Monthly Archives: July 2004

Okay, it's time we stuck you with this one to think about. Let's say you go on the game show Let's Make a Deal, and you have your choice of three doors. Behind one is the grand prize of a car. Behind the other two are goats. You pick a door. Let's say you pick Door #1. Your host, Monty Hall, knows which door conceals the car and he then opens one of the other doors — let's say it's Door #3 — and he says, "As you can see, the car is not behind Door #3. Would you like to stay with your choice or would you like to switch to Door #2?" Is it to your advantage to switch? Or do you have just as good a chance of winning if you stay with your original choice?

The answer seems obvious…but given how much argument this question has prompted, maybe it's not. Here's a link to one of many websites that tackles the problem…and even allows you to play Let's Make a Deal first. You'll enjoy it more if you put on a ridiculous costume first. (Never mind. What you're already wearing will do just fine.)

We continue to recommend The Daily Show With Jon Stewart as the cleverest show on television. Lately, we've especially enjoyed this report by correspondent Samantha Bee on a man who's making a documentary against Michael Moore. We also recommend this commentary by Lewis Black on folks who are merchandising the death of Ronald Reagan. (Stay tuned for the punchline at the end.)

If those links don't work, go to this page of the Comedy Central website and look for the clips entitled "Dislike Mike" and "Reaganomics." Better still, just watch The Daily Show.

Over on his weblog, Jim Henley asks some pointed questions about how Ditko's well-known Objectivist philosophy meshed with the famous theme of "With great power, there must come great responsibility." Well, one answer is that it didn't. Ditko quit the company, remember — and while a lot of that was because he felt the publisher was reneging on promises of financial participation, some of it was certainly because he felt that he was basically writing the stories and drawing them, and that Stan Lee was then warping what he wrote with the dialogue, occasionally requiring that panels be redrawn to take the story in a slightly different direction. There are a couple of other things that could be said to clarify what seems like a conundrum to Jim, and I say all this having interviewed just about everyone at Marvel in those days who could be interviewed, and even spending an afternoon or two with Ditko.

Both might deny it today but I sure got the impression that at the time, Ditko wasn't quite as militant in his beliefs as he later became and that Lee wasn't all that Liberal. Lee was a lot less Liberal than Jack Kirby, which prompted many an argument, especially when Jack thought he was writing the story and Lee, in the dialogue stage, altered an important (to Jack) underlying philosophy. Someone once made the interesting remark that when Stan worked with Kirby and Ditko, he was caught in the middle: Too Conservative for Kirby and too Liberal for Ditko.

Also, it's been many years since I read any Ayn Rand, but I doubt she would have argued with the basic wording that "With great power, there must come great responsibility." She certainly recognized that, if only as a basic function of nature, some people do have a lot more power than some other people and must decide how to deploy it. She probably would have disagreed with the customary way in which those reponsibilities are generally interpreted in comics, placing an obligation to one's self much higher than any duty to society. But she would not have denied that there was great responsibility to be considered, and I'm not sure that if you take the Ditko Spider-Man stories as a finite set (i.e., don't view them through the prism of later issues), there's that much conflict. Ditko did later concoct several heroes who, though more openly spouting Rand-style views, still put on masks and went out to fight crime. Even Objectivists think it's a good idea not to have violent criminals roaming the street and I don't know that you can always separate that mission from one of pure altruism.

For that matter, the notion of Spider-Man as a wimpy anti-hero is more an invention of Marvel's press coverage than of anything in the published comics, much like the oft-cited but non-existent scene where the hero can't go to his prom and/or go out and duke it out with the villain due to acne problems. That was mentioned so often in articles about Marvel that Stan once called to ask me which issue he'd done that in, and was surprised when I told him, "Never." I don't believe the Lee-Ditko Spider-Man had "feet of clay." He had doubts and worries (mainly in the dialogue, not in the elements Ditko contributed) but apart from a couple of selfish moments in his origin story, he never backed down on confronting Dr. Octopus or the Green Goblin…or questioned that the bad guys were the bad guys. Ditko may even have rationalized the occasional thought balloons of self-doubt as reflecting the kind of confusions that any growing boy experiences before coming to the "right" way to look at the world. And then at some point, along with the money situation, it became intolerable for him.

