Thursday, July 24, 2008

by Ari

The balcony has closed for Roger Ebert and the show he and Gene Siskel made famous. Ebert has a tribute to the show at his site.

"Did Gene and I hate each other? Yes. Did we love each other? Yes. Somehow an outtake from a promo session has found its way on YouTube, where in a single take you can see us bitterly sniping at one another and then happily joking together. It was like that. "You have the entire staff in terror of you," I told him. "That's funny," he said. "That's what they tell me about you." We were both terrible to work with. And great to work with."

I can't remember the exact movie, but one of my favorite episodes was when Ebert convinced Siskel to change his thumbs up to a thumbs down for some turgid summer movie (Broken Arrow, maybe? Update: Yep, Broken Arrow). The bickering was always classic, the shows were always engaging. I can't say the same for Ebert and Roeper, but I always admired his determination to keep the program alive. Good things come to an end, but at least you can watch old shows at the Siskel and Ebert archives.