<P> The film's first broadcast received positive critical notices in newspapers the following day . Variety magazine prophetically suggested that the film could be telecast annually and at an earlier time . </P> <P> The film was not rebroadcast in 1957 or 1958 . For telecasts from 1959 (the year of its second telecast) up until 1998, the film was always shown as a stand - alone TV special instead of as part of an anthology or movie series . Between 1959 and 1968, and again in 1990 when Angela Lansbury, star of CBS' Murder She Wrote, hosted the 50th - anniversary telecast, CBS chose its hosts from its then - current prime time lineup . In 1959, the host was Red Skelton (The Red Skelton Show); in 1960 it was Richard Boone (Have Gun, Will Travel), in 1961 and 1962 it was Dick Van Dyke (The Dick Van Dyke Show), and from 1964 through 1967, it was Danny Kaye (The Danny Kaye Show). Skelton, Boone and Van Dyke brought their then - young children along to appear with them . </P> <P> Although the hosting segments for the 1956 telecast of the film had to be done live, Skelton's, Boone's, Van Dyke's and Kaye's segments were recorded on video tape in advance of the telecasts . Lansbury's hosting segment was the first one recorded on film . </P> <P> During these years, the hosting sequences were not staged in a run - of - the - mill manner, with the host merely standing in a studio set, but in what could be considered imaginative ways . Richard Boone was taped on the set of his television series Have Gun, Will Travel, in a "living room" with his real son about to watch the film on a TV set . Dick Van Dyke was shown in a living room set with his children, and Danny Kaye's hosting segment featured him sitting on a prop toadstool against a painted backdrop of the Yellow Brick Road and the Emerald City . The Kaye segment did not include a television set as part of its design . </P>

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