I have many messages this morning arguing whether that's Zeppo playing Groucho in the Animal Crackers clip. This may well be one of those "we'll never know for sure" things and no one writing me seems to have anything more to go on except whether they think it sounds like Groucho or not. My view is, like I said, I think it's Zeppo but it wouldn't shock me if it was Groucho.
Buzz Dixon makes an interesting point to me in an e-mail. The transition on American Bandstand from kids dancing like they did when not on TV to kids performing for the camera may not have had that much to do with music videos. The kids on Bandstand probably picked that up from watching the teens who danced on Soul Train.
Dick Clark had what I guess was a mixed reaction to that syndicated series. You know how people will say something as a joke but you get the feeling the joke reflects something they really feel but don't want to admit? Dick would joke that Don Cornelius (host/creator of Soul Train) "stole everything from me including my initials." Dick didn't think he really owned the idea of a teen dance party show but he thought they were all sold by somebody saying, "Hey, let's imitate Dick Clark's show." I don't think what he was really sore at the imitators for, as he saw it, ripping him off. I think he was sore at himself for not thinking to market a black version of Bandstand before Soul Train came along.
One of the projects I did with Dick was a short-lived series for ABC that was kinda like Laugh-In but without the success. It was called The Half-Hour Comedy Hour, not to be confused with a couple of other shows with similar names…or the same one. Dick was the producer but he kept turning up in sketches, including one where Arsenio Hall played Don Cornelius. In it, Dick came on at the end and hit "Don" with a pie…and I recall him enjoying that a lot. An awful lot.