It's 1964.
Millions discover a Sunday night TV show called
This Hour Has Seven Days.
Patrick Watson and Laurier LaPierre front
the CBC's most popular, controversial hour.
It has a hold on national attention,
pop culture, confrontational interviews,
off-beat stories and satire.
The ratings are historic.
More than 3 million viewers.
The cheeky week-that-was squad
produces hockey numbers.
With its irreverent format
and anti-authoritarian
take on current events,
it becomes the morning-after hot topic,
"the Peoples' Show."
For two years it kicks ass,
inspires a generation of new mediafolk
to move for a decade, like moths to a light,
towards Toronto.
I was one of them.
Two years later, the CBC locked
in a death spiral with the show's
hosts and producer Doug Leiterman,
unwilling to cede power
to the show's sensational success.
The CBC cancels Seven Days in 1966.
Troublemaker Watson
later resurfaces in positions of broadcast
influence and power.
But the CBC cancelled
the highest-rated show of its time
largely to prove that it could.
The gatekeepers and dinosaurs
felt threatened.
On Watson's passing,
let it be noted.
There's a fair take on the politics
of the kill at the link below.
Top image: Laurier LaPierre,
Dinah Christie and Patrick Watson
This Hour Has Seven Days
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