"The Icons That Built America" highlights the talented, often provocative entertainers whose brilliance and rise to stardom transformed American popular culture.
In 1965, a struggling motorcycle salesman desperate to juice sales at his small-town dealership comes up with a dangerous publicity stunt that not only launches him into a new career, but changes entertainment forever.
A struggling New York actor, brushed aside because of his speech impediment, bets on himself to write, and star in a movie. By challenging the ideas of what it means to be a leading man, he gives himself a fighting chance in Hollywood.
For decades, the radio world has been dominated by top-40 music. But in the 1970s, two maverick broadcasters take a different approach, challenging their bosses, the rules and polite society to help create a new genre: talk radio.
A young martial artist and actor from Hong Kong has dreams of breaking into Hollywood, but in the 1970s, the racial barriers that have been in place for decades block any chance he has of becoming a star.
In the world of late-night, a young midwestern comic, who idolizes Johnny Carson, struggles to rise to the top as his irreverent comedy and antics finds its footing with a completely new audience.
Fitting into the clean-cut roles that comedians occupied in the 1950s, two up and coming standups make names for themselves. As society shifts, both men realize they need to adapt their comedy to better fit their world views.
In 1987, a small-time drug dealer forms a hip-hop based group in his hometown of Compton, California. The group's provocative brand of "reality rap" draws backlash from the government and law enforcement.
