Kraft Music Hall (TV series)

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Kraft Music Hall was an umbrella title for several television series aired by NBC in the United States from the 1950s to the 1970s in the musical variety genre, sponsored by Kraft, the producers of a well-known line of cheeses and related products.

The original Kraft Music Hall was a radio series aired from 1933 to 1949. It was one of the most popular programs of its type, particularly during the period (1936–1946) when it was hosted by Bing Crosby. However, unlike several similar programs, it did not make the transition directly to network television; Kraft's early ventures into that field entailed the sponsorship of a famed series of dramas, initially broadcast live, under the title Kraft Television Theatre.

By 1958 Kraft was prepared to revive the Music Hall for television. The first host was "Mr. Television", Milton Berle, who had become television's first superstar by hosting an earlier NBC program, the Texaco Star Theater. An alternate summer host in the program's early period was Englishman Dave King. The program achieved its greatest success while being hosted by crooner Perry Como beginning in 1959. In 1966, the summer program was hosted by John Davidson and comedian George Carlin was a featured regular.

Beginning in 1963, Kraft Music Hall specials hosted by Perry Como were presented about once a month. During the 1963-64 and 1964-65 television seasons, The Kraft Suspense Theater was broadcast in the same time slot during the remaining weeks.

In 1967, the Kraft Music Hall returned as a weekly series, but without Perry Como. A policy of guest hosts was implemented, employing some of the leading figures in the U.S. entertainment industry at the time, including Rock Hudson, Lorne Greene, George Burns, Dinah Shore, and Woody Allen. In 1968, the practice of regular hosts was reinstated, with programs starring, in succession, country crooner Eddy Arnold, John Davidson (again), and Ed McMahon. Arnold's programs all featured an appearance by comedian/impressionist John Byner.

Other famous performers who appeared on the Kraft Music Hall on a reasonably frequent basis were Don Rickles, Alan King, Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, Mitzi Gaynor, Bobby Darin, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, Wayne Newton, and Johnny Cash. An early telecast of the Country Music Association Awards was presented as an episode of the Kraft Music Hall, as were the earliest telecasts of the Friars Club Roasts which later became a regular feature of The Dean Martin Show. Summer hosts during this late period of the show included Britons Tony Sandler and Ralph Young in 1969 (some other programs that summer were hosted by Don Ho), and Des O'Connor in 1970 and 1971.

Despite the variety of casts and formats employed by the program over the years, there were some constants as well. Longtime Kraft announcer Ed Herlihy voiced all but the summer programs, and the Peter Matz orchestra provided most of the music, again with the exception of the summer shows, and Peter Gennaro was the choreographer.