Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:22 PM

Happy 2003!!!!!! I'm such a dope that I'm still writing 5762 on my checks.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:05 PM

The new Dumbledore and his credits.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:31 PM

Another place I visited was the Smithsonian American History museum. They still had a large exhibit about the First Ladies that was there when I last visited the museum 5-6 years ago. I was more disappointed to learn that the exhibit still contains a gross fabrication to prove an urban legend.

An explanation is in order. Most people when asked for the origin of the name of the Baby Ruth candy bar would say Babe Ruth. Many have probably read in a "Exciting True Facts!" book that the candy bar was named after Ruth Cleveland, President Grover Cleveland's daughter, in honor of a tour she made of the company (Baby Ruth being her nickname). This is the official explanantion of the Curtiss Candy Company, makers of Baby Ruth. It is also not true as snopes shows. Snopes's main points are:

1. The candy bar came out in 1921 when Babe Ruth was very famous. A kooky coincidence, you'd agree
2. Ruth Cleveland died of dyptheria in 1904. Naming a candy bar after a 17-year-dead President's child is an odd choice. (I don't recall seeing a "Patrick Bouvier Kennedy" candy bar in 1980.)
3. Ruth Cleveland died 12 years before the Curtiss Candy Company existed so she couldn't have toured the company.

So anyhoo, the Smithsonian in a display about Presidential children tells the Baby Ruth urban legend. To illustrate the point, they wanted a Baby Ruth ad or packages showing the connection between Baby Ruth and Ruth Cleveland. Such an item does not exist (or, at least, the official site* doesn't show such an item). So what the Smithsonian did was take a circa-early-70's box** and pasted a picture of Ruth Cleveland on the box.

*For some reason, this same site has the Babe Ruth candy bar that probably inspired this made-up story.
**I say early 70's becuase it did not have metric measurements (Hence not after the mid-70's) but did have the modern font of the Baby Ruth name.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:16 PM

The light posting will probably be made up by heavier posting as I catch up on my movie going on the 29th through the 1st. Not only have I not seen the new Lord of the Rings, I've even missed the Star Trek Nemesis flick. I'm sure my geek credentials will be taken away from me at some point.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:15 PM

I'm visiting my brother in Washington DC (or technically in Virginia, near, I'm sure, many a street and what-not named after Confederate "heroes") so posting will be lightish.

I visited the US Holocaust Memorial Museum today. One of the more touching exhibits is a wall of the Righteous Amongst Nations, non-Jews honored by Yad Vashem for their efforts in rescuing Jews during the Holocaust. I lingered at that wall and read all the biographies; if they can risk their lives, the very, very least I can do is read the parapgraph each was given.

Two that especially stuck out for me were Paul Gruninger, a Swiss border guard who ignored the Swiss government's instructions not to allow Jewish refugees to enter Switzerland and got fined and fired for his trouble, and Bishop Chrysostomos.

In 1944 Mayor [Loukas] Carrer was ordered at gunpoint to hand over a list of Jews residing on the island [of Zakyntho]. The list was presented to the Germans by Bishop Chrysostomos containing only two names: Mayor Carrer and Bishop Chrysostomos. The Bishop bravely told the Germans, "Here are your Jews. If you choose to deport the Jews of Zakynthos, you must also take me and I will share their fate." In the interim, all the Jews of the island were safely hidden in the mountainous villages.

(I note that I only learned of Carrer's part in this through the website. While I'm sure his name was on the wall, his equally brave help in the matter was not mentioned in the display's tale about Chrysostomos.) The display does renew one's faith in humanity, especially as one is about to see the display of shoes stolen from the victims of the camps.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:32 PM

A few years back, I came home from a Christmas Eve party. I had made a little too much merry if you catch my drift. I had a few cups too many of Christmas cheer if you know what I mean. I had decked a couple of halls too many if my metaphor is not too obscure.

Anyway, it's 3:30 AM and to stop the room from spinning, I tune in to Cartoon Network. What was broadcast, I felt at the time, illustrated the true meaning of Christmas, regardless of one's faith. It touched me so much that I immediately recorded the plot. This is what I've been able to interpret from my drunken scribblings:

This story is not my own. It came from some nature of a Pac-Man Christmas special (called "The Pac-Man Christmas Special" or "How Pac-Man Saved Christmas" or "The First Pac-Man Christmas").

The ghost monsters accidentally scare Santa's reindeer causing him to crash. The Pac-Man family and a couple of supporting players (a Pac-Man-esque policeman and so forth) help out Santa. They've never heard of X-Mas what with the light of Jesus Christ never reaching Pac-Land (or Pac-adonia or Pac-istan or whatever the $@%! they call that city). They help repair the sleigh and find lost toys. It still seems like it's too late to save X-Mas. But then Pac-Man comes up with a plan to save X-Mas. He's nearly stopped by the ghost monsters but Pac-Man convinces them to let him help Santa. The ghosts recognize the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Pac-Man takes Santa to the Power Pellet forest and feeds the reindeer power pelllets thus saving X-Mas. Everyone then goes to convert Q-Bert.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a Shalom Aleichem.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:54 AM

To save a friend of mine the trouble of a google search, here are the In 'n' Out secret menu codes. For those outside California unfamiliar with In 'n' Out, here's a New York Times article on the burger chain. Even Eric Schlosser likes them!

In said article, In 'n' Out denies that the secret menu exists (despite this receipt with the secret code printed on it). (Thanks to Max Power for both). When I told my friend about the codes, he was all "I'm uncomfortable with a corporation doing one thing and saying another." I replied "Why does everything have to be an object lesson on stuff?"

A less conspiratorial explanation could be that the main office doesn't have a secret menu policy but individual stores have the autonomy to create cash register keys for the codes if they want.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:40 AM

Reader J McConel sent me a link to the picture by Auschwitz victim Petr Ginz that will be taken into space.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:10 PM

LA Times story of the first Israeli to orbit the Earth (login: cptspaulding/cptspaulding). Particularly touching part:

Shuttle crew members are allowed to carry a small bag of personal items into space, and in his, Ramon will include a simple black-and-white drawing borrowed from the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem. It is the haunting work of a 14-year-old boy from Czechoslovakia, Petr Ginz, who died at Auschwitz in 1944. Ramon's mother lived to be liberated by the Russians but other family members perished in the Nazis' campaign against the Jews.

"The picture is a drawing of Petr as he imagined himself looking at Earth from the moon," Ramon said. "I really feel I'm taking his imagination and fulfilling his wish of being there, of being his eyes."

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:21 PM

Did you know the Dreydel song has two verses? Here's proof.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:21 PM

Someone also gave me at the gift bag the Ray Stevens Live video they picked up. Here's the lyrics to the new Ray Stevens hit "Osama - Yo' Mama!"
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:19 PM

I received as part of an Open Mike's XMas grab bag a CD called "I Saw Hanukkah Harry Beat Up Santa" (Actually someone else picked it but gave it to me.) This song is literally the worst Christmas novelty song I've ever heard. Also the worst Chanukah song ever (and considering its competition is the Dreydel Song, that's saying something).

Here's merchandise of that "humorous" album cover. For some reason, Hanukkah Harry is portrayed as injured even though he's the one who beat up somebody. It may be a case of "You should see the other guy." And this page has an MP3 sample.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:11 AM

A Slate slideshow shows Ten Commandment displays that are and are not violations of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. My objection to Ten Commandment displays are that they leave out 603 commandments.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:33 AM

Madonna's bizarre plot to destroy the film career of her husband Guy Ritchie continues. Ritchie's next film is going to be about the Kabbalah (story here). A sort of Jewish-themed Omega Code, I guess.

Perhaps the plot isn't so bizarre. Had Guy Ritchie stuck to making funny comedies about British lowlifes, he might have been successful to the point where Madonna would have been known as Guy Ritchie's wife, rather than the reverse.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:13 AM

Tonight's episode of Buffy was really good as it ramps up the apocalypse against the First Evil. Buffy's speech at the end where she says she's through running and will take the fight directly to the First was particularly great.

