Monthly Archives: September 2003

Like Karnak the Magnificent, we give the answers before the questions. As I was posting the previous message explaining about the music changes in the reruns of WKRP, Jim Lawless was sending the following question about one of the episodes TV Land aired this evening…

Toward the end of this episode, Carlson called Venus and asked him to play something for himself and the "little girl" he had in his office. In the original airing (and IIRC, early syndication) of this episode, Venus played "Thank Heaven For Little Girls." However, in all later broadcasts of this episode that I've seen, Venus plays "We've Only Just Begun." (You can still see him clutching the Gigi soundtrack album in both flavors of the episode, though.) Do you know why the original was altered?

Like I said. But this is a good example of the kind of change I was writing about. The cheapo music library probably didn't have "Thank Heaven…" so they picked something else. And of course, being a song about newlyweds, it's much less appropriate…to say nothing of the fact that Venus is holding the wrong record jacket. In some episodes, the alterations are even worse.

If you set your TiVo to tape the "Turkey" episode of WKRP in Cincinnati tonight, you instead got the episode where Mr. Carlson (Gordon Jump) assisted in the delivery of his child. In tribute to the late Mr. Jump, TV Land switched around the schedule to run four episodes that spotlighted his character, none of them the one we were hoping to see. Let's all keep an eye out for it.

By the way: If you think there's something different about those WKRP episodes from their original network runs, you're right. A lot of the songs being played on the radio station have been changed from genuine hits to generic knock-offs. It costs money to use an Elton John or Beatles record on a TV show but at the time WKRP was originally produced, ASCAP charged less for a taped show (like WKRP) than for a filmed show, so the producers spent the money. Some time in the mid-90's, the discount went away and whatever company then owned the show (it's changed hands a few times) decided the rates were now prohibitive. They went in and replaced the real rock records with fake ones from some inexpensive music library. Even worse, when a line of dialogue (like a disc jockey intro) referred to one of those songs, the dialogue was redubbed, often by someone imitating the original actor. There are a few places where this kills a joke or damages the storyline.

Apparently, some stations that have been continuously running the show in syndication have been able to keep using the old, unaltered tapes but the versions on TV Land or on home video are the changed versions. Alas.

I never met Donald O'Connor and have no anecdotes about him that I didn't pick up in books, but I always thought he was a class act in everything he did. The "Make 'Em Laugh" number in Singin' in the Rain may be my favorite movie musical number — and that's no small achievement, doing the best song-and-dance spot in a movie starring Gene Kelly. He also held his own when he played the title role in The Buster Keaton Story. It was a dreadful, appallingly-fictionalized version of Keaton's life but he probably "did" Keaton as well as anyone could who was not Buster Keaton.

There was just something so darned likeable about O'Connor, even in his weaker films. That was, unfortunately, most of them…but somehow, he was always good. Even when they didn't let him dance, even when they made him work with the Talking Mule. I guess that explains why the man worked for sixty years. Here's a link to a pretty good New York Times obit.

Tuesday night, one of David Letterman's guests is a gent named Ray Wold, who bills himself as a "pyrotechnician." This is a fancy term meaning that he sets himself on fire.

I first saw Ray Wold around 1993 when he was in a revue called "Hot Stuff" that played at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. I love variety acts — jugglers, magicians, folks who balance items and on each other, etc. Once in a while, those acts involve apparent danger to the performer and there's a certain fun in that because you know it's an act; that the performer has done it hundreds, maybe thousands of times, and that they're not likely to get hurt the evening you're there.

For example, at one point there were at least three magicians just in Vegas doing the "Houdini Water Torture" trick. That's the one where the magician is shackled and submerged in H2O, and the idea is that he has to get out in under three minutes because that's how long he can hold his breath. As traditionally performed, an assistant stands by with an ax to smash the tank and rescue the magician, just in case something goes wrong…and then something seems to go wrong. The clock ticks past three minutes without the magician emerging and his aides start to panic. Finally, someone yells, "Quick! Get him out!" and the guy with the ax rushes up and is just about to use it when the magician suddenly appears, dripping but alive, from some unexpected entry point. When performed with a little showmanship, it can be highly effective, even unsettling an audience that knows darn well that everyone is just pretending. The magician's life was not really in jeopardy, just as it will not be in jeopardy when the exact same thing happens at the 10:00 show later that evening.

