male gaze

Male Gaze: LeVar Burton, Blast From the Past

Photo: PBS/Courtesy Everett Collection

Today, Star Trek commander and legendary read-outloud-er LeVar Burton launched a Kickstarter campaign to revive the long lost Reading Rainbow — the generally beloved PBS series you may remember for its pro-literacy theme song and regularly encouraged field trips to your local library. Released in 1993, the show — which was hosted and produced by Burton — enjoyed a 23-season run (as well as 26 Emmys) before it was canceled in 2006, and has since been reimagined as an app. Now Burton is determined to rescue today’s kids from the dearth of stimulating daytime programming: With help from viewers like you, he plans to launch a web-enabled Reading Rainbow, along with classroom supplements and subsidies for schools in need. Backers can look forward to LeVar-recorded voice mails, LeVar following you on Twitter, picnics, video chats, and various other ways to interact with LeVar.

Male Gaze: LeVar Burton, Blast From the Past