Presumably in the next episode, Buffy's first strike policy will be called inhumane. Protestors will demand that she work through the UN and perhaps try to understand the root causes of the First Evil. Maybe Mike Farrell will hold an anti-apocalypse press conference and Sean Penn will visit the First Evil and the Ubervamp.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:46 PM

I will be appearing Saturday at 9:30 pm as a contestant on Joke Machine, a nutsy stand-up comedy game show. The show is at the Comedy Underground at 320 Wilshire Blvd in Santa Monica. Cover is $5.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:58 AM

Saturday Night Live is running a Christmas clip show on Tuesday. The commercial featured a half-second clip from the "controversial" "So This Is Chanukah" sketch that was supposedly shelved and then not going to be shelved. The clip was Tracy Morgan as Lou Begla so that's not any indication if they'll show the part that got the ADL's ire.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:56 AM

An article about a lost comedy album by Phil Hartman now available, thanks to the good folks of laugh.com, who I already praised for releasing great old comedy albums on CD.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:47 PM

Turner Classic Movies as part of their tribute to Ealing Studios is running a marathon of great Alec Guiness movies tomorrow. Most are terrific comedies (or at least the two of the four I've seen were). If you miss them, you can buy The Alec Guinness Collection on DVD which includes a movie that ran last week Kind Hearts and Coronets. In that movie, Guiness plays eight roles, a record I believe for a non-sketch-troupe movie. (I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm mistaken.)

Tom Hanks is set to star in a Coen brothers' remake of The Ladykillers (article here) if that helps the films' case any.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:07 PM

I neglected to say in my review of Adaptation that you should stay until the end of the credits for additional nutsiness.

POTENTIAL SPOILER:
Also a couple of years ago, I was at a presentation honoring Get a Life. Kaufmann was there as he was a writer for the show. An audience member asked him about the circumstances of the death of his brother Donald. Charlie mumbled "I don't wanna talk about it."
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:56 PM

I've updated my permalink to the as lovely as she is talented Rachel Arieff who got herself a domain name and didn't bother to tell anybody.

I found through Rachel a nifty blog by the name of Media Yenta. Here Media Yenta gives a theory of ABC's long-term strategy with Jimmy Kimmel and here Media Yenta states what Hollywood could learn from the success of the Jackass movie (and if Hollywood learned said lesson, it would be good news for film lovers regardless of what you think of Jackass).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:50 AM

And speaking of the Rat Pack, the CD played during the last episode of the Sopranos was The Rat Pack Live at the Sands, a great album that recorded a Dean Martin show at the Sands where Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis, Jr. dropped by, sang and did shtick. No Joey Bishop alas.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:37 PM

For the first time ever, a Joey Bishop biography has been published. Joey Bishop is the last living member of the Rat Pack. He wrote most of the group's comedic material. I was initially excited upon seeing the title Mouse in the Rat Pack as this was what Bishop used to joke would be the title of his memoirs. Alas, these are not those promised memoirs. The book itself is a little slim for its price tag and considering I'm one of three or four who'd want such a book, I don't know how well it'll sell.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:31 PM

I did find time to see Adaptation, the second of Charlie Kaufmann's three legendary "great but unmakeable" screenplays. (The first was Being John Malkovich; the third is Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (the film based on Chuck Barris's autobiography). I liked it a lot. I'm almost prepared to say "movie of the year".) The real-life Charlie Kaufmann signed to write an adaptation of the book The Orchid Thief and instead turned in a screenplay about the trouble he had writing the adaptation. In it, he mocks Hollywood convention through the character of his identical twin brother Donald who takes Robert McKee's story seminar and successfully writes a hack screenplay. When in the story Charlie in desperation turns to Donald for help, the movie itself gets a hackneyed third act with suspenseful chases, sex, violence, and a character learning a lesson. The most meta-meta-meta-movie made ever.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:52 PM

Posting was nonexistant this weekend as I was purchasing Christmas presents for underprivileged children on Saturday and minding said kids today while their abused and/or homeless Moms got a makeover. Some things I noticed while toy-shopping:

• LucasFilms has broken down Star Wars merchandising to the fine point where even Playskool has a line of Star Wars toys for the toddler set that come with Playskool figures of Star Wars characters. They look like mutant manga-influenced Star Wars.
• There's a Spiderman dump truck toy. While I understand that children love dump trucks and children love Spiderman, I don't buy that they'll gravitate to the Spidey dump truck. At least have Spidey drive a dump truck in a comic book somewhere (like when they tried to merchandise the Spidermobile).
• Remember that Play-Doh barber set where Play-Doh hair would shoot out of this guy's head and you'd cut it? They still make those.
• You don't 100% realize what a priviliged childhood you had until you're shopping for kids who ask for clothes for XMas. They got toys, too; don't worry.
• Have you ever been shopping downtown and you end up returning to the wrong parking structure and so you walk up and down a few levels wondering if your car has been stolen until you figure out that your in the wrong parking structure? If not, don't; it's not as much fun as it sounds.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:02 PM

A very odd quote from Trent Lott wishes that Strom Thurmond had been elected President in 1948.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:07 PM

A reader sent me this link of an article from the National Post about how the creator of the Love Boat, Gordon Farr, is a gen-u-wine Canadian.

Farr also produced The Bob Newhart Show and adds an interesting element to a classic Newhart story. Newhart often tells of getting a script where Emily (his wife on the show) is pregnant. His response was "That's a great script. Who are you going to get to play Bob?" What isn't mentioned is that the reason they wrote that script was Newhart was making noises about it being his last season. The script was intended for the last show.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:51 PM

Hello, everyone who's coming here from Mark Evanier's POV, (specifically this article). I too figured that the visible stuntmen was a function of seeing the picture a hundred times. In fact, part of the passage Mark quoted was supposed to acknowledge that (it's my fault that it didn't and I have since corrected the entry). It was genuinely the first time I noticed that, say, the Ethel Mermen falling on her ass in the prison hospital scene (SPOILER WARNING: At the end of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, Ethel Merman's character falls on her ass in a prison hospital. Jesus, it's a forty-year-old movie!) was not Ethel Mermen. No, I'm not an idiot and don't think they threw comedians in their forties or older into buildings. It just surprised me that said stunt men would face the camera. It was particularly funny when the stuntman at the post-discussion told of putting on masks so that they were unnoticeable. My friend and I humorously shrugged at each other in slight disbelief.

It didn't ruin my enjoyment of the picture at all. For me, it was just another fun thing to do: pretend to be outraged that that ain't Jonathan Winters or whoever.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:31 PM

I will be reprising my role as Sheldon Leonard on Sunday, December 15th at 8 pm at the Fake Gallery at 4319 Melrose Ave. Specifically, I will be playing Nick the Bartender ("Out you two pixies go, out the door!") in a radio play version of It's a Wonderful Life.

And they said impersonating Sheldon Leonard was an unmarketable skill.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:27 PM

Ray Wallace, the creator of the Bigfoot hoax, died a couple of weeks ago. His children reveal the hoax.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:06 AM

Did you know AMC is only AMC and no longer stands for American Movie Classics? A TV critic suggests that the reason for the name change is the same as the old urban legend of why Kentucky Fried Chicken is now KFC.

AMC does have a show on Saturdays at 8 PM EST/PST called "Movies at Our House" starring Jimmy Pardo, a very funny comedian that, unjustly, you've probably not heard of.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:57 AM

My entry on It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World got its HTML screwed up and was jumbled. Fixed now.

A tale I forgot to tell was the friend I was with complained that they weren't opening up the curtains for the screen wide enough for the movie. I said to him, "Didn't you hear? They're showing the pan-and-scan version."

Another discussion Mark Evanier and I had was when I asked for confirmation that in the lengthy road show version the Three Stooges only had the very brief cameo that they have in the current version (inspired by a vague memory of a still of them doing more shtick as firemen). He confirmed it and commented that it was the biggest laugh they got in their career and they didn't really do anything. I pointed out that it took the credibility of their thirty-year career to get that laugh.

Certainly if you've seen Stooge movies from that time period, probably Kramer's best decision was to only have them do the cameo as nothing they could do would equal the audience's imagination of "here comes trouble."
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:35 PM

DC and New Line are reportedly inking a deal to do a Shazam movie. I offer my services in the role of Fat Billy Batson (scroll down to Lieutenant Marvels).

