Monthly Archives: April 2004

The other day here, I wondered about the decree of a top Vatican official that "pro-choice" politicians have disqualified themselves from receiving communion. Obviously, the Catholic church can make whatever rules it wants, and no one is forced to remain in the church. But it struck me as odd that we never hear about someone being denied communion because they support the Death Penalty, which the Vatican also opposes. (For that matter, did the church ever raise the issue regarding "pro-choice" Republicans like Rudy Giuliani or Tom Ridge?) Anyway, this morning in The Washington Post, there's an article that discusses that issue.

There's an e-mail message making the rounds that points out that John Kerry's service record starts with the words, "I request duty in Vietnam," whereas George W. Bush's includes the line, "Do not volunteer for overseas duty."

Now, I happen to think that very little that either man did in the seventies is relevant to what kind of president he'd be in the next four years. In fact, I doubt there's a person in their (or my) age bracket who doesn't have a few 30-year-old deeds or statements that they should be ashamed of, and I'm suspicious of being urged to vote for or against someone because of what they did in 1971.

However, I do think that if those service records were reversed — if Bush had Kerry's and Kerry had Bush's — Bush supporters would be telling us the following: That Bush is a real man, Kerry is a wimp, and they don't need to know anything more about either candidate to know who to vote for.

Here's a short but nice article on Sidney Reznick, one of the best comedy writers of his era. And last time I saw him, he still seemed pretty darned funny.

A week or three ago here, I asked if anyone could recommend an MP3 player with a harddisk that had a good pause/resume feature. (Among other needs, I wanted to be able to listen to recordings of Al Franken's new show, starting and stopping without losing my place.) I instantly received e-mails singing the praises of almost every model by every manufacturer out there, and I'm sure most of them would have been fine. But after studying several messages, especially those from a gent named Phil Merkel, I opted for the Archos 20 GB USB 2.0 MP3 Jukebox Recorder. The Archos is a little heavy, so it isn't ideal for carrying around when you jog or walk but it holds a ton of music and seems otherwise ideal…that is, if you make one little change.

When I first began researching this, I came across some poor reviews for this device, based largely on its internal software. Phil informed me that there's a terrific, free alternative. Some folks wrote an open source program called Rockbox which you can download here and load into your Archos Jukebox. It's simple to install and it corrects all the flaws the Archos people built into their product, making it into a wonderful little machine.

One other selling point for the Archos Jukebox is that it's cheap. If you click on this link, you can buy one from the Amazon folks for $179.88, which is a pretty good price, somewhat below what other online dealers charge. It can be even better because Amazon is currently offering a $50 rebate, bringing the actual price down to $129.88. There are online dealers asking a hundred bucks more than that, which reminds us that it pays to shop around. Anyway, so far, I'm pretty happy with my purchase.

I just got one from Abase J. Ironical and another from Gambled M. Earplugs. My pal Nat Gertler says he just got one from Cretin K. Crossfire.

I'm getting e-mail asking me what's up with the announced (but not too clearly) release of Garfield and Friends on DVD. As you may recall, I recently posted a press release that said the first volume, collecting the first season of 13 episodes, would be out in July from Fox Home Video for $39.98. I also said — and I quote me — "I think the above may have the contents listing wrong." I said this because I'd been informed that they'd be releasing the first 24 half-hours, and it seemed to me that $39.98 was a more appropriate price for that.

Well, this announcement says that it's coming out July 27 for $39.98 and they list episode titles for 24 half-hours. Sharp-eyed folks will notice that the episode titles do not exactly match a list I've circulated of what was in the first 24 half-hours. That's because my list was based on the original CBS runs, and a few things were switched around when the shows were released in syndication. The only special feature on this set is a trailer for the forthcoming Garfield live-action/CGI movie.

I notice that DVD Empire is taking advance orders for it but they think the list price is $29.95 and they've discounted it to $20.07. I have no idea what will happen if you order from them but if someone does, let me know.

Jerry Beck asked me to let him know which episodes have the interesting guest voice actors in them. This first release includes Chuck McCann, Stan Freberg, Pat Buttram, Dick Beals, Lennie Weinrib, Larry Storch, Jeff Altman, and Robin Leach. (The odd story of how Robin Leach wound up on the show is told here.) And of course, we have our regular cast of Thom Huge, Gregg Berger, Julie Payne, Howie Morris, Frank Welker and the late, lovely Lorenzo Music.

