tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-44688881629511134652024-02-20T12:32:19.854-05:00Best (and Worst) of Thrilling Days of YesteryearSelected scraps from the long-running (and now vaporized) nostalgia blog's Salon musings (2003-2007)...Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.comBlogger263125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-12802483004996320752007-10-28T14:56:00.000-04:002013-04-28T20:08:39.855-04:00Corrupting the minds of America’s youthDuring my hiatus, my younger sister Debbie made a pilgrimage
to <st1:city>Savannah</st1:city>, along with her husband
and young daughter, for the expressed purpose of attending her twenty-year high
school reunion. Mom made arrangements
for Deb and my brother-in-law to stay at a Hampton Inn (we’re kind of starved
for space here at Rancho Yesteryear—plus sister Kat and her roommate came down
for the weekend as well) while making sure my niece stayed at the house in
order to <s>spoil her rotten</s> spend quality time with her only
granddaughter.<br />
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I don’t get the opportunity to see niece Rachel too
often. I did see her in June, when we
made our yearly trek to <st1:state>West Virginia</st1:state>
for the annual Shreve reunion (a.k.a. “The Driest Weekend of the Year”), so I
was really pumped about her visiting.
The first night she’s here, she tells my mom she can’t sleep—and with
the day she had, with the travel and planes and all, it’s no wonder—so “Nana”
gets the idea to let her hang out in my room and watch DVDs on my portable
player.</div>
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I had the Bozo collection I told you about on top of a
waste-high shelf, and upon seeing that she wanted to watch some of the
shows. I couldn’t figure out how she
knew who Bozo was until she reminded me that I had got her a Bozo doll a few
Christmases back—which I did; I bought one at a Cracker Barrel at which the
‘rents and I breakfasted on some long forgotten trip. (Normally, I do not make it a habit to eat at
the Barrel because I strenuously disagree with their policy of refusing to
allow homosexuals serve me my food, but since I wasn’t paying I made an
exception.) She watched about a show and
a half of the World’s Famous Clown, and then announced she was going to bed. But then she stops, and looks at some other
DVDs on the shelf.</div>
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“What’s that one with the moose?” she asks.</div>
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Lo and behold, she had found my Rocky and Bullwinkle
stash. And like the proud uncle I am, we
watched a few of those before she definitely decided that it was time to hit
the hay.</div>
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Rachel is pretty bright for her age, but many of the jokes
from the residents of <st1:place><st1:placename>Frostbite</st1:placename> <st1:placetype>Falls</st1:placetype></st1:place>
went over her head—this, however, didn’t matter. One of the great things about kids is that
they don’t <i>discriminate</i> when it comes
to cartoons. We watched a couple of the
Bozo shorts—and let me tell you, the animation is lousy—but she didn’t care at
all…nor did she go off on a rant (the way I did when I got older) about the
limited animation that is Moose and Squirrel.
If it’s a moving drawing, they’ll sit and watch with rapt
attention. The other thing that I
marveled about my niece was that after we tucked a few Bozos under our belt,
she knew the theme song by heart. (I’m
lucky if I can remember the chorus.)</div>
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Rachel had a pretty good stay here in Savannah—she got to go
to the beach, swim in my step-Gran’s pool, played some games on the computer
(Bombast <i>would</i> pick that weekend to
go down, by the way) and watch Rocky and Bullwinkle, Bozo and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0039404" target="_blank">Fun and Fancy Free</a> (1947) with ol’ Uncle Ivan
(again, she couldn’t figure out why I was cackling during the Edgar
Bergen-Charlie McCarthy exchanges…but she did recognize Charlie when he first
appeared onscreen). The only downer came
when my Mom talked with her on the phone Sunday evening after they returned to <st1:state>Iowa</st1:state>:
she was in total tears because she had to go home after having so much fun.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-72749118236607844412007-10-13T12:30:00.000-04:002014-11-08T07:32:22.351-05:00“The apes have taken over…while we were busy watching television and filling our freezers, they’ve come out of the jungle and moved in!” – Professor Sam Bastion (Frank Lovejoy), Shack Out on 101 (1955/Allied Artists)Leonard Maltin describes the cult classic <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048607" target="_blank">Shack Out on 101</a> (1955) in his <i>Classic
Movie Guide</i> thusly: “Lee Marvin <i>is</i>
Slob in this trash classic about the efforts of hash slinger [Terry] <st1:city>Moore</st1:city>
to combat Communism while juggling the lecherous advances of nearly all her
co-stars.” And that’s as accurate a
description of this film as you’re ever going to get. (The film’s original
title was supposed to be <b>Shack Up on 101</b>—but
star <st1:city>Moore</st1:city> objected to its
suggestiveness.) As a Lee Marvin devotee, watching this movie was pretty much a
done deal—and I enjoyed the hell out of it, despite its existential
bizarreness. Marvin is wonderful; it’s
as if his character from <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047677" target="_blank">The Wild One</a>
(1954) decided to abandon the open road and make a desperately futile bid for
working class respectability.<br />
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<st1:stockticker>OTR</st1:stockticker> veteran Frank Lovejoy
is in <b>Shack</b>, playing a character
who’s referred to throughout the eighty-minute proceedings as “The
Professor.” I think Lovejoy was one hell
of a radio actor, but most of his silver screen forays showcase a thespian who
can be embarrassingly stiff at times.
This movie features one of his better performances, though his romance
with <st1:city>Moore</st1:city> isn’t at all
convincing. (Lovejoy's love scene with <st1:city>Moore</st1:city>,
as they passionately make out while discussing the U.S. Constitution, has to be
seen to be believed.) His character is
supposed to be in cahoots with Marvin’s (Slob’s not <i>really</i> a fry cook—he’s a Commie spy!) but anyone who’s seen <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043665">I Was a Communist For the FBI</a>
(1951) will know that Lovejoy’s “traitor” persona is all just an act.</div>
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Keenan Wynn (who owns the beanery where about 95% of the
film takes place), Whit Bissell, Frank DeKova and Len Lesser (<b>Seinfeld’s</b> “Uncle Leo”) also make
appearances in <b>Shack</b>, a
truly one-of-a-kind film written and directed by Edward Dein. Other than <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054020">The Leech Woman</a> (1960), a wacky
horror flick starring former noir siren Coleen Gray, I’ve not been exposed to
much of Dein’s oeuvre, though according to the IMDb he was a rather prolific
screenwriter (<b>The Falcon Strikes Back</b>,
<b>Calling Dr. Death</b>, <b>Boston Blackie’s Rendezvous</b>). </div>
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<b>Shack Out on 101</b>
was part of a double feature I ran last night (something I’ve decided to call
“Cold War Paranoia Theater”); the second entry being <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057242">Ladybug Ladybug</a> (1963), Frank
and Eleanor Perry’s follow-up to their critically-acclaimed debut film <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055892">David and Lisa</a> (1962), Since Perry’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063663">The Swimmer</a> (1968) and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064573">Last Summer</a> (1969) are two of my
favorite 60s flicks, I’ve been wanting to see <b>Ladybug</b> for some time now—and got the opportunity via <i>Five Minutes to Live</i> (where I also
purchased <b>Shack</b>). <b>Ladybug</b>
tells a fascinating story of a rural elementary school and its reaction to what
may or may not be an eminent nuclear attack.
As it turns out, the sounding of the “attack” alarm is due to nothing
more than a short circuit, but by the time this is discovered, events have been
set in motion that result in tragedy for one of the students sent home.</div>
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There are quite a few familiar TV faces in this movie:
William (<b>St. Elsewhere</b>) Daniels
plays the school principal, and Nancy (<b>Lou
Grant</b>) Marchand is one of the teachers assigned to lead a “patrol” of
students home. Other well-known
character actors include Judith Lowery (Mother Dexter from <b>Phyllis</b>), Richard Hamilton and Estelle Parsons—the latter two
playing the stern parents of one child who’s so freaked out by the experience
that she hides under her bed when she’s refused permission to take shelter in
the basement. Miles Chapin, an actor who
you may have seen in movies like <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079261">Hair</a>
(1979) and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117318">The People vs. Larry
Flynt</a> (1996), plays one of the kids in <b>Ladybug</b>,
as does Alice Playten—an actress known for both her voice work and
participation in various <i>National Lampoon
</i>productions…but for some odd reason, will always be associated (to me,
anyway) as the babysitter in the Sid & Marty Krofft Saturday morning
classic <b>The Lost Saucer</b>.</div>
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<b>Ladybug Ladybug</b>
is reportedly based on an actual event, but of the two films I think <b>Shack</b> holds up better—after all, it’s
essentially an espionage melodrama…and they never go out of style no matter <i>who</i> the bad guys are. But if you grew up in a time when adolescents
were scared shitless of the bomb (and, as the film notes, the adults are just
as nervous) and were drilled endlessly to “duck and cover” at their school
desks, I’m sure it will resonate; it’s definitely worth seeking out.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-4322905173313147002007-10-12T14:30:00.000-04:002013-04-28T20:25:56.888-04:00Eat my dustHe passed away on September 28, 2007 of this year, but my <s>Bombast</s>
Comcast.net home page is just now getting the news that Charles B. Griffith, a
writer-director-producer…and even sometime actor, has <a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Thrilling%20Days%20of%20Yesteryear/wwwj.comcast.net/movies/news/index.jsp?cat=MOVIES&fn=/2007/10/11/786045.html">gone
on to his rich reward</a>. He was 77.<br />
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<st1:city>Griffith</st1:city> will
remain best-known for his authorship on the screenplay for Roger Corman’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054033">The Little Shop of Horrors</a>
(1960), a.k.a. The Film Shot in Two Days (though this isn’t technically true);
a cult favorite about a nebbish (Jonathan Haze) who makes good in the floral
business after finding a plant that begins to demonstrate none-too-attractive
cannibalistic qualities. (<strong>Horrors</strong>
was later brought to the stage in musical form, and that in turn saw a <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091419">cinematic version</a> directed by
Frank Oz in 1986.) In addition to the
screenplay, <st1:city>Griffith</st1:city> served as
second unit director (uncredited) and actor (he plays three roles—one of which
is the voice of Audrey, Jr.) on the project.</div>
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Personally, I’m not a fan of either version of <b>Horrors</b>—the 1960 version doesn’t have
the budget it needs to get the picture’s admittedly novel concept across, and
the 1986 film has a sugary-sweet happy ending tacked on. I prefer <st1:city>Griffith</st1:city>’s
treatment for <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052655">A Bucket of Blood</a>
(1959), a mordant black comedy about a nebbish (Dick Miller) who becomes the
toast of the art world by murdering people and encasing them in clay. Among the other memorable Corman films he
wrote are <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049370">It Conquered the World</a>
(1956), <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050778">Not of This Earth</a>
(1957), <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050906">Rock All Night</a>
(1957), <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051128">The Undead</a> (1957) and
<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061189">The Wild Angels</a> (1966).</div>
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Naturally, when working for Roger Corman, you’re going to
wind up directing at one time or another—just ask Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford
Coppola, Jack Nicholson, Peter Bogdanovich, Jonathan Demme, etc., etc.,
etc. Griffith got the opportunity to sit
in the director’s chair on a few occasions, notably the Ron Howard car crash
delight <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074454">Eat My Dust</a> (1976)
and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080658">Dr. Heckyl and Mr. Hype</a>
(1980), an interesting (if unsuccessful) take on the Dr. Jekyll tale starring
Oliver Reed.</div>
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Regular readers know that I’m quite enamored of Mr.
Corman—the King of the B’s—so when I hear of the passing of one of his loyal
minions, I can’t help but be more than a little depressed. R.I.P., Charles—you will be missed.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-10297123240813082252007-10-12T12:00:00.000-04:002013-04-28T20:34:05.399-04:00Webb of suspicionIn <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043292"><span style="color: purple;">Appointment with Danger</span></a> (1951), diminutive
movie tough guy Alan Ladd plays Al Goddard, a postal detective who’s
investigating the murder of a colleague named Gruber—and in the course of his
examination finds that the only witness to the crime is a saintly nun in the
form of Sister Augustine, played by Phyllis Calvert. Sister Augustine singles out a suspect from a
mug book, but his “friends” manage to croak him before Goddard can get to
him—necessitating that the postal cop pretend to be “on the take” and
infiltrate the gang undercover to find out what their game is…namely a big payroll
heist on a postal truck.<br />
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I know, it sounds pretty routine—and truth be told, it
pretty much is. But the
soon-to-be-pushing-up-daisies hood is played by Harry Morgan (billed as Henry
here, he later changed it so as not to be confused with the acerbic radio-TV
comedian) and his buddy, who beats him to death with a pair of bronzed baby
shoes, is none other than Jack Webb.
Watching the two of them before their celebrated stint on <b>Dragnet</b> in the 1960s is all the fun—in
fact, this movie, directed by Lewis Allen (<b>The
Uninvited</b>, <b>Suddenly</b>), has the
stink of <b>Dragnet</b> all over it. The screenplay was co-scripted by longtime
Webb crony Richard L. Breen, and two of <b>Dragnet’s</b>
“road company” players appear in it—Stacy Harris as the “inside” man at the
post office and Herb Vigran as the cop in the scene when Sister Augustine
peruses the mug books.</div>
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Before creating what would become his radio and television
legacy, Jack Webb appeared in a number of feature films and to be honest, he
wasn’t too bad an actor. From small,
unbilled roles in films like <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040444"><span style="color: purple;">Hollow Triumph</span></a> (a.k.a. The Scar) (1948) and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041940"><span style="color: purple;">Sword in
the Desert</span></a> (1949) he went on to do first-rate work as one of Marlon
Brando’s fellow paraplegics in Elia Kazan’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042727"><span style="color: purple;">The Men</span></a>
(1950) and as William Holden’s jovial buddy in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043014"><span style="color: purple;">Sunset
Blvd.</span></a> (1950). <b>Dragnet</b>, unfortunately, completely
changed his personality—transforming him into the stick-up-his-ass,
crime-fighting automaton that we’ve all come to know and love. (That’s why I was disappointed to learn that
Webb turned down John Landis when he was offered the role of Dean Wormer in <b>National Lampoon’s Animal House</b>—he
would have been sensational.) In <b>Danger</b>, he plays vicious low-rent thug
Joe Regas, whose job skills offer little outside of beating people up…but it’s
interesting to note that he doesn’t trust Ladd’s character through the course
of the movie, and he turns out to be right.
