Monthly Archives: January 2004

I just received an e-mail ad telling me that there will be a great Super Bowl party this Sunday at the Bar Celona in Chicago. I entered its address in Mapquest and found out it's 2,034.25 miles from my house, or 31 hours and 16 minutes if I drive straight through without stopping.

I doubt I'll be making the trip. If I am suddenly seized by the urge to watch my first football game ever, I figure there have to be a few closer places…maybe in Denver or even southwestern Illinois.

For some reason, this kind of Spam annoys me more than the ones for penis enlargement and giving my bank account details to strangers in Nigeria. And I'm wondering if someone just bought a list of e-mail addresses scattered all over the world and didn't care that 99% of the ads were going to people far from Chicago. The only thing I can recall signing up for that was based in Chicago was many years ago when as a treat for a friend, I ordered some hot dogs from Fluky's, a famous Chicago frankfurter emporium. But I gave them my delivery address so you'd think that if they'd sold their mailing list, someone would have taken the 40 seconds to filter out non-Illinois zip codes. (I also signed up for access to the Chicago Tribune site but with a different e-mail address.)

Oh, well. If anyone's going to spend Super Bowl Sunday at the Bar Celona, tell 'em not to hold a stool for me.

If you share my view of how the press is overdramatizing and misreporting every step of the primaries, read this article in the Boston Globe by Brian McGrory. Oh, heck. Read it even if you disagree. It's funny.

Do you know how Jack Paar broke into show business? It's kind of an interesting story. Before going into the service for World War II, he did some local radio but it was in the Army that he became a star. Because of his broadcasting experience, he wound up in Special Services, travelling from base to base, doing shows for other soldiers. There, he developed a series of monologues that were almost exclusively on one topic: Insulting officers. He would get up on stage and do to officers what Don Rickles did to a fat black lady in the front row. I don't know if privates make fun of officers in today's army but they sure didn't then. Paar would talk about how the officers should have rear-view mirrors on their helmets so they can see the real soldiers going into battle. He did jokes about how a whole platoon of privates could live for a week off the food they throw out in the officer's mess. Jokes like that. Soldiers loved it and officers tolerated it…up until the time a general arrived at a show accompanied by two comely WACs and Paar remarked, "The girls were going to do the Dance of the Virgins for us but they went to the Officers' Club and broke their contracts." A furious general had Paar arrested, tossed in the stockades and prepped for court-martial. Only when the general was convinced it would harm troop morale did he relent.

While all this was going on, the war correspondent for Esquire Magazine was hearing about this unknown comedian. G.I. after G.I. told the reporter they'd loved it when Bob Hope came to entertain but this Jack Paar guy was their hero. The reporter caught up with Paar and interviewed him for what Paar figured would be a brief mention, if that. Months later, when Paar was mustered out of the service, he was wondering what he'd do for a career. That's when he heard that the current issue of Esquire had a full-scale article on him calling him the most brilliant undiscovered comic talent in the world. Suddenly, the movie studios and radio networks were calling.

The other interesting thing about Paar's success is that it didn't all flow from that. The Esquire article got him a number of breaks but one by one, he either blew them or they just didn't pan out. By the time he was offered The Tonight Show, he was to the point where one more flop might end his career forever. Fortunately for us all, it didn't happen.

Here, for what little these things may be worth, is my take on the Democratic Primaries. A week or two ago, the story was the inevitability of Dean. Now, it's the Kerry comeback and coming up, we have primaries in Arizona (where Clark will probably do well), South Carolina (which Edwards will take in a walk) and Oklahoma (where both those guys will do well). Ergo, before we get near a winner, we'll probably sit through a cycle of stories about Clark breaking through, and one comparing Edwards' performance to when Clinton came from behind in the primaries to seize the nomination. I dunno which of those four guys will triumph but I think they'll each have their turn in the spotlight. Dean will probably have at least one more turn and I'll bet that if and when it looks to be dissolving, he'll give the most tempered, non-screaming speech of his life.

