Monthly Archives: July 2016

Got a question from a reader of this site asking, "So what exactly is a TV tag?" Guess I should have explained that.

When you produce a TV show for a network, there are specifications. The show is supposed to be delivered at a specific length and the opening titles and closing credits are to be a certain length. If there are commercials involved, producers are told how much time to leave for commercial breaks and approximately where in the show they are to fall.

If we're talking about a half-hour show as we were with M*A*S*H, the specs usually lead to the decision for a two-act structure. The show is to be told in two acts…once in a while, three. But these acts may be preceded by a very short scene at the top to try and hook the viewer…or it may be followed at the end by a very short scene that provides a feeling of "wrap-up" and if it's a comedy, ends on a joke. Once in a while, you do all of these.

If the scene at the top starts your show and precedes the opening titles, it's called a cold opening. If it comes after the opening titles, it's called a tease or teaser. The scene at the end is called a tag. These are not set-in-titanium terms. They're just what most people call them.

When I worked on Welcome Back, Kotter back in the ice age, this was the format: The first thing you saw was a cold opening in which Mr. Kotter told his wife a joke. This led into the opening titles, which led into Commercial Break #1. Then we had Act One, followed by Commercial Break #2, then Act Two, then Commercial Break #3. When we came back from Commercial Break #3, we had a tag in which Mr. Kotter told his wife or someone else a joke and this led into the closing credits.

Generally speaking, you want to make the tag expendable because when they start cutting the show for more commercial time in syndication, that's usually the first thing to go. Why have it in the first place? Because it may cause some viewers to sit through the last commercial break to see it instead of turning off the set, changing channels or heading for the bathroom. So advertisers like tags and so do networks. That last commercial break is where the network will probably put a promo for the show that's on next, the goal being to stop viewers from reaching for the remote. And that's about it.

Hey! How do they make bacon?

A Spanish bullfighter was gored to death by the bull he was fighting yesterday — and it was witnessed by millions on live television. Do you, like me, have trouble lamenting a death in this situation?

Whatever reverence we have for human life, it's mitigated somewhat when the deceased was engaging in "daredevil" activities, seeking a thrill and/or paycheck by risking death. If you risk death, you're accepting that every now and then, what you're doing is going to lead directly to your demise. It's in a whole different category when someone dies as a result of a choice as opposed to illness or an accident or an unpredictable act of violence. Bullfighting is in a subset of that category because even when it goes well for the human, it never ends well for the bull and turns that bull's death into a public, inhumane spectacle.

Bullfighting is on a long list of activities or practices that some people enjoy but I cannot for the life of me understand why. Most of them I can easily ignore but bullfighting has long troubled me…as I would hope it troubles you. One of the things I don't like about it is that on those rare occasions when a matador (or a toreador of whatever they're called) is killed or injured, there's a moment when a part of me that I don't like very much thinks, "Good!"

Preview Night for Comic-Con International in San Diego is ten days from now. Ten! Time for you to begin looking over the Programming Schedule because if you're going, you really, really need to study it in advance and make some notes on what you're going to see…and what you're going to see if you can't get into your first choices. (I believe people are already lining up for the Star Trek panels.)

If you're not going…well, maybe you want to check the schedule to live vicariously through those who are going. In any case, you can now look at the schedules for programming on Preview Night, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday — in that order.

Even better, you can look below and see the list of the important panels, the ones I'm hosting.

Thursday, July 21 – 3:30 PM to 4:30 PM in Room 8
THE MARK, SERGIO, STAN AND TOM SHOW
This used to be the annual "Sergio and Mark Show" but we've changed the name to note that the adventures of Groo the Wanderer are brought to you not just by the award-winning team of Sergio Aragonés and Mark Evanier but also by Stan Sakai (the creator of Usagi Yojimbo) and the hardest-working man in comics, Tom Luth. They'll be discussing the new Groo mini-series – the first issue of which is debuting at the convention – and many upcoming projects. Some feature their silly barbarian, some don't. But it's always a treat to hear these brilliant guys, especially the tall one who wrote this panel description.

