Monthly Archives: November 2004

I never thought I'd be linking to an article by John Podhoretz but a lot of things are topsy-turvy these days. Like a surprising, encouraging number of Conservative voices the last day or so, Mr. Podhoretz is condemning the recent Republican rule change that will allow Tom DeLay to remain as their leader even if, as expected, he is indicted. I do not completely concur with this piece. Podhoretz's main concern seems to be not that the change is wrong but that it's bad politics, and his view that DeLay is the victim of a zealous partisan prosecutor sounds more like spin than fact. Nevertheless, I thought the piece was worth a link.

As most of you know, I am often found at comic conventions moderating panels and interviewing the great and near-great. At the Comic-Con International in San Diego, back in 2000, writer-historian Ron Goulart and I did a tag-team interview of Harry Lampert and Marty Nodell. Harry, who passed away last week, was the artist on the first Flash story and Marty, who is happily still with us, filled much the same post on the first Green Lantern story. The panel ran around 75 minutes and was videotaped for posterity by a devoted preserver of comic history, Mike Catron. In Harry's memory, Mike has edited a 30 minute version of this panel that emphasizes the Lampert conversation, and has made it available online in QuickTime movie format. Here is where you can view it.

If you're a fan of the TV show Taxi and/or Andy Kaufman, you might want to catch/record the Saturday Night Live rerun airing late Saturday night/early Sunday morning on NBC. They're scheduled to air the full, 90-minute version of the show that originally ran on May 15, 1982, hosted by Danny DeVito. At the time, Taxi had been cancelled by ABC and not yet picked up, as it soon was, by NBC. So the monologue is DeVito complaining about the abrupt termination, and bringing on some of the cast members for a "final bow," then there's a filmed segment in which he extracts revenge by blowing up the ABC building. One wonders if NBC had decided at that point to take on Taxi and this was a way of hyping the show's merits…or if they hadn't yet decided and this episode inspired that decision. Perhaps neither occurred.

Also on this episode, faux wrestler Andy Kaufman showed footage of his famous match against real wrestler Jerry Lawler, and apologized to real wrestlers everywhere for mocking their profession. I think this may have been Kaufman's last live appearance on SNL. The following season, he was "voted off" the series forever. NBC is skipping around those years in picking their reruns so perhaps they'll run the two episodes where that happened. Next week, they're supposed to run the 5/14/83 show hosted by Ed Koch.

Two additional points on Mr. Berman: Turns out, his out-of-print CD — the one recorded in 1995 — is back in print, after all. At least, they seem to have it over at www.laugh.com, which features a terrific selection of great comedy albums, including many that were originally on vinyl. They also have CD versions of Shelley's first three albums, including Inside Shelley Berman, for a few bucks less than Amazon charges. I don't get a commission if you order from there but they're so good, I'll suggest you buy 'em there, just to encourage you to buy 'em.

(Actually, they're not all good. Inside Shelley Berman is great. Outside Shelley Berman is very, very good. The Edge of Shelley Berman is much weaker, and I believe Shelley has said that it was done as a contractual commitment and that he never cared for it. Live Again!, which is the one I heard recorded, is terrific. Maybe someday soon, they'll put out his other ones, including A Personal Appearance and The Sex Life of the Primate, both of which were wonderful.)

Also: Someone wrote to ask if there was any reason I didn't mention that I directed Shelley Berman when he did a voice on Garfield and Friends. No reason, other than that it was such a minor moment in his career that I didn't think it warranted mention. He was very funny and very professional, and he seemed a little embarrassed when I tried to tell him how much his work had always meant to me. One of the great parts of doing that show was that I got to hire a number of folks who were in that category, like Stan Freberg, Jonathan Winters, Imogene Coca and Paul Winchell. I'm sure Shelley Berman doesn't even remember that hour or so we spent in a recording studio but I sure won't ever forget it.

Just back from a lovely luncheon in honor of the great comedian, Shelley Berman. Well, I need to clarify that: The lunch part was awful: A choice of turkey left over from the first Thanksgiving or fish caught during the Nixon administration. But the event itself — a function of the Pacific Pioneer Broadcasters — was joyous enough to make up for it. The dais included comedians (Mort Sahl, Richard Lewis and Gary Owens), comedy writers (Arnie Kogen, John Rappaport, Hal Kanter, Rocky and Irma Kalish), a nightclub proprietor (Budd Friedman), a former mayor of Los Angeles (Richard Riordan) and Dr. James Ragan, the head of the entertainment department at U.S.C., where Mr. Berman teaches.