I see a lot of weblogs and pundits moaning that Lieberman, Kucinich and Sharpton should have dropped out by now. The first two will probably do so before long but I have to assume that the Reverend Al is not at all surprised by where he stands and that it serves his purpose in running. He's much too smart a guy to ever have thought he had a chance to win. Going into a couple of past conventions, the oft-asked question was, "What does Jesse want?" meaning that the Reverend Jackson had just enough support that he had to be appeased with some sort of concession — a plank in the platform, a featured speech, a promised cabinet appointment, whatever. Soon, we'll be hearing, "What does Al want?" Based on his last few talk show appearances, I'd say he's already got it. Is there anyone else out there who can even suggest that they speak for Black America?

My mother loves to play Video Poker. Loves to play it in Vegas and loves even more to play it at home where she can play without fear of losing her son's inheritance. Years ago, I got her a little toy Video Poker machine. It was about a foot tall and ran on batteries and you didn't have to put coins in. You just pressed a button and it "dealt" the cards just like the machines in Vegas.

She played it for hundreds and hundreds of hours. She played it so much that she once got a Royal Flush on it. A Royal Flush is the rarest of all poker hands and the odds of getting one are one in 40,200, so you don't see them often. This thrilled her but presented a problem: She couldn't bring herself to push the button that would wipe the Royal Flush off the screen and deal the next hand, so she couldn't use her beloved Video Poker machine. I finally solved things by taking a Polaroid camera over, snapping some shots of the Royal Flush, then pushing the button for her.

This brings us to another of my infamous Public Appeals…

That machine was worn out and junked long ago. She would like a new one but I can't seem to find the perfect one. You can get computer software that will replicate a Vegas Video Poker machine but she doesn't have a computer. You can buy little handheld, battery-powered Video Poker games but the cards are too small for her to see. I can't find a toy to buy that doesn't require coins and has a large display. Anyone here know where I can get such a thing?

(Sarah…if you read this, please don't tell her about it. I want to surprise her.)

Here's a belated obit (on account of, I just found out) for Robert C. Bruce, who died August 24, 2003 at the age of 89. Mr. Bruce was a voice actor in many cartoons of the thirties, forties and fifties, most notably as the narrator of silly travelogues and newsreels. You know all those great Looney Tunes like Detouring America and Of Thee I Sting with a serious announcer who sounded like a real travelogue host? Well, that serious announcer was usually Robert C. Bruce. He was an announcer and actor on KFWB, a radio station then owned by Warner Brothers (note the "WB") and housed on the studio lot, not far from where they made Warner Brothers cartoons. He appeared on many shows for the station but the most famous was probably The Grouch Club, which also featured Arthur Q. Bryan, the voice of Elmer Fudd.

Bruce was heard on many radio shows and on what some call the earliest cartoon made for television. It was called NBC Comic Book and it consisted of several radio actors voicing what were very close to still drawings. Later, he had a company that produced TV shows that were not unlike real travelogues and newsreels. In the late sixties, he retired to a home in South Carolina.

Information on Mr. Bruce has generally been a bit elusive, in part because he has often been confused with his father, who had the same name. Robert C. Bruce Sr. was a cinematographer and still photographer whose work included some of the earliest silent travelogues, and he passed away in 1948. The Internet Movie Database has a page that confuses the two men to the extent of saying Robert C. Bruce died in '48 but kept on voicing cartoons until 1959.

That's about all I know about the man. But I sure know that voice and if you like great cartoons, so do you.

I spoke to Julius Schwartz this evening. This was not easy to do as his hearing is bad, though it is expected to improve. I did manage to make him understand that I'm mailing him a few hundred "Get Well" wishes from his fans on the Internet. He was concerned because he has no way to respond to them but I assured him you didn't expect replies.

You can still send mail to schwartz@newsfromme.com but please…don't ask questions that he'll feel should be answered. And no attachments.

So far, I've received about 100 e-mail messages infected with the MyDoom virus, (aka W32.Novarg.A@mm) and the address I set up for Julius Schwartz has received about ten. Norton Anti-Virus has been catching them like Willie Mays on a good day, but it's still an annoyance.