(I was going to throw in an Uncle Marvel joke but there isn't an Uncle Marvel page. Damn you, Internet!)
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:13 PM

Yesterday's eventful evening also included a stop at the Golden Apple funny-book shop picking up this and last week's new comix (The fact that I waited a week to get new comics probably will get my geek membership card revoked). A person from a marketing company asked me if I would be willing to pose for a picture with Kevin Smith. I foolishly said yes, not realizing that by "Kevin Smith", they meant a cardboard picture of him. For my trouble, I got a wool-knit hat with "An Evening with Kevin Smith" patch on it; it looks just like the wool hat Silent Bob would wear if he'd had a hat that says "An Evening with Kevin Smith".
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:04 PM

I went to yesterday's big screening and post-screening discussion of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World at the Egyptian Theatre. The joint was packed. Sid Caesar, Jonathan Winters and Peter Falk were there but unfortunately could not hang around for the post-screening discussion. Just before the movie when someone was asking everyone to take their seat, Winters was standing and appeared to be doing shtick; alas, no one thought to put a mike on him.

I was tempted to get Winter's autograph despite the no autograph policy of the event. I figured that the worst that could happen would be he'd have me thrown out but perhaps he'd do it as a wacky character. Or even better, maybe he'd put on some nature of a hat and throw me out himself.

I had the great pleasure of meeting Mark Evanier during intermission. He introduced me to Chuck McCann and Stan Freberg. Freberg talked to me and Mark of the scene he was in that was in the four-hour road show version but cut from the version we saw.

Freberg at the post-show discussion told a couple of stories of doing advertising for the movie (which can be found in his autobiography). Mickey Rooney rambled on about his life story to the embarassment of the audience. Mark later asked me if he was doing Dana Carvey's impersonation. A fair criticism as he even said Carvey's catch phrase of being the #1 box office star in the world; as Carvey and Rooney did a sitcom together in '82, I wonder if this habit of Rooney dates back to then.

A fun evening at the theater and the prospect of releasing the road show version seems more realistic than I had previously thought. One minor negative note is that (and I don't know if this is a function of the big screen or of seeing the movie a hundred times) the stunt doubles in some scenes were glaringly obvious (as in an actor's face would turn to the camera and was obviously not his face).

I snagged a couple of seating signs: One says "Reserved for Marvin Kaplan" and the other "Reserved for guests of Mr. Rooney". I have no idea what I'm going to do with them. I also now have a print of the Jack Davis poster that I don't have (he made two for the movie).

UPDATE: Mark Evanier writes of the evening here. In this article, Mark tells of the different versions and a great story about Phil Silvers's dedication to funny.

UPDATE 2: I screwed up the HTML of this entry and so it was jumbled. Fixed now. Sorry 'bout dat.

UPDATE 3: Mark replies to my stunt double comment here. I shamefacedly re-edit the post yet again and then reply here.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:12 PM

Bravo is running a documentary tomorrow on the Smothers Brothers at 8 (presumably EST and PST). Details here.

When E! reran old Smothers Brothers episodes with accompanying interviews, my favorite soundbite was Jackie Mason: "I was on the show. It didn't help my career. It didn't hurt my career. Not everything has to help or hurt your career."
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:26 PM

Mark Evanier's telling of a classic Jack Benny-George Burns prank is all the excuse I need to tell my favorite Burns-Benny prank. (BACKGROUND: Jack Benny used to double over in hysterical laughter at George Burns's slightest provocation and would obsess over making Burns reciprocate.)

Burns & Allen were playing the London Palladium. Benny secretly flies to London (even telling his writers only that he'd be gone for a few days) and rents a room next to Burns (with the help of a Palladium executive who is the only one in on the gag). At an after-show party in Burns's room, the hotel operator asks for Burns and says "Please hold the wire. I have a person-to-person call from a Mr. Jack Benny in Beverly Hills, California, U.S.A."

As Burns waits for the call, Benny sneaks into the room, tiptoes behind Burns and says "Hello, George." Burns seeing Benny bursts into tears so touched was he to see his friend. Benny says to the other guests, "How do you like that? I spend thousands of dollars on a practical joke to break him up, and instead of getting a laugh, I make him cry." He turns to Burns and says in mock anger "Why didn't you laugh?"

Burns says "Well, Jack, when you said 'Hello, George,' you read it wrong." Benny has now spent thousands to wind up laughing on the floor due to Burns.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:55 PM

Slate's Virginia Heffernan writes about the Chevy Chase roast calling it particularly venomous. As I implied in my entry about the roast a couple of months ago, I believe you get the roast you deserve. Roasts work better if the people doing the roasting have genuine affection for the roasted. A bunch of young comics Chevy doesn't know doing the roasting (possibly because he alienated the famous people he did knew) don't have that. I'm reminded of a joke I usually trot out every time I do a roast

Bob Hope once said that you can judge a man by the caliber of people who come out to roast him. I've seen the guest list and if I were you, I'd worry.

Sadly for Chevy Chase, that joke is fairly close to the truth.

Comedy Central apparently hired the same guy who edits Premium Blend to bring his machete to work on the Roast. Here's a hint to tell if something got edited out: If the laugh seems disproportionally high to the funniness of the joke, then a funnier joke was cut out. I'm also pretty sure that there were a few situations where they left in the set-up but cut out the punchline which is also not unusual for Comedy Central editing of joke-telling.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:27 AM

An LA Times article about It's a Mad, Mad, Mad World and the screening tomorrow.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:26 PM

NOW IT CAN BE TOLD: Sad Sack meets Joe (from Bill Maudlin's Up Front).

(And for equal time plugwise (as is required in these crossovers), the Sad Sack website.)
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:15 PM

A Yahoo news article about Gillian Anderson is accompanied by a slide show of Pamela Anderson.

(Folks, these are actual headlines found in actual newspapers. We do not make these things up.)

UPDATE: Slide show has since been removed with no substitute.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:01 PM

I had the privilege of meeting Fred Willard Sunday. A friend of mine is in an informal sketch troupe of his (which also features Lou Wagner and Richard Horvitz) (I'm not name-dropping, just telling a story) which meets at Willard's house to go over sketchs and then they, on occassion, perform them.

Fred Willard might think I'm an idiot. He was complaining that there was no place in the area (Hollywood and Vine) to get dinner. I asked as a joke "Is the Brown Derby open?" He says, "No, the Derby closed years ago." I'm left mumbling " I know; I was kidding."
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:34 PM

The American Cinematheque is running It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World on December 4th. Details here.

Discussion following with actors Jonathan Winters, Sid Caesar, Mickey Rooney, Edie Adams, Don Knotts, Madlyn Rhue, Marvin Kaplan and Stan Freberg, editor Robert Jones, casting director Lynn Stalmaster, stunt man Loren James and Karen and Kat Kramer, wife and daughter of Stanley Kramer

I am reminded of when I went to see The Happiest Millionaire at the Cinematheque. One of those musical movies that played to roadshows complete with intermission and the last live-action movie overseen by Walt Disney. It's a pleasant enough film but it dragged on and on. Discussion with various folk took place during the intermission. At one point, I told the friend I was with that I had to go to work the next day and if the film didn't start up again in four minutes, I was leaving. It started in three.

One hoot was newsreels predicting big things for Tommy Steele. I, the next day, phoned my friend pretending to be Tommy Steele now working as a polltaker for the Cinematheque

After hearing the song "Fortuosity", would you say fortuosity is
a) your by-word
b) your apple-in-your-eye word
c) your own word
or d) your never feel alone word?

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:04 AM

As you recall, I had a theory that comedies, particularly ones with big name comedy stars, set in circuses never work and the possibility that You Can't Cheat an Honest Man, starring WC Fields and Edgar Bergen, contradicted said theory. Thanks with a little help from my brother, we use the seeming contradiction to refine the theory.

NEW THEORY: Comedies in circuses starring wacky people never work. WC Fields is not wacky; he's a combination cynic/bad con man. A sleazy guy running a circus and/or a world-weary guy working at a circus (in this case, Charlie McCarthy) might work.

Another consideration is that, as I recollect, the circus setting was secondary; the movie being mostly about Fields's daughter marrying a rich guy she doesn't love and his son being ashamed of him. He could have just as easily been a snake-oil peddler with the same effect (other than the fact that he probably wouldn't have a ventriloquist working for him (although arguably not that many circuses have an on-staff ventriloquist either)).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:28 PM

MAD's Onion satire illustrated the Onion's tendecny to do jokes about inappropriate activities of corporate icons with the Pilsbury Doughboy; this week's Onion features a wacky picture of said Doughboy.

