Monthly Archives: March 2013

I should have mentioned that I found that Steve Allen Show on the website of Kliph Nesteroff, your go-to guy for interviews and artifacts of great comedians…but more importantly of obscure comedians. You can find lots of fun things to read and watch over on Kliph's site.

I lunched this past Saturday with Kliph and superstar publicist Jeff Abraham. Nowhere in the world that day was there a table full of guys exchanging more trivial info and anecdotes about funnymen of days gone by. I was telling Arnold Stang stories, for God's sake. Anyway, we had this important summit meeting at the only appropriate place to talk about old, mostly-Jewish comedians — Canter's Delicatessen, a place where the food practically talks to you. The corned beef says, "Come…feast on me." The bagels wonder, "Wouldn't I taste good toasted?" Why, even the chopped liver asks, "What am I? Chopped Liver?"

Then I scurried over to a recording studio a few miles away where one of my favorite musical groups, Big Daddy, is slaving away on a new CD. You may remember me badgering you last September to pledge to a Kickstarter for them and you may recall the festive mood when, in no small part to many of you, they achieved and even exceeded their goal amount. They're working on that new CD and what I heard sounded terrific to me. They say they're on schedule to have it out whenever they said they were going to have it out and I can't wait. They're also talking about performing live again and I'll keep you posted as to if they do and where you can buy tickets after I do. Great stuff.

Jim Korkis sent me this link to a pretty good article about the movie parodies of MAD magazine. In case you don't have time to read the entire piece, I'll quote the last paragraph, which is especially good…

MAD has never been successfully sued, but that hasn't stopped people from trying. The magazine once received a letter from Lucasfilm's legal department after their Empire Strikes Back parody, demanding that they recall all printed copies of the issue and destroy them. MAD replied by sending a copy of another letter they had received the previous month — from George Lucas, offering to buy the original artwork for the Empire parody and comparing Mort Drucker to Leonardo Da Vinci and the parody's writer, Dick DeBartolo, to Mark Twain. They never heard from Lucasfilm's legal department again.

For a couple of years in the sixties, beginning while new episodes were still being run in the evenings, CBS ran reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show every morning, Monday through Friday. When I was not in school, I rarely missed them. They were the best thing about being home sick.

Back then, it was not uncommon to move a long-running show into syndicated or daytime reruns while the series was still on in prime time and usually, they'd change the name of it. Gunsmoke reruns ran under the title, Marshall Dillon. Dragnet reruns became Badge 714. You Bet Your Life became The Best of Groucho. And I'm not sure but I don't believe the Sgt. Bilko program was ever called Sgt. Bilko in prime time. It started as You'll Never Get Rich and later changed to The Phil Silvers Show. I think it was only when CBS sold the reruns for daytime airing to NBC that it became Sgt. Bilko…in TV Guide if not on the screen. My recollection is that they called it Sgt. Bilko in the listings and it could have any of its three names when you saw it on the air, depending on which prints they had handy.

The Dick Van Dyke Show became The Dick Van Dyke Daytime Show…a minor change. The episodes were cut by a minute or so and they had different end credits. In the original airings, the credits displayed a picture of the sponsor's product — usually, Kent Cigarettes. The plug was replaced, as you'll see, by a portrait of Mr. Van Dyke which I believe is on most prints these days. Here, thanks to the good offices of Shokus Video, is a peek at The Dick Van Dyke Daytime Show…

Okay. If it says it's 9:05 AM above then the timestamp problem is fixed and all subsequent posts should be right.

Sorrentino's Seafood House was one of several Southland restaurants owned and operated by members of the Sorrentino family. It was located at the corner of Pass Avenue and Riverside in Burbank. A few blocks away was the more upscale Alfonse's, run by the famous chef, Alfonse Sorrentino. The seafood restaurant was reportedly run by two of his cousins. Whoever ran it, it was a great place that at lunchtime was packed with folks in the entertainment industry. When I was working for the Ruby-Spears animation studio, Joe Ruby and I used to go over my scripts at a table at Sorrentino's.

I liked lunch there better than dinner, though both were great. At lunchtime, most entrees came with an amazing kind of potato I've never encountered anywhere else. It was halfway between the consistency of a baked potato and mashed — something like a pudding — and laced with onion. It was not listed as a side dish on the menu, which may explain why it didn't seem to have a name. Every time I asked a waitress what it was called, the answer was "It's just something the chef whips up at lunchtime." He did not whip it up at dinner and believe me: I asked.

The photo above is of Sorrentino's banquet room which got a lot of traffic from TV shows and movies holding wrap parties or press conferences. I rented it a few times on behalf of CAPS, the Comic Art Professional Society, back when I was on its Board of Directors. The food was good, the staff was great. The only reason I can imagine for its closure in the eighties was that they didn't do as much business in the evenings as they did for lunch. An awful lot of deals were concluded and script meetings held in its lush, red booths. I miss it and I miss those potatoes.