Thursday, July 22 – 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM in Room 9
CAPTAIN AMERICA 75th ANNIVERSARY
Created by cartoonists Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, Captain America has been wielding his shield, donning red, white, and blue, and fighting the good fight for 75 years. From Captain America Comics #1 to Captain America: Civil War, Steve Rogers has had a pretty decent 75 years, to say the least. Come celebrate "Cap" with Jim Simon (Son of Joe Simon) and Allen Bellman (artist, Captain America) all while being interviewed and questioned by former Kirby assistant, moderator Mark Evanier (author, Kirby: King of Comics).

Friday, July 22 – 12:30 PM to 1:30 PM in Room 8
WALT KELLY AND POGO
The greatest newspaper strip of all time? Some would call you that and even if you aren't one of them, you've gotta love the wit and whimsy of Walt Kelly's magnum opus, Pogo, now receiving its first ever complete reprinting in an Eisner-winning series from Fantagraphics Books. Let's remember this great artist with comic historian Maggie Thompson (Comic Buyer's Guide), film critic Leonard Maltin, historian Michael Barrier, cartoonist Scott Shaw!, Eric Reynolds (co-editor of the Complete Pogo series) and Moderator Mark Evanier (Groo the Wanderer).

Friday, July 22 – 3:00 PM to 4:00 PM in Room 4
SPOTLIGHT ON ALLEN BELLMAN
Before there was Marvel Comics, there was Timely Comics. Artist Allen Bellman was there, and now you can not only listen to his amazing stories and the history of Timely Comics but also participate in a fantastic Q&A. A short signing will follow. I'm moderating this.

Saturday, July 23 – 11:45 AM to 1 PM in Room 6BCF
QUICK DRAW!
It's still the fastest, funniest panel in the whole convention! Once again, your Quick Draw! Quizmaster Mark Evanier pits three super-speedy cartoonists against one another as they go mano a mano and Sharpie to Sharpie to create great cartoon art right before your very eyes. Competing this year are (as usual) Sergio Aragonés (MAD Magazine, Groo the Wanderer) and Scott Shaw! (The Simpsons) and they're joined this year by Keith Knight (The K Chronicles) plus a couple of surprising surprises!

Saturday, July 23 – 1:00 PM to 2:30 PM in Room 6BCF
CARTOON VOICES I
Each year, Moderator Mark Evanier gathers together a bevy of the most talented cartoon voice actors working today and invites them to explain and demonstrate their artistry! This year's lineup includes Phil LaMarr (Samurai Jack, Futurama), Brian T. Delaney (MAD, Halo 5: Guardians), Georgie Kidder (Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Goldie and Bear), Gregg Berger (The Garfield Show, Transformers), Julianne Buescher (The Muppets, Sid the Science Kid) and Jim Meskimen (Avengers Assemble, MAD).

Saturday, July 23 – 4:30 PM to 6:00 PM in Room 5AB
THAT 70'S PANEL
It was a time of change in comics with a new generation intermingling with the old and taking command. Hear what it was like from Howard Chaykin (American Flagg, Black Kiss), Paul Gulacy (Master of Kung Fu, Sabre), Elliott S! Maggin (Superman, Green Arrow), Marv Wolfman (Tomb of Dracula, The New Teen Titans), probably one other person and Moderator Mark Evanier (Groo the Wanderer, Blackhawk).

Sunday, July 24 – 10:00 AM to 11:15 PM in Room 5AB
THE ANNUAL JACK KIRBY TRIBUTE PANEL
Each year, we set aside time to talk about Comic-Con's first superstar guest and the man they call The King of the Comics, Jack Kirby. Jack left us in 1994 but his influence on comics, film and this convention has never been greater. Discussing the man and his work this year are Kevin Eastman (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), Kirby biographer Ray Wyman, Jr., Scott Dunbier, (Director of Special Projects for IDW Publishing) and attorney Paul S. Levine. Naturally, it's moderated by former Kirby assistant Mark Evanier.

