Comic Pete Barbutti plays "Tenderly" on the broom.
Hey, I wanna make a suggestion to someone. There are eighty-seven thousand people running around these with high-def home video cameras and the desire to make some sort of documentary about something. I dunno what Pete's up to lately — haven't spoken to him in years — but someone oughta sit this guy down in front of a camera and capture some of his great anecdotes about working Vegas or working in clubs. Funniest storyteller I've ever met.
A new poll from the Public Policy Polling People (who I suspect used to make Clean Copper Clappers) confirms something I've suspected since this whole silliness began about Barack Obama's birthplace. A number of those who say they don't believe he was born in the United States say that because they don't believe Hawaii is part of the United States.
You all know about the Monty Python Reunion, right? Okay, so it's only one night of being honored and questioned. It's something.
Comedy Central broadcasts each episode of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report several times a day. Can anyone here explain why the second broadcasts of each are now starting at eight minutes past their announced times? On my satellite dish, the first broadcasts are supposed to be at 8:00 PM and 8:30 PM, and the second ones at 11:00 PM and 11:30 PM. Lately, the second broadcasts have been more like 11:08 PM and 11:38 PM. What's running over and why?
Roger Ebert, who has been a stone's throw from death for some time, is still alive and able to write a column about the ridiculous "death panel" opposition to Health Care Reform. I agree with Mr. Ebert that the current yelling is not really about anything the Obama administration is proposing. It's just about the fact that there is an Obama administration and these folks are hysterical at having lost power.
From 1969, we have a 26 minute film of historic note. It's the "pitch" that sold Sesame Street, explaining what it would be and why it was necessary. There's some nice Muppet stuff in there and some samples of early segments for what would become one of the most important TV shows ever done…
Sorry I haven't posted more lately. I spent today in a recording studio directing the first three shows of the second season of The Garfield Show, an animated series I work on which runs in many countries. America, I hear, will soon be one of them. We had a fine cast today. We have our regulars — Frank Welker (as the cat), Gregg Berger, Wally Wingert and Jason Marsden. We have our semi-regulars — Audrey Wasilewski, Julie Payne, Laura Summer and David L. Lander. And today, we had as guest stars, Stan Freberg, Laraine Newman and Jack Riley.
Whenever anyone asks me the secret of directing cartoon voices, I tell 'em it's easy. Hire a cast like that, tell 'em which microphones to use and get out of their way. It's hard work but enormous fun. Having grown up listening to Stan Freberg records (and having purloined much of my sense of humor from the man), I still find it a little unbelievable to be working with him.
Anyway, that kept me busy today, and prepping for the session kept me busy yesterday. But I'm back now.
Oh, yeah. I've also been spending time hassling with my health insurance company. I was already for reform and public options and all sorts of other things that Fox News thinks are the Communist takeover of America. As if to cement my opinion, my provider has suddenly decided to stop covering one prescription medication I've been taking for two years now. With them, it's ten bucks a month. Without them, it's $320. My doctor is confident he can persuade them to cover it…but I have to wonder what folks who can't afford insurance, or can't get it due to pre-existing conditions, do if this drug becomes a necessity. And is this really the best use of my doctor's time?
A few folks have written me about what I wrote yesterday about comic book letter pages. I apologize if I underestimated the effort some put into assembling letter columns in the eighties. Paul Levitz noted that he wrote scripts for a lot of the comics for which he also wrote letter pages; that he was not just "some guy in the office." That's quite true. Long before he was head honcho at DC, Paul may have set the industry record for whipping up more letter pages than anyone else — and I say "may" because I have no idea how many E. Nelson Bridwell did. I'm guessing one of those guys is the champ and the other is first runner-up. (Paul also writes to remind me that when our pal Steve Gerber went to work at Marvel, he produced some of the best letter pages ever done in the ersatz Stan Lee style. They weren't signed with Stan's name but the editorial voice was supposed to suggest it was Stan himself answering your mail…and Steve was very good at it.)
Still, even if it happened a bit later than I suggested, there was a time when letter columns went away, which is a shame. I remember the utter thrill I got the first time I saw one of my letters in print. It was a copy of Aquaman and I was fourteen…and while the letter was childish and I (of course) didn't get paid for it, it was still something I wrote that someone has put into print in a real, sort of, magazine. Long before then, I'd decided I wanted to be a writer if and when I grew up so I can't say that it started me on that road. But standing there in the drugstore, seeing my words and name in print, my chosen career suddenly seemed a bit more possible. In fact, I felt more like a Writer that day than I did the last few times I worked for Disney.
I'm just going to post this press release…
LOS ANGELES, Aug. 13 /PRNewswire/ — An amateur home movie has been discovered recently which apparently contains the last known film images of comedy legend Stan Laurel, once celebrated as half of the most famous comedy duo in the world: Laurel & Hardy.