The Supreme Court's hearing arguments today — right this moment I think because this message, despite what you may read, was posted at 8:32 AM — on the all-consuming topic of Gay Marriage. This is to say a bunch of attorneys are in a courtroom, selling their positions and engaging in banter with the various justices who had their minds made up long ago. Shortly, various reporters will try to predict the vote based on the way Scalia scratched his nose or some random syllable Roberts uttered. I hereby resolve not to place even a milligram of faith in such predictions. They've recently had about the same track record for accuracy as Dick Morris on a bad day. Dick Morris hasn't had a good day for predictions since 1974 when he ordered bacon-and-eggs in a Denny's in Atlanta, Georgia and predicted it would come with grits. Somewhere in my garage, I have a Magic 8-Ball that can make just as accurate a forecast of the highest court in the land. It'll probably say, "Ask again later, picture cloudy."

Even if we don't know where SCOTUS is heading, we know where the country's going. More and more former opponents of same-sex wedlock are "evolving" every day, rushing to get on the right side of history while there's still time…and — you notice? — nobody prominent ever evolves in the other direction. My (oft-mentioned here) cynical side suspects that the ones who are now open to Adam and Steve as a married couple are shifting because it's just not as valuable an issue as it once was for getting right-wing supporters fired-up to donate and get out the vote.

I have a few right-wing friends who are to the point of now arguing that allowing gays to marry one another is really the conservative position. I also have one or two who are still wrestling with how to walk back their former deeply-held positions…or maybe they're just afraid of what's next. They spent so much time telling us that Gay Marriage would lead to everyone marrying cocker spaniels that they have trouble turning loose of that. It's amazing how many Slippery Slopes aren't all that slippery when you actually get onto them.

Further tech problems (which involved our relocation to yet another new server — one that is all our own) kept this weblog down most of yesterday. This will not happen again. I hope, I hope, I hope. For service above and beyond duty, I would like to thank Glenn Hauman here…and I will thank him in person later this week at WonderCon, taking him out for a lavish dinner and allowing him to order anything he likes on the menu as long as the first two letters are "Mc."

I still have one or three cosmetic things to put back the way they're supposed to be. The biggie is that for some reason, the server on which this site now operates doesn't know what time it is. It will tell you via this message was posted at 3:14 AM. It wasn't. It's around 8:30 as I write this. The next message or two (at least) will be similarly unstuck in time. Isn't it shocking to know you can't always believe what you read on the Internet?

I've been writing here about how today's talk shows lack spontaneity. We have here an example of a talk show where very little was planned, even less was scripted…and all depended on the ability of the host and guests to ad-lib. Fortunately, that host was Steve Allen — a very witty man and as you'll see if you watch this, a very brave one, as well.

This is an episode from 1962 of a 90-minute late night show he did that was syndicated by Westinghouse. It was done from a theater on Vine Street a few blocks south of Sunset and very close to a funky, all-night open-air food store called The Hollywood Ranch Market. Steverino and his merry band of co-conspirators often did stunts out in the street (this video opens with one) and they frequently involved the Hollywood Ranch Market which, sad to say, is no longer there.

This incarnation of The Steve Allen Show was utterly unpredictable. Not only did you never know what was going to happen on it but it was quite obvious that Steve often didn't know. If you stick it through to near the end, you'll see Steve interview a lady who had been dubbed Miss Mattress and who was on to promote mattresses. Steve does not introduce her. The show's announcer, Johnny Jacobs, brings her on and that's the first Steve knows about the guest he's to interview. No notes. No rehearsal. Just Steve Allen winging it. And if you stay through to the credits, you'll note that this show, which ran 90 minutes, had a writing staff that consisted of two men — Mike Marmer and Stan Burns plus whatever Steve contributed.

The show also did not put much emphasis on Big Name Guests. Sometimes, they had one or more. Sometimes, not. They often didn't billboard guests at the top because they did these shows two or three at a time — that is, two or three taped on the same evening — and sometimes didn't decide until well into the taping of an episode if a given guest waiting backstage would be in that episode or the next one.

I remember watching this show — which aired from 1962-1964 — whenever I didn't have to be at school the next day. KTLA Channel 5 aired it at 11:20 following a 15-minute 11 PM newscast and an odd little five minute show on which comedian Cliff Norton would give the weather forecast. It has been rarely seen since then but I'm told the Steve Allen Estate has every episode in its vaults. I wish they'd release them because it was such a funny, wacky program. I suspect you'd see an awful lot of things on it that were later considered revolutionary and ground-breaking when done by others. This is not the best episode but at the moment, it's all we've got…

This blog has been up today more than yesterday but we're still having some problems. We'll get 'em fixed. In the meantime, it is not necessary to send me messages telling me my blog is down. Thanks but I usually know…and if I don't know, I'm away from it and in no position to do anything about it.