Accident or winking nod at the satire?
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:23 PM

A coalition of religious group will run ads encouraging drivers to stop driving SUV's with the slogan "What would Jesus drive?" Details here.

I'm not convinced Jesus wouldn't drive an SUV; after all, he does need to transport twelve other passengers.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:40 AM

Mark Evanier debunks the notion that Paul Reubens's 1991 arrest destroyed his career. At one point he suggests that the failure of Big Top Pee-Wee had more to do with the end of Pee-Wee Herman than the arrest did. This is as good an excuse as any for me to expound my theory about Circus Comedies. To wit: comedies, particularly ones with big name comedy stars, set in circuses never work.

Comedy is frequently about contrasts. Pee-Wee Herman at a biker bar is funny. The Marx Brothers at a high society ball or an opera or running a country is funny. They don't belong there and chaos results. Wacky people at a circus is not so unusual and so the contrast isn't there.

UPDATE: You Can't Cheat an Honest Man potentially contradicts this theory.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:45 PM

Talking of SNL, I can't believe that the first post-monologue sketch they did closed with the a variation on the old "Doc says you're gonne die" joke.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:04 PM

The Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle shorts were delightful. They showed ones where he was giveing Buster Keaton his start. I would have been curious to see some pre-Keaton ones as Arbuckle was a big star when he gave Keaton his start but apparently Buster's more of a draw at the Silent Movie Theater. Arbuckle's comedy is the usual "fat guy fall down" comedy but is skillfully done "fat guy fall down" comedy which is not universal to the genre (Exhibit A).

The short "The Bellboy" has what is the earliest-that-I've-seen poof joke in movies. Specifically Fatty and Buster are scared of a long-haired, fully-bearded, mean-looking gentleman. Buster thinks he's Satan and Fatty thinks he's Rasputin. The gentleman then walks in a fey manner and both are relieved. Arbuckle then imitates the walk.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:52 PM

All the actors who portrayed James Bond talk about the role. An interesting factoid is that George Lazenby was not fired, but quit.

Also for you trivia buffs, Patrick McGoohan turned down the role of James Bond (proof here).

I've always found that a fun and easy way to get Bond fans unreasonably mad is to say that I liked Roger Moore the best. I actually have a soft spot in my heart for Moore's portrayal mostly due to the fact that he played Bond when I was 8.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:46 PM

The Silent Movie Theater is running old Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle shorts. Their calendar, for some reason, refers to him only as Roscoe Arbuckle; perhaps because as this site notes "His friends never called him Fatty". Reminds me of when I followed a comic who did a bit about how unPC the name Fatty Arbuckle was. I suggested that "Fatty" Arbuckle was a better nickname than one based on his alleged Coke bottle activities.

I'm interested to see his work as I only know of him through the scandal that led to the third or fourth Trial of the Century (in which the jury went to the trouble of writing a statement declaring his innocence).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:32 AM

The Jesus inscription ossuary is going on display even though the "brother of Jesus" part is a proven forgery.

Every visitor gets a free piece of the True Cross.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:19 AM

Mad magazine goofs on the Onion in the funniest thing they've done in years and one of the funnier humor-magazine-on-humor-magazine things since National Lampoon goofed on MAD.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:12 PM

A DVD set of the first season of South Park is coming out. However Warner Brothers wanted to edit Stone and Parker's commentary for content. Stone's spin on it here. The commentary will be available on CD. One can purcahse the DVD from Comedy Central and get the commentary CDs here or one can purcahse the DVD elsewhere and send in proof of purcahse to get the commentary CDs (Details here).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:51 PM

Another LA Times article; this one about potential British imports coming to a TV near you. One show described is The Kumars at No 42, a talk show which is filmed in a studio that is part of the house that the host shares with his "family". The guests must endure questions from the family.

I have low hopes for the American version called The Ortegas as it has been announced that Cheech Marin will be playing the father of the family. Nothing aginast Cheech but it's going to be hard to suspend disbelief in the show when the Dad is Cheech. It sounds like NBC wanted a different show but was afraid of it being too different so they hired a celebrity to hedge their bets.

I'm reminded of how Sports Night was saddled with a laugh track at the beginning, guaranteeing the alienation of people who might like a one-camera, non-traditional comedy and then the show's low ratings being blamed on it being different. Unfortunately the DVD set does not remove the laugh track according to customer reviews nor offer the option of removing it like the MASH DVD set does. Seriously that laugh track was very annoying; imagine Moonlighting or West Wing with a laugh track.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:06 PM

A fascinating story in the LA Times (Login as cptspaulding with password cptspaulding) about the attempts to find out the truth about Pavlik Morozov. Pavlik Morozov was a young boy who informed on his father to the authorities. He was then found murdered in the woods and his grandfather, grandmother, cousin and godfather were convicted of the murder. The story of Morozov was to the Soviet Union what the Washington cherry tree story was to America as children were encouraged to follow his example.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:05 AM

Every year on Halloween, a national tragedy occurs as millions of children are deprived of trick-or-treating and free candy due to scaremongering.

Max Power links to this article on how there has not been a single case of anonymous Halloween poisoning ever; all poisonings have either been hoaxes or targeting the children. Snopes was on the case years ago; even the incident that has promoted the legend from "false" to "undetermined" did not take place during trick-or-treating but during a school Halloween event.

Even today, this myth is repeated like in this Jump Start comic strip. And this one. I bring this up based on personal bitterness: even when we lived in what was essentially a gated community without a gate, my parents wouldn't let me trick-or-treat. Of course, they also wouldn't let me use the Cracker Jack tattoos because they might be laced with LSD.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:48 PM

Mark Evanier lists things you see in every episode of Hawaii 5-0 including:

11. Some innocent remark gives McGarrett the answer.

This one was actually seen in about half the TV detective shows ever done. Someone makes a stray comment like, "Well, let's get your mind off the case for a while. How about a cup of coffee?" And then Mannix, Barnaby Jones, Cannon, McCloud, McMillan or McGarrett says, "Wait a minute...coffee. Coffee is made of beans. That's it! The killer is hiding in the old abandoned bean warehouse, just outside of town!" And, of course, he is.

What he doesn't mention is that the other 50% of detective shows (the type where the detective gathers all the suspects in a room) would have this dialogue:

DETECTIVE: Beans, yes, that's it.
FRIEND: That's what?
DETECTIVE: No time to explain. (Runs off to confront murderer.)

Conan O'Brien and Robert Smigel wrote a great pilot called Lookwell where Adam West played a washed-up Adam-West-esque actor who used to play a detective on a TV show. A running joke was that every three minutes he'd pull a "Yes, that's it" and be totally wrong.

Conan has once or twice alluded to the show being "the second lowest-rated television show of all time" (like in his Harvard commencement address). What he doesn't say is that the show was run on a Sunday against the second half of 60 Minutes with absolutely zero publicity (except for an Adam West appearance on Late Night with Conan O'Brien the second or third week Conan was on the air (which is how I found out about it)).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:17 PM

Many people (like "Delightful Dave" Trowbridge) confuse Robby the Robot from Forbidden Planet with Robot or B9 from Lost in Space. In this picture, Robby is the one on the left.

Here, B9 and Robby perform in a little skit.

You can buy your very own Robby the Robot (or it makes a great Hanukah gift, wink, wink, nudge, nudge) or build your own B9 robot with the aid of this site to answer any questions you might have.

UPDATE: Robby the Robot appeared in two episodes of Lost in Space, this one and this one.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:03 PM

The ossuary that said "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus" is a crude forgery (or at least the "brother of Jesus" part) is. Details here (thanks to Meryl Yourish). Some scholars were reportedly skeptical because of an additional sentence which said "And by Jesus, we mean that guy from Christianity Jesus".

Of course, proof of fraud hasn't stopped people from claiming the Shroud of Turin is real.

In other news, I found a headstone that read "Thomas Wayne, father of Bruce".
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:40 AM

Bill Mumy (TV's Will Robinson) eulogizes Johnathan Harris (TV's Dr Smith). Also a Dr Smith Insult Library.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:12 PM

Jimmy Kimmel tells Bill Carter his plans for his ABC late night show and Carter goes behind the scenes on how ABC chose Kimmel.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:36 PM

Don Rickles is on Letterman this Friday (because talk shows never book elder guests). His appearances are always a delight.

