O'Reilly and Beck appearance postponed

NOTE: Due to the anticipated winter storm, the Bold and Fresh Tour, featuring Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck, has been postponed until 8 p.m. Friday, May 21. Tickets sold for the Jan. 30 show will be honored during the rescheduled date. Refunds will be given at point-of-purchase until Feb. 6. Call (757) 683-4444 for more information.

By Joy Vann
Correspondent

Millions of people watch, listen to or read Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck every day. That, apparently, is not enough.

The pair of political commentators kicked off their Bold and Fresh Tour to a sold-out crowd last week in Westbury, N.Y., and will perform before another sold-out crowd in Norfolk on Saturday.

The TV talkers are feeling the love from their fans. Tickets for the initial four dates sold out in less than a week, prompting the addition of two shows in Los Angeles. Those who don't have tickets to the Norfolk show can pay to see live

simulcasts Saturday in movie theaters.

There also will be a repeat showing at movie theaters Tuesday.

Fans will get the same kind of no-holds-barred political talk and theater that the men present on the Fox News TV shows. O'Reilly and Beck give individual presentations, then sit down to banter together.

That fans would pay to see the hosts of "The O'Reilly Factor" and "The Glenn Beck Program" live onstage - when they can watch them for free Monday through Friday - isn't a mystery to Larry J. Sabato, director at the University of Virginia's Center for Politics.

"It's tough to get people to part with their hard-earned money to see any presentation about politics. Most of us in the field, myself included, could draw a big crowd only if professors made attendance mandatory for their students," Sabato joked. "So how do O'Reilly and Beck do it? Like (Rush) Limbaugh or, on the left, Keith Olbermann, they are a rare combination of TV celebrity with a point of view that sells to an enthusiastic, ideological slice of the American public. People with strong beliefs will come out and pay to see someone they agree with who is also famous and entertaining."

Robert J. Thompson, professor and founding director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University, has a similar take on the popularity of the men who have so successfully joined politics and entertainment.

"These guys are enormous celebrities. It's just like late-night comedians you can see on TV five nights a week," Thompson said. "When they make a local appearance, people will still pay to see them."

Thompson said O'Reilly and Beck also draw a lot of fans by positioning themselves as the underdogs against the "elite, mainstream media."

"If Fox isn't mainstream media, I don't know what is," Thompson said. "It's owned by Rupert Murdoch, and they won't let us forget that it's the No. 1 cable news channel in the country. They want to be the David of David and Goliath, but they are the Goliath. O'Reilly and Beck are the media elite."

Joy Vann, joyvann@cox.net