Ted Herrmann wrote me to say…

I only hope Leno doesn't do a long fade into obscurity like Merv did — seemed like his syndicated show went on for years and years…and years.

There are performers — though I don't know that Jay is one of them — who'd be quite happy with any show that went on for years and years…and years. I have a friend who got a job some time back as a regular in a sitcom. Before it went on, we were at a party and someone said to him, "I hope it's the next Bob Newhart Show." He said, "I'd rather it was the next Perfect Strangers." He explained he'd be more comfy with a series that didn't draw a lot of attention but did draw enough of an audience that (a) he felt he was entertaining a huge chunk of America and (b) it stayed on a long, long time. Perfect Strangers was on for eight seasons. The Bob Newhart Show was on for six.

You can want all sorts of different things as a performer. You can be primarily motivated by money. You can yearn to have people recognizing you in restaurants. You can want artistic satisfaction or recognition. If you got a TV series, you might want it to be the capstone of your career or you might want it to catapult you into movies. A powerful wish by some is that — never mind fame or fortune — they just won't have to go out and look for a job for a while…and they hope that when they finally do, they don't have to go back to auditioning like an unknown beginner.

Leno's kind of different from other guys who've done talk shows in that he has a second career that is very lucrative and which he enjoys very much: Doing stand-up. If he lost The Tonight Show and never got another talk show again, he could probably be pretty happy and well-compensated just working in Las Vegas and doing concert dates until such time as he was standing-up with the aid of a walker. I can't think of anyone else who ever hosted a talk show for any length of time who had that kind of fallback position. Pat Sajak, when he did his, still had Wheel of Fortune but his talk show was more like a temp job…something to do in his spare time when he wasn't selling vowels. Carson wasn't going to go out and play Vegas, Letterman isn't going to go out and play Vegas, Conan wasn't going to go out and play Vegas…

I dunno what to make of this supposed interest from Fox. If Jay is really going to be taken off The Tonight Show, as seems increasingly his destiny, there will probably be some kind of fight over how long NBC will be able to prevent him from engaging elsewhere. That may be all they're talking about right now over there. Fox may not want to wait, feeling that Jay will cool off too much before they get him. If they do want him when he's available, the next question would be the terms of the deal and the solidity of their commitment. I doubt he'd go there if there was a chance of being dumped in six months or a year. If I were in his position, I'd try demanding a clause that established a certain minimum acceptable ratings level for my show and specified that I could not be cancelled as long as I didn't dip below it for X consecutive months.

When I think of what's gone on with Leno, I'm reminded of a quote from Ken Berry, who starred in a spin-off of The Andy Griffith Show called Mayberry, R.F.D. It was the fifteenth highest-rated show and #1 in its time slot when CBS decided to purge itself of "rural" shows and cancelled it. Berry let his anger seep into public view and said, "I feel like I played by their rules, I won by their rules…and then they changed their rules." I don't feel sorry for Jay because I think it's insane to feel even a tinge of sympathy for a guy who's doing that well. I just like following this story because it reminds me that the one certain thing about show business is that that there are no certain things in show business. Except that whatever you watch, there's always a Geico commercial.

It's Stooges Sunday here at newsfromme.com and today's was the fourth short subject starring Moe, Larry and Curley (later known as Curly). It's Three Little Pigskins and it came out December 8, 1934, a little more than two years after the release of Horse Feathers, a Marx Brothers film with a similar storyline.

What's notable about it? Well, its similarity to Horse Feathers, for one. The presence of a blonde (and new to movies) Lucille Ball, for another. It's also supposed to be the first film in which the Stooges demanded and got stunt doubles.

The way Moe always told the story, the director wanted them to do this scene in which all the other players dogpile on top of them. Moe, on behalf of himself and his fellow knuckleheads, refused, saying they'd get hurt. He said that earlier in the filming, Larry had lost a tooth when a faked punch was botched and turned real, and that Curly broke his leg in the dumbwaiter scene which you'll see in the film. Curly doesn't appear to have a broken leg in the rest of the movie so I don't know what that's all about.

Anyway, Moe said no to do the dogpile scene. The director argued it was safe. Moe put his foot down and finally, filming shut down for an hour or two until suitable stunt doubles were brought in. The scene was shot, everyone piled onto the stunt guys…and when it was all over, the doubles had multiple broken bones. At least, that's how Moe told the story. It's apparently the shot with the photographer.

The football scenes were shot at Gilmore Stadium, which was located at the corner of Fairfax and Beverly — where CBS Television City now stands. You can spot a few Gilmore signs in the background plus there's the name on the scoreboard. You can also see the sign for the Fairfax Theater, which is now closed and awaiting demolition…but it's still right where it was at that intersection.

Here's the film. Forgive me if there are commercial interruptions…