18.12.10

Long Live The King

Last week saw the end of one of the most watched television programmes around the world. When I was a child, my parents did a lot of travelling and whether we were in countries that spoke a language we knew or not, a recurring memory that I have is watching CNN, first thing in the morning and the last thing at night in our hotel room. Before the era of every television network having their own news channel, before tweeting and live streaming, CNN was the go-to for news and Larry King was the host of his very own interview show. Larry King Live pioneered the boundaries of interview formats with an intimate set that saw King's international guests from the world's leaders of politics to celebrity face to face with his famously hard questions that often lead to breaking news. I will never forget King's trademark suspenders or the iconic lit backdrop of a world map that survived any radical design changes throughout the show's twenty-five year career. December 16th aired the final edition of Larry King Live - it is unknown how King's British replacement, Piers Morgan, will be received with his own interview show on the network in the New Year. One thing is for sure, it takes twenty-five successful years to become a legend and with the outputs of media forever changing with the speed of technology, it is certain that in its own space and time, there was and will only be one Larry King. Follow the show's on air career, now off air but always online at CNN.