By Christina NewlandFeatures correspondent

In our latest essay in which a critic reflects on particular cultural work that brings them joy, Christina Newland writes about becoming hooked on the work of a 1970s TV legend.

Of all the things that mark out Dick Cavett as a talk show host like few others, perhaps the most notable is that US President Richard Nixon was caught on tape discussing how to ruin him. It was 1971, and Nixon was on the warpath against much of show business. The commander-in-chief perceived the press as generally malign and left-wing.

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Dick Cavett was not, on appearance, the kind of brazen media figure such a vendetta might suggest. He was a physically unimposing former comedian with a neat blond side-parting; mild-mannered, hyper-cultured, and thoroughly liberal, in spite of welcoming guests from across the political spectrum. His talk show was popular, sure, but acted as a more cerebral counterpoint to mainstream peers like Johnny Carson and Merv Griffin, who both remained firmly above him in ratings.

If you were to ask me how I first grew to love the Dick Cavett Show, a time capsule of 1970s Americana with all the mutton chops and quips about women’s lib you can imagine, it’d be difficult for me to pinpoint exactly when. Maybe it was when I saw how he welcomed a young, nervous Martin Scorsese onto his show before his Taxi Driver success, asking him questions with the enthusiasm of a film student. Or his long interview with David Bowie circa 1974, with Bowie looking frail and beautiful. As an interviewer, Cavett lacked the plastered-on charm or authoritative air of a Johnny Carson, but his gentler, more erudite approach worked wonders.

A goldmine of chat

Clips and episodes of his show can be found on YouTube, many from his official archive. The Dick Cavett show started in 1968 on ABC, moving to CBS in 1975 and then on various networks straight through the ‘80s. To film fans, these YouTube channel archives are a goldmine. Witty but unassuming – and somehow never above being made to blush like a schoolgirl – Cavett managed to wrangle the most notoriously awkward of guests.

There are long, meandering conversations with directors both on the rise at the time and also in their twilight years: Alfred Hitchcock, Ingmar Bergman, Spike Lee, Martin Scorsese and Robert Altman, among countless other legends. And candid interviews with legendary stars like Katharine Hepburn and Paul Newman, softened by years in the spotlight and no longer under any studio’s yoke. Embedded as many of these famous names were in the mores of their times – ones that dictated stars’ private lives were sacrosanct – some of them opened up as never before when interviewed by Cavett. Combined with a general loosening of traditional values in the 1970s,  the results are often amazing: like Bette Davis chatting with Cavett about losing her virginity.

Right now, also, you can go on YouTube and see Salvador Dalí throw an ant-eater at someone; or watch the generation gap made visible when silent film star Gloria Swanson and Janis Joplin share a show together. If you have any interest in some of the major cultural names of the 20th Century – from Jimi Hendrix to Gore Vidal to Gloria Steinem – you can find them on the Dick Cavett Show at one point or another, speaking with candour and humour. All the while, Cavett facilitates, wry and unassuming, chairing gatherings that have the intellectual air of an old-school Parisian salon. The only interruptions come from the commercial breaks, which Cavett announces as an afterthought mid-conversation – often arching his brow and looking unimpressed with the crassness he’s being forced to acknowledge.

Nixon’s dislike of Cavett undoubtedly stemmed, at least partially, from his interest in showcasing serious political subject matter. The potential subversives the show hosted included John Lennon, Jane Fonda, and members of the group Vietnam Veterans Against the War. In fact, Cavett was the first to televise interviews with vets from that war, at the height of its controversy, with one speaking from a wheelchair.

An enemy of the Silent Majority

Much like the New York ‘liberal elites’ detested by Trump and his supporters, Cavett was a personification of everything hated by the so-called ‘Silent Majority’ – a term coined by Nixon to refer to the great swathes of his supporters outside urban centres. One of Cavett’s more contentious interviews – with segregationist Lester Maddox – went on to inspire a 1974 Randy Newman song, Rednecks. The lyrics viciously skewered the perspective of the pro-Nixon faction in the opening lyric. Last night I saw Lester Maddox on a TV show / With some smart-ass New York Jew, it goes, and although Cavett isn’t Jewish, Newman is: the point is clear. The deep schism in the US across class, race, and political affiliation was as apparent in 1970 as it is half a century later. In Cavett’s words to Maddox: “If I called any of your admirers bigots... who aren’t bigots... I apologise.”

On a more basic level, watching Cavett’s interviews now also provides the thrill of seeing the stars and public figures of yesteryear speak freely – ones who had often achieved a certain level of unattainability through age or careful stage-management, making them all the more fascinating. 

However, the hunger to see friendly and unstructured conversation with stars of the highest calibre has not lessened with time. The popularity of a recent episode of Marc Maron’s podcast, interviewing Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt, attests to this. In fact, today, that type of encounter could be said to be even rarer. While, thanks to social media, stars may notionally appear to be more intimate with their fans, the modern publicity machine is much too protective of its sacred cows to be lackadaisical about their public appearances.

By contrast, in Cavett’s day, actors and stars were not merely vessels of media-trained soundbites or overly groomed politeness. Or if they ever had been, by the counterculture era, American society had allowed them to be honest about themselves in a way they never had been before. John Cassavetes, Peter Falk and Ben Gazzara turned up on his show roaringly drunk and refused to behave, taking off their shoes and pratfalling around the set. Legendary heavyweight boxing foes Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali exchanged sulky verbal jabs before their actual ones in the ring, facing up to one another with a comically miniature Cavett venturing to stand in between them. 

Cavett’s style of hosting and of initiating genuine conversation with his guests – neither pandering to them nor acting smugly superior – reflected how entertainment and cultural spheres were liberated by the bohemian spirit of the 70s. His show’s informality and looseness of structure belied a probing intellect, and he became as adept at covering the Watergate scandal as he was with music, sports, and cinema.

Watching his show now, cooped up, makes me yearn for the days of public intellectualism, when the contrasts between people were celebrated for producing the most striking and engaging discussions, rather than manipulated and exploited for entertainment. It also makes me yearn for mainstream cultural spaces that were more open to dissenting views and uncomfortable moments.

Cavett pulled back the curtain on the sheer anarchy of hosting a myriad circus of rock stars, superstar athletes, ageing divas, and angry politicians, and he did so with grace and wit. Today, he is 83 years old, a beloved veteran of showbiz, and has written several memoirs about his experiences. I wasn’t alive when The Dick Cavett Show was in its heyday. But I miss it regardless.

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