That's how it works with most "dangerous" acts. I guess it works that way with Ray Wold, but it sure didn't seem that way.

I went to see "Hot Stuff" on the recommendation of a friend in another show. She said, "You like to see sexy dancers? Well, Anita Mann choreographed this new show over at the Sands." Anita Mann was and presumably still is one of the best choreographers in the business. She did Solid Gold, for instance, and the dancers in "Hot Stuff" were in that category. My friend further explained, "The show is not topless so they were able to get real dancers, and real good-looking dancers. Trust me. These ladies are sexier with their tops on than most Vegas dancers are with their tops off." That turned out to be a fair assessment.

But my recollection of the show was and is largely negative because of Ray Wold's spot. He came out with his hat and jacket on fire and throughout his time on stage, some part of him would always be engulfed in flames. He'd put one blaze out and another would start. Thanks to some combination of well-concealed insulation and clever manipulation, he seemed unharmed, even when he sat on a chair that was completely ablaze and sang a few bars of "Great Balls of Fire." At one point, he jumped rope with a rope that had been doused in fuel and set ablaze.

Entertaining? Not to me. Since he still seems to work regularly, I guess he's refined his act and found folks who enjoy it. But that night at the Sands, I have never seen an audience so unentertained and uncomfortable, especially those seated in the front row. Perhaps the act works better in a bigger room. The Sands had a tiny stage and when he was skipping rope, sparks and little pieces of burning something-or-other were flying around and some people got up and moved back. If I'd been sitting that close, I think I would have, too. He got some applause for his obvious courage and there was a big ovation at the end, which struck me (seriously) as audience delight that he had finished. A few people did walk out, never to return.

On the way out, I asked one of the Sands hosts if the fire act usually went over as poorly as it did that night. The man shook his head and said, "The show is called 'Hot Stuff' so I guess they figured they needed something like that. Every show, I worry." I'm not sure if he was worried about some high roller getting singed or about anyone in the place being burned. Either way, Wold had managed to convince even someone who saw the show at every performance that disaster was possible. I left, assuming that I would someday read either that he'd set a showroom on fire or that a member of his audience had been injured.

To the best of my knowledge, that has never happened so perhaps Mr. Wold is much more skilled than I thought, or maybe he's toned down what he does on stage. As I said, Letterman's having him on this week and I'm guessing Wold is the guy who occasionally appears on the program as "Man-on-Fire," just running across the stage with his back ablaze. (Paul Shaffer usually plays the old Arthur Brown song, "Fire," and probably will again, this time.) I can understand the entertainment appeal of a lot of things that don't amuse me personally, but I'm afraid this one just leaves me — the pun is unavoidable — cold.

It isn't just rabid conservatives who can't turn loose of the notion that Hillary Clinton is running for president. Over on the Newsweek site, there's an article by Eleanor Clift that is headlined, "Why Hillary May Still Run For President." But if you actually read the article, Clift says…

I don't believe she'll run in 2004, and I'm sticking to my story. But she is leaving a crack open in the event President Bush's presidency collapses on a grander scale than we've seen so far, that Howard Dean implodes on his straight talk and that Clark with his quirky certitude turns out to be more Ross Perot than Dwight Eisenhower. Even then, Hillary would run into a buzz saw in New York because of her repeated pledge to serve out her full six years. Prematurely bolting for the presidency would play into the caricature of Hillary as a careerist and opportunist, more focused on her own ambition than what's good for her constituents.

So in all honesty, the headline should be almost the opposite: "Why Hillary Will Probably Not Run for President." But I guess that doesn't sound like as juicy a story.

