Monthly Archives: October 2014

• Never confuse what should happen with what will happen.

Around 1982, I decided the time had come to purchase a projection TV — one of those big, wall-sized jobbies. The Advent was the best-selling brand but there were a few dozen makes and models on the market. Which one to buy, which one to buy?

Fortunately, I had by then developed my foolproof, never miss, infallible method of determining which item of audio or video equipment is the one to purchase. It involves careful and meticulous research, a comprehensive understanding of the technology and specifications of every product, a full and exhaustive working knowledge of all the manufacturers, their track records and — most crucial — staying close enough to the industry to be aware of what's in the pipeline and will soon be released.

My method involves all of this. But you'll notice that I did not say that I, personally, do any of it.

No. What I personally do is to call my pal Marc Wielage and just buy whatever he tells me to buy. He does all that stuff. Marc is a highly-respected video engineer and author of countless articles and reviews that cover not only consumer audio and/or video equipment but professional hardware, as well. I've known him for something like forty years and I've never known him to be wrong about anything except, obviously, the proper spelling of the name "Mark."

So I called him, told him what I had in mind and asked him what he said was the easiest question he'd fielded in months. The answer was: "The Kloss Novabeam."

I replied, "Kloss Novabeam? Not the Advent?"

"No," he moaned as if I'd asked him if I could get decent TV reception on a G.E. toaster oven. "The Novabeam is the best projection TV out today, by far." At that moment, I'm sure he was right.

He explained to me that the Kloss Novabeam was designed and manufactured by Henry Kloss, a legendary figure in the fields of, first, audio technology and, more recently, home video. Among many other credits, Mr. Kloss was one of the inventors of the acoustic suspension loudspeaker, the high selectivity FM radio, the first audio cassette unit to employ Dolby B noise reduction, and the first successful audio product to utilize transistors, the Model 11 portable phonograph.

In the area of home video, he had presided over the invention and marketing of the original Advent projection televisions. Then he left Advent — reportedly, not of his own free will — and began marketing the Kloss Novabeam in direct competition. It was, Marc assured me, superior in every way to the Advent.

"Okay," I said. "Any idea where I can buy a Kloss Novabeam?"

"Only one place you can get it in town," Marc responded. "Go to Federated Electronics. They have the exclusive in L.A. But one thing — if you go in there, they're gonna try to sell you an Advent. They have tons of them piled up in their warehouses but they sell the Novabeams as fast as they can get them in."

The next day, I walked into the Projection TV section of my nearest Federated store and, sure enough, the salesguy immediately tried to sell me an Advent. Marc knows of what he speaks.

"I'm interested in the Kloss Novabeam," I said, looking around. "I don't seem to see one on display here…"

"The Advent is a very fine piece of equipment," he proclaimed. "It's the best-selling make. In fact, I just had a customer stop in and tell me how happy he is with the Advent I sold him."

"I'd like to see the Kloss Novabeam, please."

"Just take a look at this Advent. I'll put a tape on and you'll see how vivid the colors are, how bright the picture —"

"Kloss Novabeam, please."

"Oh, and the Advent has some other great features…"

"Kloss Novabeam," I said.

"Another thing about the Advent. It's real easy to get parts for them and…"

It was only when I started for the exit that he sighed and led me into a back room. There, sure enough, a working Kloss Novabeam was on display.

"We keep it back here," he explained. "If we had it out there next to the Advent, we'd never sell another Advent."

"Fine," I said. "I'll take one."

— only I didn't take one. I had it delivered. Those suckers were big.

The Kloss Novabeam worked just as Marc had said it would, which is not to say I ever doubted his counsel. The unit was in two parts. One was a big, six-foot (diagonally-measured) screen which took up an entire wall of what, thereafter, I could only refer to as my TV Room. The image was projected onto it from three lenses — one red, one blue, one green — mounted in a console that stood in the center of the room, something like a small coffee table.

For months, my guests and I would sit by that small coffee table and enjoy TV shows and movies blown up with amazing brightness and clarity. The only drawback was that, outta force o' habit, I was always pointing the remote control at the TV screen to no apparent effect. One had to remember to point the remote at the small coffee table since that, not the screen, was the TV set.

