Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:55 PM

SHOWS, SHOWS, SHOWS: I will be doing stand-up at two upcoming shows this weekend. This Saturday at 10 pm at the Comedy Hideout and this Sunday at 8:00 at the World Famous Improv. Mark your calendars. Like you had something better to do?
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 4:22 PM

NBC has a Three Stooges salute this coming Tuesday at 8 pm EST. Details, sketchy though they are, can be found here. Woody Harrelson is hosting; I guess John Ratzenberger was booked.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:26 PM

Mark Evanier writes about what really happened with the phone clattering during the Oscars that I alluded to here.

Are there really people who thought it really was a failed bit? The reason I quoted the punchline was that I saw what it was: an ad-lib to cover a screw-up. Trust me, I've seen enough comedy that I know that sometimes comedians manufacture situations so that they can deliver quip they "came up with off the top of their head". And if someone claimed Steve Martin had done that, I wouldn't necessarily dismiss it out of hand. But it never occurred to me to think that it really was a failed bit mainly because I don't see what would be theoretically funny about that.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:57 AM

Oscar ratings are down 15% from 2002. I guess that means it went from one billion viewers last year to 850 million viewers worldwide this year.

(ALTERNATE PUNCHLINE: Tthat means it went down from one billion viewers worldwide last year to one billion viewers worldwide this year.)
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:48 AM

Researching "Billionaire Bill" Sherman's claim that there were two Sherlock Holmes vs. Jack the Ripper movies, I found this site listing all Jack the Ripper movie and TV appearances. The site includes the Babylon 5 appearance and the Star Trek appearance.

And for the record, the two Sherlock Holmes vs Jack the Ripper movies are this one and this one.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:42 PM

One thing I like about Steve Martin over Whoopi Goldberg hosting-wise is that when Whoopi hosts, she treats it like she's going to do a joke on every news topic that occurred since the last time she did a stand-up monologue.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 9:04 PM

The reason people laughed when someone reminded Martin Richards to thank his wife was the someone doing the reminding was Hillary Swank who forgot to thank her husband.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:46 PM

Adaptation didn't win and so my scenario didn't happen. Damnation! They did use a reverse negative for a picture of "Donald Kaufman".
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:39 PM

The big walk-out at the salute to past Oscar winners in protest of the war didn't happen.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:28 PM

Red Buttons won an Oscar for Sayonera but he never got a dinner.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:17 PM

"Lisa Marie Presley: This time nothin's off limits. Elvis, Michael, her music!"

Oooh! I hope they ask her about her music! I do! I do! I do!
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:04 PM

Wouldn't it have been cool if they had gotten someone else to sing Eminem's song since he apparently wouldn't do it? Steve Lawrence, just to throw out a name?
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:48 PM

Could someone out there in Internet-land answer this: The Salute to Oscar Musical Numbers showed an ape from Planet of the Apes running or dancing or something. Was there some big Planet of the Apes number at an Oscar ceremony at some point?
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:40 PM

When a Best Picture nominee starts sweeping minor awards like Chicago has, that means it's gonna win Best Picture. Except for the times when it doesn't.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:35 PM

Understand that in addition to the 45-seconds of Robin Williams footage in the What It's Like to Win an Oscar montage, there's an unused two hours where he does his gay-guy voice, his old-Jew voice, a Ronald Reagan impression, a John Wayne impression, a black guy voice, and a Lorena Bobbit joke.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:23 PM

"We like non-fiction but we live in fictitious times". Debunking of the "non-fiction" Bowling for Columbine. Booing is louder than applauding. The other nominees didn't seem to know that he was gonna bring them up so I wonder if they're really in solidarity or not.

UPDATE: And Michael Moore's prepped spin if he had lost.

UPDATE 2: Michael Moore denying that a genocide happened in Kosovo.

UPDATE 3: Thinking this over a little, and Michael Moore at a post-Oscar interview makes a similar point, giving Moore an Oscar and expecting him not to act similarly to what he did is like SNL having on Milton Berle and expecting him not to do old jokes and shtick. That's what you sign up for.