Okay, I promised this story. But first, let me note that Gary DeJong did some research and unearthed the info that the first of the two Archie pilots done in 1976-1977 aired on December 19. 1976 and starred Audrey Landers as Betty, Hilary Thompson as Veronica, Mark Winkworth as Reggie, Derrel Maury as Jughead, Jane Lambert as Miss Grundy, Susan Blu as Midge, Jim Boelson as Moose, Whit Bissell as Mr. Lodge, Michelle Stacy as Little Jinx, Tifni Twitchell as Big Ethel and Amzie Strickland as Mrs. Lodge. Byron Webster played Mr. Weatherbee and Gordon Jump (whose passing started this discussion) played Archie's father. In other words, referencing the earlier anecdote, Gordon Jump came in to audition for Mr. Weatherbee and got the part…then, since the producers couldn't properly cast the role of Archie's father, they moved Jump to that slot and put their second-choice in as Mr. Weatherbee. As I recall, the role of Archie's father was much larger than the role of Mr. Weatherbee so that may explain the decision.

Who played the title role of Archie Andrews? Well, that's the story I wanted to tell. After extensive auditions and screen tests, they picked a young man with brilliant red hair but no real acting experience, at least on television. Somehow, things didn't work out. I never heard exactly what happened but suddenly, the role of Archie was being played by the producers' second choice, an actor named Dennis Bowen who had appeared a few times on Welcome Back, Kotter. (Kotter was produced by the same company. Dennis played the recurring role of Todd Ludlow, an honors student who sometimes heckled the Sweathogs.)

The Archie pilot was an odd mix of sitcom and variety show. It was an hour in length and there were blackouts and little, self-contained storylines of about ten minutes each. Between these, the focus would shift to a rather generic rock band that played bubble-gum style music. The whole thing was being targeted for the 7:00 Sunday evening slot and I recall a lot of argument over how many scenes there could be of Betty, Veronica and a number of good-looking female extras in swimwear and sleepwear. The writers had scripted a number of quick jokes at a swimming pool, and one of the short stories involved the boys crashing a slumber party that Veronica was throwing at the Lodge mansion. Both had been planned expressly to get the ladies into scanty outfits, which the ABC programming department encouraged. At the same time, their Standards and Practices folks ran around demanding less-revealing bikinis and nighties. Some of the best jokes in the show wound up being cut because the girls were showing a half-inch too much of their physiques.

The mix of sitcom and sketches didn't quite work. There was a second pilot with the same cast and pretty much the same idea and it didn't work, either. As I recall, the main change from the first one was that they replaced the generic rock band with one comprised of Archie, Betty, Jughead, etc. Danny "Neil's brother" Simon was the head writer on this try.

Anyway, the great story, the one I wanted to get to, was what happened because they replaced Archies in the first pilot. Somehow, the ABC publicity department never got the word and all the p.r. they issued for the show contained the name of the first actor, the one who was replaced during rehearsals. Poor Dennis Bowen had to endure publicity photos that displayed his face but identified him as the first guy. A few years ago when the Archie comic book folks published a book on the character's history, they said the first guy had played the role.

What happened to that first redheaded guy? Well, he eventually got a TV series, then he left it and made some movies. Now, he's back with another TV series. Can you guess who it is?

Yesterday afternoon, I attended one of the Pacific Pioneer Broadcasters luncheons. P.P.B. is a group of folks with extensive credits in TV and radio, and every so often, they assemble at the Sportsmen's Lodge out on Ventura Boulevard for mediocre food and good company. The honoree this time was Jack Klugman (seen above left and also at right on the cover of the one issue of the Odd Couple comic book, published by Gold Key Comics in 1971) and among those present to speak about him were Dom DeLuise, Charles Durning, Dick Van Patten and about half the cast of Quincy. Tony Randall and Garry Marshall weren't there but both sent notes to be read. Marshall's said something like, "I really love and respect you, Jack, but obviously not enough to show up at your luncheon."