Whenever Rickles is on Letterman, Letterman will invariably say "Oh, Dooooon." This is an allusion to Don Wilson, announcer and butt of fat jokes on the Jack Benny Show.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:49 AM

Speaking as we were of Butch Patrick, Johnny Hardwick (the voice of TV's Dale Gribble and a talented gent in his own right) sends us this article about a Texas couple who've set up their house to look like 1313 Mockingbird Lane (a.k.a the Munsters' house) and the special housewarming/Halloween charity fair they held there. Of course, Butch Patrick drops in for the fun.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:19 AM

Bruce Campbell gives a list of the best ten and worst ten horror flicks.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:40 PM

Talking of Butch Patrick (TV's Eddie Munster), according to his FAQ, he hangs out with Jerry Mathers and Danny Bonaduce.

I once performed comedy with Butch Patrick in the audience. He knew the headliner or something and was living near Austin, TX so he dropped in and became part of an audience of about 7. This was part of a particularly surreal evening which included the city of Austin attempting to start an annual Mardi Gras parade as 6th Street is, of course, Austin's answer to Bourbon Street (No, I don't know what the question was). We literally stopped the show in the middle so everyone could look at the parade. The parade itself consisted of two pickup trucks and a Toyota Corolla that made a wrong turn and just thought everyone was being really friendly by cheering and such. The parade was over and we continued the show.

Later that evening, between shows, someone popped his/her head into the club and said "Hey, Clint Eastwood and Kevin Costner are at Maggie Mae's." And, no, neither Costner nor Eastwood dropped in. As MC of show 2, I opened with the announcement that Anson Williams was at the pizza place across the street.

But the point is I played for Butch Patrick. And if that don't get me laid, nothing on this blog will.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:18 PM

Speaking of impersonators, this is the website of Dakota Horvarth, the kid Frank Sinatra impersonator who played the Jennifer Aniston-Brad Pitt wedding at age 13 and did a jillion talk shows a year or two back. He also looks to have had one of the better childhoods ever outside of Butch Patrick. I hope he saved some money for a college fund since I suspect the act gets less cute as he grows older, at least judging from his two month booking in Akron.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:05 PM

We established earlier that everyone wants to liven up their parties and the best way to do so is to hire John Cleese impersonator John Parkin. But if you can't afford John Parkin's services, you may want to try Ed Wells. Or at least I'm presuming that a John Clesse lookalike who doesn't actually look like John Cleese is fairly inexpensive.

Nor does Mr. Wells particularly sound like John Cleese.
(via Mark Evanier).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:56 AM

The LA Times has an article on the Valley Girl dialect. Next week, look for an article on breakdancing being all the rage.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:33 PM

Here, Richie Rich and Jackie Jokers meet a Harpo Marx knockoff named Kool Katz.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:32 PM

Get your own limited issue maquette of Jackie Jokers, the so-called "clown prince of show-biz". Yet if one examines these 7 covers of Richie Rich and Jackie Jokers, in three of them, he's doing magic and on one of them, he's spinning plates.

Clown prince, feh! And people wonder why I have no doubt that Uncle Scrooge is richer than Richie Rich.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:20 PM

Here is Little Sad Sack, the adventuires of Sad Sack as a boy.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:57 AM

Paul Krassner writes a review in the LA Times of a new book about Lenny Bruce's obscenity trials (login:cptspaulding/cptspaulding). While Krassner likes the book, it disturbs me that the authors got the joke Lenny made after Kennedy's assasination wrong. The joke they quote is not only totally wrong but is, of course, less funny.

Lenny Bruce is the most influential comic of the last forty years. My proof of that is very simple: Nobody gets arrested for telling jokes anymore and we have Lenny Bruce to thank for that. This CD is a recording of what is supposed to be Lenny's best performance ever.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:54 PM

Doonesbury closes his week on blogging with this strip. If I knew he was going to close with the "hot chick on the Internet is really a guy" joke, I would have saved my gag from Monday about how dated his punchline was for today. I started messing around with the Internet in 1991 and the joke was old then. In fact, I believe that joke was first told in a reply to the first ever email written by a woman.

If only Trudeau's skepticism about things written on the Internet was developed before he drew this strip.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:50 AM

Jim Treacher mocks how yesterday's Doonesbury seems to have Zonker Jr (or whatever the hell his name is) type in articles he could simply cut and paste.

Today's was kind of funny. Although I notice that the other kid has switched from "Dude" to "Man". Look for "Bro" tomorrow and "Homey" on Friday and Saturday.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:29 PM

I saw Comedian Saturday. While it doesn't quite show, as the tagline promises, "where comedy comes from", it does show the aggravation of performing and working on new jokes. Jerry Seinfeld takes a particularly hard route by publicly retiring his old material. Almost all comedians, even when working on new stuff, will open with an old joke or two to get a rhythm going. While, yes, Seinfeld's fame helps a little for the difficult transition, that buys you maybe a five minutes grace period (as Colin Quinn correctly notes). This is why Ray Romano gazes at Seinfeld in awe when he realizes that there are no loopholes for what Seinfeld is doing. (An interesting contrast is the awe Seinfeld held for Cosby in a discussion he has with Chris Rock about a Bill Cosby concert--- two-and-a-half hours, almost all new material, no intermission, no opener.)

Almost every comedian I know has commented on how heartening it is to see that even Seinfeld has to endure some of the same crap we do and gets the same jitters we do. (At one point, he asks "How big do I have to be for the audience not to talk?") Seemingly less unsure of himself is Orny Adams whose high confidence level doesn't seem to match his talent level (Granted we don't see much of his act but his using the bar stool as a wacky prop was enough proof for me; when you watch a lot of stand-up comedy, you pick up on these signs.) Granted, Orny, who's about my age, has George Shapiro (who manages Seinfeld and who managed Andy Kaufman) as a manager and did Letterman and Montreal. So what do I know? I don't think he looks good in this movie and even if the general public doesn't care, those who do the hiring will probably see it.

All in all, an excellent moving picture show.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:51 PM

Gary Trudeau does bloggers today (and presumably this week) with the original punchline that bloggers have nothing to say (Check out next week's strip about two guys standing next to each other talking on their cell phones).

I don't have much to say, I will grant. Other than, at least I wasn't dopey enough to fall for the Presidential IQ hoax.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:48 PM

Today would have been Margaret Dumont's birthday. Here's a blogcritics article about her with a debunking in the comments column by me about the "Dumont never got the jokes" myth.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 5:32 PM

About a month ago, Forbes ranked the fifteen wealthiest fictional characters. Among the injustices of this list was ranking Richie Rich above Scrooge McDuck.

Uncle Scrooge writer Don Rosa attacks this injustice as well as the gross underestimate of Scrooge's wealth at $8.2 billion. (Although in Forbes's defense, perhaps the day they did the official count Scrooge had been robbed by the Beagle Boys and had not yet rescued his dough.)
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 5:20 PM

Speaking of Mark Evanier, he has a picture of Harpo Marx and Jerry Lewis in a mug-off. Harpo wins.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 5:17 PM

Holy Moley! Great Caesar's Ghost! By the Beard of Odin! Mark Evanier now has a page of weblog links and for some dopey reason I'm on it. The head writer for Pink Lady and Jeff digs my stuff! (I am, of course, joking; Mark Evanier is the standard bearer of pop culture themed weblogs.)
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:54 PM

My performance as Sheldon Leonard was terrific, thanks for asking. (And if you're still unsure of who Sheldon Leonard is, you might recollect him from It's a Wonderful Life as Nick the bartender ("Hey, get me, I'm giving out wings!").) A friend's review was "Now if you could only be equally skilled in something that's marketable."

I dunno if I agree that it's unmarketable. There's gotta be a market for a comedic, Jewish-looking gangster. Hell, Michael Lerner and Alex Rocco can't play everything.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:42 PM

Punch Drunk Love was terrific. I hope Paul Thomas Anderson is collecting a million frequent flier miles because he'll need them for the extra plane seat for his Oscar!

The friend I saw it with had the perfect summary "You don't know what will happen next. And how many films can you say that about?"
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:25 PM

I auditioned for the Aspen Comedy Festival yesterday. I've played around last year with the idea of doing what's done during the Sundance Film Festival where you have alternate film festivals in neighboring towns at the same time like Slamdance which are as successful as the original.