A couple things need to be said about Shelley Berman. One is that he's one of the most important figures in the history of stand-up (or in his case, sit-down) comedy. Along with Sahl, Lenny Bruce and just a few others, he was part of the revolution in the late fifties. Before then, it was all about jokes and one-liners and "My mother-in-law is so fat…" The lines were largely interchangeable between comics and you didn't think or care if the guy even had a fat mother-in-law. Once Shelley, Mort and Lenny took over, the comedy was the distinctive viewpoint of the guy with the microphone and, more significantly, it was in his rhythm: No more set-up / joke / set-up / joke…

Berman pioneered in two main areas, one being what some call "observational" comedy. He pointed out little things that annoyed him, which turned out to largely be little things that annoyed us all…or should have annoyed us if we thought about them for two seconds. Every comedian after him who started a sentence with "Did you ever notice –?" should have had to pay royalties to Shelley. The other area in which he led the way was in doing little scenes, usually phone conversations heard from his side. He was such a good actor that he didn't need a partner to play off. He made you "hear" the person at the other end of the phone call.

Both of these areas were well represented on his 1958 album, Inside Shelley Berman, which was probably the second record ever made by recording a comedian's act live in performance. (One of Mort Sahl's had been done the previous year by the same company, Verve Records.) I think Inside… is one of the five best comedy albums ever made, worth the price alone just for the bit where a guy tries to phone a department store and inform them that a woman is dangling from an upper-story window ledge.

It also includes "The Morning After the Night Before," a scene Berman had developed in improvisational comedy workshops in Chicago. I doubt there's a person who got into stand-up comedy before 1980 who wasn't inspired by this LP. (You can order an import CD from Amazon by clicking here.)

And one other thing I should say about Shelley Berman: He's still funny. Not everyone who was then is now…but Berman is still performing and still very funny. I had the honor of being in the audience when he recorded his most recent album, Live Again!, which is sadly not in print at the moment. The place was full of top comedians and, as the saying goes, it was a great night for envy.

So was the event this afternoon, as Shelley was serenaded with the odd mix of roast insults and genuine tributes that seem to define an "honor" these days. He seemed to be laughing himself silly at some of the jokes at his expense, but it may be that he's a good enough actor to fake enjoyment. However, he also seemed genuinely touched by the presence on the dais of Mort Sahl, some genuine words of love from Richard Lewis, a good assessment of his importance to comedy by both, and affection from many other friends, to say nothing of the audience. I hope he really was moved by it all because everyone there sure meant it.

Yeah, another damned obit. Cy Coleman wrote the scores for a stunning number of good Broadway shows, including Wildcat, Little Me, Sweet Charity, Seesaw, I Love My Wife, Barnum, On the Twentieth Century, City of Angels and The Will Rogers Follies. Those were all hits but I even like some of his relative flops; like, I didn't enjoy The Life as a whole but there were about a half-dozen first-rate songs in there, well worth playing over and over on the CD player in my car. He also composed the scores for some fine movies and the tunes for some wonderful standalone songs, including "Witchcraft" and the familiar Playboy theme. Here's a full obit. I just wanted to mention how much I admired so much of his work.

If you'd like to see a very elaborate website full of some fun stuff, the new Disney-controlled Muppet website is quite amazing…but don't go there unless you have a good, fast Internet connection. And try to track down and play the game where Bunsen and Beaker challenge you to discover their new coffee recipe.

Hey, remember I mentioned that the magnificent voice of Norman Rose could be heard on a National Lampoon record called "Deteriorata"? Well, reader Dan Hayes informs me that it is possible to hear it online, right this very minute. For those of you too young or drugged-out to recall, this is a parody of "Desiderata," a record that enjoyed a brief, inexplicable success around 1971. It consisted of the ancient poem being read by one-time late night talk show host Les Crane, backed by haunting music. The NatLamp parody was written by Tony Hendra, who's probably best known as the manager in This is Spinal Tap and the music was by Christopher Guest, who's probably best known as one of the stars of This is Spinal Tap. I think but do not guarantee that the female back-up vocals were done primarily by Melissa Manchester.

Anyway, none of those folks is as important at the moment as the main voice, which was Norman Rose in all his glory. Wouldn't you like to sound like that? Could anyone possibly say no to you about anything if you sounded like that? Run a guy for president who has that voice and all the Diebold machines in the world couldn't deny him the White House. Here's the link to a Flash animation version of "Deteriorata."

