Monthly Archives: May 2010

As we've noted on this site, many hotels in Las Vegas now charge these things called Resort Fees. You book your $26 room and think you got a bargain, unaware the fine print commits you to pay a $25 Resort Fee that includes a newspaper you don't read, access to a spa you have no intention of visiting, high-speed web access you don't use, etc. As this article notes, a lot of ill will is being generated along with the profits.

Frank Rich discusses the news coverage of the White House Correspondents Dinner last week, which was apparently more important than, say, a possible terrorist attack in Times Square. I have a half-written post here I'll try to finish one of these days. It's about how I think all presidents, Obama included, waste a lot of time in cosmetic, ceremonial nonsense when they probably oughta be solving real problems. I wish Obama had cancelled on the dinner, citing more pressing matters. Of course, I also wish our press was mature enough that they wouldn't have savaged him for doing that.

Suzanne Lenzer eats alone.

Mapquest, Google Maps and my GPS all swore to me the drive to Riverside would take one hour and five minutes, the liars. Well, maybe if you were going via rocketsled at 4 AM. Carolyn and I left Los Angeles at 3 PM and we got where we were going about 5:35…and here's one of those odd coincidences. My friend Gregg Berger and his dazzling spouse Dora were among the friends who'd decided to all caravan down there, rendezvous for a 4:30 supper and then go over and see Frank Ferrante do his Amazing Groucho Act at the Fox Performing Arts Center. As I was finally (finally!) on the off-ramp for the 91 Freeway, I was cell-phoned by Gregg who told me that he was just getting off the freeway…and then he noticed that he was directly behind my car. We were both, simultaneously, an hour and five minutes late.

So were writer Paul Dini and his extraordinary wife, magician-actress Misty Lee. So were writer Earl Kress and our pal Mark Nelson, who among his other endeavors is Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Academy of Magical Arts (i.e., The Magic Castle in Hollywood). Here…I'll get ahead of the story and show you a photo of all these folks. I know it's small but most of the guys aren't that good-looking…

The guy in the tux at left is Jim Furmston, who's Frank's musical director and on-stage foil. To the right of him is Mark Nelson. I'm in the suede jacket. Earl Kress is in front of me while Paul Dini and Misty Lee are on either side of me, behind. Frank Ferrante is presumably the one who looks frighteningly like Rufus T. Firefly and then, left to right, we have Carolyn Kelly, Dora Berger and Gregg Berger. Gregg, in case you don't know, is one of the top voice actors in the business.

(Quick aside about that suede jacket: I bought it around 1990 or so at the Rochester Clothing Store on 52nd Street in Manhattan. I tried it on and asked the salesguy, "How does this look on me?" One of the other customers volunteered, "That looks great," and asked if they had one in his size. The other customer was, so help me, Rush Limbaugh. I thought you might enjoy hearing about the last time he was right about anything. Well, anyway, I wore the jacket often until around '95 when I'd put on sufficient weight that it no longer fit me and it went into storage. Among the happy "marker" moments of dropping all that poundage a few years ago was that I got the jacket out of mothballs and it not only fit, it's actually a tad big on me.)

Getting back to Riverside: The theater was showing Duck Soup before Frank's performance but given our late arrival, we had to opt out of that. It would have been nice to see it on a big screen with a live audience but it was nicer to dine at leisure with friends. Then we hiked over to the place in the top photo and took our seats along with hundreds of other folks…including a few who didn't come up to me before the show, after or during intermission and tell me, "I heard about this on your blog." The ones who said it at intermission or after all added some version of "…and boy, you were right about this guy." That alone made the Bataan Death March on the Pomona Freeway almost worth it.

Frank was great. As usual, he hopped up on stage as Frank Ferrante, said a few words and proceeded to transform, not unlike Don Blake morphing into The Mighty Thor, into Julius "Groucho" Marx. The main difference, of course, is that Groucho is more powerful and godlike. It was the fifth time I've seen him perform and easily the best…and the most extemporaneous.

In a couple years of plugging Ferrante incessantly on this site, I've received 50-75 e-mails from folks who've been to see him and have written to tell me how much they loved the experience. I've received a grand total of one from a disappointed attendee, and he was mainly bothered that not everything that seemed to be improvised was. The answer to that (of course) is that, first of all, not every alleged ad-lib out of the real Groucho was created on the spot, either. Not only did he have secret writers on the quiz show but improvisation is often a function of rapid memory; of quickly pulling up the perfect line at the perfect moment. That's especially true when — and this is my second point — situations reoccur. Frank is well into his third decade of doing this act. When he asks an audience member, "What do you do for a living?," one out of twenty or so is going to say, "Lawyer." So out come the lawyer jokes. They may well have been on-the-spot inventions the first time they were uttered but now they're part of the repertoire.

I think I can tell the difference between a line that's recalled and one concocted for the moment. There were a lot last night in the latter category. At one point, Groucho/Frank went to fling himself onto an onstage sofa as Mr. Marx was wont to do. A huge dust cloud, probably visible from the balcony, burst forth. Frank broke up, the audience howled…and he did about five minutes on how the theater crew hadn't been able to find a proper couch in Riverside and had actually trucked this one in from a warehouse in La Mirada. For the rest of the show, every time he went to sit on the couch, he seated himself ever-so-daintily so as to not raise more dust. The whole evening was like that and we all laughed a lot. A lot.