(The scene where he and Ladd play handball is worth the price of
admission.)</div>
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<b>Danger</b> features
character great Paul Stewart as the gang’s leader; an Orson Welles crony,
Stewart had many memorable moments in silver-screen villainy—he’s the guy who
menaces annoying little Bobby Driscoll in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042046"><span style="color: purple;">The
Window</span></a> (1949), and the sebaceous Carl Evello in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048261"><span style="color: purple;">Kiss Me
Deadly</span></a> (1955). (Even when he
was playing a half-way decent guy, like in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041239"><span style="color: purple;">Champion</span></a>
[1949], there was still something a bit seedy about him.) <i>TDOY</i>
fave Jan “Smoochie” Sterling plays Stewart’s main squeeze, and if you look
fast, Kathleen Freeman has a bit part as a nun—long before she was rapping the
knuckles of Jake and Elwood Blues with a ruler in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080455"><span style="color: purple;">The Blues
Brothers</span></a> (1980).</div>
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<b>Danger</b> was filmed
in 1949, but wasn’t released until 1951—which allowed Morgan to appear on a
couple of Webb’s <b>Dragnet</b> programs
long before he filled in for Ben Alexander as Joe Friday’s new partner in the
1967-70 TV version of the seminal cop show.
(You can definitely hear Morgan’s distinctive tones on one September 17,
1949 broadcast, where he doubles up as both a hotel manager and bank teller.) Someone at <st1:city>Paramount</st1:city>
must have liked the teaming of the two men, because they ended up on the wrong
side of the law again in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042379"><span style="color: purple;">Dark City</span></a> (1950), a seldom-shown noir that
served as Charlton Heston’s introduction to the big screen. Still, they remain the best thing in <b>Appointment with Danger</b>—a
well-worth-your-time film noir that I purchased from the good people at <i>Five Minutes to Live</i>.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-83813013097744882312007-10-11T16:30:00.000-04:002013-04-28T20:42:10.596-04:00“If you make a movie that a lot of people want to see—no rating will hurt you. If you make a movie that few people want to see—no rating will help you. Ratings have nothing to do with box office.” – Jack “Boom Boom” Valenti, former head of the Motion Picture Association of America (1966-2004)He doesn’t wear a silk hat nor twirl a moustache, but for
all intents and purposes Jack Valenti is the villain in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0493459"><span style="color: purple;">This Film
is Not Yet Rated</span></a> (2006), a funny, incisive documentary by Kirby Dick
that I had the distinct pleasure of watching last evening as my latest rental
from Netflix. (Netflix’s Red Envelope
Entertainment produced this doc in tandem with the Independent Film Channel and
the <st1:stockticker>BBC</st1:stockticker>, which leads me to think there might
be a conflict of interest going on here.)
In archival interviews spaced throughout the film, Valenti makes a
self-serving statement only to have it knocked down by evidence painstakingly
put together by Dick and writers Eddie Schmitt and Matt Patterson that the
“ratings system” implemented by Valenti in 1966 is completely gamed and biased,
often coming down on films with strong sexual content while looking the other
way where violence is concerned.<br />
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Let me just say upfront that while I’m not a prude about
this sort of thing, I prefer the movies made at a time when much of said sexual
content onscreen was a no-no—only because it inspired creativity among
filmmakers to make mention of “Topic A” in a sly, subtler fashion (Ernst
Lubitsch, call your office). But to me,
the only form of censorship individuals regularly practice is turning a TV knob
to the “off” position or not bother coughing up the nine bucks to see a movie
in the first place—so I do sympathize with the filmmakers interviewed (Kevin
Smith, John Waters, Kimberly Peirce, Allison Anders) when their work is judged
by a “star chamber” (as Dick memorably terms it) who purportedly have their
finger on the pulse of America’s moviegoers and who rate films in keeping with
the interests of “impressionable young minds.”
(For God’s sake, won’t somebody think of the children!)</div>
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A documentary that features renowned filmmakers bitching
endless about receiving NC-17 ratings and the unfairness of the system would
get old pretty quick, so it’s a good thing that a large portion of <b>This Film</b> is made up of Michael
Moore-type muckraking with Dick and a pair of lesbian private investigators
(who look like convenience store clerks) successfully identifying the unknown
individuals who make up the MPAA ratings board. They learn that many of these individuals
(whose identities remain secret because of the fear they might be “pressured”)
have children, all right—but most of them have left the “impressionable mind”
stage years ago. I also chuckled at the
irony of Dick himself receiving an NC-17 upon submitting his film for review;
his attempt to appeal the rating results in a hearing that reeks of Franz Kafka
and Lewis Carroll.</div>
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I have to say, this new Netflix arrangement is working out
pretty well—I’ve been able to squeeze in a rental at least once a week and I’ve
stacked a number of both documentaries, silent films and recent movies in my
queue to offset my usual classic movie habit.
Last week, I watched Kevin Keating’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0473037"><span style="color: purple;">Giuliani
Time</span></a> (2005), a thought-provoking look at the former NYC mayor who
may very well (and this is the part that scares me) become the next President
of the United States. I liked Keating’s
film, and would definitely recommend it to rent; though I think Keating pulls
his punches on several occasions when he gets a little too close to revealing just
what kind of fascist Giuliani really is.
Next in the queue is <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0486358"><span style="color: purple;">Jesus Camp</span></a> (2006), Heidi Ewing and Rachel
Grady’s harrowing look at how culture warriors spend their spare time during
summer vacation.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-46608908867388462992007-10-10T21:50:00.000-04:002013-05-01T23:32:29.939-04:00Tell them Boris sent youSo the ‘rents and I are dining on some fried chicken
purchased from Publix for lunch this afternoon, and my Mother makes mention of
the fact that she and Dad went to the National Guard Armory today to get flu
shots.<br />
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“They have a drive-thru, you know,” she informs me.</div>
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Slight pause from me.
“You mean…you drive up, stick your arm out and…”</div>
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“That’s how they do it now,” she reaffirms.</div>
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“Good thing you weren’t there for a tetanus shot,” I
responded, getting back to my chicken. A
three-minute pause, then the two of them begin to cackle like hens, having just
got the joke. (Just more evidence to add
to the already voluminous pile of verification that I was adopted.)</div>
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Anyway, some eBay-related business (okay, I had packages to
mail) kept me getting anything accomplished today (like watching something for
the blog), so I thought I’d direct you to a nifty little feature at Laughing
Gravy’s <a href="http://inthebalcony.com/" target="_blank">In the Balcony</a> entitled “31 Days of
Boris Karloff”. Every day this month,
the Gravymeister is watching some of Mr. Karloff’s finest (and…well,
not-so-finest) films and reviewing them in his own inimitable style.</div>
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I mention this partly because I have nothing prepared, and
partly because I loaned him my copy of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028478"><span style="color: purple;">The
Walking Dead</span></a> (1936), which I dubbed to <st1:stockticker>DVD</st1:stockticker>
from a VHS recording (in the good old DirecTV days) two years ago. Someone asked Gravy if he needed any more
Karloff films and he mentioned that there were one or two that he had not yet
seen, including <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0029754"><span style="color: purple;">West of Shanghai</span></a> (1937).</div>
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Now…don’t tell him this…but I had this on VHS—except that I
chucked it out two weeks ago. I couldn’t
remember why I recorded it (I got it confused with Lon Chaney’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0019563"><span style="color: purple;">West of
Zanzibar</span></a>—which I already had) and tossed it in the bin…then realized
my error <i>only</i> after reading a short
list of the Karloffs he had not yet seen.</div>
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D’oh! Stupid
getting-older-memory…</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-64314855911707377562007-10-09T13:05:00.000-04:002014-11-08T07:32:00.065-05:00“When you live outside the law you have to eliminate dishonesty…” – Julian (Robert Keith), The Lineup (1958/Columbia)One of my earliest posts here at <i>Thrilling Days of Yesteryear</i> was an essay on <b>The Lineup</b>, a CBS radio series that premiered on <st1:date day="6" month="7" year="1950">July 6, 1950</st1:date> as an imitator of the
then-popular police procedural <b>Dragnet</b>
and lasted on the air until <st1:date day="20" month="2" year="1953">February
20, 1953</st1:date>. Scripted by future
film director Blake Edwards (who also created <b>Richard Diamond, Private Detective </b>for actor-crooner Dick Powell),
the series starred <st1:stockticker>OTR</st1:stockticker> stalwart Bill
Johnstone as Lt. Ben Guthrie and Wally Maher as Sgt. Matt Grebb (previously
played by Joseph Kearns). <b>Lineup</b> differed from <b>Dragnet</b> only in that its dramatized
cases were mostly fictional, compared to Jack Webb’s “liberation” of actual
police files from the L.A.P.D.<br />
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<b>The Lineup</b> was
one of a handful of CBS radio series that made the successful transition to
television, premiering October 1, 1954 with Warner Anderson taking over for
Johnstone as Guthrie and Tom Tully pinch-hitting for Maher as Grebb (who had
since been promoted to Inspector). A third
character, Inspector Fred Asher (Marshall Reed), was also added to “the
lineup,” and the series had a home at <st1:time hour="22" minute="0">10:00pm</st1:time>
on CBS’ Friday night schedule for five seasons before being expanded to an hour
in the fall of 1959 on Wednesdays. Tully
and Reed got their pink slips, and a new cast joined <st1:city>Anderson</st1:city>:
William Leslie as Insp. Dan Delaney, Tod Barton as Insp. Charlie Summers (that
name sounds familiar), Skip Ward as Officer Pete Larkin and Rachel Ames as
Policewoman Sandy McAllister. Whether it
was the brand-new cast or brand-new time slot—or simply that the series had
worn out its welcome—the changes did little to keep the program on the air, and
<b>The Lineup</b> left CBS-TV on <st1:date day="20" month="1" year="1960">January 20, 1960</st1:date>. It was syndicated soon afterward; its name
changed to <b>San Francisco Beat</b>.</div>
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During its stint on CBS, someone got the idea to produce a <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051866"><span style="color: purple;">theatrical
version</span></a> of the series, a B-picture that has acquired a sizeable cult
following due to its crisp, no-nonsense direction by the legendary Don Siegel (<b>Invasion of the Body Snatchers</b>, <b>Dirty Harry</b>) and suspenseful <b>Naked City</b>-type script by Sterling
Silliphant (<b>In the Heat of the Night</b>). Indeed, <b>The
Lineup</b> starts off with a bang: the audience is taken to a pier where boat
passengers are disembarking when a porter swipes a grip from art dealer Philip
Dressler (Raymond Bailey, sans his Milton Drysdale toupee), throws it into the
back of a waiting cab, and the cab heads off for points unknown. The cabbie fails to see a large truck backing
out in his path and he rams into it, causing the truck’s driver to exit his
vehicle to start the usual “Why don’t you look where you’re going” brouhaha. The cabbie drives around the truck, and plows
right into a beat cop who’s motioning for him to stop—and as the cop’s body
hits the ground he manages to get off a shot that hits the cab driver and
causes him to ram into the back car of a stationary train.</div>
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Lt. Guthrie (Anderson) and Insp. Al Quine (Emile Meyer—apparently
Tom Tully wasn’t available to reprise his TV role as Grebb) are curious as to
why the fuss over a simple suitcase has resulted in two deaths—and soon learn
that a statue inside Dressler’s case is the hiding place for a nice little
stash of heroin. A narcotics smuggling
ring is operating in Frisco, whereupon innocent tourists have smack planted on
them and then are relieved of their cargo once they’ve left the boat. That confiscation job falls to a pair of
hoods played by Robert Keith and Eli Wallach; Wallach is the gunman described
by his mentor (Keith) as “a wonderful, pure pathological study…a psychopath
with no inhibitions.” (Maybe so, but
Keith comes across as a pretty creepy customer, too—particularly his habit of
writing down the last words of dying individuals in a little notebook.) Keith and Wallach (and wheelman Richard
Jaeckel) have to obtain three parcels of heroin from three separate passengers
and have it ready at a checkpoint before <st1:time hour="14" minute="0">2:00pm</st1:time>.</div>
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I had seen <b>The Lineup</b>
one time before, and to give you an idea of how long it’s been it was on a
television station that interrupted the movie <i>with commercials</i>. I’ve come
to appreciate it a little more with a second viewing, though I’m still not
certain why it’s held in such high regard by cultists—there are an awful lot of
slow spots in the film (primarily the scenes in which the cops appear…when your
villains are more interesting than the law you’re bound to have trouble) and
many of its memorable moments and ideas have been cribbed from earlier noir
movies (<b>T-Men</b>, <b>Kiss of Death</b>, <b>The Lady from
Shanghai</b>, etc.). It does have a wild
climactic chase that kicks in around the seventy-six minute mark, and the
performances (particularly Wallach and Keith) are first-rate; my biggest
delight while watching the film was recognizing right off the actor who plays
Wallach’s contact as Bob Bailey, a.k.a. <b>Yours
Truly, Johnny Dollar</b> (his voice was a dead giveaway). (Jack “Rocky Jordan” Moyles has a bit part in
this one, too, as a steam room attendant.)
My copy of <b>The Lineup</b> came
courtesy of <i>Five Minutes to Live</i>,
which is a nice site to locate hard-to-find noirs. </div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-167804763631485362007-10-03T15:37:00.000-04:002013-05-01T23:44:55.184-04:00Farewell, GeorgeFrom my <s>Bombast</s> Comcast.net webpage comes some truly
devastating news. Actor George Grizzard
has gone on to his rich reward <a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Thrilling%20Days%20of%20Yesteryear/wwwj.comcast.net/movies/news/index.jsp?cat=MOVIES&fn=/2007/10/03/778927.html"><span style="color: purple;">at the age of 79</span></a>.<br />
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His obituary covers in nice detail his incredible acting
range, particularly in the area of live theater. I wasn’t at all aware of Grizzard’s stage
accomplishments—he won a Tony Award for his performance in 1996’s Edward
Albee’s <i>A Delicate Balance</i>, and
nominations for his work in <i>The
Disenchanged</i> (1959) and <i>Big Fish,
Little Fish</i> (1961). His stage debut
was opposite Paul Newman, playing his brother in 1955’s <i>The Desperate Hours</i>, which was later brought to the silver screen
with Humphrey Bogart in the starring role.
