Museum of the Moving Image Announces Retrospective of Ernie Kovacs and Edie Adams, 4/27

Museum of the Moving Image and Ediad Productions, announced today a month-long retrospective from April 27 through May 27, 2012, of one of television's most talented and beloved married couples, legendary comedian Ernie Kovacs (www.erniekovacs.com) and Tony Award-winning entertainer Edie Adams (www.edieadams.com).

The retrospective, the first to feature the careers of both Ernie Kovacs and Edie Adams, will kick off at Museum of the Moving Image in New York on Friday, April 27, with a celebrity panel discussion moderated by comedian and actor Robert Klein, and featuring legendary Broadway producer Harold Prince, newsman Jeff Greenfield, television critic David Bianculli, and guest curator Ben Model, a film and television historian and archivist for the estates of both Ernie Kovacs and Edie Adams. The panel discussion will include rare clips from both performers. Daily through May 27, compilations of both Kovacs and Adams's shows will play continuously in TV Lounge, an artwork by Jim Isermann, in the Museum's core exhibition Behind the Screen. On May 19 and 20, a special compilation for children, "Kovacs for Kids," will offer an introduction for families to Ernie Kovacs's playful and endlessly inventive comedy, often filled with tricks and surprises, designed to delight audiences of all ages.

Edie Adams's son, Josh Mills, who controls rights to the works of both his mother and Kovacs, provided the shows that will be screened and will attend the retrospective's opening on April 27.

This retrospective coincides with two milestones in the performers' careers. The year 2012 is the 60th anniversary of Kovacs's network television debut on Kovacs Unlimited on CBS, and is also the 50th anniversary of Edie Adams's Here's Edie pilot which debuted on April 9, 1962 on ABC.

Photo: Wendy Moger-Bross