All was peachy until one day, about eleven months after my Novabeam had entered my life. Suddenly, its picture became dull, blurry and overly green. When I watched The CBS Evening News with Dan Rather on it, it looked as if Dan and the newsmakers of the day were submerged in a big vat of lime jello. And now that I think of it, if Dan had actually done things like that, he'd still be on the air.

Amazingly — for when appliances go kablooey, you usually discover the warranty expired ten minutes before — my Novabeam was still covered. I called Federated and they dispatched a gentleman who knew approximately as much about fixing Novabeams as I know about fixing a ruptured aorta. Matter of fact, in a head-to-head contest, I'd lay serious money that I could learn and perform quadruple-bypass surgery before this clown could locate the Novabeam "on" button.

"Gotta take it into shop," he finally announced. And it was not until he put the coffee table half (only) of my Novabeam on his truck and drove off that something dawned on me. I had not heard him say anything about bringing it back from the shop.

Indeed, he did not. No one did. Days passed and I saw nothing of my Novabeam console. And when I tried calling Federated, the following happened…

1. I would wait on hold for 5-10 minutes before someone came on the line.
2. I would explain my situation to the person and they would take down my invoice number and name and say, "Let me check on it and I'll be right back with you."
3. They would put me on hold.

And that, by God, was it. #4 was me surrendering after a long, long wait and hanging up. Once placed on hold, I would remain there indefinitely, listening to tinny phone-Muzak. Not once did they ever come back.

I put one such call on my speakerphone and sat here working, waiting for Godot or a human being to get back on the line. Neither did. The first time, I admitted defeat after 45 minutes. Subsequent calls, I surrendered after 10 or 15 minutes of sitting there, wondering why a firm that specialized in high-end audio and electronics had such crappy hold music.

With each attempt, I would increasingly impress upon the Federated employee how I was always being placed forever on hold when I called, never to return. Each time, the person on the other end would assure me that they would be right back with me. They would then put me on hold and immediately retire and move to Florida — or something of the sort.

Finally, I had to act. I phoned Wielage again and asked him what to do. He gave me the phone number in Massachusetts of a Vice-President of the Kloss Novabeam Company. I called and explained the situation to the man who said, "Let me put you on hold…"

I yelled into the phone, "DON'T PUT ME ON HOLD! I never come back from there!"

But he swore he'd return…and that turned out to be a fib. I never spoke to that man again. However, less than a minute after he'd sent me to Limbo, someone else came on the line and said, "Tell me the problem."

I asked, "To whom am I speaking, please?"

"Kloss," the man said. "Henry Kloss." Well, that was impressive.

Amazed I'd reached the Head Honcho so quickly, I blurted out the story. I got as far as the third or fourth time they left me twisting in the wind on hold when he interrupted: "How long did they make you wait?"

I told him. He sounded politely skeptical. "You sure you're not exaggerating?"

"Mr. Kloss," I said, "I will give you the number and my invoice data and you call them. Pretend you're me and see what they do to you. But you might want to send out for pizza first."

"I've got a better idea," he said. "You call and I'll listen in. Give me the phone number." I did and he switched us over to three-way calling and dialed the service number of Federated Electronics. It was like I was phoning them again but he was eavesdropping.

A cheery young lady only kept me on hold about two minutes before taking down all my data, saying "I'll be right back" and putting me back on hold, where she thought I belonged. As we listened to the bad music, I said to Mr. Kloss, "My phone has a little timer. It's now been two minutes and —"

He interrupted. "— and forty seconds. I'm running a stopwatch on it." We made idle chit-chat about how much, apart from this, I loved my Novabeam…and we waited. And waited. And waited some more.

How long they would have left us there, we'll never know. After five minutes, Henry Kloss said, "This is unacceptable" and hung up on them. I was still on the line, feeling vindicated in my claim. He then told me, "Okay, just listen" and made another three-way call. This time, it was his turn to talk, mine to snoop.

I shall now attempt to re-create that call. I do not recall the name of the executive involved and I'm cleaning up the language but otherwise, this is pretty much what was said. The first voice you hear with be that of the switchboard operator…

WOMAN #1: Federated Electronics.