Other highlights include <i>Who’s
Afraid of Virginia Woolf?</i> (the original 1962 production), <i>California Suite</i> (1976) and <i>Judgment at Nuremberg </i>(2001).</div>
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Grizzard also did a goodly amount of television work,
including the prestigious dramatic anthology <b>Playhouse 90</b>. Among the
series he appeared on: <b>Alfred Hitchcock
Presents</b>, <b>The Twilight Zone</b>, <b>Rawhide</b>, <b>Ben Casey</b>, <st1:place><st1:city><b>Medical Center</b></st1:city>, <st1:state><b>Hawaii</b></st1:state></st1:place><b> Five-O</b> and <b>Law & Order</b>,
on which he had a recurring role as Arthur Gold. He also copped a Best Supporting Actor Emmy
in 1980 playing opposite Henry Fonda in the TV-movie <b>The Oldest Living Graduate</b>.</div>
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But I’ll personally remember Grizzard best for performances
in films like <span style="color: purple;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055728" target="_blank">Advise & Consent</a></span> (1962, as Senator Ackerman), <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062473"><span style="color: purple;">Warning
Shot</span></a> (1967, as the flaky pilot-playboy who befriends David Janssen’s
cop) and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086927"><span style="color: purple;">Bachelor
Party</span></a> (1984) because—and I mean absolutely no malice in this—no one
could play a better asshole than George.
Any individual who has the cojones to play truly unlikable people time
and time again is aces in my book.</div>
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R.I.P., Mr. Grizzard.
You will be missed. </div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-36658729692835491192007-10-03T11:51:00.000-04:002013-05-01T23:54:06.480-04:00Everybody loves RaymondHaving watched <b>The
Further Perils of Laurel & Hardy</b>, <b>Harold
Lloyd’s World of Comedy</b> and the <st1:stockticker>DVD</st1:stockticker> set <b>Weiss-O-Rama</b> of late, I cannot escape
the fact that the silent film bug has bit me again. It’s a recurring phenomena (though certainly
nothing to get all plastic-sheeting-and-duct-tape about) whereupon I find
myself buying goodly-sized portions of DVDs showcasing silent cinema, and
again, while the consequences are slight (and most enjoyable), it does have a
tiny tendency to put a dent in my wallet.
I’ve procured within the past two weeks alone some silent comedies and
dramas from the likes of <a href="file:///C:/www.grapevinevideo.com/"><span style="color: purple;">Grapevine Video</span></a>, <a href="http://www.sunrisesilents.com/"><span style="color: purple;">Sunrise
Silents</span></a> and <a href="file:///C:/www.kino.com/video/results.php?search_type=Genre&search=Silent&genre_id=3"><span style="color: purple;">Kino</span></a>—which I hope to find time to watch and
review in this space this month.<br />
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I’ve been a fan of silent films since I was a little
gaffer—particularly the works of the great comedians. I’m not entirely sure when and how this came
about, though I’ve long suspected that my exposure to Buster Keaton, Harry
Langdon and Charley Chase in their Columbia two-reelers would go a long way
toward explaining it. I’m also old
enough to remember the hoopla surrounding the return of Charlie Chaplin to the
United States (not knowing at the time, of course, that the U.S. was
responsible for kicking him out in the first place) to participate in the 1972
Academy Awards. A few years later, I
made a point to borrow from the town library Walter Kerr’s seminal reference
tome <i>The Silent Clowns</i>—not long after
its publication, the author/critic appeared occasionally on a program that I
watched on our local PBS affiliate entitled <b>The Silent Comedy Film Festival</b>.</div>
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But enough about my truly odd childhood. This October 15th and 17th, the <a href="http://www.moma.org/exhibitions/film_exhibitions.php?id=2462&ref=calendar"><span style="color: purple;">Museum of Modern Art</span></a> has scheduled showings of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0016947"><span style="color: purple;">Hands Up!</span></a>
(1926), Raymond Griffith’s Civil War comedic masterpiece. I’d certainly love to be there (although Pam
says the popcorn really sucks) but since I cannot, I spend last night (through
the courtesy of Grapevine) watching it in the confines of my own home, where
the popcorn is assuredly better. <b>Hands Up!</b> is acknowledged by many
silent comedy fans to be Raymond Griffith’s best feature, even earning a spot
on the National Film Registry in 2005.
Author Kerr enthusiastically championed Griffith in <i>Clowns</i>, writing: “Raymond
Griffith seems to me to occupy a handsome fifth place—after Chaplin, Keaton,
Lloyd and Langdon—in the silent comedy pantheon, a place that is his by right
of his refusal to ape his contemporaries and his insistence on following the
devious curve of an entirely idiosyncratic eye.”</div>
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It would be difficult for someone like myself to argue with
Mr. Kerr’s assessment (though I do take issue with his assigning Langdon to
fourth place—I think a strong case can be made for Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle)
since I’ve only seen the one Griffith vehicle—and in fact, more knowledgeable
fans than I demur based on the reality that many of Griffth’s films have been
lost to the ravages of time. In a
February 2005 article in <i>Classic Images</i>,
Bruce Calvert informs readers that only two of Griffith’s best comedies—<b>Hands</b> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0016205">Paths to Paradise</a> (1925)—are
available on video; some of his supporting performances also exist in that
medium, but the rest of his starring films still extant remain locked away in
private archives. (In the case of <st1:place><b>Paradise</b></st1:place>, nearly every available
print is missing the film’s final reel.)</div>
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But rather than lament what’s unavailable, allow me to
praise what is: <b>Hands Up!</b> is a
first-rate feature comedy, featuring <st1:city>Griffith</st1:city>
as a Confederate spy assigned to keep a <st1:state>Nevada</st1:state>
gold mine out of the hands of the Union Army (represented by Captain Montagu
Love). During the course of his mission,
he faces a firing squad (one of the film’s most memorable sequences, as he
cavalierly tosses plates in the air to distract his would-be executioners) and
Indians on the warpath, and manages to fall in love with both daughters (Marian
Nixon, Virginia Lee Corbin) of the mine owner (Mack Swain)—a sticky wicket
resolved at the end with a gag that I’m certain raised more than a few eyebrows
at the time. <st1:city>Griffith</st1:city>’s
unflappable character (adorned in silk hat and tuxedo) makes the comedic
entanglements work, displaying a breezy insouciance that is positively
engaging. I also find <b>Hands Up!</b> intriguing in that like
Keaton’s <b>The General</b>, both of its
protagonists are backing the Confederate cause…even though we all know (with
the possible exception of a few people hanging out in my neck of the woods) how
that turned out.</div>
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In <i>The Silent Clowns</i>,
Kerr states that “…’<b>Hands Up!</b>’
contains some work that is daring—for its period, certainly—and some that is
masterfully delicate; the work of an inventive, unaggressive, amiably
iconoclastic intelligence.” To me, the
test of a really good silent film is whether or not it encourages me to seek
other entries by the same artists (actors, directors, writers, etc.) and in the
case of <b>Hands Up!</b> it’s passed the
exam with flying colors.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-39169102562182694682007-10-02T14:11:00.000-04:002013-05-01T23:58:14.037-04:00Requiem for a heavyweight producerMy <s>Bombast</s> Comcast.net home page reports the passing
of television producer Martin Manulis, who has shuffled off this mortal coil at
the <a href="http://www.comcast.net/tv/index.jsp?cat=TELEVISION&fn=/2007/09/30/776598.html"><span style="color: purple;">age of 92</span></a>.<br />
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This will demonstrate how much of a lowbrow I am, by the
way. I saw Manulis’ name and immediately
recognized him as the executive producer of <i>TDOY</i>
sitcom fave <b>The Many Loves of Dobie
Gillis</b>—not stopping to realize, of course, that he was also the creator of
television’s <b>Playhouse 90</b>, one of
the most prestigious dramatic anthology series in the history of the TV
airwaves, with productions like <i>Requiem
for a Heavyweight</i> and <i>Days of Wine
and Roses</i> to his credit.</div>
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Manulis was also the producer of the movie adaptation of <b>Wine and Roses</b>, which starred Jack
Lemmon and Lee Remick., and he dabbled in film production through the 1960s
with films like <b>Dear Heart</b> (1964)
and <b>Luv</b> (1967) among his
credits. But it was on the small screen
that he achieved his greatest fame, producing various programs from the likes
of <b>Suspense</b> to <b>Studio One</b> to <b>Adventures in
Paradise</b> to <b>James at 15</b>.</div>
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R.I.P., Mr. Manulis—you will be missed.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-60596634259491506032007-10-01T16:32:00.000-04:002013-05-02T00:08:03.721-04:00I think we’re all Bozos on this busIf you’ve ever seen <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084516"><span style="color: purple;">Poltergeist</span></a>
(1982), I’m guessing you haven’t forgotten one of the most terrifying scenes in
that horror flick, where the little kid’s clown doll turns evil and goes medieval
on his ass. I certainly won’t forget it,
because I had a dream like that once when I was little—that my talking Bozo had
me trapped in my room and wouldn’t let me out, and I couldn’t contact my
parents.<br />
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I’ve known some people who claim to be freaked out by
clowns. I can’t honestly say that I
share that phobia, because I dealt with the Bozo dream in a perfectly calm and
rational manner: I threw that goddamned doll into the back of my closet. (Mom: “Why don’t you ever play with Bozo
anymore?” Six-year-old me: “I don’t feel
like it.”) Mom says I was a pretty big
Bozo fan as a kid—I even had this little <a href="http://www.clown-ministry.com/index_1.php?/site/aStore/bozo_the_clown_bop_bag"><span style="color: purple;">tchotchke</span></a> in the basement—but outside of the
toys and maybe an occasional Bozo cartoon, it’s faded out of my childhood
memory for good.</div>
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The entity billed as “The World’s Greatest Clown” was
created by Alan W. Livingston in 1946 as a character for Capitol Records, offering
children what was then the innovative idea of allowing them to read stories
while listening along on 78 r.p.m. records (dubbed “Record Readers”). Vocal actor Pinto Colvig (the voice of Goofy
and so many others) was the man behind the clown’s voice, and he also became
the first television Bozo when a TV program based on the character appeared in
1949 in the <st1:city>Los Angeles</st1:city> area.</div>
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The cathode ray tube began to cut into Bozo’s record sales,
and an associate of Livingston’s, a gynecologist-turned-actor-comedian named
Larry Harmon, had the foresight to see what a money-making machine the Boz
could turn out to be on TV by buying the rights to various Bozo products and
knock-offs. (The jewel of the clown…er,
crown, the rights to the character, were finally purchased by Harmon from
Capitol in 1957.) Harmon then started
his own cartoon studio (in association with Jaywark) not long after, and
eventually cranked out 156 cartoons that were so dismal in their animation they
made the <b>King Features Trilogy</b> material
look like it came out of Disney. Armed
with this “wealth” of cartoon riches, Harmon began to actively promote sales of
the new cartoon series, and decided to copy the success of TV’s <b>Romper Room</b> by franchising his animated
output: the cartoons would be sold to local stations, who in turn would produce
their <i>own</i> kiddie-show series
featuring their <i>own</i> Bozos—after
having purchased the costume and “training” from Mr. Harmon, who became a
staggeringly rich tycoon in the process.
One of the more famous individuals to don the Bozo duds was a young man
named Willard Scott (on Washington’s WRC-TV from 1959-62), who a meaner person
might say pretty much <i>stayed</i> a Bozo
the rest of his life, even while doing the weather for <b>The Today Show</b>. (I’m glad I
didn’t disappoint you.) WJCL-TV in <st1:city>Savannah</st1:city>
even had a Bozo show, though I don’t know too much of the backstory behind
that…<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20080417042109/http:/blaxstone.blogspot.com/"><span style="color: purple;">Sam Johnson</span></a> probably does, when he’s not out
being the Six Million Dollar <st1:state>Man.</st1:state></div>
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I mention Bozo’s background only because I entertained
myself over the weekend watching the <st1:stockticker>DVD</st1:stockticker> box
set <b><i><a href="http://www.deepdiscount.com/viewproduct.htm?productId=13426545"><span style="color: purple;">Larry Harmon’s Bozo, the World’s Most Famous Clown: Volume
1</span></a></i></b>, a collection of thirty shows originally broadcast over
WHDH-TV in Boston between 1965-67 (the program, <b>Bozo’s Big Top</b>, actually ran on WHDH from 1959-70; Harmon took one
hundred-and-thirty episodes from 1965-67 and syndicated them to stations who
couldn’t afford their own local Bozo).