Sunday, July 24 – 11:30 AM to 12:45 PM in Room 6A
CARTOON VOICES II
Yesterday's Cartoon Voices Panel will have been such a hit that we'll have to do another one with different but equally talented actors from the world of animation voicing. Once again, Moderator Mark Evanier has assembled an all-star dais that will include Dee Bradley Baker (Phineas and Ferb, Family Guy) Vicki Lewis (Rugrats, Finding Nemo), Fred Tatasciore (The Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H., Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness), Trevor Devall (Guardians of the Galaxy, Kid vs. Kat) and Debi Derryberry (Monster High, F is for Family) and maybe someone else.

Sunday, July 24 – 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM in Room 25ABC
COVER STORY: THE ART OF THE COVER
What does it take to make a great cover for a comic book? Let's ask four of the top artists…all folks who've created some of the best. Come hear the "shop talk" of Jonathan Case (Batman '66, The New Deal), Howard Chaykin (American Flagg, Black Kiss), Babs Tarr (Batgirl, Sailor Moon), Paul Gulacy (Sabre, Master of Kung Fu) and Scott Shaw! (Captain Carrot, The Simpsons). Moderated by Mark Evanier.

Sunday, July 24 – 3:00 PM to 4:30 PM in Room 25ABC
THE BUSINESS OF CARTOON VOICES
Interested in a career doing voices for animation and videogames? There are plenty of people around who'll take your money and tell you how to go about it…but here's 90 minutes of absolutely free advice from folks who work in the field. Come hear cartoon voice actor Dee Bradley Baker and Debi Derryberry, talent agent Paul Doherty (Cunningham-Escott-Slevin-Doherty) and your moderator, voice director Mark Evanier (The Garfield Show).

As always, these times, room assignments and panel participants are subject to change. I suggest you get there early for any panel in a room that starts with a "6" as these always fill up quickly. Matter of fact, a lot of people try getting into the last half of the preceding panel, whether they care about it or not, just to get a seat for the panel they do want to attend. I may have to start doing this on some of the panels I moderate because they don't always want to let me in. See you there, I hope.

Another Sondheim moment. From the PBS version of Company (the one starring Neil Patrick Harris), we have Anika Noni Rose performing "Another Hundred People." I once saw a really low budget version of this show done in a 99-seat theater with too small a cast. Some people had to double, playing two roles that would usually be played by separate actors. Afterwards, I tried to talk the director into changing this song to "Another Seven People"…

I've received about thirty of these. Here are three. This first one's from Steve Bailey…

Your memory is quite correct regarding the final Henry Blake episode of M*A*S*H. It did indeed end with a montage of Henry moments. I remember that because I was a teenager when the episode first aired, and like millions of Americans, the ending shocked me. After Henry's death was announced, I hung around after the commercial, hoping that they'd come back and say it was a horrible mistake. Instead, the montage came on, and that was it.

And this one's from Peter Cunningham…

You're absolutely right. The scene with Radar in the O.R. was the final scene of the story, airing right before the final commercials. The montage was the tag. And that's how it is presented on the DVDs which restore the original network broadcast. Anytime the O.R. scene is the tag, that's an edited syndicated cut.

While this one's from Mary Lou Wallace…

You are remembering the tag correctly. I audio-taped the episode and listened to it so much that I have it committed to memory to this day (I do have all the episodes on DVD). I no longer have the tape but I will swear on a stack of TV Guides that you are right!

Okay, so unless someone comes up with solid proof to the contrary, I'm figuring that's how it was. Meanwhile, Matthew O'Hara points me to this article which proves that Henry Blake's death was revealed to the general public before the show aired. Guess that's how I knew about it in advance.

A couple of folks have written to me to say that they recall watching the "Abyssinia, Henry" episode of M*A*S*H when it first aired and that they recall the scene where Radar announces Henry's death as being in the tag, not before the last commercial. They're wondering if the show was edited for reruns.

