BLACK MUSIC MOMENT #96: Short-Lived Integration Of The Buddy Deane Show. You are watching the "Buddy Deane Show." "The Buddy Deane Show" defined a new generation of rock & roll as well as dance on television in the late 1950s. Every weekday afternoon, in each of these broadcast markets, these shows presented images of exclusively white dancers and rendered black youth as second-class teenagers. And because a new dance was introduced practically every week, you had to watch every day to keep up. 'Buddy' Deane; www.WashingtonPost.com -- The Messy Truth of The Real 'Hairspray.' Vanessa Udon plays Motormouth Maybelle, who hosts the monthly Negro Day on the Corny Collins Show. We got more mail: Oh, please dont break up! Somebody even sent us a miniature pair of boxing gloves. (NWA Media). From 1957 to 1963, only white teens were allowed to attend the weekday broadcasts of the Buddy Deane Show, with the exception of one Monday each month when black teenagers filled the Hairspray is John Waters most commercially successful film the 1988 dancing comedy spawned a hit Broadway musical, a movie and TV movie of that musical, plus multiple sequel and TV show offers that never saw the light of day. In fact, "American Bandstand" was not shown on television in Baltimore because Deane's show was so popular. On Jan. 4, 1964, "The Buddy Deane Show" aired its last episode. The best little jitterbugger in Baltimore. That's what really happened, and the show shut down." 3. All Rights Reserved. Once I was off the show for a while, and they said I had joined the nunnery, says Helen, laughing. I'll include some of those comments in an upcoming pancocojams series about that dance.However, it seems to me that The Buddy Deane Show is more important because it exemplifies the need to go back and understand how the past has influenced the present with regard to systemic racism in Baltimore, Maryland and elsewhere in the United States. The first and maybe the biggest Buddy Deane queen of all. And according to Arlene, Buddy encouraged one popular Committee member (Buzzy Bennet) to teach himself to read so he could realize his dream of being a disc jockey. Black teens were only allowed to dance on the show one day per month. He also left the Army in 1948 and began his radio broadcast career at KLXR station in North Little Rock. Warner, Tony, Buddy's Top 20: The Story of Baltimore's Hottest TV Dance Show and the Guy Who Brought it to Life! In 1958 the Buddy Deane Show lost support from the Baltimore City Board of Education due to it's segregation policies, and in 1964 it went off the air instead of choosing to integrate. Im a typical housewife, says Peanuts. Deane hosted a morning show at WITH. In 1985 the Committee members are for the most part happy and healthy, living in Baltimore, and still recognized on the street. "How 'The Buddy Deane Show' really went off the air is the white kids crashed Negro Day to integrate it. Then we made up on camera.. But Hairspray also resonates for at least one of the same reasons it did in the 80s: It shows how seemingly innocent moments in popular culture were also sites of struggle over who was worthy of being a counted as a somebody in America. Every week she had a different dothe Double Bubble, the Artichoke, the Airlifteach topped off by her special trademark, suggested by her mother, the bow. (There was a token all-black program once a month on the show called "Negro Day" in the movie, a phrase that now drips with surreal period flavor but no black Committee, and the protests called for integrating the show.) On the last day of the show, January 4, 1964, all the most popular Committee members through the years came back for one last appearance. What: The Buddy Deane Show was a teen rock-and-roll dance television show that aired on WJZ-TV in Baltimore, Maryland from 1957 until 1964. The Hairspray Live! The Buddy Deane Show was over. Originally an all-white teen show with a monthly "Negro . In a long list of reasons why we find it difficult to wait for freedom, King writes: When you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she cant go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. It was similar to Philadelphia's American Bandstand. The Buddy Deane Show was a teen dance television show, created by Zvi Shoubin, hosted by Winston "Buddy" Deane (19242003), and aired on WJZ-TV (Channel 13), the ABC affiliate station in Baltimore from 1957 until 1964. Waters based the main storyline and "The Corny Collins Show" on the real-life "The Buddy Deane Show" and racial events surrounding it. Six days a week and often two hours a day, Buddy Deane and his Committee Members--the privileged regular teen dancers . "Buddy" Deane was a broadcaster for more than 50 years, beginning his career in Little Rock, Arkansas, then moving to the Memphis, Tennessee market, before moving on to Baltimore, where he worked at WITH radio. She became so popular that she was written up in the nationwide Sixteen Magazine. Theatre producer, Margo Lion, saw a television broadcast of the film in 1998 and started to conceive it as a stage musical. Or Snuggle Dolls? Buddy: Deane in the 50s when she worked for a record wholesaler and he was the top-rated disc jockey on WITHthe only DJ in town who played rock n roll for the kids. Now a receptionist living near Towson with her husband and two grown children, Arlene remains fiercely loyal, organizing the reunions and keeping notebooks filled with the updated addresses, married names, and phone numbers of my kids. She met Winston J. It was a fluke. January 4, 1964. If "The Buddy Deane Show" didn't exactly end happily (canceled in 