Charles Van Doren, a Quiz Show Whiz Who Wasn’t, Dies at 93
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In 2008, Charles Van Doren broke a decades-long public silence to tell his side of the quiz show scandal story:
All the Answers (
The New Yorker.)
From the article:
Of course, I eventually saw the movie. (Quiz Show
.) I understand that movies need to compress and conflate, but what bothered me most was the epilogue stating that I never taught again. I didn’t stop teaching, although it was a long time before I taught again in a college. I did enjoy John Turturro’s version of Stempel. And I couldn’t help but laugh when Stempel referred to me in the film as “Charles Van F@cking Moron.â€Van Doren conflated two cracks given to Stempel in the film---Stempel referred to "Charles Van F@cking Doren" and "Charles Van Moron." I guess it did sound even funnier in Van Doren's conflation. But not quite as funny as John Turturro, as Herb Stempel, watching a television promo for
Twenty-One the night he was supposed to take his dive to Van Doren and said, mournfully,
No, tonight on Twenty-One
Herb Stempel is going to take a dive. Tonight, watch Charles Van Doren eat his first kosher meal.Among other things in his later life, Van Doren co-authored
How to Read a Book with the philosopher Mortimer J. Adler. I have that plus a charming transcript, published in book form, from a CBS television special of 1963,
The Dialogues of Archibald MacLeish and Mark Van Doren, the latter poet, of course, being Charles Van Doren's father.
RIP.
