Monthly Archives: July 2007

Here, slightly but unavoidably delayed, is the clip from Mr. Terrific, the "other" sitcom about a nerdy superhero. The same night Captain Nice debuted on NBC, Mr. Terrific first flew onto CBS, a half hour earlier. Actually, as you'll see, this is two clips. The first is the Mr. Terrific opening with a nice bit of narration by the ubiquitous (in the sixties) Paul Frees. Then the second part gives us a few minutes from one episode that pretty much captures what was wrong with the series. It wasn't that funny.

I know little of Stephen Strimpell, who had the title role. He apparently was more of a stage than screen actor and he was at one point quite prominent in New York theater as both a performer and teacher. He also was one of those people — there sometimes seem to be a lot of them — who go to law school, pass the bar…and then go do something else. One wonders if at any time when they had him dangling from wires in a baggy superhero suit, he paused to think, "Well, I guess this is one way to uphold the law." Ten bucks says that the casting calls for this show said they were looking for a "Woody Allen type" and Strimpell was as close as they could come.

The rest of the cast included Dick Gautier, a fine gentleman who tells me he reads this weblog. You probably know he played Hymie the Robot on Get Smart and Elvis Conrad Birdie in the original stage version of Bye Bye Birdie and Robin Hood on When Things Were Rotten and hundreds of other roles. Did you know he's also a cartoonist? Check out his website and see some examples. And also in the cast, you have John McGiver, who was on every sixties sitcom at one time or another to play a frustrated authority figure, and who starred in a fun but forgotten sitcom I liked called Many Happy Returns. Playing his aide was Paul Smith, who may have set some sort of record for doing bit parts on TV shows without anyone ever knowing his name.

I recall getting bored with Mr. Terrific after an episode or two but I watched Captain Nice up until its also-quick demise. Someone did an article soon after in TV Guide saying that the two shows had cancelled each other out; that the lesson television should learn is not to do two shows at the same time with the same premise because neither would succeed. Of course, only a few years earlier, we got The Munsters and The Addams Family in the same season and they both did okay. I don't think either of the superhero sitcoms was that wonderful and in neither case did you have particularly endearing characters. William Daniels, who played Cap'n Nice, is still one of the great actors out there but he's cold and — as his John Adams was described in 1776 — "obnoxious and disliked."

Here's Mr. Terrific in its fleeting glory…

People who attended the screening of Skidoo in Hollywood last evening are e-mailing me to say, "It wasn't as bad as you made it out to be" or "It was worse." You folks will have to mud-wrestle to settle this. Me, I think the film transcends ordinary adjectives about quality. Here's another view of it.

Just found this. David Corn rebuts that William Kristol op-ed about how George W. Bush will go down in history as a great and successful president. I think editors who publish pundits like Kristol, or TV producers who invite them on the air, ought to be asked the following question: Would you entrust your body and your family's health to a doctor whose every diagnosis turned out to be as wrong as the predictions of some of the political commentators you think we ought to hear from?

Since I've been swamped with work all day and been too busy to post, I now get to do back-to-back links to Fred Kaplan. In this article, he says we're about to see more attempts to read our mail, listen in on our phone conversations, etc. and — this is the troubling part — doing so without accountability or adherence to the law. Lovely.

In the meantime, I can't help but join the chorus of blogs linking to this article. Here's the first paragraph…

BAGHDAD — In March, he was declared captured. In May, he was declared killed, and his purported corpse was displayed on state-run TV. But Wednesday, Omar al-Baghdadi, the supposed leader of an al-Qaida-affiliated group in Iraq, was declared nonexistent by U.S. military officials, who say he is a fictional character created to give an Iraqi face to a foreign-run terror group.

Tune in tomorrow when Omar al-Baghdadi unmasks and is revealed to be Andy Kaufman.

Fred Kaplan summarizes the new National Intelligence Estimate. If it's right, we're in for more terrorist attacks. Isn't it comforting to know that either that's true or the entire U.S. intelligence community doesn't know what they're talking about?

From that long, long list of TV shows that came and went quickly but which should have stuck around for a while, we bring you Captain Nice, created by Buck Henry, no doubt capitalizing on the "heat" he had in the business due to the success of Get Smart. The title role was played by William Daniels and the series debuted on NBC on January 9, 1967 — the very same night that another super-hero parody sitcom, Mr. Terrific, debuted on CBS. Both were pretty clever shows, though I liked Captain Nice better. (If all goes well, we'll be featuring Mr. Terrific tomorrow in this space.)

Captain Nice went off in May of 1967 and the fifteen episodes were barely rerun thereafter. I have a 93rd generation VHS tape of a few episodes and they hold up pretty well. The series also starred Ann Prentiss (Paula's sister), Byron Foulger and the wondrous Alice Ghostley. A few years ago, I directed Alice on a cartoon series and she looked exactly the same as she did in '67 and she was even funnier.