So I'd find a town near Aspen and hold the Gaspin' Comedy Festival or the Graspin' Comedy Festival or whatever. However there is a fatal flaw to this plan: The reason alternate film festivals are so successful is that people like going to the movies. "Come see eight more hours of stand-up" is a harder sell.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:28 PM

On the subject, here's the story of a guy Michael Moore sued for using Roger-and-Me-esque techniques on him. Also this book has a funny essay where the author does the same thing.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:07 PM

Reviews like this one of Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine question the relevance of Moore's emphasis that Columbine happened on the same day as US bombers dropped a huge payload. Here's an essay that Moore wrote at the time of Columbine making the same point (It was on his website at the time).

This essay was the start of my dislike of Moore because he denies that the Serbs were committing genocide on the Albanians. I wonder if he ever retracted that claim. Maybe I should follow him with a video camera, this photograph, a bullhorn and a guy in a gorilla suit to find out.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:02 PM

Punch Drunk Love, the Adam Sandler/Paul Thomas Anderson collaboration opens this weekend in New York and LA. A friend and I have been playing phone tag to set up seeing this together. Invariably, we leave messages where we impersonate Adam Sandler. Mine are complete with high-pitched screeching songs.

Here's the story of the real-life guy who spent $3000 on pudding to get a million frequent flier miles.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:22 PM

Want to liven up your party? Sure, we all do! Why not book professional John Cleese impersonator John Parkin? Read some testimonials by satisfied customers. (Four of the eleven testimonials are weddings; not a bad idea now that Emil Sitka isn't available to shout "Hold hands, you lovebirds!") (via Mark Evanier).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:31 PM

Sunday, October 13th, I will be performing in a radio play production of an old Saint episode. I will be playing a role Sheldon Leonard played. The location is the Fake Gallery at 4319 Melrose Ave. Show starts at 8 pm.

If the imdb entry for Sheldon Leonard is insufficient to jog your memory cells, here's an episode of The Lucy Show guest-starring Sheldon Leonard. The episode is called, appropriately enough, "Lucy Meets Sheldon Leonard". As was the style of the time, a brief biography of the special guest star is worked into the dialogue ("After appearing so many times as a gangster in the movies, you then started producing television shows such as The Danny Thomas Show!").

UPDATE: The reviews are in!
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:50 AM

OUT OF CONTEXT DEPT: From this WSJ article about the gay community's embrace of Spongebob Squarepants

Early in September on NBC's "Late Night With Conan O'Brien," Mr. O'Brien asked Tom Kenny, the comic who is the voice of SpongeBob, to address the "controversy" about one of SpongeBob's pals, a grumpy squid named Squidward who speaks in a voice some find reminiscent of Paul Lynde, the late comic actor who specialized in gay double-entendre on "Hollywood Squares."
"Whether he's intended to be a gay character or not, that's the question people are asking," responded Mr. Kenny. Describing Squidward as a fussbudget who likes bubble bath and classical music, Mr. Kenny ultimately dodged the question. "It's never been addressed by us on the show," he said, adding with a wink that besides, "all the main characters are hiding horrible secrets of their own."

When Tom Kenny was saying "all the main characters are hiding horrible secrets of their own", he was not alluding to the Spongebob Squarepants show. He was doing a bit about how sitcoms in the past would have clearly gay characters but no one talked about it because the characters were hiding their own secrets (my wife is a witch; I live with a genie; I own a talking horse, etc.). In fact, the question itself was obviously a lead-in to do the bit.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:50 PM

Barbershop is now running ads that exploit the controversy. The ad cuts to a clip of Eddie saying people are supposed to talk about whatever they want in a barbershop to his saying the OJ did it to Calvin saying "Do not get him started". I believe that the announcer invites to see the film that has everyone talking.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:34 AM

By the way, Red Buttons does have a website. But he still never got a dinner.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:25 AM

In 1993, Ted Danson appeared in blackface at Whoopi Goldberg's roast. Conan O'Brien had an interview with "Danson" a few days later (actually, a Clutch Cargo-esque picture of Danson). In the interview, "Danson" listed Friars Club comics who loved the bit

Marty Ingalls was peeing in his pants, Freddie Roman was worshiping me, Red Buttons said it was brilliant, Jack Carter was in tears

Comedian Red Buttons sued Conan and NBC for slander. Here are the details and results of that case.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:22 AM

Something else not mentioned in the New York Observer article(WARNING:contains swears) that I discussed earlier. A disadvantage of having Comedy Central in the room for a roast is that part of the charm of a roast is people acting different than their public image. So a roast would have Jack Benny go blue or what have you.

The most famous/infamous example is Ed Sullivan at Don Rickles's roast in the late sixties (You will, of course, need to imagine this in Ed Sullivan's voice):

I have a few words to say. F&% you, you bald-headed bastard.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:13 AM

I was thinking about what I said about being surprised about how funny Paul Shaffer was at Chevy Chase's roast. Perhaps I shouldn't be that surprised. I've always felt that Paul's contributions to Letterman were underrated. Hell, you sit through Warren Zevon trying to be funny when subbing for Paul and you see it ain't easy.

The best example I remember was during the NBC show. Dave was ranting about Howdy Doody and Buffalo Bob's appearance in a commercial for a hotel chain. Dave complains that it makes Buffalo Bob and his puppet look sleazy, like they spend their days travelling and staying in cheap hotels. He then says "I don't know if that's the image they're trying to project." Paul says "Who, Howdy Doody or the hotel?" BAM! Dave chuckles and says "Yeah, I guess it's hard to choose a winner out of that bunch" and then proceeds to do a few more minutes of comedy around how silly the hotel looks for having a puppet as a guest ("More towels for Mr. Doody?") This is exactly what a straight man is supposed to do, provide fodder for additional comedy.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:59 AM

I just saw the live version of Mr Show. Woooh! Greatest show ever. A majority of the material was new stuff. Of course, I got a Los Angeles-only version with performances by cast members who were unable to tour.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:02 PM

A NY Observer article about the Friars Club roast given for Chevy Chase (WARNING: Has dirty words). The article states that the roast wasn't terribly good and blames the younger comics performing in it including Comedy Central's desire for younger comics.

I'm not convinced. Roasts aren't that hard and I say that as someone who's done a few (including this past Monday when I roasted Lew Wasserman's granddaughter in honor of her pending nuptials to Milton Berle's grandnephew. I love Hollywood!). Of course, hidden under the veneer of the insults and gay sex jokes is genuine affection for the roasted. I think the problem with the Chevy Chase roast is that the only SNL veterans he could attract to his roast were Lorraine Newman, Al Franken, and Paul Shaffer. According to a review of Tom Shales's book about SNL, the main constant amongst the casts throughout SNL's history is a hatred for Chevy Chase.

What sort of surprised me was how good Paul Shaffer is at roasting.

Combustible Boy aka the Blazing Blogger (of the Sound and the Fury) asked me to explain this joke:

When the laughter subsided, Mr. Shaffer dropped a beauty of a show-business insider’s joke: "How about that new Saturday Night Live book," he said. "They were pretty rough on Chevy. I haven’t seen anybody eat that much [$&%!] since the biography of Danny Thomas."

An apocryphal rumor about Danny Thomas is that he was into what the kids call "plating". Mr. Thomas would supposedly lie under a glass coffee table while the hookers he had hired would defecate on said table.

Hey, blame Combustible Boy. He asked!

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:27 PM

Barbara Streisand can't find the word gullible in the dictionary. Details here. The snopes debunking.

UPDATE: Streisand admits to being duped but resorts to the usual last refuge of the duped: saying that the statement is true even if not written by Shakespeare.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:39 AM

Sunday October 13th, I will be playing a role Sheldon Leonard played in a radio play production of an old Saint episode he appeared on. More details as to location and time when I have them.

UPDATE: I stupidly forgot to include a link of who the hell Sheldon Leonard is. I have one now.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:37 AM

I'd been getting the 503 error when I published entries for my blog. Equally important was that the archives list wasn't updating. Solution: Copy your template and paste in Notepad. Select a new template. Copy and paste your old template on top of the new template. Save and republish all.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:47 PM

The Batcycle is for sale.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:21 PM

As promised here, I've sampled Pollo Camperno, the Guatamelan fried chicken chain making a go of it in the US. I hereby declare it delicious. The chicken (Tradicional style) is nicely spiced and the chicken itself is crunchy and not-at-all greasy.