Maybe I’m just a strange person, but I’ve really been enjoying this
jaw-droppingly awful collection of live shows that feature Frank Avruch as the
Boz himself and future <st1:street><st1:address><b>Sesame Street</b></st1:address></st1:street> performer Carroll
Spinney as various characters under the circus’ big top.</div>
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I say “jaw-droppingly awful” only because <b>Bozo’s Big Top</b> (produced and written by
Harmon) can’t hold a candle to the Cadillac of Bozo shows, <b>Bozo’s Circus</b>, which ran on WGN-TV in Chicago from 1960 to
2001. Having been blessed with getting
WGN on our cable service in Ravenswood while I was still toiling away in high
school, I got to enjoy the antics of Bob “Bozo” Bell, Frazier Thomas, Roy Brown
(as Cooky), Marshall Brodien (“Wizzo the Wizard”) and the rest in an incredibly
well-produced show that may have been targeted at kids but had equal appeal for
adults as well. (Actor Dan Castellaneta
once revealed in an interview that he modeled the voice of <b>The Simpsons’</b> Krusty the Clown character after <st1:city>Bell</st1:city>’s
Bozo.)</div>
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<b>Big Top</b> is like a
traffic accident from which you can’t quite turn away. The ninth show on the DVD set will give you
an example of its so-awful-it’s-great appeal: two of the regular performers,
Carl Carlsson (who played Professor Tweetiefoofer) and Ruth Carlsson (who
played most of the female characters), are doing a juggling act that they
apparently rehearsed maybe twenty seconds before the show started. They keep dropping their pins, and helpful
kids from the audience get up from their seats to pick them up and hand them to
the jugglers…<i>while they’re still juggling</i>. When this not-at-all-impressive display is
finished, the Carlssons then <i>light
torches</i> and start to <i>juggle these</i>—prompting
me to cry out: “Wait a minute! You
haven’t mastered the <i>pins</i> yet!” Even though they turn out the lights in the
studio to emphasize that the materials they’re juggling are on <i>fire</i>, they miraculously manage not to
drop any of the torches and barbecue any of the tiny tots in the process.</div>
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On <b>Bozo’s Big Top</b>,
Avruch would choose at random a child who was to be—and I can hear you all
getting ready to guffaw—his “Butch for a Day”; Butch being the little kid in
the Bozo cartoons that resembled Richie Rich except that he wore a ringmaster’s
uniform. In Show #9, he chooses a
defiant little girl who most definitely is <i>not</i>
going to wear <i>either</i> the jacket or
cap—I sort of halfway expected her to glare at him and say <a href="http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/bozo.asp"><span style="color: purple;">“Aw,
cram it, Clownie!”</span></a> The main
duty of the “Butch of the Day” is to draw a number from a hat to pick a child
who spins a Bozo wheel to win a big honkin’ load of toys in “Bozo’s Treasure
Chest,” sort of a very-poor relation to WGN’s “Grand Prize Game.” The “Butch” kid, who’s apparently having a
bad day, ignores the clown and several kids start running out of the peanut gallery
to volunteer to take over her Butch duties before Avruch manages convince Miss
Pissy Moppet to pull a out a number. The
kid who has the winning number eventually wins the chest with a lucky spin; by
this time, there were so many freakin’ toys in that chest (I watched eight
shows before anyone won) that the winner could have opened a Toys R Us
franchise there on the spot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once you have children breaching the soundstage perimeter,
chaos eventually follows. Bozo and his
circus pals are attempting to convulse the kids with some hoary old vaudeville
sketch when you can see one brave little moppet decide to join the festivities,
staring at the camera as if she were ready for her close-up, Mr. DeMille. The sketch involves the demolition of a hi-fi
set, which produces a ton of paper on the floor that, of course, the
tidier-minded kids feel its their job to clean up…but this time they take the
paper back to their seats.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you want to know why a perfectly sane individual like me
would find this sort of kitsch fascinating…well, I can’t really tell you. But Infinity Entertainment, who released the
first set, has a second collection following in <a href="http://www.deepdiscount.com/viewproduct.htm?productId=21528871"><span style="color: purple;">November</span></a>. <i> Somebody</i> besides me has to be watching
this stuff. So remember what your ol’
pal Bozo always says…<i>keep laughin’!</i></div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-82546035298800343772007-08-06T21:27:00.000-04:002013-05-02T00:13:08.497-04:00Blogs that make you go hmmm…My good neighbor to the North, <a href="http://childoftv.blogspot.com/2007/08/five-blogs-that-make-me-think.html"><span style="color: purple;">Brent McKee</span></a>, has bestowed upon my humble blog a
meme (and this just goes to show you how much I know—I thought it was
pronounced “mem,” as when Madeline Kahn says to the cowboy in <b>Blazing Saddles</b>: “Tex mem?”) and to be
honest, this isn’t any ordinary meme (you know what I’m talking about—the ones
that ask “Paper or Plastic?”…or some such esoteric claim) but one that asks you
to name five blogs that make you <i>think</i>. I’m nothing sort of astonished when Brent
says <i>Thrilling Days of Yesteryear</i>
starts up the old thought processes for him because usually when people comment
on my blog it’s a variation of “Lots of free time on your hands, huh?”<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, here is how this meme works:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN">If, and only if, you get tagged,
write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think.</span><o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<ol start="2" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN">Link to this post so that people can
find the exact origin of the meme.</span><o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ol start="3" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN">Optional: Proudly display the
Thinking Blogger Award on your site with a link to the post you wrote.</span><o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Even though Brent’s already tagged Tom Sutpen, Stephen Cooke
and Richard Gibson’s pop culturally delicious <i>If Charlie Parker Were a Gunslinger, There’d Be a Whole Lot of Dead
Copycats</i> (which, in all fairness, has already been tagged previously)—one
of the blogs I was going to include on my list, I thought I’d take a stab at
this. Here goes:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://elisson1.blogspot.com/"><span style="color: purple;">Blog
d’Elisson</span></a> – If you look at the “Yet More Self-Aggrandizement”
Section in the right hand section of Steve’s blog, you’ll see a quote by
me that I confess I swiped from Kaspar Gutman (Sydney Greenstreet) in the
movie <b>The Maltese Falcon</b>. But in “liberating” this quote I meant
no malice: simply put, Steve is one of the most fascinating individuals
I’ve ever met. His blog is a
living, breathing example of esoteric; he has so many interests that he
reminds me of a good friend in college who could hold forth on any subject
without any hint of “I know more than you do.” (Or, as Walter Brennan used to put it:
“No brag…just fact.”) There’s
always something to be learned or taken away from Blog d’Elisson—and if
you ever get the pleasure of meeting the man himself in person, take it
from me: there’s no pretense about him, what you see is what you get.<o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<ol start="2" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://popculturepetridish.blogspot.com/"><span style="color: purple;">Pop
Culture Petri Dish</span></a> – I have only one complaint about Tony Kay’s
blog…he doesn’t update it nearly enough.
As an observer of pop culture, I am full-green-envious of those
individuals who dissect it better than I can, and Tony is definitely in
the top five. In <a href="http://popculturepetridish.blogspot.com/2007/08/cleanin-house-quinn-martin-production.html"><span style="color: purple;">watching the TV chestnut</span></a> <b>Streets of San Francisco</b> on <st1:stockticker>DVD</st1:stockticker>,
Tony can’t help but marvel at the huge leaps in technology made since that
series’ 1972-77 run: “’Where's his cell phone?’ my mind cried out more
than once as I watched a beat cop forced to run to the nearest pay phone
to call in a crime scene, and observing antique equipment like Tele-type
machines and, hell, electric typewriters was like peeking in on a living
museum.” Great stuff.<o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ol start="3" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><a href="file:///C:/http:/thirdbanana.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><span style="color: purple;">The Third Banana</span></a> - As an individual who’s been known to drive
people out of the TV room with cries of “That’s so-and-so!” any time I
recognize a character actor, it’s nice to know that Aaron Neathery and
Company are there to share their immeasurable knowledge of comedians who
are either forgotten today…or were obscure from the get-go. Case in point, this on-the-money <a href="file:///C:/http:/thirdbanana.blogspot.com/2007/07/wrong-miss-wright.html"><span style="color: purple;">mini-review</span></a> of <b>The Wrong Miss Wright</b> (1937), a Columbia two-reeler starring
Charley Chase that Aaron notes “is arguably better than most of his final
performances for [Hal] Roach…” Nice
to know that I’m not the only one who thinks <b>Wright</b> is one of Chase’s best comedies.<o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ol start="4" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://zvbxrpl.blogspot.com/"><span style="color: purple;">Something
Old, Nothing New</span></a> – I’ll just put it as succinctly as I can…I
want to be Jaime Weinman when I grow up.<o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ol start="5" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><a href="file:///C:/http:/www.scrubbles.net/" target="_blank"><span style="color: purple;">Scrubbles.net</span></a>
– Like any good pop culture blog, Matt Heinrichs samples everything from
the buffet, from Siskel & Ebert to erotic playing cards to <st1:place>Disneyland</st1:place>
records. Matt consistently
emphasizes what people have long suspected but are afraid to admit: kitsch
is cool. <o:p></o:p></li>
</ol>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-11805790492421991642007-06-17T14:37:00.000-04:002013-05-02T00:23:48.498-04:00“Wake up, America! It’s time to stump the experts!”I’m sure I’ve mentioned this a time or two in the past, but
one of the nifty benefits of being involved in the <a href="http://www.radioarchives.org/">First Generation Radio Archives</a> and
purchasing ten or more of their Premier Collections is that…well, “membership
has its privileges.” For starters, you are recognized as a “Friend of the
Archive,” and on the fifteenth of every month you receive a newsletter pointing
you toward other OTR programs offered by the FGRA, including discounts on
special collections and access to their “Bargain Bin” and Low Generation CD
library, where you can often pickup CDs for as low as $2 a pop. Though
you can certainly make a strong argument that I need more CDs for the dusty <i>TDOY</i> holdings like a moose meets a hat
rack, I couldn’t resist picking up a 10-CD set of twenty broadcasts from the
quiz show favorite <b>Information Please</b>—one
of June’s specials and a program of which I’m become fonder and fonder with
each listen.<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you’re unfamiliar with <b>Information Please</b> outside of the yearly <a href="http://www.infoplease.com/orderipa.html"><span style="color: purple;">almanac</span></a>,
you should check out <a href="http://www.homestead.com/oldtimeradiotapes/information.html"><span style="color: purple;">this book</span></a> by the Isaac Asimov of old-time radio
publishing, Martin Grams—but if you’re in a hurry, allow me to crib a quick
description of the program from the latest “Friends of the Archive” newsletter,
composed by Director Tom Brown and Preservation Manager Harlan Zinck:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: red;">Both of us have always been fans of the more obscure shows
from radio's past. We enjoy the mainstream shows like <b>The Jack Benny Program</b>, <b>The
Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show</b>, and <b>The
Shadow</b> of course -- but it's the lesser-known programs that really strike
our fancy.</span><br />
<span style="color: red;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: red;">One that really delights Harlan is <b>Information
Please</b>, the bright and witty quiz program hosted by Clifton Fadiman and
featuring a "brain trust" of quick-witted panelists like Franklin P.
Adams, John Kieran, Oscar Levant, and guests ranging from Basil Rathbone and
Groucho Marx to Alexander Woollcott and Alice Duer Miller. Though at first
glance, it would seem that such a program would be of primary interest to
intellectuals and literary enthusiasts, those who have taken a chance and
listened to a few programs have been pleased to discover that the shows were
and remain highly entertaining for modern day audiences. </span><br />
<span style="color: red;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: red;">The very concept of the program - turning the usual game show concept backwards
by making the experts, rather than the average man or woman, answer the
questions - made it an early success with audiences ranging from truck drivers
to college professors (particularly when none of the panelists could answer a
relatively simple question). Likewise, the experts chosen to participate in the
quiz, though all knowledgeable on a wide range of subjects, were not eggheads
or dull researchers; Levant, for instance, made a career out of being a piano
prodigy playing and composing both classical and popular pieces, as well as by
being a popular character actor in the movies. John Kieran was a well-known
sports columnist while Frank Adams, or 'FPA', as he was best known, had for
many years authored the popular "Conning Tower" column in various New
York newspapers, documenting the words, phrases, poetry, and goings-on of the
Manhattan theater and literary scene. Despite their knowledge and memories, all
of the regular panelists - as well as many of the guests - frequently
demonstrated a very low-brow love of bad puns, old jokes, and word play -- and
it was common on many a broadcast for the entire group to break into iffy
barbershop harmony and perform a vocal rendition of some old-time favorite!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I am in 100% agreement with both Tom and Harlan on the
merits of <b>Information Please</b>—and not
just because they can get me work. You see, one of the broadcasts in this
CD set (from June 20, 1939) features a guest appearance (on the panel) from
George Burns’ better-half, Gracie Allen—who, contrary to previous accounts,
doesn’t completely abandon her “dumb Dora” persona (you gotta love Gracie—she
never broke character) but at the same time demonstrates she’s got plenty of
Moxie on the ball by holding her own in answering questions. (I listened
to this particular show last year for a project that is currently in limbo
right now.) So I’m really looking forward to hearing to the rest of the
shows: these 1939 broadcasts include such notables as Rex Stout (Nero Wolfe’s
creator), Russel Crouse, John Gunther, H.V. Kalterborn and Lillian Gish.
There’s also a February 7, 1939 broadcast featuring a young Michigan University
student named Myron Wallace—whom OTR fans might remember as an
announcer-performer (<b>The Green Hornet</b>,
<b>Sky King</b>) and others as a celebrated
investigative reporter for the CBS television network on shows like <b>60 Minutes</b> (I think he was answering to
“Mike” by that time).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And while I’m on the subject of the First Generation Radio
Archives, just a quick reminder that you still have plenty of time to enter
their <b>Adventures by Morse</b> <a href="http://www.radioarchives.org/Newsletter.htm#An_Exciting_Contest:_Win_a_Rare_and_One-of-a-Kind_Radio_Recording%21">contest</a>,
which will award one lucky winner a rare test pressing—a one-sided, white vinyl
disc containing program #40, “Land of the Living Dead” (Chapter 1, Part
2). All you have to do to enter is purchase one of the two Premier
Collections (or both if you want two chances to win) this month, <a href="http://www.radioarchives.org/sets/PC63.htm">Volume 3</a> of Adventures by
Morse or <a href="http://www.radioarchives.org/sets/PC62.htm">Volume 2</a> of
The Chuck-Wagon Jamboree (hosted by Ken “Now, Matthyoo…” Curtis)…or if your
tastes learn toward NTR (new-time radio), either (or both) <a href="http://www.radioarchives.net/sets/TZ10.htm">Volume 10</a> or <a href="http://www.radioarchives.net/sets/TZ11.htm">Volume 11</a> in the Twilight
Zone radio series. So don’t miss out—order and enter today!</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-1858930029778013742007-06-07T18:46:00.000-04:002013-05-02T00:28:25.347-04:00The Thief of Bad Gags<span style="color: #333333; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Back
in October of 2006, I mentioned that I purchased
some old-time radio programs from my good friend Jerry Haendiges that included
broadcasts from <b>The Jack Carson Show</b>, <b>The Fitch Bandwagon</b> (the
Phil Harris & Alice Faye years, before they switched to their self-titled
series sponsored by Rexall) and the Ray Milland laugh
fest <b>Meet Mr. McNutley</b>.