This is the first four minutes of what I believe was the first episode of Captain Nice, including the opening titles. I don't know this for a fact but I have the feeling that this gag was shot as a quickie pilot/demo and that the network bought the series from it. (NBC bought Get Smart off one scene — the one of Maxwell Smart and The Chief trying to discuss a mission inside The Cone of Silence.) Perhaps I'm wrong about this. I may also be wrong but I think that's Buck Henry doing the narration and I'm pretty sure that in the theme song, one can hear our old friend Dick Beals doing the kid's voice. Have a look and then come back here tomorrow for Mr. Terrific. Thanks to Stan Tychinski for the suggestion.

Here's an amazing peek into the mind and self-image of Richard M. Nixon.

If you'd like to see more photos from last night's What's My Line? Live on Stage, your cordial host (J. Keith van Straaten) has posted some on his weblog, including a slide show of the entire show. Here's that link.

There are many places you can go on the Internet and see George W. Bush be bashed, ridiculed, attacked, insulted, etc. It's becoming more common on the web than porn. But the most derogatory thing I've seen on the topic of Bush lately is an article by his devout supporter, William Kristol, entitled "Why Bush Will Be A Winner." If this is the best anyone can say for the guy, he's (and therefore, we are) in more trouble than anyone thought. A dead giveaway is this early sentence…

Let's step back from the unnecessary mistakes and the self-inflicted wounds that have characterized the Bush administration.

Note to my friends: I'm never going to be in a position where if I screw up, thousands of people die. But even if it's just a matter of defending me when I write a lousy comic book, please don't start your defense of me by saying everyone should look past the unnecessary mistakes and self-inflicted wounds that have characterized my work. You won't be helping.

You can find many responses to Mr. Kristol on the web today. Here's one.

Michael Kinsley on his lunch with Ronald Reagan that really didn't happen.

Though battling deadlines and other pressures, I took time out last evening to attend What's My Line? Live on Stage, a local enterprise I've written about before…here, for instance. And here. Oh, and I wrote about it here, too. It's always a lot of fun and last night's installment (their 70th) was the best I've seen.

The panel consisted of Frank DeCaro, who's on Sirius Satellite Radio and who was on the recent revival of I've Got A Secret on GSN; comic actress Annie Wood; Oscar Nunez, who can be seen each week on The Office; and our lovely Matinee Lady, Teresa Ganzel. The first contestant was a woman who made doggie treats. The second contestant was a former Beverly Hills meter maid who'd been on the original What's My Line? back in 1964. (They showed a clip.) The third contesant signed in as "Mr. X" but I had a hunch he was my partner, Sergio Aragonés. DeCaro guessed that occupation — "draws for MAD Magazine" — and then Sergio gave a brief cartooning demonstration to the delight of the crowd.

I was there partly to see Sergio but also because the show's producers had told me that they had a super-spectacular Mystery Guest. They didn't tell me who — they're real good at keeping things secret — but did say I shouldn't miss it. So I didn't. I was there when Peter Falk entered and signed-in, please.

And boy, the place exploded. I was in the front row (with Scott Shaw!) and I could see how baffled the panelists, who of course were blindfolded, were as to what kind of celeb could be getting this incredible welcome. It went on and on…everyone in the house standing and cheering and clapping and just being thrilled to be in the same room with Columbo. Sergio had received a decent ovation when he entered and another, thunderous round when it was revealed to the audience just who he was and what he did. But for Peter Falk, they (we) took the roof off the dump, as it were. What a great moment. And after the panel guessed who it was — another point for Mr. DeCaro — host J. Keith van Straaten conducted a funny and charming interview with the man. Is anyone reading this surprised that Peter Falk was funny and charming? Actually, Keith is a superb emcee who could make any guest funny and charming but in this case, he didn't have to work so hard.

This current series of What's My Line? Live on Stage has two more Sundays to run and they may or may not do more after that. Next week's Mystery Guest probably won't be as wonderful as Peter Falk but the show will have Len Wein on the panel…and yes, I know that's like saying, "Sorry you missed Laurence Olivier but you can still catch George 'Goober' Lindsey," but the show will still be fun. You can get more info over at this website. If you're in or around Los Angeles, I highly recommend the outing. (Thanks to Chris Valada, who took the fine photo above.)

Last week, my friend Carolyn and I were in Pittsburgh for the Anthrocon, a gathering of "furries." This news story will give you a brief sense of what it was like there…though of course, the TV crew sought out the more colorful, bizarre elements of the convention. As Dr. Conway (the head honcho of Anthrocon) notes in this report, only about 10% of the attendees — and it seemed like less to me — dress up in "fursuits." But if you're a TV news operation and you have your choice of showing footage of people dressed like polar bears and people not dressed like polar bears, which are you going to air? Exactly.

