Monthly Archives: September 2012

Today is the 95th birthday of the First Lady of Cartoon Voices, June Foray. It's still a little fuzzy as to when she started doing that. She used to tell all who asked that her first job in animation was speaking for Lucifer, the cat in Cinderella, which came out in 1950, which would probably mean she recorded her part in 1949 or 1948. Historians have since found what seems to be June in a few earlier cartoons but that wouldn't (couldn't) make her body of work any more impressive.

And she is still working. She's playing Granny on The Looney Tunes Show. She occasionally guests in her Emmy-winning role as Mrs. Cauldron on The Garfield Show. She recently recorded the voice of Rocket J. Squirrel for an upcoming Rocky & Bullwinkle short. She's really amazing and is, of course, much loved by all who know who she is and what she's done.

I was trying to think of a great June Foray video I could put up here today…and I had many from which to choose: All her work for Jay Ward, all her work for Warner Brothers, all her work for Walter Lantz, etc. I settled on maybe the least impressive film to which she ever contributed…and I don't expect you to watch all or even most of this. I certainly never have. But at least watch the opening titles…

Rod Dreher writes one of the smartest pieces about the current Mitt Romney flap and the reaction to it among Conservatives. They never seem to learn from those moments when things collapse around them. And those moments are easy to spot. They all seem to involve Rush Limbaugh screaming at them to "Double Down!"

I also wanted to steal/quote a paragraph from my pal Kevin Drum…

The last 30 years in the United States have been better for the rich than any time or place in human history. High-end incomes are up spectacularly. Tax rates are down. Welfare reform has been the law of the land for 15 years. Private sector unions are all but extinct. The wages that business owners pay to their employees have been virtually flat for more than a decade. For the rich, it's been a golden age. And yet, America's wealthy class nonetheless seem to be in an absolute fury. The looters want their money, the government is resorting to socialism, the president who rescued the banking industry hates them, and their tax dollars are all going to support a bunch of freeloaders and shirkers.

I don't have an explanation but I'd been thinking the same thing. For some, Too Much is never enough.

There are an awful lot of articles out today about Mitt Romney's silly dismissal of 47% of the electorate as "takers" who don't pay taxes…or whatever he said. Ezra Klein has the simplest explanation of why Romney is wrong.

A friend of mine told me this story. He went into a restaurant in Santa Barbara and noticed John Cleese sitting at a table. He mentioned to the manager, "It must be great to have the funniest man in the world eating in your restaurant." The manager corrected him. "The two funniest men," he said and he pointed to another table on the other side of the place.

Dining there was Jonathan Winters.

What's interesting to me about this story is that I don't think there are too many people who would have a problem with it. They might think the list of the two funniest men in the world should include one or two other names but I don't think anyone would consider Mssrs. Cleese and Winters as unlikely contenders. The times I've been around Jonathan, conversations were often interrupted by people stopping by to tell him he was the funniest man who ever lived.

The amazing thing about him — and the thing that has so many of his peers in drop-dead awe — is that his humor is so organic. With most comedians, you can hear their sources and inspirations and maybe even, if you listen real hard, hear their staff of writers deliver the material. But what Jonathan does and has been doing for years comes out of nowhere and no one but Jonathan.

All of this is by way of telling you that when Stu Shostak launches his new season of Stu's Show Wednesday afternoon, his guest for 2+ hours will be Jonathan Winters. Way to go, Stuart.

I'll try and remind you tomorrow but for now you should know that you can experience Stu's Show two ways. The show starts at 4 PM Pacific (7 PM Eastern) and if you listen then at the Stu's Show website, it's free. If you can't listen then, all is not lost. Beginning shortly after, you'll be able to download the 2+ hours (betcha it runs close to three) from that site. It'll only cost you 99 cents but if you have a brain in that module you call your head, you'll select some other webcasts from the voluminous Stu's Show Archives and download four episodes for three bucks. It's a great bargain and it'll be a great interview.

Last evening, Carolyn and I attended a very nice birthday party for the wonderful Ms. June Foray, who turns 95 tomorrow. The event was arranged by Stu Shostak of Stu's Show but mainly by the lady in his life, the wonderful Jeanine Kasun. (And before I forget: This Wednesday, Stu starts a new season of his popular internet radio show and boy, has he snagged himself a great guest. Details later today.)

The party for June was filled with friends and family and actors and animators and voice actors and me and all sorts of interesting folks. I got to meet Fred Frees, who is now following in the voice tracks of his late father, the amazing Paul Frees. Marvin Kaplan was there…and Rose Marie. Have I mentioned that Rose Marie recently recorded a role for The Garfield Show? The episode won't be completed for some time but I had her playing a witch who's the sister of the witch June plays on the series, the role she officially got the Emmy for. If you know of my love for The Dick Van Dyke Show, you can kind of imagine what it means to me to work with and get to know one of that show's stars.