I'm also being asked when the next release will be, whether there will be special features on future volumes, and which theme song(s) will be on this one. I have no answers to any of those questions. All I know is that the concept here is that the entire run of 121 half-hours will be collected on five DVD sets, of which this is the first. How soon we'll see the next one may depend on how quickly this one gets snatched up.

Ray Harryhausen is the acknowledged master of stop-motion animation. His work on movies like The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts inspired almost everyone else who ever tried to animate three-dimensional figures, whether it was on major 35mm features done in Hollywood or little 8mm attempts done in some teenager's garage. Mr. Harryhausen himself started in his garage in Hollywood, working in 16mm, learning his craft by experimentation, which is really the only way you can learn that kind of thing. Last night at the Motion Picture Academy, a good sampling of the animation business gathered to hear him interviewed by Leonard Maltin, and to see some of that earliest trial-and-error work.

It was amazing how few errors were visible in it, even with the films enlarged to 35mm for the Academy's screen. (Well, visible to us. Ray kept talking about how many flaws he now saw in films he made over a half-century ago.)

Those who associate him only with animating dinosaurs and skeleton creatures would have been fascinated to see what made up the bulk of the program last night. Beginning in the forties, Harryhausen animated — still in his garage — a series of short fairy tales for what was then called the non-theatrical market, meaning schools and rental agencies. The Academy arranged for major restoration work to be done on the films, and the prints were stunning. This material has been available in home video in the past, but a forthcoming DVD of the restored versions will soon be out, perhaps as early as late this year. It is quite fascinating, especially when viewed in chronological order, allowing you to see Harryhausen become more ambitious and more facile in bringing life to the beautiful little figures he designed and built.

The audience was like a Who's Who of the animation field. (I sat next to June Foray, who had just come from recording voice tracks for a new Rocky and Bullwinkle slot machine.) Mr. Harryhausen seemed genuinely humbled by the turnout and passion for his work, and I think a lot of those in attendance sensed a direct correlation between the film and the filmmaker. Stop-motion animation requires an incredible devotion to detail, and nothing occurs by accident. After hearing Ray Harryhausen talk about his craft, I think everyone understood why it all turned out as well as it did, and why he was always striving to outdo himself. A lovely time.

As this news story explains, a number of newspapers had to agonize over whether or not to publish today's installment of Doonesbury.

Some papers (like this one) elected not to print the entire week of strips "because of the graphic, violent battlefield depictions of Iraq." Makes you wonder what they're publishing on their front pages.

Others (like this one) dropped only today's from the print edition but made it available on their website. This sounds to me more craven than not running the week of strips at all. Why is it appropriate for the website but not the newspaper? It's an old trick when you're afraid of outrage over something to make some meaningless gesture just so you can tell the protesters you did something about it.

The Duluth News Tribune took the occasion to move Doonesbury permanently from the comics page to the editorial page. That strikes me as a more intelligent way to deal with things…if you felt you had to do something.

The Green Bay News-Chronicle chose to "bleep" the expletive in today's strip. In the first article I linked to in this item, an editor is quoted as saying, "…we learned that we are contractually bound to print the strip as is, or not publish it at all." I thought that was s.o.p. for Doonesbury contracts. Does the News-Chronicle actually have a different deal? Or did they just violate it?

This article gives a good overview of the situation (and even quotes Mort "Beetle Bailey" Walker). And finally, if you haven't seen it, here's a link to today's Doonesbury…unexpurgated.

A news item this morning says, "A top Vatican cardinal said Friday that priests must deny communion to pro-abortion Catholic politicians, but he would not comment on whether it was right for John Kerry to receive communion." This raises a few questions in my addled, non-Catholic cranium…

One is this: Kerry would describe himself as "pro-choice," not "pro-abortion." Actually, I can't think of anyone I would describe as "pro-abortion" in the sense that they run around saying, "Abortion is great! Let's have more of them! Let's forcibly abort pregnant women against their wishes!" Maybe there have been a few nutcase population-control people somewhere saying that but in the mainstream, "pro-abortion" is just a more emotional, somewhat incorrect way of describing "pro-choice" people.

Kerry's position, as I understand it, is that he personally does not like the idea of abortion but feels it would be wrong to interfere in a woman's right to choose. Does this mean he fits the definition of "pro-abortion" that in the above news item would mean he should be denied communion? If the answer is no, then to whom does it apply? If the answer is yes, isn't the above just a disingenuous way for that "top Vatican cardinal" to condemn John Kerry while pretending to stay out of politics?