Several friends have recommended that I recommend the discussion from the latest Bill Moyers Journal. One of these friends is one of those guys I'd have bet serious money would be outraged at the segment, which is all about the feasibility and perhaps the necessity of impeaching George W. Bush or, preferably, Bush and Dick Cheney. I don't believe this is ever going to happen but I was impressed with some of the arguments, none of which strike me as real partisan manuevering. You can watch the video online or read a transcript from this page.

Speaking of real partisan manuevering, I'll just say I might disagree with one statement in the conversation. It's when one of the gents says that Tom DeLay wanted to use the impeachment process to remove Bill Clinton as president. Maybe. But it always struck me that those who were driving that movement, and DeLay in particular, knew that they'd never have the votes to convict Clinton. Perhaps they didn't know that early-on and they believed/hoped that a more genuine, significant Impeachable Offense would get uncovered. But at some point when they could still have just reprimanded the guy and gotten on with the nation's business, they decided to go all the way with it because (a) they thought they could embarrass folks like Al Gore who they'd be running against and force them into defending the indefensible and (b) they thought it would make a certain part of the Republican "base" very happy and eager to donate and get out the vote to oust Clinton supporters.

I have a special e-mail address that I use when I have to register on political sites…and it's probably signed up with more Liberal sites than Conservative but it's on both. It gets a ton of mail that says, in effect, "Give us money and we'll fix every problem in the world by destroying the Clintons." It also gets a ton that says, in effect, "Give us money and we'll cure every disease and physical ailment in your body." I think all these messages come from the same place.

I have several computers — all of the PC variety — and until recently, my two main computers each had one of these hooked up to it. If you don't want to bother clicking, I'll tell you what those are: They're Maxtor OneTouch™ Turbo Edition External Hard Drives. A quick survey of my computer-savvy amigos told me (and still tells me) that they're pretty good units; that while any piece of hardware can fail, the Maxtor Externals are as reliable as anything else even vaguely in that price range. I asked around and kept hearing, "It's very rare that those crash."

Well, not around here, it isn't. I've bought three of them and two have gone kablooey in the last month. One was about two years old but the other lasted a mere four weeks, during most of one of which it was unused because I was outta town. Shortly after my return, it began emitting the blood-curding, sad "Click of Death" that means Trouble Right Here in River City. Both are under warranty so they will be replaced by…the same thing. That isn't as maddening as it might sound because I really don't know of anything better I can buy. I just need to be more conscientious about backups. I lost some things because I got busy and foolishly postponed my own backup routine.

On the first one that failed, there was one clump of files that I really wanted back. They could be replaced but I'd have to do a load of manual work to get them back to the form in which they were last seen. So I took the Maxtor over to a friend/computer consultant who spent many days and charged me a large fee to recover all the data on the hard drive. And he did…but not one of the "recovered" files was readable. What I got back was 750 gb of files that would no longer open. I then purchased File Scavenger, a piece of software which cost a paltry fifty bucks. It's not a complete life saver but it did enable me to recover about 600 gb of files and they were like new and readable. Alas, the most-desired files were in the absent 150.

So I bit the bullet, did all the work and restored the files the hard way and of course, promptly backed them up to a brand-new Maxtor…and that was the second one that failed. Which was annoying but not fatal because I'd also backed them up to DVDs. I have, for obvious reasons, become Backup Crazy. In fact, this message is taking a beastly long time to write because I have to stop every five words and back it all up to disc.

There's not much else to say about this except to remind you (and especially me) that hardware does fail and you need to always be prepared for it. I also wanted to recommend File Scavenger, which could save you beaucoup bucks if and when you have a crash. Don't bother writing me and telling me of your good experiences with this Seagate or that Western Digital. I no longer want to believe that any brand is highly reliable because that'll just make me complacent and lazy about backups. In fact, I'm even going to get the words "if and when" out of my vocabulary on this topic. I'm going to presume there's no "if," just a "when."

From the 1987 Tony Awards and from the musical, Me and My Girl, here's Robert Lindsay leading the troupe in the infectious number, "The Lambeth Walk."

You can't see him very well but the tall, dignified gent in the tux near the center of the stage in some shots is George S. Irving, a longtime Broadway actor — he's 85 and still performing — whose voice could be heard on about half the cartoon shows that were produced in New York in the sixties. He was the narrator on the Underdog show and he did those Twinkles commercials (like this one). But don't spend a lot of time looking for him. Just enjoy this fine piece of theatrical merriment…