He also included a plug — one of dozens heard throughout the afternoon — for "An Evening With Jack Klugman," which Guess Who is currently performing at Falcon Theatre in Burbank…a theatre run, by the way, by Garry Marshall.

I've always liked Jack Klugman, ever since I first saw him in a short-lived, utterly forgotten situation comedy called Harris Against the World. When he and Randall did The Odd Couple as a TV show, I had a friend who got me in to watch rehearsals, which I found fascinating. Jack and Tony were quite serious about acting. Even working through a script that they knew would be extensively revised, they discussed every line and what it meant, advised each other on how to read it and engaged the director and producers in extensive, wholly-constructive discussion. Or at least it looked constructive to a kid in the bleachers, A few of those producers later told me the biggest debate in the office was over which of them, Jack or Tony, was the bigger pain-in-the-butt. One said, "When it came to discussing the script, they were both Felix."

There was nothing all that quotable at the luncheon. It was just nice to see all those folks turn out to honor a guy who's been around a long time and done a lot of fine work. If I think of anything else that was said, I'll post it later.

Yesterday, I linked to a short interview with Lynn Johnston, who does the For Better of For Worse newspaper strip. In that piece, there's a reference to a longer interview that ran in the magazine, Hogan's Alley. Here's a link to that piece. (Don't thank me. Thank Nat Gertler, who told me about it.)

Here's a website full of ads from old comic books. For all you Sea Monkey fans. (Thanks to Bruce Reznick for the pointer.)

Here's a short but interesting interview with Lynn Johnston, who does the newspaper strip, For Better or For Worse. And a fine strip it is.

If I were to mention a successful playwright with a background in cartooning, a lot of you would instantly think of Jules Feiffer, and that would be correct. But the description also fits Herb Gardner, author of A Thousand Clowns, I'm Not Rappoport, Who Is Harry Kellerman and Why Is He Saying Those Terrible Things About Me?, Thieves, The Goodbye People and many others. I never had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Gardner but owing to the quirky sense of humor that pervaded his work, I felt like I knew him.

In the late fifties, he wrote and drew a syndicated comic strip called The Nebbishes, which is almost forgotten today. I have a pretty good library of books on comic strip history and I'm not sure it's mentioned in any of them. I remember it being quite funny and being extensively merchandised, mostly for things like cocktail napkins and bar equipment, at a time when strips rarely appeared on items that might be bought by an adult. Around 1960, Gardner gave it up and turned to novels and then plays and screenplays.

In addition to his impressive body of known work, he is said to have done a lot of unknown scripting. Sometimes, it was a matter of secretly assisting friends. Rumor has it he wrote all or most of the funny lines in scripts credited to Bob Fosse, especially in All That Jazz. He also is supposed to have done extensive punch-ups and revisions on some other pretty famous movies and plays by strangers, but information on these is vague. Even discounting all this, he leaves behind a pretty impressive body of work.

Here's the New York Times obit.

I TiVoed it earlier and I've just finished watching it. If I had to pick a winner, I'd probably pick Gray Davis, who wasn't even there. I can't imagine too many viewers deciding to vote for any of these people because of what they said in the debate, but I can sure imagine someone deciding we might as well stick with Gray. (Actually, Arianna Huffington may have "won" in the sense that she increased her celebrity and visibility for other purposes but she's still going to get 3% in the election.)

I think the court made the right decision not to delay the vote. The sooner we get this over with, the better. Leno missed a bet the other night by not starting his show by having a little, tiny car pull up outside and all of the candidates get out with rubber balls on their noses.

Jesse White was a very funny man and a great stage performer (I saw him playing Oscar in The Odd Couple and Mushnick in Little Shop of Horrors, and he was great in both.) As with many character actors, he did his best work in parts that paid little and went largely unnoticed, then made his fame and fortune in an odd, non-challenging role. He was the Maytag Repairman for 21 years in what was apparently a very successful advertising campaign…so much so that it was an actual news story when he "retired" in 1988. I put "retired" in quotes because Jesse told everyone he met that it was not a voluntary retirement; that those [expletive deleted] ad agency guys had decided he was too old. He was only 69 which doesn't seem that old when you consider that his replacement, Gordon Jump, was 56 when he assumed the role. As good an actor as Jesse was, I think Gordon was even better. He just seemed somehow…lonelier.