I also bought a fourth series from Jer, one that I had planned to write
about after tucking a few episodes under my belt…well, as you know by now, it’s
often hard for me to get around to things as quickly as I would like. But since I was doing some random surfing
earlier today and discovered that someone referenced a <i>TDOY</i> post for an <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Network"><span style="color: purple;">entry</span></a> on Wikipedia, I decided to have a listen
to this series: <b>The Texaco Star Theater</b>, Milton Berle’s radio farewell
that ran a single season on ABC Radio beginning </span><st1:date day="22" month="9" year="1948"><span style="color: #333333; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">September
22, 1948</span></st1:date><span style="color: #333333; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">.</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #333333; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Berle’s
television show, as you’re no doubt familiar, was also known as <b>The Texaco
Star Theater</b> (only it was televised on NBC-TV) and became one of the
contributing factors to the phenomenal number of television set purchases in
the halcyon days of the new medium. On
radio, however, <b>The Texaco Star Theater</b> had been on the air since 1938,
as the generic banner for shows starring the likes of Adolphe Menjou, John Barrymore,
Ken Murray, James Melton, Tony Martin and Alan Young. (In fact, Fred Allen’s show was known by that
title while he was on CBS from 1940-44.)</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #333333; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">When
Berle’s former NBC series </span><span style="color: #333333;">was axed on </span><st1:date day="13" month="4" year="1948"><span style="color: #333333;">April 13, 1948</span></st1:date><span style="color: #333333;">, he moved to the Life Savers network in the fall of
1948, bringing along with him former NBC stooges Arnold Stang, Pert Kelton,
Jack Albertson, announcer Frank Gallop, and writers Nat Hiken and Aaron
Ruben. (These two scribes were also
joined by the Simon Brothers, Neil and Danny.)
In later years, </span><st1:city><st1:place><span style="color: #333333;">Milton</span></st1:place></st1:city><span style="color: #333333;"> remembered it as “the best radio show I ever did…a hell
of a funny variety show.” Though it, too, was doomed to last only one
season—it’s every bit as hilarious as his unjustly neglected NBC program, and
it’s wonderful to be able to get the opportunity to listen to what is almost
the complete run of the series. One
broadcast from </span><st1:date day="24" month="11" year="1948"><span style="color: #333333;">November 24, 1948</span></st1:date><span style="color: #333333;"> features this amusing exchange between Berle and Stang
(who apparently rejoined the series—my guess is probably because Henry Morgan’s
ABC program had been cancelled): <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Uh, what is your name, young
man?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG (loudly) My name is Milton
Berle!</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Milton Berle?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: Yeah, I see you’re confused…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Yes…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: …I suppose I’d better
explain…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: I wish you <i>would…</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: I’m not the Milton Berle
that has a <i>shoe store</i> in the </span><st1:place><span style="color: blue;">Bronx</span></st1:place><span style="color: blue;">…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: You’re not…?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: No…that’s the first thing
people think of when they hear the name…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Now, wait a minute…wait a
minute…there’s <i>another</i> Milton Berle,
the radio star…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: Yeah, yeah, yeah…you’re
making the same mistake a lot of people make…that’s <i>Burl Ives</i>…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Now, wait a minute…wait…wait
a minute…please…look, <i>my</i> name is
Milton Berle, too…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: Oh, so you’re one of those
guys who right away takes a name the minute it becomes popular, huh?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Wait a minute…<i>takes a name?</i> That’s my <i>real
name!</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: Milton Berle?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Yes!</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: I don’t get it…if you’re
here <i>tonight…</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Yes?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">STANG: …who’s watchin’ the <i>shoe store?</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This broadcast is titled “A Salute to Thanksgiving,” and the
funniest bit on this (and other Berle <b>Theater</b>
broadcasts) emanate from a feature showcased on his 1947-48 program,
“(Fill-in-the-blank) Forum,” which I suspect writer Hiken “liberated” from his
former boss, Fred Allen. Here, Uncle Miltie
interviews Pert Kelton’s long-suffering housewife:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Let’s hear from the
women…the lady in the second row, opening a can of beer with her <i>tooth</i>…Madam, uh…what is your name?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: Tallulah Feeney—I’m a
homemaker…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: I see…I see…and you have a
problem concerning Thanksgiving, is that…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: Yeah…how can I keep my
husband from eatin’ so much rich foods?
He’s a regular <i>Barbara Glutton</i>…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: He must like Thanksgiving,
huh?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: And how…the last
Thanksgivin’, the minute he woke up, he jumped out of bed and took a big bite
out of the turkey…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: I see…you hadn’t cooked it
yet?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: I hadn’t <i>killed</i> it yet…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: He eats a lot at
Thanksgiving dinner?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: Oh, brother…he knocks off a
huge meal and then rolls over and goes to sleep…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: But a man’s <i>entitled</i> to sleep after a heavy meal…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: With his head in the <i>mashed potatoes?</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Oh! Oh!
He’s sure a heavy eater…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: The doctor says he has a <i>tapeworm…</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Tapeworm? Does he watch his diet?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: Yeah…he stopped eatin’ <i>tape…</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Well, that does it every
time…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: What a clumsy jerk he is,
carving our Thanksgivin’ turkey…every year he cuts off the same piece for me…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: What piece is that?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: His <i>thumb…</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: He’s really a pest around
Thanksgiving, eh?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: He <i>means</i> well…today, he was helpin’ me in the kitchen…and it took him <i>six hours </i>to dress a turkey…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Six hours? Why, you could dress a <i>dozen</i> turkeys in that time…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">KELTON: In slacks and sports shoes?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>The Texaco Star
Theater</b> also carried over the “At Home with the Berles” feature prominently
showcased during <st1:city>Milton</st1:city>’s NBC run
(with Stang playing the part of Berle’s obnoxiously bratty son)—sadly, without
the participation of Mary Shipp, who by that time had found steady work as
night school teacher Miss Spaulding on <b>Life
with Luigi</b>. I’ve noticed, however,
in sampling these shows that Jack Albertson was allowed to participate more in
the sketches—Albertson had a recurring bit in which he played an influential
figure (movie mogul, Broadway producer) infatuated with Berle (“So it was a
flop…so I lost some money…I like show business…I like you…kill me! I like you...”), but in this exchange from a <st1:date day="8" month="12" year="1948">December 8, 1948</st1:date> broadcast he seems
to have forgotten on which side his bread is buttered:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Our questions tonight are on
radio, and here’s our first contestant—are you ready, sir?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">ALBERTSON: Yes, sir!</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: All right…now, for ten
dollars…who is the star of the <b>Texaco
Star Theater</b>?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">ALBERTSON: Milton Berle!</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Correct! For twenty dollars, who is the star of the
Texaco television show?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">ALBERTSON: Milton Berle!</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: Right! Now you’re up to forty dollars…what comedian
is known for his mother laughing at him?</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">ALBERTSON: Milton Berle!</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE: That’s right again…now, for
eighty dollars…who do you think is the <i>funniest</i>
comedian on the air? (Long pause,
accompanied by audience laughter) Come on—it’s for <i>eighty dollars…</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">ALBERTSON: You <i>keep</i> the money…I’ll keep my <i>self-respect!</i></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: blue;">BERLE (after the audience response
dies down): Thank you, <i>Henny Youngman</i>…</span><o:p></o:p></div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-31838446557756369682007-04-30T19:55:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:35:02.913-04:00I shot an Arrow into the airI finished watching the fourth and final serial in what I
could refer to as “the Horne of Plenty,” provided I was given to atrocious
puns. (As it turns out, I am—so there you go.) It’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032557"><span style="color: purple;">The Green
Archer</span></a> (1940), a rousing fifteen-chapter romp that might well be the
yardstick on how to measure a cliffhangers fan’s tolerance for James W. (this
one is frequently cited for heresy because in one chapter, some of the henchmen
while away their idle hours playing tiddlywinks) Horne. Major confession
time: I enjoyed <b>Archer</b> more than the
other three serials I’ve watched over the last several days, simply because it
aims for something different (eschewing the typical
“mad-genius-taking-over-the-world” plots of many cliffhangers) and because of
its “everything-but-the-kitchen-sink” approach (hidden rooms, passageways,
secret identities, fistfights, gunplay, poison gas, plot twists, etc.).<br />
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Although <b>The Green
Archer</b> is based on the famed mystery novel by Edgar Wallace (and was in
fact filmed previously as a silent chapter-play in 1925) it bears only a
passing similarity to the novelist’s work. The 1940 serial tells the tale
of egomaniacal villain Abel Bellamy (James Craven), a twisted genius who frames
his brother Michael (Kenne Duncan) for a crime Mike did not commit, thereby
gaining control of <st1:place><st1:placename>Garr</st1:placename> <st1:placetype>Castle</st1:placetype></st1:place>,
the ancestral home of the Bellamy clan. Abel has put the smackdown on the
castle—previously a thriving tourist attraction—because he’s using the edifice
as his headquarters for a major criminal empire (and I do mean <i>major</i>—he’s got enough henchman for <i>three</i> Republic serials), and when
Michael’s wife Elaine (Dorothy Fay) comes a-snooping around looking for
evidence to clear her spouse, Abel locks her in a secret room and holds her
captive. Two houses down, Elaine’s father Parker Howett (Forrest Taylor)
and sister Valerie (Iris Meredith) set up light housekeeping, along with Michael’s
bosom chum Spike Holland (Victor Jory), an insurance investigator convinced
that Abel is not the paragon of virtue he seems to be. Whenever Spike,
Valerie or any of the other good guys find themselves in peril, they can count
on the masked hero The Green Archer to bail them out of a tight spot; said
Archer being the legendary but mysterious do-gooder who protects the Bellamy
family in times of crisis.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once again, actor Jory serves out his serial sentence with
stoic dignity and grace; a lesser thespian might be tempted to gag it up in the
role of the hero, but Vic takes on his assignment as if it were written by the
Immortal Bard himself. No, the honors for scenery chewing go to <st1:city>Columbia</st1:city>’s
number-one serial baddie James Craven, who avails himself to several helpings
of scenery du jour like a hungry fat man at Golden Corral. Craven’s
Bellamy is apoplectic with frustration over the idiocy of the men in his
employ—though in all honesty, Team Black Tiger of The Shadow fame make
Bellamy’s henchmen look like Rhodes scholars. No one did villainous rage
like Craven, who could be wonderfully over-the-top in vehicles like <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034577"><span style="color: purple;">Captain
Midnight</span></a> (as Ivan Shark) but for some reason seemed a bit subdued
outside the studio (he’s the alter ego of the Purple Monster in Republic’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038007"><span style="color: purple;">The
Purple Monster Strikes</span></a>…and a bit of a nebbish in the part).
Another performance I enjoy in <b>Archer</b>
is our old pal Jack Ingram, who plays a hood named “Brad” (<i>Brad?</i>) in Bellamy’s employ disguised as The Green Archer…only he
keeps getting mistaken for the <i>real</i>
Green Archer, and frequently takes a pummeling from the other goons working for
boss Bellamy (a thug named “Dinky” in particular).</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Archer</b> also has
some really eye-popping chapter endings. Among the perils Jory’s
character faces: a room rapidly filling with water, another room with a
spike-covered ceiling, and my particular favorite, a room that loses its
floorboards one at a time to reveal a raging inferno below.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There’s just something irresistibly goofy about Columbia
serials: I love how the fistfights do away with all that choreographed nonsense
prevalent in Republic’s output and end up just being unorganized donnybrooks
with fists flying and the sound effects making smacking sounds regardless
whether a stuntman has hit his mark or not. The heroes of Columbia
cliffhangers also seem to be able to take on six to eight guys in one of these
melees, and are only knocked out when (this is <i>always</i> shown in close up) one of the goons hits the hero with a
heavy object (sap, gun butt, potted plant, etc.) If I have any nitpicks
with <b>Archer</b>, it’s that once again it
suffers from the elephantiasis that is a <st1:city>Columbia</st1:city>
chapter-play and should have been trimmed to twelve chapters before rolling off
the assembly line. (Oh, that and the fact that I figured out who the
Archer was in the first chapter.) Though my serial mentor Laughing Gravy
doesn’t care for <b>Archer</b>, I enjoyed
every cotton-pickin’ insane minute of it—and if you’re capable of allowing a
little levity creep into your choice of serials, I think you will, too.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-50315717278027813382007-04-29T09:48:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:31:35.880-04:00“…as haunting to superstitious minds as a ghost…as inevitable as a guilty conscience…”There are going to be a good many Shadow fans that will
react to the James W. Horne serial <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033040"><span style="color: purple;">The Shadow</span></a> (1940) like an
allergic-to-strawberries-rash…but since this <i>is</i> my blog, I’m here to tell you I’m not one of them. I
personally think, after watching all fifteen chapters, that Shadow is one of
the best Columbia cliffhangers I’ve seen (keep in mind that I have oodles and
oodles of their serial product to go through) even though it’s derived more
from the pulp stories than the radio show (for instance, the Shadow can’t cloud
men’s minds to make himself invisible…but the villain of the piece can with a
narrow beam of light)…and to be completely honest, the plot is straight out of <b>The Spider’s Web </b>(1938).<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You have a metropolis menaced by a mysterious, masked
villain called the Black Tiger (in <b>Web</b>,
it’s the Octopus) who seeks to take over all of the city’s industries by
terrorizing its powers-that-be. The hero is a scientist/criminologist
whose secret identity as The Shadow (in <b>Web</b>,
it’s the Spider) gets him in Dutch with both the authorities (who suspect that
he and the Black Tiger are one and the same) and the underworld.
