Monthly Archives: October 2007

John Updike reviews the new book on Charles Schulz.

I've written in the past — here, for example — about Shrimpenstein, a short-lived but very funny kids' show that ran in Los Angeles on KHJ Channel 9 for about a year, commencing in January of 1967. (Ignore any other dates you may find on the Internet.) The series was created and initially written by two gents named Michael Dormer and Lee Teacher, and it starred the comedy-writing (and occasionally, performing) team of Gene Moss and Jim Thurman. Moss played Dr. Von Schtick, a mad scientist, and Thurman did off-camera voices and occasionally stuck a hand into a scene or puppet.

Here's a little less than seven minutes of Shrimpenstein. As you'll see, it was a loose show full of ad-libs and great silliness, and you may get the idea why my friends and I were so fierce about watching it every day. There's a reference in there that needs a bit of explanation. At one point, to promote this show, Gene Moss went on a teen dance party show on KHJ called Boss City and in taking a comedy fall, somehow managed to break or sprain his arm. He had it in a sling for a couple weeks of Shrimpenstein…and that's about all you need to know. So click already.

This is from someone named Arturo8…

I don't understand something about your post on the WGA and Animation. On the net today I am reading many pieces about it and they all say the Writers Guild does not cover animation writing. You say they sometimes do. What is the explanation here?

I usually cringe when people talk like this but the answer is that they're wrong and I'm right. The Writers Guild of America covers some animation projects. As I mentioned, the Simpsons Movie was written under a WGA contract. [Correction] The Simpsons TV show is written under a WGA contract. King of the Hill, Futurama and Family Guy are written under WGA contracts. I have written animation projects under WGA contracts. Quite a few shows and movies have been written under WGA contracts. I just received an e-mail from Neil Gaiman informing me that he and Roger Avary wrote the animated feature, Beowulf, under a WGA contract.

To repeat for emphasis: There are some animation projects that are covered by the WGA. There are some that are covered by The Animation Guild, which is a local of I.A.T.S.E. There are also animation projects produced that are covered by no union at all…and I should add one other category, lest folks get confused: There are projects where the WGA represents the writers and The Animation Guild represents the animators and other artists. The Simpsons would be the best example of this.

While I'm at it, let me clarify another piece of misinformation going around. As we all know, the networks buy a lot of so-called "reality shows" that claim not to employ writers. And as we also know, there isn't as much "reality" in those shows as they claim, and there are writers but they're disguised under other names to try and keep the show out of WGA jurisdiction.

The misinformation is that "reality shows" were invented to circumvent the WGA and the misinformer sometimes cites as the first two examples, Real People and That's Incredible! This is wrong. First of all, Real People and That's Incredible! were WGA-covered shows…and some other shows that fall under the category of "reality" have been WGA shows. Secondly, there have always been TV shows, including prime time shows, that tried to get by without employing WGA scribes…and even succeeded. Many game shows, including (I think) all the Goodson-Todman shows like What's My Line? and I've Got A Secret were non-WGA. They sometimes had writers disguised under other credits…but this is not a new trick and it's also one that only goes so far. It is essential to the health of the networks to have plenty of the other kind of programming, the kind that requires WGA writers.

There are a couple of key issues in the current labor negotiation, one being the issue of sharing revenues from new technologies. Perhaps equally important is the question of jurisdiction. The WGA covers most but not all TV and movie writing. For obvious reasons, the union would like to cover more and the Producers would like them to cover less. You'll be hearing more about this…but don't listen to anyone who tells you the WGA doesn't cover animation…or that reality shows like Real People were invented as a trick to get around the Writers Guild.

Stephen Colbert turns New York Times op-ed columnist.

Earl Bennett, who performed with Spike Jones and the City Slickers, died October 4 at the age of 87. When he worked with Spike, he went by the name Sir Frederick Gas and played a wide array of musical instruments, many of which were not instruments at all. He could get notes out of hitting two pieces of lumber together or blowing on a leaf. He also belched a lot to music — ergo, the name.

Earl Fred Bennett was born November 5, 1919 in Kansas and grew up pursuing the dual paths of music and art. He studied painting at the Kansas City Art Institute from 1938 to 1941 before serving in World War II. In the service, he got to playing occasionally with military bands and appearing in shows so after his discharge, he gravitated in that direction. He toured for a time with a night club act featuring novelty music and appeared in Ken Murray's stage revues. In 1947, Bennett's act caught the attention of Spike Jones, who was then at the peak of his popularity and recording songs that employed the kind of odd sounds in which Bennett specialized. Spike hired him on and assigned him the handle of Sir Frederick Gas, which had previously been a gag credit on several of the City Slickers records.

Bennett appeared with the band on records, on radio, in movies and on Jones's 1954 TV series. He vocalized (often doing a Yiddish accent) and played odd instruments and even built some of the outrageous props that the orchestra employed. But after the '54 series, he decided there wasn't much future in that kind of act, and he was also tired of touring…so he got into film production, mainly as an editor but occasionally as a sound effects specialist. He worked for U.P.A. on the Mr. Magoo cartoons (he edited Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol, among many other productions) and later became a long, friendly fixture at Hanna-Barbera Productions, working on all their shows from around 1965 on. He occasionally worked with Joe Siracusa, another member of the Spike Jones band who became a film editor.

