Monthly Archives: October 2009

A little while ago, I called Stan Freberg about something and I happened to ask him if he'd sold a lot of autographed books at the Hollywood Collectors Show over the weekend. He said yes, he had. Then the following exchange ensued…

ME: Too bad you can't go deposit all that money. Banks closed.

FREBERG: Oh? Why?

ME: Columbus Day!

FREBERG: Oh, yeah. We going out on that joke?

ME: No, we do reprise of song. That help but…

BOTH OF US: …not much!

If you don't get the reference, don't worry about it. But if you do, you know why I feel like Woody Allen's character at the end of Play It Again, Sam. I've waited my whole life to say it.

The next Comic-Con International in San Diego will be held Thursday, July 22, 2010 through Sunday, July 25, 2010. As usual, the Wednesday evening before is a Preview Night with most of the convention open as of 6 PM.

This time, the con is selling two different kinds of four-day passes — one with and one without Preview Night. The passes that include Preview Night are already sold out.

I shall repeat that: The passes that include Preview Night are already sold out. Some of us still haven't finished unpacking from the last Comic-Con International but Preview Night at the next one is sold out.

I have no inside info as to how fast the four-day passes without Preview Night are selling but their unavailability will surely come sooner than it usually does. If you're thinking of attending and you figure you can wait until next April to order a four-day pass, I suspect you're in for a surprise.

Consider yourself warned.

Interested in the rise and fall of presidential popularity? Here's your one-stop website for such data.

Here's a photo of two men who, between them, were responsible for about half the comedy records sold in this country before Vaughn Meader and many, many after Mr. Meader's career ended near a grassy knoll. That's Shelley Berman and Stan Freberg at the Hollywood Collectors Show in Burbank this past weekend.

My pal Earl Kress and I went out there on Saturday and had a fine time, walking around and talking to folks. The longest lines were for the two men above and for Jackie Cooper, who seemed to be autographing every single still, poster and DVD ever issued for any of the Superman movies he was in. I'm not sure some of the people in that line knew he'd ever done anything else.

Mickey Rooney and Debbie Reynolds were there. So were Sean Astin, Hank Garrett, Sally Kellerman, June Foray, Eddie Carroll, William Schallert, Alan Sues, Bill Mumy, Margot Kidder, Helen Slater, the ladies of Petticoat Junction, Jane Withers, Earl Holliman, Linda Gray, Patrick Duffy, Richard Anderson, Corbin Bernsen, Angela and Veronica Cartwright, Stephen Furst, Peter Mayhew, Skip E. Lowe and a lot of other famous folks. And there were at least as many celebs wandering the aisles as customers.

I don't have anything particularly interesting to report. I just wanted to say I was there and to run that great photo that Christopher Bay took.

Of course, there are other differences between David Letterman's "sex scandal" and most politicians' transgressions. Letterman is a comedian…not someone we expect to be making laws that define what's right and wrong. Also — and I suspect this was on his mind when he decided to go public with his situation — Dave comes off to a great extent like a victim in his case. This may or may not be how it all plays out but at the moment, the other guy looks like a sleazeball extortionist. Which, of course, makes Dave look better…makes you even feel sorry for him in a way.

The smart thing Dave accomplished by breaking the news himself was that he made it about David Letterman being blackmailed, rather than about Dave having sex with women on his staff. He even told the story that way on his show, telling the world that he was being shaken down for having done "creepy things" and then, at the end, finally revealing what those alleged creepy things were.

How it will all develop will depend, of course, on what else comes out. If some female Worldwide Pants employee comes forward with a tale that makes Dave sound like an aging Roman Polanski, that may do Letterman's rep some damage. The lawyer for the alleged blackmailer has been making it sound like he wants to put Dave on trial and to fill the courtroom with damaging revelations if his client doesn't get a generous plea bargain. Frankly, in the absence of some genuine crime on Letterman's part, I don't think America cares who's on his personal Top Ten list.

Not every movie produced by Albert Zugsmith was terrible. Touch of Evil was pretty good…though one suspects that the producer was largely irrelevant on a movie directed and written by Orson Welles. Other than that…

Back in the days of theatrical short comedies, there was a very popular series of one-reelers starring George O'Hanlon as a luckless gent named Joe McDoakes. Mr. O'Hanlon is now probably best known as the voice of George Jetson, and before that, he was one of the busiest character actors in film and early television. And between 1942 and 1956, he made 63 Joe McDoakes shorts with titles like So You Want To Give Up Smoking and So You Want To Be A Detective. Whatever it was the title said you wanted to have happen, you could bet that Joe McDoakes would show you why he couldn't do it.

Now's your chance to own all of them…all 63 on six DVDs for forty bucks. It's part of the Warner Archive program whereby they sell plain vanilla DVDs (no fancy menus, no special features) of rarities from the vaults. Here's the link. I don't make anything off these but if you're a big Joe McDoakes fan, don't let that stop you. I have a hunch it'll be a long time before we see these get a fancier release.

Also of possible interest: Warner Archive has brought out a set of the last 52 Our Gang comedies — the ones made at MGM after the Hal Roach Studio sold the franchise. During the run, familiar faces like Spanky, Alfalfa and Darla exited the series as they outgrew it and new kids came along…to generally diminishing results. Still, there's some fun in these rarely-seen films…which also will probably not be available in any other way for a long time.

That's my pal Randy West on the left. Randy is a professional announcer and warm-up wizard specializing in game shows. He recently lent his talents to the new Newlywed Game for episodes yet to air, then returned to his regular gig in Las Vegas. There, he announces for the live version of The Price is Right (the one I wrote about here) and follows in the footsteps of the King of Game Show Announcers, the late Johnny Olson.

Somehow, Randy also found the time to write a book about his friend and idol — Johnny Olson, A Voice in Time. It's the story of a pioneer of early television. Johnny did zillions of hours of shows, good and bad, sometimes hosting but usually announcing. He was so facile at audience warm-ups that Jackie Gleason insisted on having his every show preceded by a Johnny Olson warm-up. That was relatively simple when Mr. Gleason did his shows from New York since that was where Johnny was then based. But then Gleason relocated to Miami Beach, Florida…and the show paid to fly Olson down each week to do the honors.

I've yet to read Randy's book on Johnny but he's an expert on the topic with a good understanding of how the job goes, so I'm eager to get a copy. If you're similarly eager, Randy's selling them over on this page of his website. You can also order your copy from the publisher or from Amazon. I get a little commission if you order from Amazon but if you order from Randy, you can get your copy autographed by him. Randy's site accepts PayPal or Plinko chips.

My initial reaction to Barack Obama's Nobel Prize was probably a lot like yours: "Uh, isn't this a little premature?" And I do think on some level, it was bestowed because the Nobel committee wasn't allowed to give out a negative award to the Bush administration for achieving the precise opposite of what this award was intended to honor.

But as I read all the different op-eds and viewpoints, I'm drifting to the view of folks like Joan Walsh and Juan Cole who think it makes sense. I also don't think it's a huge deal if the Nobel Prize is given to the undeserving. The world didn't end when Kissinger got one and that was like giving a humanitarian award to Hannibal Lector. The Nobel Prize is just the opinion of a bunch of people whose names we don't know and whose actions we don't care about the other 364 days of the year.