UPDATE 4: Moore claims that he did tell the other documentary nominees what he was going to do. If so, fair enough. I'll keep an eye peeled.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:59 PM

Tsk, tsk. Two seat fillers ain't doing their job.

UPDATE: Mark Evanier suggests that because of hightened security, they're not using seat fillers this year.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:57 PM

I wish they had, in the Salute to Oscar Musical Numbers, shown the Rob Lowe/Snow White dance number. Hell, they could have had the clip during the song lyric "Even in a turkey that you know will fold."
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:51 PM

It could be the camera angle but it looks like Peter O'Toole got a lousy seat.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:46 PM

I haven't seen Gangs of New York and I don't know much about the era it's set in but apparently a real moneymaker in those days was the hat business.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:33 PM

Every year the presenter of Oscar for Make-Up doesn't do the Milton Berle "Make-Up!" joke and every year I'm disappointed.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:22 PM

Mickey Mouse only gets to present Best Short Animated Film and not Best Live-Action Short Film? What's that about? Anti-semitism, that's what!
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:10 PM

I don't think they should have closed the Chicago musical number by having Steve Martin ask Queen Latifah if she likes shampoo.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:03 PM

"Question: Who can build anything from molehills to mountains..."

I know! I know! the answer is Jesus! Is it Jesus? It's Jesus, man...Art director? Well, Jesus is like an art director. See?
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 5:43 PM

Why is there no camera on Olivia de Havilland when Steve Martin mentioned her? It's not like they don't have a copy of his speech beforehand.

Steve Martin --- high-larious, of course.

UPDATE: "I understand now that throwing a phone in the middle of a joke is a bad idea."
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 5:32 PM

First Oscar Robbery: Grace Kelly lost to Halle Berry in the best Oscar Style poll on Oscar.com. Outrageous!
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:12 PM

This week's Entertainment Weekly (March 28th issue) has an article about JFK-impersonator Vaughn Meader of the album First Family (unfortunately currently unavailable on the web). Probably best known now, if at all, as a footnote in the life of Lenny Bruce. (Lenny's first post-assasination joke was "Boy, Vaughn Meader is screwed.")

The interesting thing I glean from the article is that Meader's career may not have lasted even if Kenedy had lived. He did the second First Family album only because of a threatened lawsuit and had recorded a comedy album sans JFK impersonation before the assasination. Branching out like this doesn't always work. Many of his post-'63 career problems seems self-inflicted due to drugs and booze.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:39 PM

I keep seeing articles that, to prove that Oscar loves period films, lists The Two Towers as an example so that they can say all the nominated films were period films. What historical era was it again that had dwarves and elves and hobbits?
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:38 PM

Bozo extraordinaire Dr. Matthias Rath published a four-page ad in today's LA Times saying that the war on terrorism is for the benefit of the pharmaceutical companies. The ad reprints ads printed in the NY Times including this one which blames Nazism on IG Farben.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:56 AM

Camp Granada the board game.

And the TV commercial for said game (courtesy of TV Party).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:38 AM

Another good Harpo anecdote from the Sherman memoirs tells of Harpo trying to collect unemployment insurance. Another book which had this anecdote tried to spin it as Harpo not having much of a career then which was not the situation. Rather, collecting unemployment was and still is a fairly common practice amongst show folk. The logic is that they pay into the system and are entitled to get the benefits between gigs. Plus in the 50's and 60's, 55 tax-free dollars was equivalent to making 500 bucks for a well-heeled show-biz type.

Harpo returns to the unemployment office in Indio, CA (date-picking country) three weeks after filling out the paperwork. The lady checks the card for Adolph H. Marx.

LADY: Have you had any work during the last three weeks
HARPO:Yes.
LADY: How long?
HARPO: One day, ma'am.
LADY: One day...and how much did you earn?
HARPO: Eleven thousand, five hundred dollars.

