Cleo Brown: The King of Shock TV: Morton Downey Jr.

On Thursday, August 13th, 2015 at 9:00pm and at 11:00pm Eastern-Standard Time, CNN TV will debut “EVOCATEUR: THE MORTON DOWNEY JR. MOVIE.” “EVOCATEUR” is produced and directed by Daniel A. Miller, Seth Kramer, and Jeremy Newberger of Ironbound Films. “EVOCATEUR” first premiered at The TriBeCa Film Festival in 2012 with it’s running time being 1 hr. and 30 minutes in length. The film was rated R and distributed by Magnolia Pictures.

The film tells the story of now deceased television talk show host named Morton Downey Jr. The son of successful entertainers named Barbara Bennett and Morton Downey, Morton Downey Jr. From 1987 to 1989 redefined the role of talk show hosts and television in the United States. Born in Los Angeles, California on December 9th, 1932, Downey Jr. Had four wives( Lori Krebs, Kim Cotten, Joan Tyrrell and Helen Downey). The last one, named Lori Krebs, was a dancer whom Downey met while at the height of his fame on “The Morton Downey Jr. Show” and while still married to his third wife named Kim. Being much younger than Downey Jr., his relationship with Lori Krebs, like his talk show, was at the same time both tawdry and attention grabbing.

Diagnosed with lung cancer in 1996, Downey’s investigatory lung surgery was televised, once again making Downey a trend setter. Having lost a lung to cancer, Downey Jr., who once boasted that he smoked four packs of cigarettes per day, became an anti-smoking advocate until the time of his death on March 12, 2001.

The movie is a blend of black and white film footage, animation, narration and live color footage especially from Morton Downey Jr.’s program. At first unsettling, adding an aura of dream-like non-reality to this story of Downey Jr.’s meteoric rise to stardom as well as his fall from grace, the footage of old black and white movies and television shows as well as animation, narration and live color footage blend well together to create this truly American saga and does recreate a realistic depiction of Downey’s life and career.

Interviews with Gloria Allred, Allen Dershowitz, Curtis Silwa, Richard Bey, Sally Jesse Raphael, Steven Pagones, Pat Buchanan, Stanley Crouch and others also helps to tell this tale of American success and self-destructiveness. Also featured in “EVOCATEUR” is a detailed discussion of both The Tawana Brawley Rape as well as Downey Jr.’s own assertion that he had been brutally attacked by skin heads in a San Francisco Airport bathroom in April of 1989. Unlike Tawana Brawley, however, Downey Jr. did not recant his claims of attack and passed two police administered polygraph tests proving that Morton Downey Jr. Had been telling the truth. Like Tawana Brawley, however, Downey Jr. was disgraced and his TV show, which had successfully competed with people such as Phil Donahue, Sally Jesse Raphael and David Letterman was cancelled in July of 1989. Also featured in “EVOCATEUR” are Al Sharpton, Tawana Brawley, Roy Innis, Larry King, Chris Elliott, Meredith Vierra, Mayor Ed Koch, Michelle Bachman, Herman Caine, Ron Paul and Glen Beck.

While “EVOCATEUR” creates a portrait of Morton Downey Jr. as a passionate man who frequently did not say and do that which was politically correct, the film does not discuss Downey Jr.’s several attempts throughout the nineties to jump start his failing career as a talk show host. Although his first love, which was his career as a Muscician and Poet is addressed, it was as a “trash” talk show host that Morton Downey Jr. achieved his greatest success paving the way for people such as Howard Stern, Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Maury Povitch, Geraldo Rivera and Jerry Springer. Morton Downey Jr. also remains as the harbinger of today’s multiplicity of reality shows which strive for both reality and sensationalism in their quest for the greatest shock value and television ratings.

On a scale of from one to ten, I rate “EVOCATEUR” a 9.0.

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About the Author: Cleo Brown is the movie reviewer for HipHopRepublican.com. She lives in Manhattan and has a Master’s Degree in Contemporary African-American History from The University of California at Davis and has done work on a Ph.D. in education at The University of San Francisco. She has published several poetry books and is featured in Who’s Who in Poetry.