Doyle Lott has left the building

The Touch That Stirred a Nation

Nov 10, 2023

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This piece is a companion to Episode 2: Watchful Eyes. (You don’t have to read the episode first to enjoy this article!)

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DOYLE LOTT has left the building: The Touch That Stirred a Nation

On the evening of April 2, 1968, American living rooms, including those in my serialized novel Dancing at The Orange Peel, were graced by an unprecedented moment on national television. During an NBC musical special called Petula, British singer Petula Clark and the iconic Harry Belafonte shared a stage, united by song and a brief, gentle touch.

Libby Billings, my novel’s young main character, recalls her family’s conversations and reactions to the special. That fleeting moment of human connection between Clark and Belafonte spiraled into a controversy that reflects the era’s tumultuous racial tensions, eventually leading to a corporate decision that would mark the downfall of Chrysler's Doyle Lott.

The Gesture Heard Around the Nation

The director of the special, Steve Binder, was thrilled by Belafonte’s acceptance of the invitation to be the guest star. The Grammy-winning singer and Civil Rights activist was the first and only star Binder and Clark wanted. Belafonte and Clark selected “On the Path of Glory,” an anti-war song Clark had co-written, to sing together. Both would perform solos first, followed by their duet.

Clark was to approach Belafonte from upstage and stand at his side. Their interaction was innocuous, even sweet, as their two powerful voices blended. When they hit the song’s emotional peak, Clark laid her hand on Belafonte’s arm—an instinctive action, spurred by the music and the message. Yet, this simple gesture ignited a storm.

Corporate America in a Time of Change

In 1968, the U.S. was in the throes of the Civil Rights Movement, grappling with seismic shifts in societal norms and attitudes toward race. The Petula show, sponsored by Chrysler’s Plymouth Division, found itself at a crossroads between progressive artistry and conservative corporate values. Internally, Chrysler was at odds about the choice of guest star, a conflict instigated from the start by Doyle Lott, Plymouth’s VP of Advertising. But after some haggling among Chrysler executives, Binder was thrilled when he was allowed to go on with the show.

By one accounting, the original staging of the duet had Belafonte downstage with Clark upstage, being shown over his shoulder throughout the duet. Binder was reportedly happy with the aesthetic but felt there was no connection between the singers during their performance. Thus, he changed the staging so the two would come together during the song.

Later, Binder recalled that when Clark touched Belafonte’s arm, “You could hear an explosion coming out of the client’s green room. Doyle Lott had left the building.”

A Leak and a Headline

Soon after the special’s filming, the incident was leaked to the press. Newsweek and Time reported on it, as did the nightly news. The New York Times headline on March 7 read: “Incident at TV Taping Irks Belafonte.” The article painted a vivid picture of the behind-the-scenes drama that unfolded, with Lott demanding a retake of the song—without the touch. The leak sparked a public outcry, with opinions polarized and emotions high. The discourse was not just about Clark and Belafonte; it was about the visible manifestation of the racial divide in America.

The Performance That Almost Wasn't

In a 2017 interview with the Montreal Gazette, Petula Clark lays out a chronology of the song’s production slightly different than the one recounted above. She recalled that they filmed the duet—the version with the touch—on the very first take. Binder complimented the performance but, seemingly with hesitation, asked for a retake. Clark was to stand distant, upstage from Belafonte. They performed it that way twice.

Immediately afterwards, Claude Wolff, Clark’s husband and the show’s executive producer, along with lawyer Pete Pryor, ordered a film man to erase the second and third takes, leaving only the first take available to be aired.

Regardless of the particulars of the incident, the producers were caught between corporate demands and artistic integrity. But Clark and Wolff made a defining choice. They refused to yield to Lott's demands, risking the ire of their sponsor but standing firm in their principles.

The Fallout

The broadcast of the original performance, complete with the touch, was a watershed moment. The anticipated backlash from Southern audiences did not materialize with the intensity Lott anticipated and feared. Although the response was mixed, the special received a generally positive reaction. People across the nation witnessed not just a duet, but a quiet statement of solidarity and equality.

The controversy and the stance taken by Clark, Wolff, and Binder were not without consequences. Doyle Lott, the man who had sought to maintain the status quo, was ousted from his position. His dismissal signaled a subtle but undeniable shift within Corporate America, as well as within the television broadcasting industry, regarding racial politics.

Legacy of a Touch

In 1967, Nancy Sinatra and Sammy Davis, Jr. had kissed on television without incident. Later, in 1968, Captain Spock would kiss Uhura. So the Clark-Belafonte incident was a small moment on a larger canvas that epitomized the growing pains of a country striving toward equality. It was but one occurrence in a chain of events spurring a kind of open-mindedness and recognition of diversity that would slowly infiltrate popular media. In the years that followed the broadcast of the Petula special, television would see a gradual move—albeit imperfect and still evolving—toward inclusivity and representation.

Reflections, 55+ Years Later

The controversy surrounding Clark and Belafonte is not just a footnote in corporate and television history; that sound stage became a place where the narrative of equality found a voice in the simple touch of two performers. That touch was a silent testament to coming changes, changes that would see Doyle Lott and his outdated ideologies left behind. Furthermore, that touch conveyed an enduring message: that the future of harmony lies in the simple act of reaching out and touching another person's life, regardless of the color of their skin.

What intensifies the power of the incident is the organic nature of that moment. Both Clark and Belafonte held strong anti-war and anti-racist sentiments; however, each emphasized in many interviews afterwards that their intent in doing the special had nothing to do with social or political statements of any kind. They were entertainers, doing their jobs, passionate about their music, and caught up in a strong emotional moment that only art can invoke.

The push-pull between Binder and Lott and the internal inconsistencies within Chrysler in support and opposition to the broadcast were a microcosm of our society at the time—and still now: in massive confusion and opposition about race. The Clark-Belafonte incident is a historical representation of the conflicting messages about race that my character Libby receives from the adults in her world, from her community, and from the media.

Libby is trying to understand why there’s disagreement where her Mama works, at the Kent Creek Chamber of Commerce, about accepting a Black businessman as a member. She’s doing her best to figure out why Granddaddy uses the n-word even though Mama tells her how wrong it is. She is regularly bombarded with conflicting messages from her family and media, making her unsure about what to believe and how to behave.

Libby, her mother, and other members of my fictional community of Kent Creek, North Carolina, grapple with the tacit acceptance of racial discrimination and with the realities of their own consciences. Even though Libby’s thoughts about the Petula special are fleeting—only a single sentence in Episode 2—the Clark-Belafonte incident was a challenge to those things in her world, just as it has challenged them in our real lives.

In the fifty-five years since that groundbreaking broadcast, we have witnessed countless echoes of that same passion and resolve displayed by Clark, Belafonte, and Wolff. While our journey towards racial equality is nowhere near over, and the individual and collective confrontation of ingrained prejudices is painful, the bravery they showed in holding their ground against bigotry can be a beacon, illuminating our path forward.