The rare and historic eight millimeter film, which captures a playful Laurel displaying his trademark impish smile while scratching his head, is just two minutes in length and was taken at his Santa Monica apartment by James and Irene Heffernan, a Los Angeles couple who were acquainted with the film comedian in his final years.
According to Laurel's daughter, Lois Laurel Hawes, the film was made in late December of 1964, just two months before his death. A letter from Laurel to the Heffernans, dated January 15, 1965, mentions their yuletide visit when, apparently, the footage was shot.
Also featured in the brief home movie segment is Laurel's honorary "Oscar" award for Lifetime Achievement which was presented to him by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (AMPAS) in 1961.
Apparently lost and forgotten for decades among the numerous entertainment and travel home movies made by the active couple during the 1960s, this final footage of Laurel was not known to exist until several months ago and has never been viewed publicly.
However, the film's present owner plans to arrange for the landmark footage to be seen by Laurel & Hardy fans worldwide on June 16, 2010, which happens to be the comic's date of birth. According to actor/producer Tyler St. Mark, who purchased the remarkable footage from the Heffernan estate, "Stan Laurel performs a special gesture at the end of the film clip which was clearly intended for his millions of fans worldwide and so we will help him deliver his message 46 years later – on the 120th anniversary of his birthday."
I'm always eager to see anything relating to Laurel and/or Hardy…but I'm especially wondering what Stan's "special gesture" is.
Back when there was a lot more hollering about Gay Marriage than there's been lately, some comic fans tried to rustle up a boycott of the Manchester Grand Hyatt Hotel in San Diego by attendees of the Comic-Con down there. As I explained here, I'm all for letting consenting adults marry or just hang out with the consenting adults of their choice, regardless of race or gender, but I'm not big on boycotts. I don't think they usually accomplish much of anything except maybe to make the boycotters feel like they're doing something.
Lately, I'm getting e-mails saying I should stop shopping Whole Foods Market because of an op-ed against "Obamacare" in The Wall Street Journal by the CEO of that chain. (And by the way, I think it would do us all a world of good if more of the health care situation was debated by folks who can't afford to buy the Mayo Clinic.)
I'd been thinking of curtailing my Whole Food purchases before that because, frankly, I'm tired of paying double the prices at Gelson's for meat that's not any better and maybe a little worse. I also keep getting produce and prepared meals at Whole Foods that taste they like were prepared by one of those experts who "styles" food for advertising photos, painting fake gloss on the Fuji apples and daubing the bananas with Turtle Wax. But I won't be taking my biz elsewhere because of Mr. Whole Foods' opinion piece…and I doubt that many other folks will, no matter how much he offends them. In times of anger, people in this country may swear they're not going to patronize a certain business or buy a certain product…but if it's what they want or it's cheaper or it's closer, that's what and where they buy.
Getting back to the Manchester Grand Hyatt, where again I stayed this last Comic-Con — and was treated quite nicely, by the way — the threatened boycott in '08 was because its CEO, Doug Manchester, was donating large sums to ban Gay Marriage. He said that he felt it was his duty as a Catholic…and of course, he's right that the Catholic church frowns on that kind of thing.
Of course, as this article notes, the Catholic church also frowns on divorce and that isn't stopping Mr. Manchester from leaving his wife of 43 years. They're currently in the midst of one of those messy millionaires' severances where both sides fight over six and seven figure properties and holdings, with much soiled laundry hung to flap in the breeze.
I don't think this is funny or a reason to gloat or anything of the sort. It's sad when a marriage goes sour and people suffer…just as it's sad when two people who love each other are denied the right and dignity to have their union respected. I just have to point out that "my duty as a Catholic" sometimes, like threats of boycotts, only goes as far as is convenient. And while we're at it, let's remember that despite the Neanderthal talking points, Gay Marriage is not what's threatening Heterosexual Marriage. I dunno what broke up the Manchester marriage but I don't think it was same-sex wedlock…unless Mrs. Manchester was furious at her hubby for spending their money to push Proposition 8.
By the way, I think I mentioned it here before but I'm curious what the divorce rate will turn out to be like for Gay Marriage. Will it be the higher, lower or the same as for mixed couples? For your information, the divorce rate in this country for straight marriages is between 41 and 50% for first marriages, 60 to 67% for second marriages and over 73% for third marriages. And that's just Larry King.
B.B. King visits Sesame Street and sings about his favorite letter…
You know what's missing from comic books these days? Letter columns. In my day (read this sentence in the voice of Dana Carvey's Grumpy Old Man, who I think was him imitating Lionel Barrymore), comics had letter columns and readers would write in and either point out errors or ask questions or critique the previous issue. And then the editor (or someone impersonating the editor) would reply…and it made for a nice interaction. Julius Schwartz's in his DC books were especially good, while over at Marvel, the ones composed by Stan Lee (or sometimes, "Stan Lee") were as much a part of some books' appeal as the stories, themselves.
