfortable addressing issues of race himself, he entrusted Belafonte with a powerful platform to do so, and it made a strong impact still being seen today.

Director Yoruba Richen explores the legacy of Belafonte’s guest stint in the new documentary The Sit-In, which premieres tomorrow on Peacock, NBC’s new streaming network.

“When I was approached by the producers to direct this film, I was amazed I had not heard of this week,” Richen says. “And I consider myself pretty up on African-American history, so I was immediately intrigued that I didn’t know about this one.”

Richen and her team began to dig into the history. What they found surprised and inspired Richen.

She was familiar with Belafonte’s career, of course (who isn’t?), but she didn’t grasp the depth of his work as an activist. “I didn’t realize his album with Day-O was such a huge success. There were so many aspects of him I did not know the complete story about, and it was such a pleasure to find that out and think, ‘Oh, this person is really groundbreaking, we’re so lucky to be able to interview him about it and that he’s here with us,” Richen says.

Much of the film from that week of Tonight was lost. But Richen does air excerpts of Belafonte’s interview with Kennedy, where he discusses race relations in-depth and voices views that evolved throughout his political career. As she notes, the JFK-era Bobby Kennedy was very different from the 1968 one.

Belafonte also displayed a personal side on the program by airing home movies shot with his wife, kids and friends, showing white Americans a Black family man at home, something they rarely glimpsed in the still-largely segregated nation.  

“Just having that record, those films, is amazing. You see the Belafonte family water skiing. Mavis Staples is hanging out on their boat, Lena Horne. It’s priceless in terms of seeing that relaxed nature of just hanging out at that time,” Richen says.

Also striking: The way Belafonte’s marriage of personal and political on the air foreshadowed the big trend in late night that emerged decades later. His approach arguably paved the way for comedians such as Trevor Noah and Stephen Colbert. Richen recognizes and makes that connection.

“He was the first person to do it, to get two pillars of politics on the show [Kennedy and King] talking about real issues, and I think it did set the stage for the more politically active stuff we see now,” she says.

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