The lady calls her boss who then calls her boss. The boss humors Harpo and asks where he earned that much money. The answer of Canada doesn't help his case much.

BOSS: And what did you do in Canada to earn eleven thousand dollars in one day?
HARPO [Whistles and makes Harpo face]: That's what I did in Canada. Then I shook some knives and forks out of my sleeve, and I cut off a girl's dress and I held up a brassiere with three pockets.
DATE-PICKER[walks over and looks at Harpo]: Hey, mister, I know you.
HARPO: Thank goodness somebody around here recognizes me.
DATE-PICKER: Sure, you're one of the Three Stooges!
HARPO: [groans]
BOSS: Are you in show business?
HARPO: Yes, ma'am.
BOSS: I've never heard of an Adolph H. Marx. Should I know you?
HARPO: Well, the H stands for Harpo.
BOSS: Now I know you're a liar. Harpo Marx can't talk!

At this point, Harpo drives home, puts on his costume and storms back in to the unemployment office honking his bicycle horn. He gets his check.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:15 AM

Thursday, I finished reading A Gift of Laughter, the memoirs of Allen Sherman, the song parodist most famous for "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah".

One of his more interesting claims is that his first album My Son, the Folksinger brought the phrase "My Son, the [profession]" into the nation's vocabulary. I was initially skeptical but am starting to buy it now. Granted I always thought of that as an old gag but someone has to invent the gag. And even if he didn't create the gag, it's not unreasonable to think that a #1 hit album popularized it.

Mark Evanier recommended the book to me largely on the strength of its last chapter (offering to refund the purchase price if I did not enjoy said chapter; his money was safe as I borrowed it from the library). Said last chapter, an homage to Harpo Marx, talks of Harpo's last performance. After the performance, Sherman tries to tell the audience that Harpo is retiring and starts blubbering. Harpo walks on stage and says "Allen, you're too emotional...Now! As I was about to say in 1907..." The audience, obviously, goes nuts. Harpo then says "Hey, I like this talking business. I think I'll start a whole new career!"

Speaking of Harpo talking and Mark Evanier, here's a clip from Mark's site of Harpo telling an anecdote.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:37 PM

EW article about a wacky morning show DJ's getting through to French President Chirac by claiming to be Jerry Lewis and Lewis's angry reaction.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:35 PM

At Oscar time last year, Mark Evanier pointed out that producers couldn't have possibly thought that the Oscars show would run within the scheduled time and wonders why they don't just schedule the show to end at four-and-a-half hours. Here's my half-assed hypothesis: Local news is a television affiliate's big money-maker. Presumably, the further away from 11 PM (10 PM CST) the news is scheduled, the lower the ad rates. Scheduling the show for three-and-a-half hours lets affiliates charge for a news broadcast that runs at midnight rather than 1 AM and gives them deniability and someone else to blame when the news does run at 1 AM.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:20 PM

Oscar Moment I'd Like to See: Adaptation wins Best Adapted Screenplay. Charlie Kaufman comes up to accept. He says "I'm really proud to receive this Academy Award and so is my twin brother Donald." Kaufman runs backstage and quickly reappears wearing a fake moustache or a hat or both a fake moustache and a hat. Perhaps he speaks in a Southern drawl as Donald. Then he can run back and get his brother Charlie and so forth. Just saying that would be cool is all.

Alternately, it seems to me that if the Oscars have the technology to show cartoon characters getting an Oscar for Best Animated Picture, they have the technology to have Charlie Kaufman standing next to his twin brother Donald.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:04 PM

I'm deliberately avoiding the 5000-pound gorilla going on now. This blog was always intended to be about show-biz and other dopey stuff. There are other sources dealing with the war and doing it better than I would. And I see no need to alienate any of my audience.