The menu itself is in Spanish but not too hard to figure out since the workings of a fast-food place are somewhat universal. Some of the workers only spoke pidgen English which is also not a problem unless you're a pain-in-the-ass like I was trying to order both a roll and tortillas when the meal comes with one or the other.

A mural on the world told the history of Pollo Campero but I was unable to read it. It also showed the evolution of the wacky Pollito Campero character. Interestingly, the side order of the plate of food he is carrying evolves from an unidentifiable blob to steak fries to French-fried potatoes. No sign of the Camperonix.

While the chicken is good, it's not worth a trip to downtown and potentially waiting in line for it. Is the chicken significantly different from anything you can get in the US? Yes. I don't find it unreasonable for folks to take a mess of it home when visiting Latin America. Hell, my family, when we made our regular trips to NY, used to take home bagels and Entemann's (back when Entemann's was a tri-state-only product). If it was possible to pack for a flight home NY-style pizza, we would have brought home one or two, I'm sure.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:58 PM

I saw Barbershop yesterday; I suppose I have Reverands Jackson and Sharpton to thank for that. It was a good movie. A few points

1. The film itself is an African-American It's a Wonderful Life with a consummate dreamer realizing the value of what he has.
2. The film was written, directed and starred African-Americans. It made good box office and, judging from the theater where I saw it, was embraced by all races. Maybe the good reverands shouldn't be trying to convince studios that African-American movies are more trouble than they're worth.
3. The character of Eddie is a clown and a blowhard. When he says that Parks wasn't the first black to not get up from the bus, he claims that he sat in the front of a bus and all he got was a day in jail. Before that scene, Eddie bragged about giving Walter Peyton a haircut after a bigtime play and his only proof was a picture of a guy completetly covered by a newspaper he was reading. Clearly, Eddie's boasts aren't to be taken seriously.
4. The papers say that everyone else in the scene disagreed with Eddie. This description doesn't do that scene justice. An elderly gentlemen, whose only role was to play checkers, be apart of the atmosphere, and occassionally mumble "You right, Eddie", stood up and shouted at Eddie for his disrespect.
5. The latter scene where Eddie rants about King's philandering was part of a larger epilogue showing things back to normal at the shop. Someone mentions King and the protagonist says "Don't mention Martin Luther King in front of Eddie" Eddie starts ranting and the protagonist walks away, rolling his eyes.
6. Malcolm X, a movie Sharpton was in, made a similar joke about King's philandering.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:07 PM

You may have heard gossip reports like this one about Internet fans protesting a leaked script of Superman because Jimmy Olsen was made gay. That's just the tip of the iceberg, a minor symptom of the sickness that is this script. The gory details here.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:26 PM

Something bothered me about this news story where Daschle condemns Bush for saying he's soft on security. Slate's Timothy Noah made me realize what: Bush's spin that he was talking about his Homeland Security reorganization is worse than if he had been talking about Iraq.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:41 PM

Behind-the-scenes of the Emmy accounting joke.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:48 AM

Do you like wacky, inappropriate captions to pictures? Neither do I. Nonetheless here's a link to a guy who did Krazy, Kooky Captions to those "With You Always" Jesus pictures I posted a link to earlier? Check them out before somebody enforces his copyright.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:58 PM

WHAT THE HELL DEPT: So I'm watching today's rerun of Burns and Allen. The plot is that a suicide note was found by Burns's dry cleaner in his suit pocket. Harry Von Zell says "What would make George want to kill himself? Hey, you don't suppose he's been watching that I Love Lucy show?"

Huh? What the hell does that mean?

UPDATE: Reader Tom Curl maybe has an answer:

Perhaps it was thought that the idea of another television show featuring a
ditzy woman might somehow sound the death knell of his own show?

I Love Lucy is also about a show-biz family so that makes some degree of sense. I'm looking at this with the benefit of several seasons of Lucy with its more slapstick-bent than Burns & Allen. But I could see where maybe at its debut, it would be thought to be similar.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:02 AM

"Billionaire Bill" Sherman lists the many potential problems of John Doe, the show about an amnesiac who knows everything but his own identity. A problem he doesn't list occurs in a scene where various folk ask Doe questions in an attempt to stump him. He answers "Willie" to the question "What is Gilligan's first name?" The correct answer is that Gilligan has no other name. Mr. "Knows-Everything-but-His-Own-Identity" has fallen for an urban legend.

Although perhaps that is a clue to his identity. If next week, he repeats the microwave poodle story, I think it'll prove to be significant.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:49 AM

I enjoyed Firefly, Joss Whedon's new show, very much. I had feared trouble upon hearing that Fox had shelved the original pilot. But pilots tend to be tricky, especially for sci-fi shows (Star Trek spin-offs have the advantage of not having to explain "it's the 24th century; the pointy-eared guys are Vulcans, etc."). Better to just see the characters in action and let things unfold naturally, with maybe a little omniscient narration at the beginning. The show itself is reminiscent of the "Wagon Train to the stars" description that was used to pitch Star Trek but more so as the ships and the planets are dirty and slightly unpleasant. And it pokes fun at a cliched villain origin. Also Ben Edlund, creator of the Tick, is a producer.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:23 AM

An obituary(login:cptspaulding/cptspaulding) for Necdet Kent, a Turkish diplomat who helped saved numerous Jews while posted in Nazi-occupied France.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:16 AM

TV's Chris Marcil, in response to my tale of MTV and the Super Adventure Team, emails an interesting story of another interaction between MTV and the Thunderbirds:

When my writing partner Sam Johnson and I worked at MTV in 1995, we wrote and coproduced a short pilot actually using old Thunderbirds episodes but with new dialogue so that they were all futuristic fashion designers: "In the future, the leaders of fashion are the guardians of world peace," was our opening.

MTV was, when approving the pilot, under the impression it had the rights to the Thunderbirds. When about to commit to the show, MTV found either they didn't have those rights or that they didn't have the rights to wipe the audio as the show called for.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:38 PM

Max Power writes about how Pollo Camperno, a Guatemalen fried chicken chain, is finding success in the US, especially with homesick immigrants who were flying the stuff in. I mention this article because in response to his question about is it that different from American fried chicken, I offered to visit the downtown LA chain (that this reviewer liked). I will post a review next week (Don't expect anything more sophisticated though than "Man, that's tasty" or "Ehhh...")
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:19 PM

Comedy Central picked up an animated show based on the life of Robert Evans (story here).

You gotta figure this show will need writers. Right? Who has his voice down better than me? Here's proof. Here's more proof.

I dunno. Write your congressman.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:32 AM

"Marvelous Max" Power sends this link of Bob Odenkirk online answering your questions at 2 PM EST today.

UPDATE: Like "Jolly Jim" Treacher, Bob and David are also none too fond of "Run, Ronnie, Run" (and their website confirms this). There's a book on sale at the tour. And supposedly a lot of new material.

Also Bob Odenkirk digs Bob and Ray.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:30 AM

FUN SITKA FACTS: Judging from this page, Harry Von Zell had at least a four-to-five-year career starring in Columbia short films.
Sitka was in The Blackboard Jungle and Pulp Fiction (see this page). The Pulp Fiction appearance was that the drug dealer was watching Sitka say "Hold hands, you lovebirds." when Travolta calls with an overdosed Uma Thurman (See the script here and search for "Hold hands"). His role on The Blackboard Jungle is "uncredited".
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:23 AM

MORE ON THE FOURTH STOOGE: As you recollect (if not look at this entry), the question of whether Emil Sitka was the Fourth Stooge partly rested on whether Sitka appeared in either film that both Curly and Shemp appeared in. Here's the results of my research.

1. "Billionaire Bill" Sherman wrote asking why I only described the gag from "Hold that Lion".
2. My recollection is that there were two films, both of which used the same gag.
3. Moe Howard, in his book, lists "Hold that Lion" as the only film "in which all us three Hurwitz brothers appeared."
4. imdb.com lists Curly as appearing in "Booty and the Beast". On the other hand, imdb.com is not 100% reliable. Especially since Curly died in 1952.
5. This page confirms the existence of two films. Not only was I right that they used the same joke, but they also used the same footage.
6. Sitka was indeed in "Hold That Lion" as this page states and imdb.com confirms as does Sitka's own site.