I'd better not start listing who was there because I'll leave too many out and hurt too many feelings. Let's just say June has a lot of fascinating friends and they enjoyed celebrating her upcoming birthday. (Someone asked her how it felt to be 95 and she said, "I'll tell you on Tuesday.")

I was asked to make a speech and I had in mind to tell the best June Foray anecdote I know, which is a terrific story. But the party ran long and when it came time, I decided to skip the talk. I think I'm going to save that anecdote for a party in about five years. Because the way June's going, I'm gonna need it.

And Kliph Nesteroff strikes again with Part One of an interview with Stanley Dean, who was briefly part of Norman and Dean, another in the long list of comedy teams of whom someone said wrongly, "They're the next Martin and Lewis." There were hundreds of such pairings and it's worth noting that while Rowan and Martin got farther than all the others and Allen and Rossi were hot for about a week, there still has not been a next Martin and Lewis.

Anyway, read what Mr. Dean has to say about Rodney Dangerfield.

Kliph Nesteroff is this fellow I met over the 'net and once in person. He's running around interviewing every older comedian he can find and every one of his conversations is interesting. There's a new one up with Shecky Greene and another with Ed Asner, who's not really a comedian but he's close enough. If you go read either, you'll find links to many others you'll enjoy.

You might also enjoy hearing Kliph interviewed. He sat down recently with Marc Maron and told many stories from his interviewees and about landing those interviews. We recommend a click.

Y'know, Rita Hayworth was a pretty good dancer…

Earlier today, extolling the virtues of the mash-up masters, Big Daddy, I suggested you go listen to some of their records on their website. It might have been a good idea if I'd remembered to include a link to their website.

And on this page, you can listen to most of what they recorded when they were active.

See how good they are, then go support their new Kickstarter campaign. Many of you already have but more would help.

Joshua Green reviews a book that attempts to answer the question of why there aren't any good right-wing comedians? There are, of course, good comedians who are right-wing but that's not the same thing.

Me, I think it flows from something basic: Comedy is about taking on the rich and powerful, not siding with them. The first great American comedy movie star was a tramp, not a banker. To the extent it's funny watching a person slip on a banana peel, it's funny to have it be a fat, pompous tycoon as opposed to, say, a homeless person. A lot of comedy is about bringing the powerful and inflated down to "our" level so it's done from a lower POV. You couldn't make a Marx Brothers movie and have Margaret Dumont be the funny one.

If you were ever a fan of The Larry Sanders Show (i.e., if you ever saw The Larry Sanders Show), you'll want to clear a week and read Edward Copeland's three-part essay/history of the series. Copeland gets a bit too gushy at times, even for a guy like me who thought it was one of the best sitcoms ever done on television, but he has lots of interesting insights and behind-the-scenes material, plus there are tons of links to great clips. Here's Part One, here's Part Two and here's Part Three. And don't bother clicking on any of them until you have a lot of time to spend on it.

I generally like Bill Clinton though I must admit two of my reasons aren't very good ones. One is that he's a great, charismatic speaker and we don't have a lot of those these days. The other is that I tend to side with people who are unjustly attacked and I think we had 8+ years in this country of Bill Clinton's political enemies just making up lies about him and ginning up phony scandals they could be outraged about.

That said, whatever favorable feelings I have about the man have to be weighed against certain realities. I'm not at all comfy with a lot of the deregulation he left us with or with some of the ways he's earned bucks since leaving the Oval Office. Matt Stoller runs them down for us.

Years ago, I was a big fan of a local musical group called Big Daddy. They had a gimmick: They'd take modern songs — "modern" being defined more or less as anything since Kennedy was shot — and rearrange them to sound like fifties' tunes. But they were also a very good band — good singers, good musicians, good arrangements. I dragged a lot of friends out to see Big Daddy play at a local club that ain't there no more called At My Place, and I of course bought all the Big Daddy records and even hired one of their number to do some voices on Garfield and Friends.

Here's the kind of thing they did. This is the infamous Barry Manilow "I Write the Songs" as arranged and rearranged by Big Daddy. Ignore the silly Shakespearean open which was part of the show on which they appeared…

Good stuff. Big Daddy did several albums which are alas not all in print but which they have happily (for us) posted online at their website. You can also purchase them as digital downloads on Amazon or iTunes. Go there, listen around and I think you'll become a fan. Which brings us to the next step…

The core members of Big Daddy have reunited and are working on a new album which they're attempting to fund via Kickstarter. I have received literally hundreds of requests to plug, endorse or otherwise urge followers of this site to support Kickstarter campaigns and until now, I just kind of put them off and declined to get involved. I will probably still abstain on those who ask but the Big Daddy guys didn't ask…so go to this page and pledge to support them. At this moment, they're $31,880 from making this new creation a reality. Here's more about it…