1964, it never did integrate the dancers), Waters remains a fan. For example, consider the comments of members of the "Committee" [the regularly featured White teenagers on that show] about boys having it worse than girls because boys weren't supposed to dance. He was mad because I was as popular as he was. Oh, my God, its Evanne! Autograph books, cameras, this is what they lived for. Every day Id come to the studio in knee-highs, and Id have to take them off. The Buddy Deane show aired 6 times a week and had a dance committee just like in hairspray. The Buddy Deane Show was taken off the air because home station WJZ-TV was unwilling to integrate black and white dancers. These were the first role models I knew. I wanted to join the circus., Two other ponytail princesses who went on to the Buddy Dean hall of fame were Evanne Robinson, the committee member on the show the longest, and Kathy Schmink. When: Summer 1963. Committee members included Mike Miller, Charlie Bledsoe, Ron Osher, Mary Lou Raines, Pat(ricia) Tacey, and Cathy Schmink. I didnt mean to, because I never would have messed up the makeup.. Its fairly neat, commercialized, and revisionist portrayal of 1960s Baltimore sharply contrasts with the current messy, national discussion of identity politicsa disjunction that could prompt new audiences to reevaluate their assumptions about how racism operates. Hopefully, some footage of you and the other Black dancers will be found and published online.Best wishes to you and yes, GOD HELP US! After the screening, he was joined by Michael Musto and original cast membersLeslie Ann Powers (Penny Pingleton), JoAnn Havrilla (Prudence Pingleton), and Holter Graham (I.Q. When I get depressed, I dont go to the psychiatrist, I go to the jeweler, she says. She was the one of the biggies who refused to be on the Board (they had power; a liked because of it). While he wasnt on the committee, Waters occasionally danced on the show as a guest. A devoted fan of the Buddy Deane Show, Waters drew on this history to write and direct the original film version of Hairspray. . The Buddy Deane Show was over. Many top acts of the day, both black and white, appeared on The Buddy Deane Show. as its newest live-television musical adaptation. It was a family: Buddy was the father, Arlene was the mother.. Buddy Deane. It was the times, most remember. Its host was Winston "Buddy" Deane (1924-2003), who died in Pine Bluff, Arkansas after . It was the top-rated local TV show in Baltimore and, for several years, the highest rated local TV program in the country. It aired for two and a half hours a day, six days a week. That was our whole social life, being a Buddy Deaner, says Gene. While at WITH, Deane was the first Baltimore disk jockey to capitalize on the new musical phenomenon that was rock 'n' roll. And more important, so did the Committee, still entering by a special door, still doing the dances from the period with utmost precision. Mary Lou was aware that in some neighborhoods it was not cool to be a Buddy Deaner. The Corny Collins Show, is a teen dance show in Baltimore's WYZT /WZZT Network. The show's format mirrored Philadelphia's . . I appreciate the contribution that you and NOBLE BRUN, and other Black dancers on the Buddy Dean dance show made on that series. From 1968 into 1973, the public television variety show SOUL! Although he never appeared on Deane's show, Waters attended high school with a "Buddy Deaner" and later gave Deane a cameo in the film, in which Deane played a TV reporter who tried to interview the governor who was besieged by integration protesters. He was 16 at the time of filming. We are kind of like Ozzie and Harriet, says Gene Snyder as Linda nods in agreement. 'Buddy Deane' really did have "Negro day" once a month -- it was called worse in some neighborhoods in Baltimore. The show designated every other friday to their black dancers, similar to "Negro Day" on the Corny Collins Show. It was hilarious., Some of the rumors were fanned on purpose. See production, box office & company info. His show became one of the highest rated stations in the country. When I became of age to understand it all I became motivated to make a difference. Get off that furniture!? The star system was born. Everybody wanted to kick a Buddy Deaners a, says Gene, recalling thugs waiting to jump Deaners outside the studio. We got out of the limousine and there was a huge crowd that went crazy when Divine jumped out, and it was such an exciting night, Waters said. The first big stars were Bobbi Bums and Freddy Oswinkle, according to Arlene, but no matter how big anyone got, someone came along who was even bigger. Joe Cash and Joan Teves became the shows first royalty. How The Buddy Deane Show really went off the air is the white kids crashed Negro Day to integrate it. The show featured only white kids dancing, so Scruggs wrote him a letter in the fall of. Print Headline: Buddy Deane Show was huge hit for young viewers in the late 1950s, Copyright 2023, Northwest Arkansas Newspapers LLC. This weekly time slot became known as "Special Guest Day" by the Deane Show's white performers and "Black Monday" by Baltimore's Black teens. Why not do The Deane Show on TV again? The early look of the Committee was typically 50s. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it. Acts that appeared on the show first were reportedly barred from appearing on Dick Clark's American Bandstand, but if they had been on Bandstand first they could still be on The Buddy Deane Show. Last episode all I became of age to understand it all I became age! 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