By the way: Frank Buxton, who knows everything about show business, informs me that Mr. Rose's presence in the movie of The Front was especially significant. Rose, he says, was among the many actors blacklisted in the fifties, as depicted in said film. I knew a lot of the performers in The Front, like Zero Mostel and Herschel Bernardi, had been blacklisted. Didn't know that about Norman Rose.

Sorry to have to report the passing of another great voice…and I wish I could find an audio of Norman Rose to link to, because a lot of you would go, "Oh, that guy!" Mr. Rose had one of the richest, most magnificent sounds of any actor who plied that trade. The obits — like this one [Los Angeles Times, registration required] are noting that he did the voiceovers in the Juan Valdez coffee commercials, and supplied the voice of God in Woody Allen's film, Love and Death. Actually, I think he spoke for God more often than Pat Robertson and I remember him from a couple of memorable jobs, on-camera and off.

One was the National Lampoon record, "Deteriorata," which parodied the treacly "Desiderata" poem/song. Another was his role as Woody Allen's lawyer in the closing scenes of The Front. I seem to also recall him doing a number of great voiceovers for commercial parodies on Saturday Night Live. I never met him but I always thought he did splendid work, and it's nice to think that right about now, God is telling him, "Thanks for making me sound good."

While we're at it: Though we told you here several days ago that the very funny Mr. Dayton Allen had passed away, it took 'til last night for this sad news to make it to the wire services and newspapers. Here's a report in The Los Angeles Times and here's one from The New York Times. One other great moment of Dayton's career I recall was the time Groucho Marx was the celebrity guest on the game show, I've Got A Secret. The panel was blindfolded and Groucho's "secret" was that he wasn't answering their questions. Dayton Allen, who did a great Groucho impersonation and who was also a first-rate ad-libber, was speaking for him.

It was a very funny spot. Maybe someone at Game Show Network will think to haul that one out and air it soon as a tribute to Mr. Allen. And I imagine Dr. Demento will be playing "Deteriorata" this weekend on his show that I can't seem to find on my radio dial.

Also here in the Washington Post, it says the founder of the Conservative watchdog group, Accuracy in Media, has died. Sounds like another typical left-wing lie to me.

According to this article [Washington Post, registration may be required], the Bush administration has a whole pile of plans to revamp the tax codes of this nation. One involves eliminating the deduction of state and local taxes on federal income tax returns.

Okay, would any of the Conservative readers of this site like to argue that this is not a tax hike? It certainly would be if a Democrat proposed it. In fact, it would be an example of how the individual making the proposal just loved raising taxes.

Another proposal would eliminate the business tax deduction for employer-provided health insurance. In other words, it will cost your employer more to insure you. That's not only a tax hike on business but a powerful incentive to cut back on providing health insurance. At the same time, other proposals would shield more and more investment income and dividends (i.e., money earned mostly by wealthier folks) from being taxed at all.

You wonder how much of Bush's "base" in middle-class America understood that this is what they were voting for.

Anyone with the slightest interest in EC Comics will want a copy of a new documentary produced and directed by Chip Selby. It's called, like that comic company's most famous horror title, Tales From the Crypt, and it features rare old documentary footage plus new interviews with the folks who created EC Comics, important filmmakers and authors who were inspired by them, and me. Yeah, I'm in there…but if you can stomach the story about the baseball game with human innards for equipment, you can watch a couple of talking head interviews with me. Chip's fine effort is airing on a couple of cable channels but the best way to experience it is to go to his website and order the DVD, which includes loads of extra footage. It's about time someone did something like this, and Chip sure did it right.

The Save Disney website is full of news about that company, most of it spun to the POV of the ousted Roy Disney. His side makes a good point with this photo essay that compares the Tomorrowland section of Disneyland as it now stands to how it looked in Walt's day.

Here's another important article by Frank Rich. [This is a New York Times link but if I've configured it right, you should be able to bypass registration.]

The topic is news reporting on Iraq and the fact that the "new paradigm" in Washington doesn't even want America to see Saving Private Ryan, let alone what's happening in our current war. Now that Bush is purging the White House of anyone who might ever tell the press the administration was wrong about anything, it's going to be an interesting time.

And here's a great example of why you should always read an eBay listing very carefully before you bid.