Bart seeks ratings with Smackdown<$>
Bart seeks ratings with Smackdown
The recent hour-long shouting match between Crom Carmichael and Tommy Burnett on the morning talkfest Teddy Bart’s Round Table has gotten the often soporific program more notice than, well, ever.
A discussion of Hispanic residents clogging the lines at the state driver’s license offices exploded into a pointless-yet-entertaining wrangle, with the suddenly thin-skinned Carmichael claiming to have been called a racist by Burnett because of Carmichael’s position on the issue. Burnett stubbornly resisted all calls for an apology, and Carmichael refused to either leave or shut up about it.
And, while Bart and his co-host and business partner Karlen Evins have obviously sought in the past to keep a high tone for their program, the publicity and ratings boost following the conflict hasn’t been lost on them.
Beginning in July, the Round Table will turn each Friday morning’s show into a managed-conflict situation, more in the style of CNN’s Crossfire than the usual “Tell me what you think of the budget, Aubrey” style for which the program is known.
To be advertised under the blanket title Round Table Smackdown, the series’ first program will feature Sunset Grill owner Randy Rayburn and the elderly woman he either did or didn’t tackle after she did or didn’t throw a rock at his restaurant.
“That should be really great radio,” Evins says of the matchup. Other regular guest lineups for the series include David Stringfield vs. Willy Stern, James Hefner vs. former TSU athletic directors, Murray Philip vs. a guest to be named later, and David Green vs. Willy Stern.
“We see Willy Stern as sort of a regular on this thing,” Bart says. “Anybody with a grudge or so forth, we’re going to be giving them a call.”