Quick prediction: Both Democrats and Republicans are planning major online campaigns in the coming election with weblogs, mass e-mailings, websites, etc. Betcha we'll see some charges that each side has engaged in the planting of viruses and the use of "spyware" (programs that spy on your computer activity). In fact, zealous hackers of both persuasions will probably do exactly that. There will be a George Bush Virus and one for whoever the Democratic nominee is.

That's what they called Jack Paar, who died this morning after a long, lingering illness. I'm just barely too young to recall his version of The Tonight Show and thanks to the lunkhead at NBC who threw out all but a few tapes, I've never had the chance to see more than a few clips. But I do recall the hour-long Friday night program that Paar then did for three years as The Jack Paar Show. It had many wonderful moments and when I heard Paar speak about ten years ago, he remarked that most people confused the two, recalling moments from the latter (probably, better) show as having occurred on The Tonight Show. On both programs, he trotted out fascinating conversationalists, most from a short list of "regulars" that included Oscar Levant, Alexander King, Peter Ustinov, Hans Conreid, Jonathan Winters and Bea Lillie. He also showcased many new comedians and occasionally welcomed a Richard Nixon or Bobby Kennedy to his guest chair.

Before The Tonight Show, Paar was the All-American Fill-In. He hosted quiz shows, panel shows, morning shows, everything. He was the guy they hired when they didn't know whom else to hire. It was an industry joke that every summer, he would turn up as the star of some low-budget summer replacement series, then disappear again at the first sign of Autumn. When NBC tapped him for Tonight, it was almost out of desperation. When Steve Allen gave up The Tonight Show, everyone expected the job to go to Ernie Kovacs, who'd been hosting the show almost as often as Allen. Instead, NBC tried a Godawful mess called Tonight: America After Dark hosted by a tag-team of newspaper columnists. When it flopped, the network tried to get Kovacs back but he was off doing movies, so they went to Paar…but not to host a talk or variety show. The idea then was to fill the 105 minute time slot with three game shows, all hosted by one guy. When it became apparent they couldn't pull the game show idea together in time, they let Paar do a talk show.

That was pretty much how Paar's entire career went: Accidents, mistakes, things being done out of desperation. Somehow, it usually worked.

The Tonight Show under Steve Allen had not been a talk show as we now know them. It had interviews but it also had sketches, stunts, games, lots of music, a stock company of comedy players and even (for a time) a real newscast. Paar usually did a monologue, then either a prepared comedy piece or some sort of demonstration of new products. The rest of the show was conversation with the occasional music number or stand-up act. Both Allen and Paar ignored other antecedents and claimed their version was "the first talk show," leading to a life-long argument that now is sadly moot. Obviously, it all depends on your definition but there's no question that between them, the two shows set the template for all that followed.

Paar was emotional. He engaged in on-air feuds, mostly with newspaper reporters. He cried occasionally on camera. He would sometimes chuck the monologue, sit on the edge of his desk and talk from the heart to America about what was bothering him. And once he even walked off his own show over a silly censorship squabble…an incident which too often is all that people recall of his show.

Paar left television for the most part in '65, then returned in 1975 to do one week a month for ABC late night. The new show didn't work, in part because it was the old show: Paar remained more or less stuck in 1959, trotting out his old regulars (those who'd survived) and telling stories about having Adlai Stevenson on his old show. In later years when he surfaced for the occasional interview, he still hadn't advanced much. He criticized "current talk shows" for eschewing witty guests for dizzy starlets…an odd criticism from one who gave so much air time to a woman named Dody Goodman whose mouth never once connected with her medulla oblongata. He also devoted a lot of TV hours to chatting with Genevieve (a French starlet who didn't speak English well), Reiko (a Japanese lady who didn't speak English well) and the Gabor sisters. I suspect that, like a lot of old TV shows, the Paar Tonight Show is legendary in part because the shows aren't available to be seen and fairly evaluated.

Still, there were more than enough wonderful things to earn Paar his place in television history. It's right there between Steve Allen and Johnny Carson, which puts him in fine company.