I got to meet Earl at H-B and pester him with questions about his days with Spike. He spoke fondly of those days and of the people with whom he worked — Spike, especially — but insisted he was glad to be out of it. I'm told that after he retired, his career went full circle and he returned to painting, which he did until worsening eyesight forced him to stop. We miss you already, Sir Frederick.

Here's Earl "Sir Frederick Gas" Bennett performing the lead vocal in a Spike Jones classic…

I'm being asked a lot of questions over what appears to be a jurisdictional dispute between the Writers Guild of America and The Animation Guild. From what I can tell, the argument as it's being depicted in news articles such as this one is not exactly the argument that those two entities are having in real life…or at least, the WGA position is not being accurately represented.

Here's an example. The above-linked article in Variety says, in part…

In addition to a ban on any guild-covered work in features and TV, a draft recap of the WGA rules said the guild plans to prohibit any writing for new media and declare that writers can't do animated features — even though that realm is not under WGA jurisdiction.

That's not true. The recent animated Simpsons movie was written under a WGA contract [Correction] and others have been or are pending. The press coverage so far has made the mistake of acting like all animation work is covered by the Animation Guild, and that's not true, either. There are animated projects where the writers are covered by the Animation Guild. There are animated projects where the writers are covered by the WGA. There are also animated projects where the writers are covered by neither.

What union has jurisdiction over a given project? It's the one that negotiates a contract to cover that project. It isn't automatically the WGA or the Animation Guild or the Loyal Order of Water Buffalo. So to the extent that the WGA is asserting jurisdiction over areas where it has a contract — or even projects where no one does and the WGA is attempting to stake out its turf — the WGA position seems entirely reasonable to me. And with regard to the part that has some folks upset, I suspect they're either not reading properly between the lines or not understanding that in time of war, you stake out the widest possible position and then negotiate down from there as necessary.

Regarding the controversial Charles Schulz biography…Schulz's son Monte summarizes the family's view of the book over in a comment on the Cartoon Brew website.

There's a website for the book that includes a video with the author, David Michaelis.

I already pointed you to a review by Bill Watterson. I should have also sent you to this review over on the Aaugh! blog, which is part of the best website on the 'net for Peanuts info. Plus, I should have pointed out a certain irony to the Watterson review. Here's a guy who has been fiercely private about his own life and he's applauding a book which delves deeply into Schulz's personal history.

In case you want to order the book, this link will get you one from Amazon.

What got cut last night on Real Time With Bill Maher: As many of you have informed me, when Maher went to New Rules, the TelePrompter was malfunctioning and it took about twenty seconds to get things moving. I'm guessing they would have left all this in for the rebroadcasts if it hadn't put them over in terms of time…though it seems to me that Maher's show has occasionally run long and in the past, HBO has trimmed some of their between-show promos to account for overage. The usual philosophy here is that a live show ought to be left the way it was done, warts and all. I mean, the program is called Real Time.

I also recall the 'prompter going out one other time but then, Maher had back-up paper copy in his pocket and he calmly hauled it out and continued. Guess he didn't have it last night…but will, from now on.

Thanks to all forty-two of you who wrote in response to my question. Like I said: We get answers fast around here. Here's the full video clip of last night's New Rules spot as it was aired live…

Hey, did you read the message I posted an hour and a half ago? This one? Someone allegedly named Rick Strandrel of Rock Island, Ill. had a letter printed in the Chicago-Tribune that borrowed generously from text of an item I posted here.

Well, it turns Mr. Strandel has been busy. Pretty much the same letter appeared last Monday in the letter section of The Washington Times. Here's a link to that page.

But it doesn't stop there. If you scroll down a ways, the same page in The Washington Times has a letter signed by "William Stosine of Iowa City, Iowa" that's plagiarized from this item that I posted about the S-CHIP expansion veto.

This is not the first time Mr. Stosine has cribbed from my postings here. Back in February of '04, my words turned up in a couple of newspapers over his signature. Here's one example and here's another.

I'll bet you ten bucks that Rick Standrel and William Stosine are the same person. In fact, I'm pretty sure I know what his real name is and it isn't either of those.

Someone posted this on YouTube. It's a promo for a 1980 production of Oliver! that played the Aquarius Theater in Hollywood. Shani Wallis was playing Nancy, Dick Shawn was playing Fagin, Tessie O'Shea was playing Mrs. Corney and Stubby Kaye was playing Mr. Bumble. I remember when it opened and got pretty good reviews. That, plus the fact that I always liked the show, Dick Shawn and Stubby Kaye caused me to want to see it. At the time, I was working for Sid and Marty Krofft and our offices were at KTLA Studios, just a few blocks from the Aquarius.

So one day on my lunch hour, I walked down Sunset to buy tickets. At the box office, the lady looked surprised. It was like, "Really? You want to buy tickets?" I convinced her I did and she sold me a pair with an unmissible sense of skepticism. Her attitude made me suspicious and so did the seats I got: Third row center.