Now, this is where I'd ordinarily tell you to rush to see him if and when he comes your way…and if you're anywhere near Longview, Washington, you can do that next Saturday. But outside that area, you may have a wait. Frank has another gig so his next scheduled Groucho appearances aren't 'til November — in Pomona, New Jersey and in Clinton Township, Michigan. If any pop up before then, I'll let you know here or you can occasionally check his schedule. Then maybe you can have an evening as much fun as the one we had last night…especially if you can manage to avoid the Pomona Freeway on a late Friday afternoon. I'm amazed I'm not still there.

Nikki Finke's Deadline Hollywood covers the "Will Comic-Con move?" question, complete with quotes from Yours Truly. And it's true: I really did once pay $50 to park at the L.A. Convention Center for a videogaming convention.

If you're an iPhoner and you listen to a lot of audiobooks and podcasts, know this: I'm really happy I bought an app called Audiobook & Podcast Player by Contity Consulting. I suppose there are a lot of these and that others work well…but this is the one I found and like. It'll play your audiobooks and podcasts and always track exactly where you left off, plus it lets you jump ahead and back with ease. A limited-time trial can be downloaded free and if you like it and want to unlimit it, it's only three bucks. This video will show you how it works.

Senator Al Franken (of all people) tells you what you need to know to maintain a smidgen of privacy on Facebook.

I was going to write a post about why I think it would not be a good thing for the Comic-Con International to move to Los Angeles but my pal Steven Grant has done the work for me. So I'll just pile on here…

The L.A. Convention Center is a terrible, terrible venue to have a convention. The building has a confusing and awkward layout where everything feels like a mile walk from everything else. The parking in the convention center itself is inadequate and you also walk forever. The parking in neighboring lots is also insufficient and there are times when the operators jack the prices up to grotesque levels. You know my annual joke, which is just about due, about how if you're going to the con in San Diego in July and expect to find a parking space, you should leave now? Well, if the con moves to the L.A. Convention Center in 2013 and you'll need a parking space, leave now.

There are not very many hotels around. There aren't all that many restaurants and when you go to them, you're competing for tables with people attending a Lakers game at the adjoining Staples Center, people attending a rock concert at the adjoining L.A. Live, etc.

I have been to comic book conventions at the L.A. Convention Center. I don't think any of them have been particularly successful and the facilities are a big reason. I have also been to trade shows of other kinds there. The more I recall them, the more I recall how much I dislike the place. I've complained about it here and here and probably other places on this blog…and I guess I've made my point which, come to think of it, Steven Grant already made.

Amazon is now cancelling advance orders for a book called The Groo Treasury, which we announced some time ago as a thick reprint collection of early tales of Groo the Wanderer, the silly endeavor I do with Sergio Aragonés. This is the same reprint collection for which some online merchants were asking $999.00 to sell you a used copy, even though the book has never been published. Anyway, the order cancellations have prompted a flood o' e-mail my way asking whassup?, what happened?, will it ever come out?

Here's whassup?: To reprint stories of that vintage, one needs to either have the original film of the color separations or one needs to scan printed comics and do lotsa touch-ups and tweaks. Printing from the original film is preferable — the quality is better — and lucky for us, we have the original film to all those issues. Unlucky for us is that we haven't been able to locate it all just yet. It's here. It's just not easily findable. So that's the reason for the delay. Once it's all located, the book will be scheduled again and I'll announce it here.

Our apologies…but don't you think it's kinda funny? Most comics have trouble getting their new issues out but their reprints, since they take less time, come out right on schedule. Only Groo has more trouble publishing reprints than new stories…

The merger of Continental Airlines and United Airlines will make things very convenient for me. Instead of two dreadful airlines I avoid, I'll only have to avoid one. Not only that but it may well doom that one. As my pal Joe Brancatelli notes, these airline mergers have a way of not working out.

Willie Mays turns 79 today. During the brief time I followed baseball in the sixties, there seemed to be some rule that said I, as an Angeleno, had to not only root for the Dodgers but to loathe the San Francisco Giants. I never quite understood why the public hating but my classmate Lewis used to pray for the swift and painful death of every Giant and most around me wished them at least a little grief, above and beyond losing games.

Still, there was one Giant that even Lewis couldn't hate: Willie. Lewis, like me, collected that year's Topps cards and one day when we were doing some trading, I noticed he had Mr. Mays in his Dodgers bundle. I asked him why and he said, "I dream of Willie coming to his senses and forcing the Giants to trade him to Los Angeles."

Our pal, James H. Burns, has an interesting article over in The Sporting News about the man, as opposed to the player. It's a small but nice little story.

Yes, if you live in Southern California, this could be your last chance (for a while, at least) to see Frank Ferrante in An Evening with Groucho, the show I plug here so incessantly that even Frank is sick of it. He and his fine piano player Jim Furmston will be onstage tomorrow night at the Fox Performing Arts Center in Riverside. The theater is running Duck Soup at 6:30 and then Frank will be performing at 8 PM.

Details on where it is and how to get tickets are here…and yes, there are seats available. The Fox Performing Arts Center has an awful lot of chairs in it. If you can come sit in one of them, you'll see what I've been raving about.