Naturally, to keep tabs on the underworld he must don another disguise (in <b>Web</b>, it’s Blinky McQuade): that of Lin
Chang, an Asian antiquities dealer. (Let me just say that those of you
horrified by Sidney Toler or Peter Lorre’s performances as Asians need to take
a gander at star Victor Jory’s Lin Chang—a character that makes Charlie Chan
and Mr. Moto the very <i>picture</i> of
political correctness.) He is assisted by his confederates, <st1:street>Margo
Lane</st1:street> (played by Veda Ann Borg…who I actually like
in this part, even though I usually associate Borg with floozy roles) and Harry
Vincent, <st1:city>Cranston</st1:city>’s wheel-man
(played by Roger Moore…and not the one you’re thinking of). If I had to
nitpick, I wished someone had eliminated the Vincent character—popular in the
pulp stories—and substituted Moe “Shreevy” Shrevnitz instead. (“You was
wantin’ somethin’, Mr. Cranston, you was wantin’?”)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, the major difference between <b>Web</b> and <b>Shadow</b> is that
the latter refuses to take itself <i>too</i>
seriously—the goons working for the Black Tiger are among the most inept
henchmen in serial history, which provides some wonderfully comic moments; my
favorite is in Chapter 9—“The Devil in White”—when the Tiger’s chief henchman,
Flint (played by <i>TDOY</i> fave Jack
Ingram) tells his fellow thugs: “Now listen, men…we’ve got to do something—he’s
<i>really</i> gettin’ mad!” (I know it
doesn’t play funny in print, but Ingram’s performance has a sort of “Will you
guys stop pissing around?” quality to it.) Much has also been said about
the uninventiveness of the cliffhangers, a goodly portion of which consist of
the ceiling falling down on Cranston/Shadow at each episode’s end. Sure,
this is undeniably funny and off-putting to those who shun comedy in
serials…but I like how these events act as violent comic punch lines, similar
to Wile E. Coyote tumbling off a cliff or Daffy Duck getting his face shot off
by Elmer Fudd. By contrast, the thugs in the <b>Spider</b> serials (well, <b>Web</b>,
anyway) are pretty ruthless customers, despite the fact that they can’t seem to
hit the broadside of a barn. (The speculation on this is that the
serial’s producers were ordered to downplay the violence as a result of rulings
by the Hays Office.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But the strengths of <b>Shadow</b>
are many, chiefly Jory’s performance in the title role. (He not only has
a great voice, he can do the Shadow's laugh...which is more than Orson Welles
could ever do.) Jory was apparently banished to this serial by the studio
for some slight or troublemaking he caused, and it’s a shame that Columbia
didn’t punish him more often because he really grabs hold of the role and
refuses the temptation to do shtick with it (he reminds me a bit of Basil
Rathbone, who would have been the ideal choice to play the Shadow though that
would in all likelihood not have happened). I also like the serial’s
brisk pacing; despite its fifteenth-chapter length it never gets boring (this
might be due to the fact that director Horne would often direct scenes of
people running or driving in slightly sped-up fashion…or as Laughing Gravy so
memorable put it, “People moving as if their asses were on fire”)—and the
effective atmospheric backdrop of a city under siege by sinister forces is
grade-A. Though the identity of the villain is pretty easy to dope out, the
ride there is nothing short of entertaining.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-7553660321114410672007-04-28T21:53:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:28:04.724-04:00Along came a SpiderFor the next few days, I’m going to be jotting down random
thoughts about some of the cliffhanger gems in the oeuvre of James W. Horne,
the veteran comedy director and prolific serial helmsman whose work has
frequently created tendentious dissension among chapter-play fans.
Fortunately, Horne’s first assignment (which he co-directed with Ray Taylor…who
presumably kept Jimmy’s excesses in check)—<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030779"><span style="color: purple;">The
Spider’s Web</span></a> (1938), a serial based on the popular pulp magazine
hero—is generally received with favor by those both pro- and anti-Horne…not
only it is considered his best cliffhanger but it is also in contention for the
best serial to come out of Columbia’s stables, a studio that tried like Avis
but unfortunately churned out some embarrassing (and not only that, <i>boring</i>) stinkers.<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Future <b>Strike It Rich</b>
host Warren Hull (who also starred in serials as the Green Hornet and Mandrake
the Magician) plays Richard Wentworth, a master criminologist/scientist who
agrees to help a frustrated police force (presided over by Commissioner Kirk,
played by Forbes Murray) capture the Octopus, a mysterious masked villain
heck-bent on destroying the industrial infrastructure of an unnamed but big
honkin’ metropolitan city in a desperately insane bid for raw, unchecked
power. (Sort of like Dick Cheney…but <i>warmer</i>.)
Assisting Wentworth are fiancée Nita Van Sloan (played by Columbia’s “Queen of
Serials,” Iris Meredith), chauffeur Jackson (Richard Fiske, the poor sap driven
to distraction by the Three Stooges in their 1940 two-reeler <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032270"><span style="color: purple;">Boobs in
Arms</span></a>), a butler named Jenkins (Donald Douglas), and Ram Singh (Kenne
Duncan), a turban-wearing “warrior” adept at knife-throwing but for most of the
serial’s running time spouts cryptic proverbs and calls everyone “Sahib.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wentworth’s gang are in the serial (granted, they do on
occasion pull his fat out of the fire in tight moments) primarily because
they’re carryovers from the pulp stories but for the most part the
criminologist does all right for himself with two secret identities. The
first is costumed hero The Spider, who not only strikes terror into the hearts
of evildoers but is mistrusted by the forces of law and order, who are
convinced that not only is he working against them but that he may, in fact, be
the Octopus his own self. Because “The Spider” is not particularly chummy
with the criminal element, Wentworth must don a third disguise as two-bit
lowlife Blinky McQuade, who nevertheless is a pal to any other losers he
encounters.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>The Spider’s Web</b>
is undeniably a rip-snortin’, slam-bang actioner, filled with impressive stunts
(and the fight sequences aren’t too shabby, either) and a suspenseful plot that
features great cliffhangers…that are, unfortunately, spoiled due to Columbia’s
unfortunate habit of “telegraphing” future events with their ill-advised codas
at the end of each chapter. The performances are also good, particularly
Hull and Meredith’s—it’s a shame that Meredith’s services couldn’t be retained
for the 1941 sequel, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034223"><span style="color: purple;">The Spider Returns</span></a>; actress Mary Ainslee takes
on the Sloan role, and though I suppose you could argue that the fact that Nita
has been waiting three years to march Richard down the aisle for the
rice-and-old-shoes routine—with precious little success—it still doesn’t excuse
Ainslee’s often irritating approach to the part (she’s a bit of a detriment, to
tell the truth). Hull and Duncan returned to reprise their roles (though
Duncan’s Ram Singh really gets shunted to the background in <b>Returns</b>), with serial vet Joe Girard
(the geriatric Major Steel in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034577"><span style="color: purple;">Captain Midnight</span></a>) as Kirk and <b>Pete Smith Specialties</b> star Dave
O’Brien (Captain Midnight himself) as Jackson the wheel-man. (I like
O’Brien’s approach to his role; it’s not entirely winking-at-the-audience but
he doesn’t skimp on the tongue-in-cheek either.) This time, the Spider
takes on the Gargoyle (a better villain than the Octopus, in my opinion—though
his identity is fairly obvious), a meanie who’s out to put a monkey wrench in
the burgeoning defense industry (even though we’re technically not in the war
yet, there’s still a ton of propaganda in this baby). In all honesty, I
thought <b>Returns</b> was every bit as
good as <b>Web</b>, but there are scores of
people who disagree with me. There’s a scene in Chapter 6 (“The X-Ray
Eye”) in which the Gargoyle spies on his henchmen…only to learn that they’re throwing
a little office party, complete with drinks and floozies. (One Serial
Squadron member told me he and a friend fell on the floor laughing at
this.) Hey, when your head goon is played by Anthony Warde—the hardest
working henchman in the serial business—shouldn’t he be entitled to a little
R-and-R every now and then? If you prefer your serials with a much
smaller laugh quotient, then <b>Returns</b>
will definitely not be your particular meat.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-45148761673072469082007-04-27T23:00:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:25:30.562-04:00Half-NelsonVia a <a href="http://zvbxrpl.blogspot.com/2007/04/scuzzy-and-harriet.html"><span style="color: purple;">post</span></a> at Jaime Weinman’s <i>Something Old, Nothing New</i> (and the Home Theater Forum <a href="http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htf/showthread.php?t=255614"><span style="color: purple;">post</span></a> that reveals the depressing news) I’ve
learned to my consternation that the Shout! Factory release of <b><i>The
Best of The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet</i></b> due out the first of May
will contain the heavily-edited syndicated versions of the cherry-picked
episodes of the long-running domestic comedy; last seen in repose on the
afternoon schedule of GoodLife TV (“the channel where old TV shows go to die”).<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by this turn of
events. First, I preordered the set—which usually spells trouble from the
get-go. Second, during its stint on GoodLife, Ozzie & Harriet were
paired with another famous 50s sitcom family, the Williams’s (Danny, Kathy,
Terry, Rusty and Linda) of <b>Make Room for
Daddy</b> (a.k.a. <b>The Danny Thomas Show</b>)
fame—a series also put cut to ribbons in syndication and whose repeats were
used for the first (and of this writing, only) DVD release (dubbed “The
Complete Fifth Season,” completely ignoring the Jean Hagen years). On
this boxset, the celebrated episode that served as the pilot for what later
became <b>The Andy Griffith Show</b> is
practically incomprehensible due to its chainsaw-like editing, a fate that also
befell the <b>Daddy</b> episode that
introduced Joey Bishop in the pilot for his 1961-65 sitcom. (Though I
maintain that much of the slicing-and-dicing of that half-hour is an insidious
conspiracy instigated by Marlo Thomas to keep people from seeing what she
looked like before she learned she didn’t have to go through life with her
father’s nose.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Since David Nelson has decided to go the cheap rate with his
family-sanctioned DVD set. I’m guessing that the “radio episodes” that are to
be included as extras in this collection are probably ones already in
circulation among old-time radio fans. I had heard quite some time ago
(and I apologize for not having the full story—it’s hell getting old) that more
of Ozzie & Harriet’s radio “adventures” are extant—only they’re under
lock-and-key in some library collection of some college (I believe my source
said Northwestern, but I could be wrong about this), tucked safely away from an
admiring public. This is a similar fate that befell some of Fred Allen’s broadcasts,
which are now ensconced in the Boston Public Library (where Allen was employed
while a mere sprat) so that greedy OTR entrepreneurs can’t get hold of them and
sell them to people like myself. (Joe Mackey and I once discussed an
elaborate <b>Ocean’s Eleven</b>-like plot
to rescue these tapes…but admittedly, the master plan is still in its embryonic
stages.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I don’t know if any Ozzie & Harriet fans are going to
bite the bullet and still purchase the Shout! Factory set despite this
revelation (in fact, I don’t know many Ozzie & Harriet fans period) but I
will suggest an alternate route: check out this latest Mill Creek Entertainment
release. It’s advertised as <b><i>Fun with Ozzie & Harriet</i></b>, a
public domain collection of thirty-eight episodes…but if you order it from Deep
Discount.com, it will arrive at your doorstep with <i>one hundred</i> episodes under the title <b><i>The Essential Ozzie & Harriet
Collection</i></b>. All for the low price of $<a href="http://www.deepdiscount.com/viewproduct.htm?productId=11531679"><span style="color: purple;">6.58</span></a>, which you cannot beat with a stick.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-61678606347446863742007-04-22T22:48:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:22:04.878-04:00“We’ve been tricked by cleverness!”Laughing Gravy, who tears the tickets in half at the
must-read classic films website <a href="http://www.inthebalcony.com/"><span style="color: purple;">In the Balcony</span></a>, has alerted his loyal readers
to <a href="http://www.inthebalcony.com/page32.html"><span style="color: purple;">a
pair of cliffhangers</span></a> available on DVD and currently being offered
sporadically on eBay by a company calling itself <a href="http://www.restoredserials.com/?gclid=CNy_jYmfk4sCFQL2ggodTmj1Wg"><span style="color: purple;">Restored Serials</span></a>. Both of these serials
are widely available from other dealers, but the Restored Serials versions
feature slightly superior prints of two fan favorites: <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034223"><span style="color: purple;">The
Spider Returns</span></a> (1941) and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041096"><span style="color: purple;">The
Adventures of Sir Galahad</span></a> (1949).<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Returns</b> is a
sequel to <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030779"><span style="color: purple;">The Spider’s Web</span></a>, a 1938 chapter-play considered by many
serial fans to be the best that Columbia Studios offered. It was directed
by James W. Horne, a man whose name is anathema to about fifty percent of
serial aficionados…and a godsend to the other half. Horne’s experience as
a veteran comedy director (among his resume you’ll find Laurel & Hardy’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0029747"><span style="color: purple;">The
Bohemian Girl</span></a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0029747"><span style="color: purple;">Way Out West</span></a>) had a tendency to drift into his
cliffhanger productions, often devising bits of intentional comedy that
die-hard serial fans have denounced as the work of the Devil. (In my
opinion—and I stress that this is my opinion only—comedy can only <i>help</i> a serial. Horne directed <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034577"><span style="color: purple;">Captain
Midnight</span></a>, one of my favorite entries among <st1:city>Columbia</st1:city>’s
prolific serial output.) One member of the <a href="http://serialsquadron.com/"><span style="color: purple;">Serial Squadron</span></a>,
who vehemently disagrees with my comedy cliffhanger thesis, nevertheless told
me in a chat session last night that if I continue to cling to my theory I will
positively <i>adore</i> <b>The Spider Returns</b>. Despite our disagreement, I value his
judgment and am looking forward to seeing it.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Galahad</b> is pretty
much what the title implies; a romp with the famed Knight of the Round Table (played
by future Superman George Reeves) and his quest to recover the sword known as
Excalibur. It has its detractors and defenders and while I haven’t viewed
it yet, any serial that attempts to do something <i>different</i> always gets a vote of confidence from me (though <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038248"><span style="color: purple;">Who’s
Guilty</span></a> almost put the kibosh on that). Hopefully I’ll get a
chance to slip it into the DVD player soon, but this evening I turned my
attention to another serial purchased from Restored Serials, Republic’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038435"><span style="color: purple;">The
Crimson Ghost</span></a> (1946).</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Republic Studios’ reputation as the go-to guy for
cliffhangers is, of course, legendary among serial fans—though I’ll risk
blasphemy here and state that while some truly fine chapter-plays were cranked
out from the “Thrill Factory,” some of them were so bad they made Columbia and
Universal’s product look like masterpieces. Many of the post-war
Republics are like this; you can find a nugget among the dross but you have to
look mighty hard. Well, look no further than <b>Ghost</b>—an engaging little vehicle that moves at breakneck speed with
energetic stunts and unique chapter endings to compliment its first-rate cast
and script.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Professor Chambers (Kenne Duncan) is a scientific genius
who’s developed a device known as the Cyclotrode, designed to detect and repel
atomic-bomb attacks which he intends to use for niceness instead of evil.