I can't speak for Ditko. Haven't talked to him in more than twenty years, in fact. But I think the answer can be found in just reading those issues of Spider-Man and looking at the hero's actions…and remembering that the word balloons are Stan talking, not Steve.

For what it's worth, it looks like those of us attending the Comic-Con in San Diego in two weeks will do so under mostly clear skies. Expect highs in the mid-seventies, lows in the low-sixties.

And while we're at it: No, I don't know where you can find a hotel room at this late date.

Steve Ditko, the co-creator of Spider-Man, doesn't do interviews but that didn't stop the author of this article from quoting some personal correspondence with him. I hope he got Ditko's permission to do this.

It's less than two weeks until a lot of us will be truckin' on down to San Diego and the Comic-Con International. Here's what I'll be doing there and where I'll be doing it…

THURSDAY, JULY 22

1:00 PM – 2:30 PM / Room 8 • SPOTLIGHT ON MIKE ROYER
He started assisting the great Russ Manning and moved on to become Jack Kirby's favorite inker on many important works, including The New Gods. Along the way, his work also appeared in Creepy, Vampirella, Tarzan and dozens of other comics. We interview a true professional, MIKE ROYER.

2:30 PM – 4:00 PM / Room 8 • THE ANNUAL GOLDEN/SILVER AGE PANEL
Every year, we gather together several of the industry's greats. This time out, come meet TOM GILL (The Lone Ranger), FRANK SPRINGER (Nick Fury), GENE COLAN (Daredevil), FRANK BOLLE (Doctor Solar), SID JACOBSON (Harvey Comics), JACK ADLER (DC Production Crew) and HARRY HARRISON (EC Comics), who between them have logged over 300 years in comics!

4:00 PM – 5:30 PM / Room 8 • THE SERGIO AND MARK SHOW
What would a Comic-Con International be without SERGIO ARAGONES, MARK EVANIER, STAN SAKAI and TOM LUTH giving you the lowdown on the world's stupidest barbarian, Groo the Wanderer, and other weird projects they have in the works? (It would be the same but with one less panel.)

FRIDAY, JULY 23

11:00 AM – 12:30 PM / Room 8 • SPOTLIGHT ON JACK ADLER
You may not know his name but if you read DC Comics in the fifties and sixties, you know his work. JACK ADLER was the main colorist and the inventor of many of comics' most innovative techniques. We'll talk with him and view photos he took over the years in the DC offices.

1:00 PM – 2:30 PM / Room 5AB • SPOTLIGHT ON CHUCK McCANN
If you grew up in New York, you probably remember his brilliant, ground-breaking kid show. Otherwise, you know him as one of the funniest comic actors in the business. CHUCK McCANN will share funny clips and even funnier stories with the audience. A not-to-be-missed event!

2:30 PM – 4:00 PM / Room 8 • THE ANNUAL JACK KIRBY TRIBUTE PANEL
It's been ten years since we lost the man they still call "The King of the Comics" and hail as its most influential artist. Let's celebrate his life with DAVE STEVENS, DAVE GIBBONS, MIKE ROYER, PAUL RYAN, WALT SIMONSON, STEVE RUDE and members of the Kirby family.

4:00 PM – 5:00 PM / Room 8 • REMEMBERING BOB CLAMPETT
He was one of the great directors of Warner Brothers cartoons and he went on to innovate kids' TV with Beany and Cecil. Come hear animation historian JERRY BECK, historian-animator MILT GRAY, animator LEO SULLIVAN and daughter RUTH CLAMPETT as they gather to view rare film footage and to recall the creative force known as Bob Clampett.

SATURDAY, JULY 24

12 NOON – 1:30 PM / Room 6AB • QUICK DRAW!
We take three swift cartoonists and throw challenges at them. They draw as fast as they can and the results are always hilarious. This year, the combatants are MAD Magazine's SERGIO ARAGONES, Simpsons comic artist SCOTT SHAW! and the creator of Bone, JEFF SMITH.

1:30 PM – 3:00 PM / Room 6AB • THE ANNUAL CARTOON VOICE PANEL
Witness a demonstration of the art form with JOE ALASKEY (Duck Dodgers), DEE BRADLEY BAKER (The Fairly Odd Parents), GREGG BERGER (Men in Black), TOM KENNY (SpongeBob SquarePants), NEIL ROSS (Transformers), BILLY WEST (Futurama) and many more!