So what conclusion do we draw from this? I would say this: Sitka was just starting his career with the Stooges when "Hold that Lion" was released as we can see from his filmography page. So he hadn't quite qualified then as the Fourth Stooge. But arguably his work with the Stooges subsequently more than qualified him as a Fourth Stooge by the standards I already gave (Only three Stooges appear in a film at a time and Emil appears with them; hence Fourth Stooge).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:07 AM

FOURTH STOOGE CONTROVERY: Emil Sitka's website labels him as the Fourth Stooge (I discuss his career here). Monkeyboy (who sent us that link to the Spanish Stooge site) wants to know how that can be if Shemp is the fourth Stooge.

While there have been six Stooges, only three at a time appear in a particular film (with an exception to be noted in a minute). So since Emil appears frequently with three Stooges, he is arguably the fourth Stooge.

Now the exception to only-three-Stooges-per-film is that there are two Shemp films where Curly makes a quick guest appearance (The Stooges see a guy asleep with his hat covering his face; they lift the hat and Curly does his patented Curly snore). The key question is: was Emil Sitka in those films? I will endeavor to find out because I care about you, the loyal reader.

UPDATE: In fact, I give the answer here.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:47 PM

Today was the 100th anniversary of the first double play of Tinkers to Evers to Chance. Article here (with the poem that made them famous).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:42 PM

Speaking of the Stooges, here's a link to a Spanish fan-site for Los Tres Chiflados.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:38 PM

An LA Times article(cptspaulding/cptspaulding) about how Emil Sitka's kid is preserving his legacy. Emil Sitka was a frequently-used straight man of the Three Stooges. He also was, at one point, going to replace Larry (publicity photo).

Here's how to join the fan club. According to the article, a benefit when Sitka was alive was that he'd show up at your wedding and shout "Hold hands, you love birds."

UPDATE: Perusing the article a little more carefully, I notice that an Emil Sitka book is in the works. And yes, I do want a copy if it comes out near Chanukah or my birthday.

UPDATE 2: Is Emil Sitka the Fourth Stooge? I say more on this important controversy here.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:30 AM

Last Friday, I went to the Other Network, a show which shows failed pilots and has the creators talk about the show's creation.

The first show was episode six of the Super Adventure Team which, although broadcast, qualified snce MTV buried the show. The show is a funny parody of Thunderbirds. Co-creators Dana Gould and Robert Cohen told of pitching the show as a goof and getting it picked up. They also told of getting very talented people like Adam West and Mike Meyers to do teh voices but MTV nixed it saying the kids wouldn't care about them (One note said Adam West sounded too old). Vodkapundit (a Dana Gould fan) might be interested in knowing that they were going to get the show on DVD with audio commentary. However they discovered at the last minute that MTV, when threatened with litigation by Gerry Anderson (creator of Thunderbirds), simply gave him the rights to the show. They are now in litigation with MTV.

Next was comedian Robert Schimmel's sitcom, hosted by co-creator Mike Scully of Simpsons fame. Schimmel's show was actually picked up by Fox. The problem was the titular star was diagnosed with cancer before production. That obviously delayed things. Schimmel went into remission but just as they were to go into production, Fox cancelled the show. A shame. The show is a fairly typical three-camera-sitcom about a family. But the jokes have the decency to be funny.

The third show and the reason I was there was Next!, Bob Odenkirk's sketch show. Odenkirk did a videotaped introduction explaining that he created the show for Fox and Fox executives didn't like it. He then said "If you like the show, please get a job as the head of Fox and put the show on the air." The show was decently funny. The format was to cut to a sketch, cut to other sketchs and then cut back to the first and so on. Zach Galifinakis played a guy at a piano bar making bad pickup lines to women while he played.

There were two funny commercial parodies, both for Essey Bros. Used Cars. The first was from an Essey brother who admitted that he wasn't very bright or knowledgeable about cars or money. For example, he sold a car valued at $15,000 for $200. So hurry up before his brother's back in town. The second was from the other brother who said he told his brother not to sell cars or make commercials. He's asking people to bring the cars back. For example, one car was valued at $15,000 and sold for $200, Monopoly money. Another car wasn't valued at anything becuase it was his car and not for sale. Both commercials did the wacky car commercial font.

And TV's Matthew Perry brushed past me on his way back from the men's room.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:40 PM

Equal Time with Jewish Kitsch?: Here's a dopey comic book called Mendy and the Golem designed to teach Jewish kids lessons about Judaism. Someone bought me a subscription to this funny book when I was a kid. Another childhood artifact I foolishly got rid of.

UPDATE: I'm an idiot. I put the link in. Sorry.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:30 PM

As we've established earlier, everybody loves kitschy pictures of Jesus. So here's some more. As his story reveals, this gentleman woke up with the revelation that the Lord wanted him to draw special drawings of Jesus involved with the tasks of everyday people. I see no picture of Jesus with a comedian but that's probably appropriate. Even Jesus doesn't care for flop sweat.

UPDATE: Not everybody loves kitschy pictures of Jesus. I posted the two kitschy pictures of Jesus links on an email list I'm on. Someone (who was originally just trying to start a fight between me and someone else but has now convinced himself that he's offended) asked if I posted these links "because only Christians do silly things like that, right Daniel?"

I hadn't really thought about it but let's see...In Islam, pictures of Mohammed are considered blasphemous. Judaism, to my knowledge, doesn't really have a human face to the Good Lord and probably considers pictures of Him blasphemous also. In terms of kitschy pictures of that which one worships, I suspect maybe it is a Christian phenomenom, yes. I would love to see counter-examples if anyone has any.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:45 PM

Talking of Popeye, here's a funnyish Popeye site. Here's an Israeli site plugging Popeye & Son with other Popeye related stuff. And here's a site about six-count-'em-six Popeye statues in America.

This page states that Popeye first appeared in a Betty Boop cartoon. Having Betty Boop meet comic strip characters was apparently a common practise of the Fleisher Brothers to test the popularity of the comic strip stars in their own cartoons. Kind of like how popular sitcoms used to have episodes that were essentially pilots of new shows (Hell, Star Trek did it).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:41 PM

Combustible Boy (aka the Blazing Blogger) wants me to answer this question: "How exactly was it that grizzled, pipe-chomping old salts came to be typecast as avuncular grownup playmates for little kids?" He expresses skepticism that it's because of Popeye.

I would suggest that Popeye is, in fact, the origin of the archetype. I say this, for one reason. Thimble Theater, the comic strip Popeye debuted in, was not a comic strip for kids. Nor was Popeye intended for kids. He swore (or comix-swore) and punched people with little to no provocation. I remember a book about the history of Popeye which showed a strip of Popeye punching a horse (to its death) for being too slow. So anyhoo, E.C. Segar gets an emergency telegram that kids love Popeye. This is unexpected and Popeye's rougher edges are softened (He only hits when provoked).

So given that nobody expected a grizzled sailor like Popeye to be popular with the yung'uns, I would suspect that Popeye was the birth of that archetype.

Regarding kiddie show hosts as sea captains, my suspicion is the origin is partially due to many of these hosts showing Popeye cartoons (like this dude). Perhaps, I'll get a copy of this book and look into the matter (after I obtain that history of Popeye book from my childhood that I foolishly ditched at some point in my life).

Combustible is under the misimpression that Captain Spaulding is a gruff-but-loveable sea captain. He is, of course, as the song lyrics on the left say, an African explorer.

UPDATE: Conbustible Boy got an email suggesting that the captain from the Katzenjammer Kids is a precursor. I dunno. He doesn't seem the archetype. Of course, I'm only familiar with the Kids Katzenjammer through MAD parodies and the Warner Brothers Christmas cartoon, so what do I know?
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:16 PM

I'm on this email list and 9/11 is being discussed. The usual oil pipeline myth was stated and a couple of people pointed out that such a pipeline is idiotic (Afghanistan is unstable and Russia won't want to give up control of such anything). I posted this article about how Unocal didn't want the pipeline. Two folk replied with essentially "See what an idiot Bush is. He's making a pipeline no one wants."

When one of those two also said that the WTC and the Pentagon were justifiable targets, I had to stop participating in the discussion before I flew a plane for the purpose of punching somebody. Grr! Hulk Smash Puny Liberal!

Thinking about this is annnoying the hell out of me. I'm going to talk about Popeye now.

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