KLOSS: Peter Johnson, please.

WOMAN #1: One moment…

(short pause, bad music)

WOMAN #2: Peter Johnson's office.

KLOSS: Let me speak to Peter. This is Henry Kloss.

WOMAN #2: Mr. Kloss, Mr. Johnson is in a conference at the moment. Can he get back to you?

KLOSS: No. Interrupt his conference. No, wait. First, I want you to take down some information. Mark, give her your name, invoice number, all that stuff…

(I quickly furnish the requested info, then I shut up.)

KLOSS: Okay. Now, interrupt his conference. Tell him Henry Kloss is on the line and I'm furious and he'd better take my call right this minute if he knows what's good for him.

WOMAN #2: (a bit shaky) I'll tell him.

(another short pause, more bad music)

JOHNSON: (dripping with friendliness) Henry! How the hell are you?

KLOSS: Furious, that's how the hell I am. Two months ago, a customer named Mark Evanier had his Novabeam picked up by you for servicing and he's never seen it, never heard a word from you. When he calls up to inquire, you put him on hold and ignore him.

JOHNSON: Oh no, we don't do that…

KLOSS: You just did it to me.

JOHNSON: Well, we've had a little shortage in the service division…

KLOSS: That's not my problem and it's not his problem. I want him to get his Novabeam back immediately. Your secretary has all the information.

JOHNSON: I will personally look into it and make sure he gets it back in the next few days.

KLOSS: No. Not the next few days. You've had it for two months. You don't get a few more days. I'm phoning Mr. Evanier in one hour. If he does not have a working Novabeam in his home, I'm canceling every damn contract I have with you. I will not have my products sold by a company that treats a customer like that. My name is on that product.

JOHNSON: Henry, be reasonable. We may not be able to find or fix his Novabeam in an hour…

KLOSS: Then give him a new one. At your expense. Now, you have one hour. Goodbye.

He clicked off that call, then directed his attention to me. "Talk to you in one hour," he said. And he hung up.

Fifty-four minutes later, I heard a squeal of tires outside. I opened my door and two men were sprinting up my front walkway with a brand-new Kloss Novabeam. They were just hooking it up and testing the picture when the phone rang again. The entire conversation went as follows — and this one, I am quoting verbatim:

ME: Hello?

KLOSS: This is Kloss. You got it?

ME: I got it. Thanks.

KLOSS: Call me personally if you have any trouble in the future.

And with that, he clicked off and I never had to call him again. His product served me well for about another ten years…and while that's not as long as I might have liked, it did manage to outlive the Federated Electronics chain. Gee, I wonder how a big company like that could possibly go out of business.

• I tried to watch the new YouTube series with Harry Shearer as Richard Nixon but 18 and a half minutes of it were missing.

Bill Maher's piece about what's happening in Kansas…

The other day I heard some Talking Head on CNN puzzling over why, if Congress has an approval rating two points below Ebola, so many of us will soon re-elect our same Congressperson. I don't see why that's such a mystery. We may hate the institution as a whole but we can only vote for our guy or gal and we may well be satisfied with him or her.

More to the point, we may be satisfied with the party he or she represents. I'm a Democrat and while there was a time in the past I could and did vote for Republicans, I don't think that could happen today. Today, for a Republican to get my vote, a candidate would have to move to the center in a way that would probably make him or her unpalatable to too many Republicans. You can't win an election in this country when you lose votes from your party and count on members of the opposition party.

And even if a Republican did say the things that might get me to vote for him/her, what are the chances of that person going to Washington and not toeing the party line? Or having any power?

Now, if it turned out that the Democratic candidate had a history of felonies and sex crimes…well, I'd probably vote against that person or perhaps not vote for anyone. But in the absence of something like that, I'm kinda stuck voting for the Democrat. If I want to vote for someone who has a chance of winning, at least.

(I understand the premise of voting for Independents but I don't think it works, at least at the Congressional level. I don't think it sends a message to anyone. I don't think it empowers future candidacies. I think it has the same impact as not voting and I wish that wasn't the case. And anyway, there are no Independents on my ballot in this election — not for Congress, not for Governor, not for Lieutenant Governor, etc.)