Other question: Last I heard, the Vatican was as opposed to the Death Penalty as it was to abortion. When was the last time a top Vatican cardinal came out to say that priests must deny communion to Catholic politicians who support the Death Penalty?

I have been fortunate to have met and in many cases, worked with most of my boyhood heroes. And when I was a tot, no one was more of a hero than the world's greatest ventriloquist, Paul Winchell. (Winch would argue that the world's greatest ventriloquist was Edgar Bergen and while I always found Bergen funny, I thought Paul was just as funny…and his lips didn't move.) I loved watching Paul perform with his wooden pals, Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff, and I even liked Paul when he appeared, sans dummy, as a TV panelist or actor. Years later, when he invented the first mechanical heart, a lot of people were amazed that a ventriloquist could do something like that. I wasn't amazed in the least. I already knew he was magical.

This magical man has now written his autobiography, Winch. It is a book that will surprise many for while he goes through the expected tales of how he took up ventriloquism, how he broke into the business, how his career took off, et cetera, much of the book is about his turbulent life and mental state, starting with an abusive mother-son relationship and a near-fatal bout with childhood polio, continuing on to even darker days, which he discusses with an almost unsettling candor. I don't want to give any of it away here but you should know, going in, that this is not one of those show biz autobiographies that goes from big success to small success and then back to big success.

Instead, Paul takes us through his crises of faith, family and even his own sanity, ultimately coming to grips with each of these. You will find it astounding that he survives and even more astounding that he shares it all with us, so openly.

Winch is available at Amazon but it's cheaper from the publisher. You can also order an autographed hardcover over at Paul's website. If you're at all interested in this versatile, honest man, you'll want one. I'm going to wait a few weeks and read mine again. It's that kind of book.

Animation World Network offers us a nice little article by Gene Deitch on how he put together the Popeye and Krazy Kat cartoons done for television in the sixties. (One quibble: It's implied that the Popeye illustrations adorning the article are by Elzie Segar, who created the spinach-eater. They're actually by Bud Sagendorf, who assisted Segar on the newspaper strip and later took it over.)

Gene Lyons goes after the myths about "red" and "blue" states. I always thought there was a high degree of nonsense in the notion that if a candidate gets 51% of the vote in that state on one day, then for years after, everyone in that state can be viewed as thinking like him.

If you aren't reading Doonesbury this week, you're missing a powerful storyline. Here's a link to Monday's strip and then you can click to Tuesday and then on to today.

I've been listening occasionally to Al Franken's radio show and enjoying it more and more. The guy actually engages in discussions, and not with people who agree maniacally with his position. I like that.

If anyone reading this has a pipeline to Mr. Franken or his producer, I have a suggestion to make which would vastly improve his show. Franken is not an experienced radio personality and he has a tendency to drift off-mike, as if he's turning his head away from the microphone. Occasionally, it's difficult to understand part of a sentence and it causes the listener to lose focus. Say what you will about Mr. Limbaugh but he really knows how to work a microphone and grab your attention. If Franken isn't using a headset microphone, he should. And if he is using one, someone should move the mouthpiece in front of his mouth.

Air America Radio is not on the air in Los Angeles in the moment but that's okay (for me) because, being a TiVo Person, I rarely sample live programming. But it's possible to download MP3 files of all the Air America shows from a number of Internet sources, so I do and I listen to Al as I work or drive. (So far, the other shows haven't impressed me much.)

Oh, by the way: I just found something very tasteless on the weblog for The O'Franken Factor. It says there that Max Cleland "…is now stumping for his friend and fellow veteran, John Kerry." Couldn't someone find a better verb than that?

It has been pointed out to me that I had a somewhat-misleading headline on my last item about the Simpsons voice cast and their fight for better pay. I put "The Simpsons Strike" up there and that's not really true. The actors are not on strike. Their old contract has expired and they're attempting to negotiate a new one at better terms, which is what every single human being who appears on a successful TV show tries to do.

The difference is significant because, for P.R. purposes, some would like to cast them as the villains in this little drama and make it sound like they had good jobs and walked off them. Another way of looking at it is that the old contract expired and Fox has not yet made them a decent offer to return for more shows. This kind of thing happens all the time in Show Biz, often without making the papers.