"60 Minutes" (1968)TV series 1968-????

Creator:

Don Hewitt

Seasons:

2 | 28 | unknown

Release Date:

24 September 1968 (USA)

Genre:

Documentary | News

Plot:

The premiere television News magazine.

Plot Keywords:

Time For Title | Magazine | Newsmagazine | Non Fiction | Number In Title

Awards:

Won Golden Globe. Another 13 wins & 23 nominations

US TV Schedule:

Sun. May 25	7:00 PM	CBS
Sun. June 1	7:00 PM	CBS

Cast

Mike Wallace	...	Himself - Correspondent / ... (37 episodes, 1968-2006)
Morley Safer	...	Himself - Correspondent / ... (36 episodes, 1970-2007)
Ed Bradley	...	Himself - Correspondent / ... (34 episodes, 1981-2006)
Lesley Stahl	...	Herself - Correspondent (33 episodes, 1991-2007)

Also Known As:

TV Land Legends: The 60 Minutes Interviews (USA) (rerun title)

Runtime:

60 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Mono

Filming Locations:

West 57th Street, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

Company:

CBS News Productions

Trivia:

Stopwatches used: Minerva: starting with the third show and for several shows after Heuer: late 1968 to the late 1970s Aristo: late 1970s to present No stopwatch was in the first two shows of October 8th and 15th, 1968

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Twelve and Holding (2005)

For the most part, 60 MINUTES has lost both its appeal and its credibility.

Because I am far too young to have experienced 60 MINUTES during its prime, I can't really comment on how good of a show it was back then. However, I can tell you what it is like now: boring and uninspired. Not that one could really blame them, given the show's history. Once the rival networks realized the possibility for higher ratings with their own "news magazine" programs, a myriad of shoddily-produced 60 MINUTES ripoffs started popping up on every other station. Rather than feature actual news stories like 60 MINUTES did, these shows existed solely for profit, and therefore they filled every installment with overblown scare stories, "must see" celebrity gossip, and sometimes even the supernatural in order to "expand their audience". I can't say for sure, but this is probably the exact moment the original 60 MINUTES started to lose its luster. I have been told that it used to be a premiere source for all the latest news stories and hard-hitting commentary, but with all the competition their credibility had started to slide until it has almost become indistinguishable from all these other self-indulgent tele-tabloids. That's the 60 MINUTES I'm familiar with.

My parents tell me of a time when CBS's 60 MINUTES was a really impressive movement in the history of television news, but they too have acknowledged that the show has since become less and less respected in the world of the news media. But again, this isn't exactly surprising, seeing as how the USA has absolutely no respectable television news outlets anyway. Even CNN is very cautious when choosing what stories to cover, and they are very careful not to offend their superiors with stories that might possibly make the wrong people look bad. If us Americans want to watch more honest, straight-to-the-point news without any lame commentary from its reporters or without meaningless stories about a family of ducks being caught in a local sewer, then our only hope is from foreign sources like CBC or BBC.

Still, don't think I'm *totally* bashing 60 MINUTES. It's still head and shoulders above all the other "news magazines" on TV today, and every so often they do tackle some important issues or have some very candid interviews. Plus, they should still be given credit for giving birth to a concept that was clever enough to have been copied by almost every other network worldwide.