So: My choice on this ballot is the Democrat or the Republican. If the Democrat was still Henry Waxman, I'd vote for him because I was actually quite happy with Henry Waxman. I told pollsters I had a low opinion of Congress but I had a high opinion of Henry Waxman.

Since it's now Ted Lieu running with the "D" after his name, I'm voting for Ted Lieu. His G.O.P. opponent, Elan Carr, has a very vague platform that suggests he's for a lots of things that Democrats oppose but is trying not to admit that in a heavily-Democratic precinct. My guess is he has about the same chance of winning as I do…and I'm not even running.

And if he did win, he'd go to Washington and vote the way the Republican leadership told him to vote. That's kind of what I'm voting against. I'm against giving them another vote in Congress.

I don't like any of this. I'd like to think I could vote for a person who'd cross the aisle and side with the other team when they're right, as other teams sometimes are. But I don't think there is such a person on my ballot so I have to just vote the party. Which is what everyone does these days, which is why we keep sending the same people back to a Congress we hate.

I just set the ol' TiVo to record Michael Feinstein at the Rainbow Room, a new special that debuts on PBS on October 31. I have a little preview of it for you.

It's always nice to see masters of cabaret performing like Mr. Feinstein and his guests. It's also nice to see that the Rainbow Room is open and operating again. In case you don't know the place, it's a swanky supper club located on the 65th floor of 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan. The place opened in 1934 and for many years, it was the highest dining establishment in the U.S. and folks went as much for the view as the food, the entertainment and the chance to see celebrities.

It closed in 2009 for a remodel and some feared that was just "spin" and that the place would never reopen…but reopen it did, just recently. I assume they didn't remodel the pricing, which struck me on my one visit there — to hear Joe Williams years ago — as just as high as the Rainbow Room.

I also recall getting as dressed-up as is humanly possible when you're me and still receiving a withering, nose-in-the-air sneer from the maître d'hôtel, who seemed well aware his job description had two circonflexes in it. I actually said to him, "Don't worry. When the rest of my party arrives in a few minutes, they'll be better-dressed than I am." A man of great class, he resisted the temptation to say, "They'd have to be." But you could tell he wanted to.

I still have such guilt about that, I may have to get into my tux before I watch this special…

Ted Cruz's Deputy Chief Of Staff Nick Muzin tweeted, "Before Obamacare, there had never been a confirmed case of Ebola in the U.S."

Yeah. And before Ted Cruz was running around saying stupid things like that, we didn't have Ebola in this country, either. I see a direct cause-and-effect there.

Running around today, mostly working on the Freberg Tribute. I hear we're close to sold out…

Funny thing about that. Whenever I hear someone say "Order now! We're sure to sell out!", I think, "Why are you telling me that? If you're really going to sell out, why are you hustling orders? Why do you care if these people buy up the last of it instead of those people?" But now I realize why I'm doing it. I don't want my friends coming to me next week and saying, "Hey, can you get me in?" Some will and I want to be able to say to them, "Hey, I warned you we were going to sell out."

If you wanna be there, here's the link to order seats while you still can.

Right now, we're just waiting on a better copy of the episode Stan did of The Girl From U.N.C.L.E. We have mediocre video quality and are looking for excellent. It's a great episode with not only Stan but Jack Cassidy, Ann Sothern and George Furth. Boy, Jack Cassidy was good at playing handsome psychos. Or maybe he just seems more convincing in those roles once you know what happened to him later.

Joe Conason on the Minimum Wage…and why it's a myth that raising it hurts the economy.

Batman has a special message for you from President Lyndon Baines Johnson…

This article claims that by the year 2100, much of Louisiana will be underwater. I suspect a lot of people will hear that, do the math on how old they'd have to live to be to see that and shrug.

There are, of course, folks who want to do something to stop that, regardless of whether they'll be around then. I suggest they start listing some of the bad things that might happen before 2100. If the disaster will be complete by 2100, some calamities will have to occur well before then, possibly even in our lifetimes.

In the meantime, there are those in Southern Florida who want to break off from the U.S. and form their own state to better deal with their not-dissimilar problem. Disney World is in Southern Florida. Why don't we just let Disney run this new state because, you know, they will anyway?