Unfortunately, a costumed villain known as The Crimson Ghost has other designs
on Chambers’ toy, and he kidnaps the good professor, placing him under his
power by placing a “control collar” around his neck that will make the
scientist bend to his will. (It also repels fleas and ticks for up to
three months…but as far as heartworms go, he’s on his own.) Chambers’
protégé, scientist and criminologist Duncan Richards (Charles Quigley), has his
hands full over twelve chapters trying to stop the Ghost’s diabolical scheme,
his identity unknown but is suspected to be one of four professors at a nearby
university to whom Richard reports in each chapter. Dunky is also
assisted by his lovely assistant, Diana Farnsworth—played by none other than
Linda Stirling, a.k.a. “Queen of the Serials.”</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The mystery element of <b>Ghost</b>—who
is the person behind this costumed creep?—is one of the things that makes the
serial so entertaining; Republic cleverly concealed the villain’s identity by
having the Ghost played by a stuntman (Bud Geary) and voiced by several
actors—one of which is I. Stanford Jolley, who receives fourth billing even
though he has a tiny role as a man posing as a government-appointed
psychiatrist. The plot is also top-notch, Quigley is a likable (if
slightly stiff) hero, and Stirling is always lovely to look at…though I prefer
to watch her in cliffhangers in which she has more to do, like <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037481"><span style="color: purple;">Zorro’s
Black Whip</span></a> (1944) and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037378"><span style="color: purple;">The Tiger Woman</span></a> (1944). I like how the
serial’s plot contains a few interesting twists: one of the major characters
snuffs it in the third chapter, and there’s a nail-biting sequence where
Quigley attempts an operation on <st1:place>Stirling</st1:place> to remove a
“control collar” bestowed upon her by the villainous Ghost. (Previous
attempts to remove these collars ultimately result in the deaths of the
unfortunates.) There are also some first-rate cliffhangers (my favorite
is in Chapter 10, “The Trap That Failed,” in which a truck containing Stirling
and one of the professors crashes through a wall of a warehouse and off the
pier to the water below—I saw the warehouse and just assumed that the Brothers
Lydecker would end up blowing it to smithereens) and slam-bang action sequences
(Quigley’s stunt double steps off a wall in order to leap upon his opponent in
the first chapter), and the ‘rents (who ended up watching it with me) enjoyed
it as much as I did; Mom in particular, who was enchanted by the fact that her
childhood hero, Clayton Moore, played the Ghost’s chief henchman.
(Hey—any serial that lets <st1:city>Moore</st1:city>
appear not only in a gas mask but a <i>surgeon’s</i>
mask, allowing the serial’s viewers to shout out “Who IS that masked man?” is
aces in my book.) Mom and I were also reduced to hysterics by the time of
the twelfth chapter, in which the villains are subdued with the help of a
ferocious dog named…wait for it…”Timmy.” (“Get ‘im, Timmy!”)</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
During the viewing of <b>Ghost</b>,
Mom started complaining that the only serials she ever sees Clayton Moore in
are the ones in which he’s the bad guy. (I guess she forgot about <b>Jesse James Rides Again</b>, which we
watched back in January.) If I can figure out what I’ve done with <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035181"><span style="color: purple;">Perils of
Nyoka</span></a> (1942), I’m going to try and put that one on for her later
this week—but if I’m unable to locate its whereabouts, we’ll have to settle for
the too-boring-for-words <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0045945"><span style="color: purple;">Jungle Drums of Africa</span></a> (1953).</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-68712682215773886252007-04-21T20:01:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:19:08.139-04:00Chapter 2-15: Atom Man vs. SupermanPreviously on <i>Thrilling
Days of Yesteryear</i>:<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i>Against my better
judgment, I told the GM this morning that I could be persuaded—if necessary—to
sit in on the first four hours of the audit to make certain these two were up
to speed on the changes. (I had also been asked by the full-time auditor
at the La Quinta on 204/I-95 if she could sit in as well.) Lord knows I
did not want to do this, and in fact I was praying that the GM would say “Hell,
no” because I’m already swimming in enough overtime to incur the wrath of his
boss. No such luck. He’s given me the greenlight.</i></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i>Why do I have a bad
feeling about this?</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I arrived at work last night around nine-ish, and I’m
making major preparations to finish the pre-audit in time so that Little Miss
Weekend Warrior, Dreads and the I-95 auditor can benefit from my aggravations
with our new Nite Vision system this past week. At <st1:time hour="21" minute="45">9:45 p.m.</st1:time>, one of the individuals manning the front desk
answers the phone and on the other line is Dreads. She tells him she will
not be in this evening.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What followed was a high-pitched primal scream that broke
the sound barrier, emanating from yours truly. I <i>knew</i> she was planning to dick me over—I should have seen it coming.
Dreads worked for us once before as a front desk clerk before agreeing to move
up to the assistant head of housekeeping position and being transferred to the
Southside La Quinta. She was relieved of her duties when she phoned the
GM one Sunday morning five minutes before her shift to inform him that she
couldn’t come to work that day…a pattern that she had established on several
other occasions.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I take the front desk person who spoke to Dreads into my
confidence, and instruct him to call the GM, telling him that he needs to let
our GM know that there is no way on God’s green earth that I will work out the
rest of the audit—that is <i>not</i> what I
agreed to, and if necessary I will walk the hell out right now.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Co-worker phones the boss, who chats with him for a minute
or two, and then asks to speak to me. “It’s a good thing you agreed to
come in tonight,” he says weakly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Listen—I’m serious about this. If that dame thinks
she’s going to get away with this, she’s nuts. I am not going to…”</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He cuts me off and tells me I’m “jumping to
conclusions.” He’ll find someone else to finish out the shift. (As
it so happens, he talks my co-worker into it—my co-worker is a bit of a
night-owl anyway—and because I really appreciate him stepping in and taking the
bullet, I buy him a bacon cheeseburger and fries from Denny’s later that
morning.) The GM then lets me in on the knowledge that he also feared
that Dreads would be a no-show as well. Apparently Dreads is scheduled to
go on a cruise beginning Sunday night, and the GM has the Big Balls in Cowtown
to remark that the AGM (assistant general manager) at Southside was concerned
about this because that meant the relief auditor would have to work six days
straight.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Talk about chutzpah. “I notice she never displayed
that kind of concern when she was working over here and scheduling <i>me</i> for six days in a row,” I remarked
through clenched teeth. He tries to weasel out with an explanation on how
the Southside’s relief auditor is on some sort of disability but at this point
in the conversation I have ceased to care.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Naturally, the rest of the evening did not go as
planned. Miss Weekend Warrior also failed to show (in fact, I believe
they tried to call her to come in for Dreads, with no luck) and the planned
midnight audit was stalled when I learned that no one—despite my mentioning it
to at least <i>three</i> individuals that
morning—had bothered to make sure that the rooms for a group that was in-house
would all be routed to the same folio. (Yes, I ended up having to do
this.) Then I learn from my new best friend at the front desk that we
still have three more rooms to rent (the housekeeper who cleans at night failed
to bring this to my attention, though in her defense I was sort of busy at the
desk selling a bunch of rooms we were stuck with because no one cancelled the
6pm arrivals) and so we were trying frantically to rent those before closing
out the day. At 1:30am, I get a call from the I-95 dame that the reason
she missed her midnight appointment was that she drove her car into a ditch (I
didn’t ask; apparently her driving skills are legendary as well as
atrocious). I tell her that if she can find a way to the motel she can
still witness the audit since I’ve not been able to start it yet.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I ended up clocking out around <st1:time hour="3" minute="30">3:30am</st1:time>,
which is when I sashayed over to Denny’s to buy breakfast for myself and my
front desk colleague. I then secured a cab about an hour later, stumbling
into the house about <st1:time hour="16" minute="55">4:55</st1:time>. By
that time, I wasn’t in the mood to sit down with pen and paper and chronicle
the events of Chapter Two of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042211"><span style="color: purple;">Atom Man vs. Superman</span></a> (1950)—instead, I just
put the DVD on and started to watch the rest of the serial until its
completion. Let’s be honest—I have no idea what the next round of
Saturdays are going to be like (I think it’s safe to say Dreads won’t be
pulling down any more shifts at either location, and that they’ll find some
prized schmuck to fill in on Friday nights…to quote Dick Powell, “Yours truly
will likely get a chunk of it”) and while I have made every attempt to emulate
the ways of my serials mentor, Laughing Gravy (watching a chapter a week) I’m
failing miserably at it. My craving for instant gratification has
necessitated the cancellation of <b><i>Saturday Morning Serials</i></b> for the
time being, and from now on cliffhangers will be devoured in one full gulp.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There are, however, some loose ends to tie up. I’ve
stated in the past that I’ve thought the first <b>Superman</b> serial was the superior chapter-play…but after re-watching
<b>Atom Man</b>, this statement doesn’t
hold water. <b>Atom Man</b> <i>is</i> a better serial, though it’s not
without its faults. To start off, the whole Atom Man character—dictated
by the plot to be a decoy persona for arch-nemesis Lex Luthor (Lyle Talbot),
who is pretending to go straight—is completely unnecessary. Talbot spends
a great deal of screen time resplendent in black choir robe and a helmet that
looks like a cross between a champagne bucket and ornate planter, and he speaks
with an accent that sounds like a bad Bela Lugosi impression. The
character comes across as totally embarrassing and ridiculous—if they needed to
include Atom Man, they should have used the one from the radio <b>Superman</b> that was played by Mason “With
a name like Smuckers’, it’s got to be good” Adams.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The other debit in <b>Atom
Man</b> is that its interesting plot peters out much too quickly—though this
could be due to <st1:city>Columbia</st1:city>’s
infuriating habit of padding out material over fifteen chapters, when twelve
would have sufficed. The major scenario—Luthor invents a device that will
scatter Superman’s atoms hither and thither through out outer space—gets
underway in Chapter Eight, and concludes around Chapter Ten. This leaves
five more chapters of the same-old, same-old shenanigans: Luthor’s henchmen are
able to commit crimes and vanish from the scene thanks to coins with a special
alloy in their pocket. It would have been better to shuffle the series of
events so that the Man of Steel’s trip into “the empty doom” was featured in
Chapter 13 or 14.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Apart from all this, <b>Atom
Man</b> is a fun (good, but not great) serial; one of <st1:city>Columbia</st1:city>’s
best, in my humble opinion. The cliffhangers are better than those in the
previous <b>Superman</b> outing, the
characters more engaging (though the source material has more to do with that
than anything) and there are some nicely nuanced throwaway bits to lighten up
the proceedings. There’s a priceless scene where Clark Kent (Kirk Alyn)
helps Lois Lane (Noel Neill) blow out the birthday candles on her cake with his
“super breath” and Perry White is featured in a funny running gag in which he
pulls out a stogie but can’t find a light. <b>Atom Man</b> also contains one of my favorite jokes in a cliffhanger:
Lois tells Jimmy Olsen (Tommy Bond) that they must return to Metropolis (whose
destruction has been threatened by Luthor) to “write the story—even if it’s our
last.” “I’d rather <i>read</i> about
it!” is Olsen’s hysterical reply.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-72352333090910852052007-04-20T18:34:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:11:44.985-04:00My stinkin’ jobIf you keep up with the frantic activity on this blog
(that’s a joke, son!) you might remember a previous occasion when I went out of
my way to do something nice for the hotel that employs me as a night
auditor…only to see it turn around and bite me in the ass. (I’m referring
to the time that I suggested that our former doofus of a security guard,
“Slappy,” be transferred to Sunday/Monday nights in an effort to protect our
declining hotel scores…only to have the rug pulled out from under me when they
saddled me with him for <i>both</i> nights,
working Monday and Tuesdays.) I swore to myself that I would not allow
this to happen again…but of course, I’m an idiot, and I rarely learn from my
mistakes.<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Perhaps I should start at the beginning. This past
week, the La Quinta Midtown followed the lead of other La Quintas in the chain
and switched operating systems over to something called Nite Vision, which is
without a doubt the least audit-friendly system that I have ever
encountered. Our former system, known as LISA, was designed for accounting
purposes. Nite Vision—touted by the powers-that-be as the greatest idea
since the walking man—is geared more toward hotel and motel management…but
because auditing, in my opinion, is basically accounting I am hating the new
system with the intensity of a thousand white-hot suns. We converted to
Nite Vision Monday night, and by Tuesday evening everyone who went near the
damn thing was reduced to a helpless, gibbering idiot (though for some of the
people at the front desk, this is barely noticeable).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was given the extreme pleasure of conducting our first
Nite Vision audit, a task that has since become a blur because not only did I
spend what appeared to be forty-eight hours on it (okay, I <i>may</i> be exaggerating a tad) anything that could conceivably go wrong
did that evening: some numbnut neglected to buy more copier paper, the phones
went out, etc. But did I let the system defeat me? Did I break down
crying, curled up in a fetal position and wishing for it to go away? Of
course I did—several times that night, in fact. But eventually I wrestled
the bull by the horns (okay, maybe this isn’t the best analogy but work with me
here) and took control of the situation. And with each subsequent night,
as I became more and more confident with using the system…I became more and
more convinced that it’s a steaming pile of horse crud.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It has definitely changed the face of auditing around the
Midtown location because I have no earthly idea of knowing whether anything is
correct because I cannot print out any pre-reports—I have no idea of knowing
whether the rates are correct or the tax exempts have been applied right
because the system either does not allow me to print out certain reports or I
can’t locate the reports that, if they can be printed, need to be printed out.
