We have a winner! Thanks to several folks — especially Tom Alger — we seem to have pieced together the answer to the most pressing question in America today: Where the hell did that silly music video with Leonard Nimoy first appear? Here's the answer…
Malibu U was a music series which ran from 7/21/67 to 9/1/67 on Friday nights on ABC. It was hosted by singer Rick Nelson and featured Australian vocalist Robie Porter, but the main attraction was a group of beautiful bikini-clad ladies. They were officially called the Bob Banas Dancers but were also known as "The Malibuettes." Various singers and celebs appeared as "guest professors" to deliver "lectures," which meant singing their numbers, usually on the beach. The segments on the show were more or less in the form we now call music videos.
Here, obtained by Mr. Alger, is a database listing for one episode in the UCLA film archive…
Malibu U. [1967-07-28] – A Robert E. Petersen production in association with Teen-Age Fair, Inc. and ABC; executive producer, Gene McCabe; producer, Al Burton; director, Jack Shea; writers, Milt Larsen, Bob Lauher. Summary: Host Rick Nelson's singing guests are Leonard Nimoy of Star Trek, Bobby Rydell, the Buffalo Springfield, Mrs. Miller and Englebert Humperdinck. Location sequences filmed at Griffith Park in Los Angeles and the harbor at Balboa, California.
Highlights: "Bilbo Baggins" — Leonard; "Volare," "Dansero" — Bobby; "Bluebird" — Buffalo Springfield; "Let's Hang On" — Mrs. Miller; "Release Me" — Englebert; "Balboa's Wet Set" — dancers.
As you'll recall, we thought it was 1968-1969. But further investigation reveals that the various Nimoy-oriented websites do not agree just when he recorded "The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins," and Alger came across info that the man who is not Spock also performed it in '67 on American Bandstand. Perhaps the single came out in '67 and the album came out in '68. Or perhaps the fan sites are just wrong. (A few of them list Nimoy as guesting on Malibu U, but the date they all give was a Thursday.)
Turns out, my friend Sam Tomaino has a pretty decent memory. He recalled it being on a short-lived summer series that aired on Friday nights, and he was correct. He thought it was NBC but said in his e-mail to me that it might have been ABC. And he was right about Mrs. Miller being on the show, though she seems to have performed a different number than he recalled. I'll bet he was also correct that the dancers did "Come On Down to My Boat" on the series, if not in that episode (as their number) then on another installment. That song was recorded by those one-hit wonders, Every Mother's Son, and was on the charts in 1967.
One other note of trivia: One of the Malibuettes on Malibu U was Erin Gray, making her TV debut, years before she appeared on Buck Rogers, Silver Spoons, and other shows. I'm afraid I can't tell if she's one of the ladies in the clip but perhaps someone else can recognize her or not.
In any case, I think this the mystery is solved of where the musical number appeared. Now we just have to figure out why…