"The Balcony Is Closed" For Good

Not many people have ever heard of Michael Phillips and A.O. Scott or know what they do. Perhaps I should say "did". I'll explain what I mean later in this post.

It doesn't take much time to compile a list of television shows that have been on the air for 35 years or longer. NBC's Meet The Press, 60 Minutes, The Today Show, and Sesame Street are the first that come to my mind. Wikipedia lists 35 of them. Ironically the syndicated program I'm posting about isn't on that list.

These first 2 paragraphs refer and bring me to the movie review program, "At The Movies". The syndicated 30 minute show aired it's last program this weekend ending it's 35 year run. Michael Phillips the film critic of Chicago Tribune, and New York Times film critic, A.O. Scott had the privilege of hosting the final episode.

Now the fact that "At The Movies" was even still on the air until this weekend is probably a surprise to 99% of television viewers. Until earlier this year even I wasn't aware that it was still on.

But nevertheless this show is one of television's greatest survivors. It started out as the public television program, "Sneak Previews", in 1975, with it's original hosts, Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert (pictured above), sitting across the aisle from each other in a fake movie theater set debating and presenting their opinions of Hollywood's latest offerings. It then moved from PBS to syndication with Buena Vista television. The title was changed to "Siskel & Ebert & The movies; later the "& The Movies" part changed to "At The Movies."

When Siskel left the program in February 1999 to undergo treatment for a brain tumor (he died due to complications from surgery less than 3 weeks after announcing his "temporary" departure) Ebert continued the show with co-host Richard Roper. In 2006 Ebert too had to leave the show due to a diagnosis and treament of cancer. It's a battle he's still fighting today.

Richard Roper hosted the show with a rotating series of guest co-hosts until 2008. In '09 critics Ben Lyons and Ben Mankiewicsz hosted for 2 years before the previously mentioned Phillips and Scott took over and completed the run of the program.

In March 2010 Buena Vista television, the show's long time distributor, announced the cancellation of the show. I first heard about it on one of the Disney Podcasts I listen to.

As I stated earlier I hadn't watched the show in years until the beginning of this year. "At The Movies" or any of the show's incarnations, will always mean Siskel and Ebert to me. They were the iconic hosts of the movie review program, which they originated.

Gene & Roger took the "thankless" job of being a movie critic from the pages of newspaper and or the last 10 minutes of a news broadcast in a big market city and brought it into people's homes. They reclaimed the old Roman custom of "Thumbs up or Thumbs down" and made it their trade mark and part of American pop culture.

In this day and age where there are hundreds or even thousands of websites that review and rate movies it's hard to remember when nationally known movie critics were rare. Siskel & Ebert were pioneers in that television genre. If it weren't for them there may not be a place like "Rotten Tomatoes" to go online to read what's good and not so good at the movies.

So I would like say "goodbye" to "At the movies" with a very respectable "thank you" to Roger Ebert & Gene Siskel (who I agreed with more often than I did his partner) for their hours and hours of entertaining debate, commentary, and recommendations.

It's only fitting that I end this post with the tag line uttered at the end of every episode either by Gene or by Roger. "The Balcony Is Closed". This time permanently.