1960s WGN-TV's first incarnation of the show was a live half-hour cartoon showcase titled
Bozo, hosted by character actor and staff announcer
Bob Bell in the title role performing comedy bits between cartoons, weekdays at noon for six-and-a-half months beginning on 20 June 1960. After a short hiatus to facilitate WGN-TV's move from
Tribune Tower in downtown Chicago to a purpose-built studio facility on the city's northwest side, the show was relaunched in an expanded one-hour format as ''Bozo's Circus'', which premiered at noon on 11 September 1961. In the early months of the series, a respected English acrobatic clown, "Wimpey" (played by Bertram William Hiles) worked on the show, providing some legitimate circus background and performing opposite Bell's Bozo in comedy sketches. Hiles continued to make periodic guest appearances on the show into the mid-1960s. In October 1961,
Don Sandburg joined the show as producer and principal sketch writer, and also appeared as the mute clown "Sandy the Tramp," a character partly inspired by
Harpo Marx. By November 1961, another eventual Chicago television legend joined the show's cast, actor
Ray Rayner, as "Oliver O. Oliver," a country bumpkin from Puff Bluff, Kentucky. Rayner was hosting WGN-TV's
Dick Tracy Show (which also premiered the same day as ''Bozo's Circus
) and later replaced Dick Coughlan as host of Breakfast with
Bugs Bunny, later retitled Ray Rayner and His Friends''. WGN musical director
Bob Trendler led the WGN Orchestra, dubbed the "Big Top Band." Games on the show included the "Grand Prize Game" created by Sandburg, wherein a boy and girl were selected from the studio audience by the Magic Arrows (a set of arrows that flashed on the screen as the camera panned rapidly through the audience), In October 1968, Bell was hospitalized for a
brain aneurysm and was absent from the show for several months. Meanwhile, Sandburg resolved to leave the show for the West Coast but stayed longer while Bell recuperated. Sandburg left the show in January 1969 and Bell returned in March. Lubbers left as well with Brown staying on as a permanent cast member. Magician
Marshall Brodien, who had been making semi-regular guest appearances in which he frequently interacted with the clowns, also began appearing as a wizard character in an Arabian Nights-inspired costume in 1968 and by the early 1970s evolved into "Wizzo the Wizard." A prime-time version titled
Big Top was seen September through January on Wednesday nights in 1965 through 1967. and increased Brodien's appearances as Wizzo. That same year, the National Association of Broadcasters issued an edict forbidding the practice of children's TV show hosts doubling as pitchmen for products. This resulted in major cutbacks to children's show production budgets. In 1975, Bob Trendler retired from television and his Big Top Band was reduced to a three-piece band led by Tom Fitzsimmons. In 1978 when WGN-TV became a national
superstation on cable and satellite through what eventually became
WGN America, the show gained more of a national following. After a nationwide search, Bell was replaced by actor
Joey D'Auria, who would play the role of Bozo for the next 17 years. In 1985,
Frazier Thomas died and Hurley filled in as host for the final six shows that season, stepping into a semi-authority character. In 1987, Hurley was dropped and the show's timeslot returned to 60 minutes. In 1987, a
synthesizer, played by "Professor Andy" (actor Andy Mitran), replaced the three-piece Big Top Band.
1990s Roy Brown began suffering heart-related problems and was absent from the show for an extended period during the 1991–92 season. This coincided with the show's 30th anniversary and a reunion special that included Don Sandburg as Sandy, who also filled in for Cooky for the first two weeks that season. Actor
Adrian Zmed (best known from ABC-TV's
T.J. Hooker), who was a childhood fan of ''Bozo's Circus'' and former Grand Prize Game contestant, also appeared on the special and portrayed himself as a "Rookie Clown" for the following two weeks. Actor Michael Immel then joined the show as "Spiffy" (Spifford Q. Fahrquahrrr). Brown returned in January 1992, initially on a part-time basis but suffered additional health setbacks and took another extended leave of absence in the fall of 1993. Brown's presence on the show remained, though, as previously aired segments as Cooky and Cuddly Dudley were incorporated until 1994, when he and Marshall Brodien retired from television. Later that year, WGN management, due to the high cost of producing a daily television program, plus the rising competition from dedicated children's television networks, decided to get out of the weekday children's television business and buried
The Bozo Show in an early Sunday timeslot as
The Bozo Super Sunday Show on 11 September 1994; WGN's decision to relegate the program to Sundays coincided with the launch of the
WGN Morning News (which debuted five days earlier), a weekday morning newscast that originally launched as an hour-long program (the move of
Bozo effectively resulted in the cancellation of the station's then two-year-old Sunday morning newscast, whose 8 a.m. timeslot
Bozo took over). Immel was replaced by Robin Eurich as "Rusty the Handyman," Michele Gregory as "Tunia" and Cathy Schenkelberg as "Pepper." (Shenkelberg was dropped in 1996.)
2000s In 2001, station management controversially ended production citing increased competition from newer children's cable channels. The final taping, a 90-minute primetime special titled
Bozo: 40 Years of Fun!, was taped on 12 June 2001 and aired 14 July 2001. By this time, it was the only Bozo show that remained on television. The special featured Joey D'Auria as Bozo, Robin Eurich as Rusty, Andy Mitran as Professor Andy, Marshall Brodien as Wizzo and Don Sandburg as Sandy. Also present at the last show were
Billy Corgan of
The Smashing Pumpkins, who performed, and Bob Bell's family. Many of the costumes and props are on display at The
Museum of Broadcast Communications. Reruns of
The Bozo Super Sunday Show aired until 26 August 2001. Bozo returned to television on 24 December 2005 in a two-hour retrospective titled
Bozo, Gar & Ray: WGN TV Classics. The primetime premiere was #1 in the Chicago market and continues to be rebroadcast and streamed live online annually during the holiday season. Bozo also returned to Chicago's parade scene and the WGN-TV float in 2008 as the station celebrated its 60th anniversary. He also appeared in a 2008 public service announcement alerting WGN-TV analog viewers about the upcoming switch to digital television. Bozo was played by WGN-TV staff member George Pappas. Since then, Bozo continues to appear annually in Chicago's biggest parades.
2010s Few episodes from the show's first two decades survive; although some were recorded to videotape for delayed broadcasts, the tapes were reused and eventually discarded. In 2012, a vintage tape was located on the Walter J. Brown Media Archives & Peabody Awards Collection website archive list by Rick Klein of
The Museum of Classic Chicago Television, containing material from two 1971 episodes. WGN reacquired the tape and put together a new special entitled ''Bozo's Circus: The Lost Tape'', which aired in December 2012. Klein maintains a substantial number of Bozo tapes in his museum; WGN initially prevented Klein from sharing the tapes on the museum's
YouTube page but later dropped its objection, recognizing the importance of preserving the content. On 6 October 2018, Don Sandburg, ''Bozo's Circus
producer, writer and the last surviving original cast member, died at the age of 87. Four months later, WGN-TV paid tribute to Sandburg and the rest of the original cast with a two-hour special titled Bozo's Circus: The 1960s''.
2020s ==Characters==