Fred Kaplan parses David Kay's report on the elusive Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. Quick summary: Back when Kay was still reporting to the Bush administration, he said there were no weapons but did so in the manner least likely to displease the Oval Office. Now that he doesn't report to them, he's a little more candid.

Here's a short but interesting interview with George Carlin.

Some people think most comedians are liberal because they go after rich people and those in power. I don't think it's usually a matter of politics. It's just the nature of comedy to deflate the privileged and the powerful. It was the Marx Brothers tormenting Margaret Dumont, not the other way around. Lately, Dennis Miller seems to be trying to reverse this principle.

I used to really like Miller, though not all the time. One of the "not" times came after I saw him perform years ago at the MGM Grand in Vegas. Rita Rudner was the opening act and she was funny and fresh and giving it her all. Miller came out next and did horribly dated "topical" material — nothing I hadn't heard him do a dozen times — with an attitude of, "Gimme my check and let me get out of here." Gauging the size of that check based on the price of the tickets, I expected a tad more effort. Later on, I warmed to him on the first season of his HBO show but thereafter lost interest. A lot of his "targets" seemed easy, a lot of his beefs seemed trivial and forced. After 9/11 when he became a cheerleader for George W. Bush, a lot of folks seemed to have changed their opinions of the guy, some for the better, some not. Long before then, I'd stopped setting the TiVo for his appearances.

Recently, he announced that on his new CNBC show, he'll be "giving Bush a pass," meaning little or no criticism. On the one hand, I think it's ignominious for any comedian who deals in current events to declare the President (any President) off-limits. It's like the Bizarro Don Rickles saying, "I don't pick on the big guys…only on the little guys." On the other hand, all comics have their personal no-fly zones and it's almost refreshing to hear one admit it out loud.

What struck me when I saw Miller on with Leno the other night was that given the state of the world right now, a comic who decides to not joke about the President really hasn't got a lot to say. He started his Tonight Show spot by hauling out his joke about Michael Jackson and George Hamilton officially crossing on the pigmentation chart. It's a joke that has now been rerun more often than the I Love Lucy about John Wayne's footprints and one that really shows its age. I suspect that were it not for Miller and that joke, George Hamilton would not have been mentioned on network television in the last decade.

The rest of Miller's spot consisted of generic insults about the Democratic contenders all being morons. I'm guessing that works well in his stand-up appearances because he's attracting the kind of audience that just wants to hear someone bash liberals and Democrats and Clintons. Mainstream appeal requires a little more substance. I am all for ridiculing politicians, even those I may vote for, but the jokes ought to make some sort of point other than, "He's a jerk." These were for the most part, the kind of jokes you do at a roast when you really don't know anything about the Guest of Honor. You just take a line about someone being a putz and stick the guy's name into it: "I wouldn't say [name of target] is dumb but they asked him about Red China and he said, 'It goes nice on a white tablecloth.'" That wasn't one of Miller's lines but it almost could have been. By contrast, both Conan O'Brien and Jon Stewart have recently had some strong, non-generic material about Kerry, Clark, Kucinich, etc.

Miller's new CNBC show will probably fail, not because it won't be good but because it has a fatal flaw: It's on CNBC. If it has any chance at all, it will come because Miller manages better comedy than he's been offering lately. That's possible, of course, even given the handicap of declaring the President off-limits for satire. But it's going to require having something funnier to say about the other guys than that they're scumbags because they're not George W. Bush.

I've finally found a candidate for President I can support. Read his platform and check out that all-important endorsement.

Here are two interesting articles, both Bush-related, in the current New Yorker. In this one, Hendrik Hertzberg discusses the State of the Union address and notes some of the same missing words that I noted here. And in this one, Joshua Micah Marshall discusses the concept of the American Empire. None of this, of course, is as important as the announcement I just posted…

So far, our special mailbox for Julius Schwartz has received 188 "Get Well" wishes, six requests to help someone in Nigeria get money out of the country, seven messages telling him he's won a lottery in Holland and thirteen offers to sell him Viagra and/or enlarge his penis. I'm trying to decide which ones to include in the package.