I walked back to the office and happened to mention to Sid Krofft that I'd just bought tickets to the production of Oliver! down at the Aquarius. Sid said, "I heard that was closing." I told him no, I'd just bought tickets for the following Saturday night.

Then I walked down to the stage where the dancers were rehearsing a number for the show we were about to tape. I invited one I knew to go with me to see Oliver! and she immediately said, "It's closing." I said, "No, it isn't." She said, "Yes, it is. My roommate's brother is in it. I just called her about something and she told me."

I went back to my office, phoned the Aquarius box office and got, I think, the same lady who'd sold me the tickets an hour earlier. "Is the show closing?" I asked her. She said no. I asked her if she was sure. She said, "Wait a second…I'll check." She put me on hold for about four minutes, then came back on the line and told me the show was closing. This was on a day when there was no performance scheduled and she said they weren't sure at the theater if there would even be another one but they'd been told to stop selling tickets and start issuing refunds.

I walked back to the Aquarius and she gave me my money back and an apology. She said, "We're always the last ones to know." Another lady in the box office chimed in, "I knew. We've only sold twenty-three tickets for tomorrow night and there are twenty-five people in the show." That was my introduction to an old show business maxim that I made up as I walked back to the office that day: When you have more bodies on the stage than you have in the audience, you're in trouble.

Here's the ad for the show I didn't see…

Bill Maher does his Real Time show on HBO live at 8:00 PM Pacific time, I believe. I TiVoed the 10 PM rebroadcast of it on HBO2 and there was a big, sloppy edit in the show, just at the top of New Rules. Anyone have any idea why?

On the matter of these flag pins, I find myself in amazing agreement with this letter that was published yesterday in the Chicago-Tribune…

Waving the flag pin

Some people are questioning Sen. Barack Obama's patriotism because he doesn't wear an American flag pin on his lapel ("His lapel naked, Obama makes a fashion statement," News, Oct. 5). This is three notches below ridiculous. A gesture that small should never be confused with actually doing something meaningful.

It's like the folks who buy a $3 sticker for their car and act like they've made a substantive contribution to the war on terror. Putting a flag on your car or coat is just about the dictionary definition of "The Least You Can Do."

I think of something my father told me. He worked (reluctantly) for the IRS and dealt with a steady stream of very wealthy people whom he caught doing everything in their power, much of it illegal, to not pay taxes. This was during the Vietnam War and some of these rich men were quite vocal that the U.S. had to spend every nickel necessary to build every conceivable weapon to defeat the communists, but God forbid it should be their nickels. Dad said every one of them had an American flag in his lapel and thought that merely wearing it made him a Good American.

Is Obama a Good American? If he genuinely defends the Constitution and the principles on which this nation was founded, then yes — regardless of what's in his buttonhole. Anyone who works against these principles is not — and it wouldn't matter if he had a flag, the Statue of Liberty, Plymouth Rock and John Wayne on his lapel.

Rick Strandrel
Rock Island, Ill

That's a great, sane way of looking at this situation…and I have to praise Mr. Strandel for his fine writing skills. Where does someone find such eloquent words?

Oh, wait — I know! He finds them here.

Y'know, I don't mind the guy stealing my writing…but he also stole my father. Thanks to Kim "Howard" Johnson for letting me know about it. (And Alan, if this is you borrowing my words again, it's okay with me but you could ask my permission.)

I made a boneheaded error the other day here, saluting Joe Simon on his 92nd birthday. I should have saluted him on his 94th birthday, which is what yesterday was. I saw 92 on some other website and it reminded me, "Oh, I have to write my Joe Simon posting," and I didn't think.

So happy 94th birthday, Joe. You look years younger. Two, anyway.

Here's an odd little bit of film. Some time in the fifties, Bob Clampett and his Time for Beany crew whipped up this little short promo pitch for a charity for the radio and television industry. It's a racy little routine that reminds one of the "horny wolf" cartoons that Clampett and Tex Avery made in the forties. I assume this was shown at some sort of industry dinner or gathering.

This was done after Stan Freberg and Daws Butler left the show, the precise date of which no one seems able to determine but it was probably either late 1953 or early 1954. In this film, Don Messick is the narrator, Irv Shoemaker is the voice of Cecil, Jim MacGeorge is Captain Huffenpuff, Walker Edmiston is Beany and the Wolf, and I think that's Joanie Gerber playing the old lady. In the credits at the end, I see a name — Naomi Something — who I'm guessing is the Marilyn Monroe-type actress playing Little Red Riding Could. And you can also spot the name of Lloyd Turner, who was the main writer for Time for Beany around this period. Lloyd had an amazing career that stretched from gag writing for Warner Brothers cartoons, all the way through writing comic books for Western Publishing and on to story-editing and writing All in the Family and other top TV shows.

Here it is. Looks like they had fun making it.

Bill Watterson — that's right, the Calvin and Hobbes guy — reviews the new book on Charles Schulz.