It’s almost like the people who designed this damn thing just assumed that no
one at that front desk ever makes a mistake, a thought that makes me cackle
wildly to the point where I’m ready for a friggin’ strait-jacket.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve been the guinea pig on this thing all week, and the GM
is still convinced that the powers-that-be have made the right decision (though
he says this in a
“Raymond-Shaw-is-the-kindest-bravest-warmest-most-wonderful-human-being-I've-ever-known-in-my-life”
Manchurian-Candidate kind of way). But here’s the real test: will the
relief auditors, “Little Miss Weekend Warrior” and the other gal (she works
four days a week at our Southside location, and one at Midtown) I refer to as
“Dreads,” be able to perform this new audit. The smart money says no:
Warrior made no attempt to attend any of the sessions conducted for the new
system (though she did sit in and watch me do half the audit before taking off,
explaining she had to go) while Dreads, though she was present and accounted
for at the night auditor Nite Vision session, has ignored the conversion
completely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Against my better judgment, I told the GM this morning that
I could be persuaded—if necessary—to sit in on the first four hours of the
audit to make certain these two were up to speed on the changes. (I had
also been asked by the full-time auditor at the La Quinta on 204/I-95 if she
could sit in as well.) Lord knows I did not want to do this, and in fact
I was praying that the GM would say “Hell, no” because I’m already swimming in
enough overtime to incur the wrath of his boss. No such luck. He’s
given me the greenlight.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Why do I have a bad feeling about this?</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-16038324363693061552007-04-19T19:03:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:09:44.397-04:00Spirits and demons bewareBefore Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis (oh, and
Ernie Hudson) began investigating something strange in your neighborhood,
Saturday morning kidvid aficionados knew who the <i>real</i> <b>Ghost Busters</b> were:
a pair of bumbling paranormal investigators and their pet gorilla who answered
to Spenser, Tracy and Kong. (For the record…<st1:city><st1:place><i>Tracy</i></st1:place></st1:city> was the
gorilla.) I mentioned back in February that BCI-Navarre was bringing this
Saturday morning perennial to <st1:stockticker>DVD</st1:stockticker>, and since
it arrived in the mail this week (along with my Criterion copy of <b>Brute Force</b>)…well, let’s just say
curiosity did the rest.<br />
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Premiering on CBS in the fall of 1975, <b>The Ghost Busters</b> was part of a Saturday morning tradition of live
action shows produced especially for kids and adults with no discriminating
taste (I used to belong to the former group—now I’m in the latter). It
reunited former <b>F Troop</b> co-stars
Forrest Tucker and Larry Storch and allowed them to do their patented
vaudeville burlesque in a series that honestly hasn’t changed all that much
from what I remember. (I will issue a caveat here: if you’re unlike me
and you look upon <b>F Troop</b> as a
television travesty, you will <i>not</i>
want to order this DVD set.) Though the humor is unabashedly corny and
kid-oriented (many of the jokes are the sort that even <i>Abbott and Costello</i> would have taken a pass on) it is still amusing
once I go to my “silly place.” The running gags (Storch’s weekly struggle
with a mind-of-its-own file cabinet, plus the fact that all the ghosts choose
“the old castle near the cemetery” as their hideout), Bob Burns’ wonderful
gorilla-suited turn as Tracy and the one-of-a-kind chemistry between Tucker and
Storch still brings a smile to my jaded face (the fact that both actors unabashedly
give their all to material that neither Oscar Wilde nor Noel Coward contributed
to is inspiring, to say the least). Burns observes in an interview on the
DVD set that he was in such awe of his two co-stars that it affected his
performance; he held back as the “gorilla” fearing he would upstage their
antics. When he finally summed up the nerve to discuss it with Tucker,
the actor shrugged it off and told him not to worry about it because “I’m too
old to care and Larry is too dumb.” (Burns also reveals that Storch would
refer to his pal as “Sarge,” something that as an <b>F Troop</b> fan I find oddly endearing.)</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But the best thing about <b>Ghost Busters</b> is that the series attracted an impressive wattage of
character talent that felt the same way Tucker and Storch did: they were there
to entertain people and only too happy to get the work. That’s why you
find performers like Ted Knight as “The Canterville Ghost,” an outing that also
co-stars <b>Family Affair’s</b> Kathy
Garver and Len “Uncle Leo” Lesser. Knight had a long association with
Filmation, the producers of <b>Busters</b>,
having done voice work on their animated shows like <b>Fantastic Voyage </b>and <b>Journey
to the Center of the Earth</b>. (Knight even posed as an animation editor
on one occasion in an effort to convince a visiting businessman to invest in
the company.) Other character greats to appear on the show include Bernie
Kopell (channeling KAOS’ Siegfried as Dr. Frankenstein), Lennie Weinrib, Marty
Ingels, Severn Darden (as Dr. Henry Jekyll), Joe E. Ross (as Mr. Hyde—though he
appears to be wearing his caveman get-up from <b>It’s About Time</b>), Howard Morris, Jim Backus and Ronny Graham.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Fifteen episodes of <b>Busters</b>
were produced at breakneck speed (I believe they mentioned that it was done in
about three months in one of the interviews) and of those fifteen my favorites
are “The Maltese Monkey” (the plot is too stupid for words but I like <b>Good Times’</b> Johnny Brown’s impression
of Sydney Greenstreet and Billy Barty’s take on Peter Lorre) and “Which Witch
is Which?” This last one is a real hoot: <b>The Dick Van Dyke Show’s </b>Ann Morgan Guilbert is a Salem witch who
comes back to take revenge on the ancestor of the man who burned her at the
stake (if you guessed that it’s Storch, then you can skip this one) and Bowery
Boy Huntz Hall plays her incredibly dense sidekick (and yes, he does the
“Motorlips” bit). Hall’s character (an amiable dunce named Gronk) must
have been well received because he turned up in another episode, this time
stooging for “Merlin the Magician”—with the titular sorcerer played by Carl
Ballantine of <b>McHale’s Navy</b>
fame. (How Gronk met up with Merlin is left unexplained.)</div>
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This two-disc set features some generous extras, including
interviews with Burns and producer Lou Scheimer, photo galleries and some
trailers for Filmation series either already out on DVD or due to come
(including <b>Ark II</b>, <b>Space Academy</b>, <b>Jason of Star Command </b>and <b>The
Secrets of Isis</b>). Curiously, there’s also an episode of the animated <b>Ghost Busters</b>, which followed the
exploits of Spenser, Tracy and Kong’s descendants. This show was so
terrible that I didn’t even mind when a rival cartoon—using the characters from
the Murray-Aykroyd-Ramis film—called itself <b>The <i>Real</i> Ghostbusters</b>.
(Because I know who the <i>real</i>
originals are: “With us on the job/troubles will fade/the Ghost Busters
do it againnnnn…”)</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-88290997978753147892007-04-18T19:11:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:03:37.065-04:00Leave of absenceI know, I know. “Where the hell has he <i>been</i> the past several days?” “Why
has he neglected the blog?” “Oh, Kee-rist—he’s babbling about his job
again…” These and many other thoughts are probably parading through the
mind of the vast readership (in the high two figures) at <i>Thrilling Days of Yesteryear</i>.<br />
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Truth be told, there are two explanations. One, I have
been busier than the proverbial one-armed paperhanger. This past Saturday
and Sunday were the two weekend days that required my presence at the La Quinta
Midtown because the relief auditor (who I have now seen fit to dub “Little Miss
Weekend Warrior”) has that prior commitment to Uncle Sam that she neglected to
mention to management until after she was hired. As such, this requires
me to work six days straight, and while I’ve been doing that I’ve also had to
juggle a pair of outside writing projects…one of which was due today.</div>
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The other excuse for my blog reticence has to do with
writing—namely, a crippling case of writer’s block. It’s a condition that
I have succumbed to many times in the past, often forgoing a go at the old pen
and paper (or in this case, Microsoft Word) to instead lie about listlessly
watching nostalgic television or classic movies…and having no desire to jot
down my impressions. (And when you’re in the middle of projects where
people are <i>paying</i> you to write, it
can be mighty inconvenient.)</div>
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But I hope to have something substantial up on the blog
within the next day or so—except that I just realized I used the words
“substantial” and “blog” in the same sentence. If push comes to shove, I
can always bitch about my job.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-22071708650996379612007-04-13T08:07:00.000-04:002013-05-02T23:01:33.783-04:00“From West Virginia they came to stay/In sunny Cali-forn-i-a…”While looking at some new releases over at DVD Price Search,
I saw a listing for <b><i>The Real McCoys: Season #1 </i></b>that is apparently going to hit the
streets <st1:date day="22" month="5" year="2007">May 22, 2007</st1:date>
courtesy of Infinity Entertainment. <b>McCoys</b> was a monster sitcom hit for ABC (and later CBS) from 1957-63,
starring character great Walter Brennan as cantankerous Amos McCoy, the
patriarch of a West Virginia family who uprooted their holdings in the Mountain
State and moved westward to California like a modern-day Joad family.
Dick Crenna (now being billed as Richard) co-starred as his grandson Luke, who
was married to the magically babe-a-licious Kathleen Nolan as Kate; other
regulars in the cast included Lydia Reed, Tony Martinez, Michael Winkelman,
Madge Blake and Andy Clyde.<br />
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<b>The Real McCoys</b>
isn’t entirely new to DVD; Rhino released two “Best of” collections a good
while back but I’m glad to see that season-by-season sets are being attempted
since the series ushered in the spate of rural situation comedies (<b>The Andy Griffith Show</b>, <b>The Beverly Hillbillies</b>, etc.) that
dominated American television in the 1960s. The series, although relying
on the broad depiction of mountain folk for much of its humor, is one of the
very few that featured <i>positive</i>
images of West Virginians (the only other one I can think of right-off-the-bat
is receptionist Jennifer Marlowe, played by Loni Anderson on <b>WKRP in Cincinnati</b>); the family McCoy
might have been a bit uninformed on the ways of their adoptive state, but they
were certainly a good role model for families back then. I can’t help but
think of the program when the University of Virginia’s “Pep Band” poked fun
five years ago at their West Virginia University competitors during half-time
by portraying a West Virginia girl as a “Beverly Hillbillies”-type they raised
the ire of West Virginia’s then-governor Robert Wise, who demanded an apology
from University President John T. Casteen III for the slight. Had I been
in Wise’s shoes, I would have painstakingly pointed out to U.Va. that the
Beverly Hillbillies were from <st1:state><st1:place><i>Arkansas</i></st1:place></st1:state> (<i>not</i> <st1:state>West Virginia</st1:state>),
thus saying all that needed to be said on the intelligence running rampant in
that institution. (Sadly, people still invoke the “Beverly Hillbillies”
example in describing <st1:place><st1:placetype>Mountain</st1:placetype> <st1:placetype>State</st1:placetype></st1:place>
natives to this day, as in the case of this overpaid clown from <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/columnist/raasch/2003-05-08-0410-raasch_x.htm"><span style="color: purple;">USA Today</span></a>.)</div>
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Anyhoo, CD Universe is listing the <b>McCoys</b> set at <a href="http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?style=MOVIE&pid=7424110&frm=lk_dvdps"><span style="color: purple;">$16.44</span></a> (which seems like a steal except their
s&h rate is $6.99) for the time being…and there’s also a link to another
set being released at the same time entitled <a href="http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?pid=7424111&style=movie&BAB=E"><span style="color: purple;">Suspense: The Lost Episodes Collection</span></a> which
sounds as if they’re putting together episodes of the television version of
“radio’s outstanding theatre of thrills.” It sounds intriguing; I only
wish there was more information to go with it.</div>
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<b><i>Update:</i></b> I spoke too soon about the <b>Suspense</b> set, DeepDiscount.com has the <a href="http://www.deepdiscount.com/viewproduct.htm?productId=13426544">collection</a>
on their website and confirms that it contains thirty episodes from the 1949-54
series based on the long running radio anthology. Nifty!</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4468888162951113465.post-85472804065619631032007-04-12T23:20:00.000-04:002013-05-02T22:57:25.120-04:00“Powerful tiny fists…”Apologies to all for having neglected the blog this long,
but I’ve been kind of taking advantage of my three-days-off occurring in the
middle of the week this time ‘round to work on outside projects…and for some
odd reason, spending every free moment in front of the DVD player watching what
can only be called a <b>Scrubs</b>
marathon. Even though I don’t watch the series on a regular basis as I
once did, I have been dutifully purchasing the season-by-season box sets…and
after sampling a two-hour mini-marathon last Saturday (while at Sister Kat’s)
on the Comedy Channel I thought I would bring myself up to speed with the goings-on
at Sacred Heart Hospital.<br />
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When <b>Scrubs</b> first
premiered in the fall of 2001, I counted myself one of the sitcom’s biggest
fans—I liked the show’s sharp, witty dialogue and its frequent forays into the
absurd (something, I remember reading reviews at the time, the critics did not
particularly care for). But for some odd reason, the show was sort of the
red-headed stepchild in NBC’s comedy lineup, never earning the accolades of a
show like, <b>Friends</b>, for example. I’m glad to see that with each passing
season, the sitcom has finally gotten a little respect (winning a coveted <st1:city>Peabody</st1:city>
award <a href="http://www.peabody.uga.edu/news/pressrelease.asp?ID=143"><span style="color: purple;">this month</span></a>). <b>Scrubs’</b> strengths include its expert blend of comedy and pathos and
fast pacing, not to mention its superb ensemble cast—not only the major players
but its backup team of utility actors as well. In the beginning, I tried
to get my mother hooked on it but I think the show’s MTV-style gaggery has a
tendency to go over her head. Still, I have not given up hope—her
favorite television hunk, Christopher Meloni (from <b>Law & Order: SVU</b>), guest stars in “My White Whale,” an episode
from the third season and I plan to unspool this one for her when she gets back
from her business trip this Saturday.</div>
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The only sand-in-the-crankcase during my <b>Scrubs</b> marathon is that the first disc
in the <b><i>Complete Fourth Season</i></b> set has a big honkin’ scratch of
undetermined origin, effectively keeping me from seeing episodes four through
nine. I will have to rectify this tragedy as soon as possible.</div>
Ivan G Shreve Jrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04067177808320053382noreply@blogger.com0