That all started to go away in the seventies. For a while, we had letter columns but it wasn't the editor who handled them. It was some kid in the office…some assistant to the assistant or something. In a few books, it was even me. That wasn't as much fun as engaging in a dialogue with the actual editor or even someone pretending to be him. Then at some point, comics just stopped having letter columns at all. Groo the Wanderer, which I work on, was one of the last holdouts. We had a letters page long after most comics didn't bother.
I used to jest that this was because we truly cared about our readers, whereas other comics didn't. That caused an editor at one of the companies to get real, real angry at me…though apparently not angry enough that he decided to prove me wrong and add letter pages to his comics. That, he did not do. Soon after, I stopped doing the joke not because I feared him but because when Groo shifted from monthly publication to the intermittent mini-series format, I stopped receiving a steady flow of letters. I suppose I could have made some up. A lot of letter pages used to do that…more than you'd imagine. But I have integrity I haven't even used yet.
Well, I've decided it's high time to get back into the letter column business. We have a new Groo mini-series starting and I'm cobbling up a letters page for it. Wanna see your name and letter in Groo? Send both of those things to letters@groothewanderer.com. I'll repeat that address for those of you who are slow of mind: letters@groothewanderer.com. It pays nothing and if you heckle us, we heckle you back…and we have home court advantage so watch it.
A recurring, too-occasional theme on this blog is how writers can protect themselves from getting swindled, burgled, fleeced, taken, exploited, cheated and generally ripped-off. It's a big problem and it requires a lot of policing and advising and warning. In 1998, the Science Fiction Writers of America set up Writer Beware, a website intended to help educate writers — new ones, especially — to some of the pernicious practices that may be employed to get them to pay to have their writing published (instead of the other way around) or at least to not be paid when their writing is published.
Thanks to the efforts of author Lee Goldberg, who is probably too busy trotting 'round the globe to writers' conferences to have lunch with his ol' pal Mark, the Mystery Writers of America group has joined the battle, throwing support behind Writer Beware. Good for all of them.
Remember: The way this is supposed to work is that you write it and they pay you to publish it. You do not pay to have it published. You do not pay to have it agented or critiqued or submitted or anything of the sort. They pay you and they pay you on an agreed-upon amount on an agreed-upon schedule and in real money. No matter how badly you want to see your work in print.
My favorite performers in the history of mankind are, as we all know, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. I've seen all their movies eighty quadrillion-zillion times…but did you know they almost got into radio? In 1944, they did a pilot for what was intended as a weekly series called The Laurel and Hardy Show.
It was performed and transcribed at NBC Studios on March 6 of that year but apparently never broadcast. The way it generally worked in radio was that a show would be done that way and then someone would take the disks around to advertising agencies and potential sponsors and if one was willing to buy, the program went onto the air. The Laurel and Hardy Show never did, presumably because a sponsor could not be found.
The premise of the show was that each week, The Boys would get a new job…and by the end of the half-hour, they would have botched things up and become unemployed again. The pilot episode was titled, "Mr. Slater's Poultry Market" and at the end of it, it's teased that next week, they'll be getting into the plumbing business. But of course, there was no next week.
The script is not wonderful…but this was '44 when Stan and Ollie were doing not-wonderful scripts for MGM and Fox, resulting in movies that were similarly not wonderful. As with the films, the radio script makes them somewhat stupider than they were in their best pictures and there's a lot of over-reacting to plot contrivances. Still, it's a shame their radio show didn't sell. Both men could have used the additional income…and maybe stardom there would have given them a little more clout in dealing with MGM and Fox. Alas, here's all that resulted from the endeavor…
Here's a follow-up to yesterday's blog post by Steve Benen about the crazies in our political discourse. And in there are more opinions from Bruce Bartlett about the situation.
I didn't know the guy but I wanted to note the passing of famed Jerry Lewis impersonator Sammy Petrillo, who died yesterday at the age of 75. As a kid, back when Lewis was teamed with Dean Martin, Petrillo so resembled Jerry that his first real job in show business was playing Jerry's baby son on the Colgate Comedy Hour. Thereafter, Lewis had Petrillo signed for a time to a personal contract that some have claimed was just to keep the look-alike off the market.
Eventually, Petrillo broke free of Jerry and went off with a succession of different partners, most of whom could mimic Dino. The main one was Duke Mitchell and in 1952, Mitchell and Petrillo replicated Dean and Jerry when they starred in a cinema classic…Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla. It was kind of the low point in Mr. Lugosi's career and the high point in Mr. Petrillo's.
A few years after that, the Mitchell-Petrillo team split up. They claimed their club act wasn't getting bookings because proprietors were afraid of pissing off Jerry. In any case, Sammy drifted through an array of small parts in small films…and I really don't know what else he did. I don't know if anyone does. We only know he looked and sounded amazingly like Jerry Lewis in this film…