I do have an idea for a protest at about the same maturity level of the vomit-in. Dude, what if to protest the war, everybody dropped their pencil at the same time? Aw, man, it'd be so cool! You gonna do it? Don't say you're gonna do it if you're not gonna do it!
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:55 PM

Dick Smothers's son (also named Dick Smothers) is now doing porno. The story here.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:54 AM

A fascinating LA Times story (login:cptspaulding/cptspaulding) about St. Louis court archives which detail pre-Dred Scott "freedom suits", law suits by slaves for their freedom.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:39 AM

YOUR INVESTMENTS IN ARTIFCIAL DUMBNESS HAVE PAID OFF DEPT.: Reader Beau Bahan points me to two M.U.L.E. knockoffs: SpaceHoRSE and the forthcoming Terra 2200 which looks somewhat more unnecessarily complicated than the original but will have Internet play.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:27 PM

THE SHIP WILL BE BACK IN 12 MONTHS DEPT.: For my father and brother, an article about the lady who invented the great 1983 software classic M.U.L.E. and the M.U.L.E. fanpage. Both give reasons why there ain't an Internet version of this game out yet.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:03 PM

Speaking of the Turkish Superman, here's the Turkish Star Trek.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:03 PM

My father sent me this CNN/Reuters story about the so-called Superman curse. The curse is proven by widening the definition of the word "curse". Kirk Allyn lived to the ripe old age of 89, you say (Indeed, when he died, I got great laughs with a bit that went "Kirk Allyn who played Superman in the serials died this week at the age of 89. Damn this Superman curse!")? Well, his career went into a decline! There's your curse! (By this logic, Burt Ward proves the existence of a Robin curse.)

Bud Collyer had a long life and a thriving post-Superman show-biz career? Well, he died only three years after taking up the role again (The article should have placed the cause of death in quotes just like those JFK-death lists do).

No word on Dean Cain, Tom Welling, Timothy Daly, Danny Dark, the guy who played Superman on Broadway, the Indian Superman or the Turkish Superman. Assumably one of them had a hangnail at some point in their life.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:12 AM

As you probably know (if not, story here), country stations are pulling Dixie Chicks' songs from the air after a member insulted President Bush at a London concert. In other news, Dallas stations are pulling Rolling Stones' songs because the Stones said that Oklahoma City was the rockingest city in the world two days after saying the same thing about Dallas.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:56 PM

One of the first and most notorious Oscar campaigning was that of Chill Wills, a character actor in Westerns. He was nominated in 1961 for The Alamo. He ran a series of ads listing all Academy members with the tag-line "Win, lose or draw, I consider you my Hollywood cousins". Groucho Marx ran a response ad which read "Dear Mr. Chill Wills: I am delighted to be your cousin, but I voted for Sal Mineo. Groucho Marx."

This page gives more of the story, including the press agent taking full responsibility for the ads and another ad which angered John Wayne.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:51 PM

I don't know how much coverage this is getting the flyover states but Miramax may have jeopardized Scorsese's Oscar chances. Academy-Award-winning director Robert Wise wrote an essay on why Scorsese deserves an Oscar. Miramax reprinted the entire essay as an ad in Variety, The Holywood Reporter and the Times (both of LA and New York). This Eonline article gives both sides of the matter.

UPDATE: A Miramax publicist admits to writing Wise's article.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 3:10 PM

Sinistro, Boy Fiend.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:15 AM

When I first heard about the talent search for a real-life version of the Archies, I offered my services as Mr. Weatherbee (and I can prove it here). Now according to the official description of the talent search, they are in fact looking for a Mr. Weatherbee (as well as any character you're familiar with and many that stumped even me).
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:22 PM

A few notes on Bringin' Down the House, a movie exactly as bad as I suspected:

