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"Daniel Frank is a very funny guy with a funny weblog." --- Mark Evanier.

Once I bagged six tigers

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Thursday, June 30, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:24 AM

Jesse Walker reviews the discography of Sesame Street. The important thing I learned from this article is that I did not as a child own Sesame Street Fever as I thought; rather I owned Sesame Disco. I remembered "Me Lost Me Cookie at the Disco" and didn't realize there were two Sesame Street disco albums.

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Sunday, June 26, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:35 PM

From my brother, a mess of crazy MP3's. Includes the two songs (this one and that one) that Burt Ward recorded with the Mothers of Invention (which Mrs. Zappa wouldn't let be included on the great Batmania CD), the Odd Couple sing "You're So Vain", Milton Berle does shtick while singing "Yellow Submarine" and Ted Knight's novelty hit "Hi Guys". Robin Jones may enjoy these two remixes of Vincent Price's cooking records or just the cooking lessons themselves.

UPDATE: Duh. It wasn't until I saw the Winchell/Mahoney theme on the site that I realized this was the website of the daughter of the just recently-late Paul Winchell (ventriloquist, inventor of the artificial heart, and voice of Tigger).

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Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 5:24 PM

Daily Telegraph story about how a French magazine recreated the Shroud of Turin using methods available during medieval times.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:42 PM

I was really disappointed by the soundtrack of Spamalot. It's not that I know the jokes since I still laugh at the original movie. Possibly it's the tacked-on happy ending where "find the Grail" is actually a metaphor for finding one's happiness. I got some smallenjoyment imagining what the Python of thirty years ago would have done with that ending. I think I can nail down what's wrong with this Socratic dialogue:

Q:Tell me why we laugh at something and feel free to swipe your answer from The Dick Van Dyke Show.
A:Something unexpected happens and we laugh as a response. So you expect a society party to be dignified; you don't expect it to break out into a pie fight (even if the host did hire the Three Stooges to be plumbers and there's a table of pies in the buffet areas) and you laugh.
Q:So what makes the "Knights of the Round Table" song funny?
A:Until that moment, Holy Grail had been playing as a straight medieval tale. Also all the kinights are looking at Camelot with hushed awe and Arthur orders riding to the castle with much pomposity. Suddenly a silly song with an elaborate dance routine breaks out. It's unexpected and we laugh.
Q:Would such a song be unexpected in the middle of a musical comedy?
A:No, not so much.
Q:What if it were the fifth or sixth song of the musical?
A:Even less so.
Q:And therefore?
A:It's not as funny.

I was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt that there were funny things in the musical not represented on the soundtrack but this Slate review reveals sins hidden by the soundtrack. Specifically, after the "There are those who call me...Tim" joke, Arthur sarcastically replies "Oh, Tim—what a scary name". The Python of old used to mock comedies that explain the joke by holding a sign that read "Joke" during a sketch or two. I now have another example to add to my "Police Squad vs. Naked Gun rant" that I often bore friends with.

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Tuesday, June 14, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:57 PM

A data point for the great Reason article that media concentration is no worse now than it was twenty years ago: Viacom just split into two companies.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:19 PM

Today's paper had an article about Gov. Schwarzenegger's ballot measures. Included was a picture of folk protesting the require-members-to-approve-public-employee-union-dues-going-to-political-campaigns. The problem is the public employees in question were DMV employees. I would think the last thing you'd want to do is remind people that public employees include DMV folk.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 8:04 AM

COOP, in a comment to the Bilko post, recommends Bilko: Behind the Lines With Phil Silvers, a book by Mickey Freeman who played Zimmerman. Appropriately, the book is only available in large-print edition.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:51 AM

From the Let's Spend Some Time Together Department: In Night and Day, the Cary Grant as Cole Porter biopic, during the singing of "I Get a Kick out of You", the lyric "Some they may go for cocaine" is substituted with "Some like the perfume from Spain". Ah, yes, that world famous Spanish perfume...

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:42 AM

You remember those really bad "humor" paperbacks you could order from Scholastic Books when we were kids. Apparently Will Eisner produced a bunch of them, two of which (this one and this one) are on sale at Ebay. I'm half thinking that I owned the Star Jaws one (or I'm thinking of the Spidey Super Stories issue of the same name)

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 7:41 AM

From The Internet Fails Me Once Again Department: I remember from The Electric Company a sketch featuring Columbo, Kojak and Sherlock Holmes (played by Morgan Freeman, I think) singing a song called "Who Done It?" ("Who done it?/Who done it?/Who done it?/Was it yoooooooooooou?"). But I try to find lyrics or a description so I can make an allusion to it in a comment on this post by my friend Robin Jones and nothing!

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Friday, June 10, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 12:58 PM

Yes, it's only a rumor but what the hell: TV Shows on DVD reports that Sgt Bilko/The Phil Silvers Show may be coming to DVD. The show starring the man willing to drown for a joke. (twice apparently!)

Actual conversation I had many years ago:
Me: Mentioned Phil Silvers in some context.
Friend: Who's Phil Silvers?
Me: He was the star of The Phil Silvers Show.

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Tuesday, June 07, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 10:01 PM

Nancy Cartwright (voice of TV's Bart Simpson) reports that a table read was done for the Simpsons movie. Other snippets can be found here.

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Posted by Daniel Frank at 6:54 PM

Variety reports that Ben Stiller has been cast in a movie version of The Persuaders playing the Tony Curtis role of the rough-and-tumble, self-made millionaire.

Now see if I had been in charge, I would have cast Stiller in the Roger Moore role of an English lord for three reasons:

Everyone expects Stiller to be the Tony Curtis (or at least everyone who's heard of the show). I'd be subverting their expectations (like how in Salt and Pepper Sammy Davis, Jr. played the role of Salt and Peter Lawford played the role of Pepper).

I figure that I could get Stiller to drop a mill or two off his asking price by convincing that I'm letting him stretch.
I really want to see Ben Stiller act in a role with an English accent and I believe America shares that desire with me.

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Friday, June 03, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 1:28 PM

Jews am smarter, according to SCIENCE! (via Just One Minute)

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Wednesday, June 01, 2005

Posted by Daniel Frank at 2:16 PM

Walter "TV's Chekhov" Koenig will be playing Chekhov in an Internet production. Story here.

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