3:00 PM – 4:00 PM / Room 6AB • RAY BRADBURY
Catch up with the world's most acclaimed author of science-fiction and fantasy (The Martian Chronicles, Fahrenheit 451, Something Wicked This Way Comes, et al) as he honors us with an hour of his time and discusses his past, your present and everyone's future.

4:00 PM – 5:30 PM / Room 6AB • SPOTLIGHT ON JUNE FORAY
She's not only Rocky (pal of Bullwinkle) and Granny (owner of Tweety), she's the undisputed queen of cartoon voicing. We'll interview JUNE FORAY and then have a reading of vintage cartoon scripts with her, CHUCK McCANN, JOE ALASKEY and others as we re-create a Rocky & Bullwinkle episode!

SUNDAY, JULY 25

11:30 AM – 1:00 PM / Room 8 • TRIBUTE TO JULIUS SCHWARTZ
We remember one of the industry's great editors and the man who launched the Silver Age of Comics and helped start fandom. Come hear FORREST J ACKERMAN, LEN WEIN, ELLIOTT S! MAGGIN, PAUL LEVITZ, MARV WOLFMAN, MIKE CARLIN and others.

1:00 PM – 2:30 PM / Room 8 • SPOTLIGHT ON TOM GILL & FRANK SPRINGER
Two great comic artists, together. TOM GILL is one of the great western comic illustrators (for years, the artist for The Lone Ranger) and an acclaimed teacher of comic art. FRANK SPRINGER has drawn everything from Batman to Spider-Man and everything in-between. Come hear them interviewed about two incredible careers.

Please remember that everything in the above is subject to change. Keep your eye on this weblog and when you get to the con, consult your program guide and various announcements posted around the exhibit hall.

One of my favorite commercial illustrators was the late Bob Peak. You may not know the name but you know the style. The repros on this website do not do his work full justice but are still enjoyable.

A lot of people have savaged Michael Moore's movie, Fahrenheit 9/11, and I agree that Moore left himself open to a lot of criticism. But in the negative reviews I've read — and I've read a lot of them — I don't think I've seen any criticism or fault found with two of the film's most memorable elements. One is the footage of Bush in the classroom on 9/11, doing nothing constructive after hearing our nation was under attack. Defenses of his inaction seem pretty feeble…he didn't want to panic the children, he was confident Dick Cheney was in command, etc. Most of the time, Bush partisans just seem to change the subject.

The other thing that doesn't get addressed is what some think is the most important material in Moore's film, which is the story of Lila Lipscomb, a Michigan housewife who believed in one set of values when her son went off to fight in the Iraq war and another after he was killed over there. This article affords some insight into her sad story.

The Cinegrill, which is a nice and intimate night spot situated in the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, has recently had its latest in a long series of grand reopenings. Most recently, it flirted with higher prices and a partnership that didn't work out with Michael Feinstein. Now, it's just the Cinegrill again, featuring a cavalcade of folks who perform show tunes and other songs with actual lyrics, and we're happy to hear this. If you live within commuting distance of Hollywood Boulevard, you might want to keep an eye on their schedule to see who'll be warbling there and when.

Take special note of who'll be vocalizing there, the evening of Tuesday, July 20. That's right — it's Chanteuse Extraordinaire Shelly Goldstein, offering her new show, which she calls "Slings & Eros." This probably means she'll be singing songs, both funny and poignant, about a raft of subjects, most of them having to do with something or other. Everyone who goes to hear her has a very good time and there's no reason to think you'd be an exception.

That's Tuesday, July 20. 8:30 PM at the Cinegrill in the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. No food served…just drinks and good singing. Call (323) 769-7269 for reservations.

I watched Dennis Miller's CNBC show last evening — first time in quite a while…and last. Miller led off with a newscast/monologue that slammed Kerry and Edwards and provoked so little laughter that Dennis tried to joke that the audience was all Democrats. Since the audience never cheered the anti-Bush statements of a few later guests, that seems unlikely.

Jay Leno was a guest but never got near any kind of political discussion. Miller fawned over him a lot, then Jay read and tested the jokes he was considering for that evening's Tonight Show monologue. That's right. Jay was unconcerned about spoiling his precious stand-up spot by exposing his jokes a few hours earlier on Miller's show. That should tell you how low the ratings are at CNBC.