1. Rosa Parks should go ahead and turn down an invite to next year's NAACP Image Awards in protest of this movie right now and save herself some paperwork.
2. Queen Latifah's character has a brawl with another chick; the soundtrack was "Simply Irresistable". Look, if you couldn't get the clearance rights to "Kung-Fu Fighting", fine; that doesn't mean you just choose a song at random.
3. Contrary to her accent, Joan Plowright's character grew up on a Southern plantation. Later, Eugene Levy makes two jokes about her British accent.
4. Steve Martin gets Queen Latifah to dress as a maid due to a last minute drop-in by a client. Why the hell does he have a maid's outfit in his house?!?!?! Which fits her too!
5. When Steve Martin buys gangsta clothing off a guy, after they show Martin in the gangsta clothing, they should have showed the guy in Steve Martin's suit. I'm just saying, is all.
6. The movie, to my disappointment, did not end with a double wedding (Martin's character to his ex-wife and Levy to Latifah) followed by white wedding guests doing crazy black people dances during the credits.
7. The movie does end with Latifah and Levy together and her pulling down a window shade, followed by a helicopter pan of the city. The friend I saw it with suggested that the window shade should have read "The End". I laughed and then grew indignant that they didn't do that. (ME: "Hell, why not?" FRIEND: "It'd be too cheesy." ME: "As opposed to a helicopter pan of the city?")
   

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:07 AM

A classic Atari joystick with 10 Atari 2600 games stored inside. Plug it into the TV and let the fun begin!
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:05 AM

More information and a review of the giant Hulk foam hands with Smansh 'n' Bash Sound Effects.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:06 PM

The history of Mountain Dew.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:02 PM

Hulk want refreshing beverage that like no other soft drink experience.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:00 PM

If you read my review of Bad Company, the Chris Rock-Anthony Hopkins team-up movie, you may recollect how surprised I was that the expected white guy acting black scenes were few and underkey. Apparently those scenes were transferred to Bringing Down the House.

UPDATE: The ad in the paper now includes a picture of Eugene Levy saying "You've got me straight trippin', Boo."
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:25 PM

I apologize for the light posting. I have, of course, been counting the seconds until the Adam West-Burt Ward made-for-TV movie airs on CBS. I don't think I exaggerate when I speculate that this will be the greatest two hours of television in the history of ever. Even if the producers did ignore my casting suggestions.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:11 PM

An article which describes some upcoming Hulk merchandise and a page of Hulk merchandise throughout the ages. A good birthday gift list for Meryl Yourish perhaps.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:04 PM

Mark Evanier describes what sounds like the greatest work of fan fiction ever. Second greatest piece of fanfic ever is this Matt McIrvin Space 1999 story.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 11:28 AM

Yaakov Smirnoff's one-man show hits Broadway. Details here and picture of poster here. He's going to talk about the unexplored comic terrain of the differences between men and women. (Apparently there are differences, not just physical but psychological differences.)
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:44 AM

An actual real-life neighbor of Mr. Rogers.

And the '98 Esquire article.

Talking of Fred Rogers again, the hack imitation has him saying "Can you say [word]? I knew that you could." (and perhaps holding up a sign with said word). I watched that show for quite a few years and I don't remember him ever doing that.
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Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:24 AM

Despite it being sold out, I did manage to score tickets to the Laugh-In seminar (discussed here). Thanks to Mark Evanier for the "hook-up" (as the kids say). I did not get a chance to ask about Turn-On (discussed here) which was just as well since someone asked about the failed attempt to revive Laugh-In in the late seventies and I'd hate to turn the seminar into a discussion of failed Schlatter shows.

A good time was had by all. Jo Anne Worley would frequently draw attention to herself but then again I would have been very disappointed if she hadn't. Not much was really learned. The censors, after allowing "You bet your sweet bippy" to air a few times, demanded to know what a bippy was and were satisfied with Dick Martin's answer of "It's a small bip." The show also is part of a pantheon of great shows which got a go-ahead despite the creators' inability to give a coherent pitch.

After the seminar, I lent Dick Van Dyke a pen. I also met Ruth Buzzi and Dom Deluise at Cantor's Delicastessin. How many celebrities did you meet on Friday? That's what I thought. Loser.

UPDATE: Mark Evanier reviews the evening here.

UPDATE2: Mark Evanier also has a story which features Mr. Rogers and Murray Langston. I'll let him tell it.
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