Carlos Watson hosted Point Taken on PBS in 2016. The Emmy Award-winning journalist returns to PBS on September 8, 2017 with the new debate program, Third Rail with OZY.

Following the success of Point Taken, Carlos Watson, Emmy® Award-winning journalist and Editor in Chief of OZY.com, will host a new debate program on PBS, Third Rail with OZY. The seven-part series will broadcast and stream on THIRTEEN Fridays at 8:30pm ET, starting September 8, 2017, and the show wants you in the audience at show tapings! Tapings are on the same day of broadcasts, beginning Friday, September 8.

Get out your calendar and sign up to participate in one or multiple tapings, using this online sign-up form.

Dates of taping in New York City and broadcast on THIRTEEN

Third Rail with OZY airs consecutive Fridays in September at 8:30pm, September 8 through October 22. The half-hour program is taped with a live audience in midtown Manhattan in New York City, the day of the broadcast.

Friday, September 8, 2017 – audience arrival at 1:15pm EDT, taping starts at 2pm EDT
Friday, September 15, 2017 – audience arrival at 1:15pm EDT, taping starts at 2pm EDT
Friday, September 22, 2017 – audience in arrival at 1:15pm EDT, taping starts at 2pm EDT
Friday, September 29, 2017 – audience arrival at 1:15pm EDT, taping starts at 2pm EDT
Friday, October 6, 2017 – audience arrival at 1:15pm EDT, taping starts at 2pm EDT
Friday, October 13, 2017 – audience arrival at 1:15pm EDT, taping starts at 2pm EDT
Friday, October 20, 2017 – audience arrival at 1:15pm EDT, taping starts at 2pm EDT

What’s The Third Rail with OZY About?

Intriguing, unexpected and enlightening, Third Rail with OZY promises to present new voices and valuable dialogue for the digital age. In a fresh addition to the PBS line-up, Watson will frame each week’s half-hour show around a single, provocative question. Expert and celebrity guests will debate it in the studio each Friday, moderated by Watson, and informed by the weeklong social media conversation leading up to it. The series’ underlying query in this contentious age is: can dialogue—informed by data—alter people’s points of view?

“After the success of Point Taken in 2016, we are excited to welcome Carlos Watson back to PBS stations this fall. Carlos brings a unique combination of smarts and razor-sharp wit to his role as host and moderator, exploring a range of topics that are timely and relevant to the concerns of the American public,” said Marie Nelson, Vice President, News and Public Affairs, PBS. “While there are many issues that divide our country, there is often common ground to be found. We are proud to continue to serve as a platform for spirited and civil discussion.”

Online and social media voting will be used to assess outcomes of each week’s debate. Viewpoints posted on Facebook and Twitter, and on PBS.org, will be integrated and displayed as part of the program. To frame and inform the televised and digital discourse, the Marist Institute for Public Opinion will conduct advance, exclusive national surveys on each of Third Rail’s featured questions. The Conversation US, a media outlet aggregating academic and research content, will be an editorial collaborator.

“Third Rail with OZY will be an arena for open and honest conversations about provocative topics, offering a variety of viewpoints and spirited debate on some of the most critical issues facing our society today,” explains Carlos Watson. “Now more than ever it is important we bring these conversations out of the shadows and into the light, offering people perspective and an opportunity to make their voices heard.”

Share your point of view on the show’s debate by using the hashtag #ThirdRailPBS.