The Maytag folks obviously worried about Gordon getting too old for the job so over the years, they tried to establish another actor in the spots as the Repairman's son or nephew. That would put a younger spin on the commercials and when Jump died or retired, the younger man could take over. I guess it never worked out. Last June, they announced that Jump was "retiring" and that an actor named Hardy Rawls would soon assume the role, but I don't think Mr. Rawls was introduced the way they once wanted to phase in the new guy.

In early 1989, I booked Jesse White to do a voice on the Garfield cartoon show. I had an idea to have a recurring Bilko-like con-man and I thought Jesse would be good in the role…and he would have been, had we done the show ten years earlier. But Jesse was having health problems. His performance was not up to this old standard, and I could understand why he was no longer doing the Maytag spots.

He apparently could not. The Gordon Jump commercials had just started appearing and someone asked Jesse an insensitive question about his absence. Jesse exploded in anger, railing against know-nothing advertising people who are prejudiced against older people. He was absolutely right that there is rampant ageism in the business, though perhaps that was not the problem in his case. I later worked with Jesse on what I believe was his last job — a small part on the comedy album/CD, Stan Freberg Presents the United States of America, Volume 2. Jesse had been the co-star of the first album, which was recorded in 1961. When Stan did the sequel in '96, he wanted to include everyone who'd been on the first one and was still around…but Jesse was only up to a small, non-singing part and even that took a great many takes. He died before the album was even released.

The day we had him on Garfield was a very gloomy day because this had once been one of the sharpest, funniest actors around and we were all a little depressed by the struggle he had to give even a passable performance. After Jesse left, I found Lorenzo Music, who did the voice of Garfield, sitting out in the lounge area, wiping his eyes. I sat down next to him and said, "I know…it's sad to see someone in that condition."

Lorenzo looked up at me and said, "Yes, but that's not why I'm crying. Jesse told me how much he got for doing those Maytag commercials."

I gasped. "You mean…?"

"Yeah," Lorenzo moaned. "They only hired Gordon Jump because I turned it down."

I dunno if I made it clear but the WKRP in Cincinnati episode with the turkeys is on TV Land this weekend. Depending on your time zone and cable company, it will probably air either at 9:30 Saturday evening or three hours after that. Speaking of which, my pal TV writer Michael Reaves sends the following info on it…

The justly-famous turkey episode of WKRP (right up there with "Chuckles the Clown", IMHO), was, as I'm sure you know, written by Bill Dial, a very nice man who was later a producer on Sliders. When I wrote for that show I asked him about the story's genesis, and he said the idea came from a PR man's plan for a stunt to advertise the opening of some public attraction. It was planned, but fortunately never executed (and I use the word in every possible sense here). Bill said the same guy also planned another stunt, in which there would be a small "farm" in the middle of a mall, with ducks who would dance to country music — they'd be inspired to "dance" by the electrical current heating the floor of the set. And they say American entrepreneurship is dead…

One other interesting thing about the "turkey" segment: It was only the seventh episode taped of WKRP, and I don't think the series had even gone on the air yet. Most long-running sitcoms do their most memorable episodes after the show has been around for a while and things have shaken down. The Mary Tyler Moore Show's infamous "Chuckles Bites the Dust," for instance, was a sixth season episode. If we were to compile a list of great episodes of shows, I'll bet very few of them would be from the first thirteen. Bill Dial and the folks at WKRP had their act together almost from day one.

I had lunch this afternoon in the commissary on the Disney lot. As I was walking back to my car, I noticed that one whole side of a studio building had a huge billboard for 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter with a big picture of the cast. And rather than take it down in light of John Ritter's death, they instead added a huge banner across the billboard. It read, "We love you John."

I don't know why but that struck me as a classy thing to do.