I really don't understand the logic of that channel's programming or that of MSNBC. Yeah, Fox News is doing great as basic cable goes, catering to those who want to enjoy their news with a right-wing spin. But how long do you have to fail, trying to beat Fox at their own game, before you try something else? It doesn't have to be left-wing TV but there must be something else to put on. And it's not like that something else is going to do any worse.

Remember I mentioned being at the Hollywood Bowl for the Fourth of July celebration? And not being certain that it was really Carrol Spinney playing Big Bird? Well, someone who was there and got to go backstage assures me that it was indeed Mr. Spinney wearing the feathers. So I can sleep better tonight.

This is an old story but it didn't get much attention at the time and I forgot to link to it. Did you know that a man escaped the death penalty because of the Larry David TV show, Curb Your Enthusiasm? Here's what happened.

Watching TV Land episodes of The Flip Wilson Show, I am reminded of how much I once liked one of his guests, deadpan comedian Jackie Vernon. (Did I say "deadpan"? Compared to Vernon, Buster Keaton was Roberto Benigni. Jackie got one of his biggest laughs just by coming out on stage and saying, "To look at me now, you'd never believe that I used to be a dull guy." He'd often follow that by saying, "At parties, I'd stay in the room with the coats…memorize labels…") Vernon, whose real name was Ralph Verrone, was a former musician who began doing stand-up in the mid-fifties. He quickly built up a good following in night clubs and at Friars' Roasts and then made the leap to television.

Legend has it that so many "big time" comics were cribbing lines from him that the producers of The Ed Sullivan Show and all the top talk shows figured, "We're already booking Vernon's material…we might as well book Vernon." He claimed authorship of one of the most-stolen jokes of all time: "I used to be an atheist but I gave it up. No holidays."

Vernon's act was, usually, a masterpiece of taking your time and remaining in character. On the Flip Wilson episode I just watched, he was obviously rushed and was therefore about half as funny as usual…but that was still pretty funny. He did his "vacation slides" bit, which consisted of him standing on stage with a clicker, describing slides that you couldn't see…

Here I am touring the Everglades. That's my guide. Guido the Guide. Here's Guido leading me around a bed of quicksand…" [CLICK!]

Here's Guido from the waist up… [CLICK!]

There's his hat. [CLICK!]

Now, here's the rescue party rushing to Guido's aid… [CLICK!]

And here's the rescue party from the waist up… [CLICK!]

And here's a bunch of hats and ropes…

If I heard it once, I heard it fifty times and it always made me laugh. Everything about that guy made me laugh. Unfortunately, he never seemed able to parlay the act into anything bigger than playing night clubs and making the occasional comedy album. He may be best remembered for providing the voice of Frosty the Snowman in the 1969 cartoon special. Here's a warm, funny article by his son, David, who recalls watching the show and bursting into tears at the end when Frosty melted. He thought his father had been killed but his mother reassured him, "He's not dead…he's in Chicago working the Playboy Club." Jackie would probably have said that was better but not by much.

I used to see Vernon lunching over at Farmers Market and even got the nerve once to approach him and chat for about five minutes. All I remember is that I told him I could quote all his routines by heart and he chuckled and said, "You and Milton Berle." That very evening, I saw Berle on Merv Griffin's show and he did the "atheist/no holidays" joke.

I saw him perform once in Vegas. It was at the old Marina Hotel, which they tore down to build the new MGM Grand. He was in a burlesque revue called "Babes Ahoy," which disappointed me a bit since what I really wanted was to just see him do stand-up, even if it meant hearing the routines I knew so well from his albums and TV appearances. Fortunately, he did about twenty hilarious minutes on his own…and to my surprise, he didn't do one joke I'd ever heard before. This would have been around 1985. He passed away in '87.

Since he never did sitcoms and since variety shows are so rarely rerun, his best work has been long forgotten. He really does seem to be recalled mostly from that cartoon special and its sequel. Maybe some CD company will see the wisdom of reissuing his albums, especially A Wet Bird Never Flies at Night and A Man and His Watermelon. They were as funny as anything ever put on vinyl, and proved conclusively that he was not a dull guy.

Here's an article by Joshua Green that will tell you all sorts of things about John Edwards.

Here's one account of how the New York Post went so awry with its cover story on Kerry's choice of running mate.