Biography (TV series)
Biography is a documentary television program. Originally produced by CBS and hosted by Mike Wallace, the A&E Network later re-ran it and has produced new episodes since 1987. The series has featured biographies on such people as Elvis Presley, Plácido Domingo, Pope John Paul II, Enrico Caruso, Diego Rivera, Mick Foley, Mao Zedong, and Queen Elizabeth II, and fictional characters like The Phantom. The program ended up profiling enough figures, that in 1999 A&E spun the program off into an entire network, The Biography Channel.
Initially, most of the episodes featured the life stories of historical figures or present political or social leaders. After a few years, however, the show began producing episodes on figures from pop culture. This move away from purely intellectual subject matter has been criticized by some.
At one point, the show aired up to six times weekly in primetime, but recently has been cut back to only once a week, usually on Friday nights. A&E will cancel Biography after August 2006, making the show exclusively available on The Biography Channel. [1]
Biography has been hosted by Peter Graves, Jack Perkins, Karen Hughes, and Harry Smith. Since Smith's departure in 2003, the show has been done in voice-over by Neal Ross.
The Canadian television comedy series Liocracy was a parody of Biography. That program, in fact, was originally titled Liography until the producers of Biography threatened an intellectual property infringement lawsuit.
External link
- Biography at the Internet Movie Database
Categories
A&E Television Networks | 1980s TV shows in the United States | 1990s TV shows in the United States | 2000s TV shows in the United States | Biography | 1987 introductions