The rise and fall of Morton Downey Jr. is chronicled in "Evocateur: The Morton Downy Jr. Movie". The son of Irish tenor and actor Morton Downey Sr., Jr. spent decades trying to find his place in the world. A periodic recording artists, a D.J., Morton Jr. seemed to have found his place as an "Evocatuer", a populist radio personality turned host of a late night talk show. 'The Morton Downey Jr. Show' aired at night, but had a daytime talk show structure, only free to be even more sleazy because of the hour. The show took off like a rocket in 1987 but relatively quickly feel to earth, canceled in 1989 do to advertiser issues and Downey's penchant for self destructive behavior. Downey made periodic attempts at a come back, a heavy smoker he died from long cancer in early 2001.
'The Morton Downey Jr. Show' was a harbinger of things to come, a polarized media environment that thrived on exploiting's conflict. Like Donald Trump, who was a friend of Downey's and guest on his show (Morton for a brief period would even live in Trump Tower), the hosts sincerity was questionable, he did what got him attention, and didn't always think things through. In fact Downey would clumsily fake his own beating by neo-Nazi's (unlike Trump, Downey seemed to be pretty consistently anti-Nazi), which would more or less be the straw that broke the camels back for his show.
Fascinating as a forgotten foot note, and disturbingly relevant for today. ***
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