We have a copy of that commercial I asked for in the previous message. Thanks, everyone.

I'm spending a lot of time working on this Stan Freberg Tribute we're doing on November 2nd. Hey, maybe someone reading this can help me with something…

You may remember Stan did that great commercial with the Lone Ranger for Jeno's Pizza Rolls. Well, of course we're going to be running that at the event and Stan will be telling the incredible tale of getting Clayton Moore to put on his Lone Ranger suit and come over and do it. But that commercial was a parody of another, then-current commercial — for Lark cigarettes. We'd like to show 20 or so seconds of that Lark spot and all we can find are fuzzy online video copies of it that won't look so hot projected up on the huge screen of the Egyptian Theater. Does anyone have a crisp, clear copy they can let us have? My e-mail address is under the Contact Me section to the right.

I am told tickets are selling at a brisker pace than the American Cinematheque imagined and will soon be all gone. This then is a warning to people who know me: Don't write or call me next week and say, "Hey, can you get me tickets?" You have your chance right now to get tickets. Here's the link.

You'll want to be there just to see 1953 footage of Stan, Daws Butler and June Foray doing "St. George and the Dragonet" live on The Toast of the Town, aka The Ed Sullivan Show. And we have some other stuff that even I, a supposed expert on All Things Freberg, had never seen before.

I spent yesterday at the Paley Center for Media comparing their copy of the Zagnut commercial with Stan's copy of the Zagnut commercial and things like that. I keep forgetting what a wonderful repository of wonderment that place is and how helpful and well-informed the staff is. I need to get over there more when I can just watch anything I want…which will probably include more Freberg stuff.

By the way: They have a Jay Ward exhibit on now in the Paley Center in Beverly Hills. They even have on display the old but refurbished Bullwinkle statue that used to stand in front of Mr. Ward's place of business on the Sunset Strip. How they got that thing in there, I have no idea. But then when it comes to most things in this world, I have no idea…

If you're not watching Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, you're missing some of the smartest, funniest moments on television — like this one…

To the surprise of no one who has followed the chain's decline in recent years, the last Koo Koo Roo — the one in Santa Monica — is gone. The Luby's company, which acquired Koo Koo Roo and Fuddrucker's in 2010, has turned the last location into a Fuddrucker's…an ironic finish since the operating premise of Koo Koo Roo, once upon a time, was to offer an alternative the traditional burger and fries fare.

Koo Koo Roo started in Los Angeles in 1988 when two brothers, Ray and Mike Badalian opened their first location and before long, their second. The one I went to was in a little strip mall at the corner of Beverly Boulevard and Orlando Avenue, a few blocks east of La Cienega. Before the mall was built, the land housed a Roy Rogers Roast Beef Sandwich stand and then a Golden Bird Fried Chicken shop. Another Koo Koo Roo was located in Koreatown.

The night of the Academy Awards in 1990, Kenneth Berg, a semi-retired real estate broker, passed by and noticed the long line of customers at the Beverly/Orlando location. He decided to stop in and get a "to go" order to eat while watching the Oscars and he was impressed with what he later described as "…the best chicken I ever had in my life." He soon met the Badalian brothers, invested in their business and later bought them out. He not only liked the chicken but the whole concept of healthy "fast food."

The story of Koo Koo Roo became one of ups and downs. New stores opened. Other stores closed. Berg's staff added an expanded menu that included freshly-carved turkey and he renamed the chain Koo Koo Roo California Kitchens. Later, he purchased a controlling interest in the Arrosto Coffee chain and opened coffee bars within his Koo Koo Roos.

It seemed like every few months, Koo Koo Roo was opening more stores and closing others while experimenting with new menu items. The folks who loved Koo Koo Roo (I was one) really loved it but there never seemed to be enough of them. Eventually, Berg's company sold out to the Fuddrucker's people and though they added their burgers to most outlets, they didn't reverse the company's fortunes…and finally that last one closed.

I miss them. I liked their signature chicken breast. I liked their turkey. I thought their macaroni and cheese was wonderful. But clearly, not everyone liked Koo Koo Roo as much as I did.