That would make a certain amount of sense. When the show went into syndication, stations had to cut out a few minutes from each episode and much of the time, they'd omit the tag as part of that editing. You wouldn't want that scene to get cut from that episode so I can imagine the syndication version being edited, trimming other things out so they would move it to before the last commercial and creating a new, cuttable tag.

But I don't remember it that way. In fact, I remember that montage tag. I even remember thinking it trivialized the closing scene a bit. Maybe I'm merging the memory of the first viewing with a later viewing.

We're all thinking about the shooting of five police officers in Dallas, trying to figure out what it means or what it should mean or just what's the correct response to it beyond saying murder is a bad thing. Today, I read a number of articles and heard a number of thoughts and two of them really work for me.

One of them is a column by William Saletan. He says there's a war out there but it's not a war of whites versus blacks. It's a war between people who want a race war and those who don't. The minute I read his piece, I thought to myself: Yeah, that's right.

The other speaker of truth (to me) today was a Lyft driver I had this morning. He was a big black guy. If you were a casting director and the producer said, "Find me a big black guy who looks menacing and ghetto and if you saw him walking towards you late at night, even the most liberal person would be a bit worried," you'd try to find a guy who looked like this fellow.

But he was a very nice, affable guy and his car radio was reporting details from Dallas so we got talking about it. He said, "This makes everything worse. Whether you're black, white, whatever, this makes things worse for everybody."

The minute he said that, I thought to myself: Yeah, that's right.

Hey, do you remember the episode of M*A*S*H where they killed off Henry Blake? I'll bet you do but in case you need a refresher, here it is…

I remember watching that episode when it first aired and being jolted by the power of that ending, even though somehow — I forget how — I'd found out in advance what was going to happen. It seemed so perfect for the series and for the character that no one accused the producers of doing it as a "stunt." It also seems to have inspired a lot of stunts on other shows.

M*A*S*H was a great show after McLean Stevenson left it but I always felt something was missing. The thing about that series that I thought made it work is that it was not about war. It was about the effect of war on human beings…in particular, these people doing this horrible job, patching together kids who'd been injured (sometimes, permanently) in a war. How did they cope with doing something that in a saner world, no one would have to do?

No one should be doing that…but in a way, the character who most did not belong there was McLean Stevenson's Henry Blake.

Hawkeye and Trapper John (and later, B.J.) were crackerjack surgeons. You need crackerjack surgeons in a setting like that. Father Mulcahy and Radar O'Reilly…well, you need priests and super-efficient clerks in a time of war as much as you need crackerjack surgeons. Frank Burns and Margaret Houlihan were very military-oriented so they were in their natural habitat. Klinger? Well, Klinger didn't belong there but he was showing us the cartoony side of that dilemma.

It was Henry Blake, sitting there trying to straighten out his wife's checkbook while choppers were bringing in wounded soldiers, who was really outta place. He always came across as a doctor who should be back home in Illinois, treating measles and broken ankles and nothing more serious than that. His replacement — Sherman Potter played by Harry Morgan — was strictly G.I. and truly belonged in the commander position.

Here's what I'm talking about: The best single moment I saw on that show occurred in Season Three, which turned out to be the last season for McLean Stevenson and Henry Blake. It was an episode called "O.R." and it was written by Larry Gelbart and Laurence Marks, directed by Gene Reynolds. The entire episode was set in and around the operating room as the personnel of the 4077th works night and day to deal with a flood of incoming wounded. Even Blake, who is usually more suited to shuffling papers and okaying duty rosters is drafted into surgical duties.

At one point, Henry asks Hawkeye for some advice. He shows him an unconscious soldier who has just been brought in on a stretcher. We don't see what Hawkeye sees when he looks under the blanket at the kid's wounds but judging from Hawkeye's face, it's pretty awful. Henry Blake is frustrated at the decision he is being forced to make…

HENRY

It's at least eight hours work.

HAWKEYE

His liver's gone.

HENRY

There's a dozen kids outside that can be saved. He'll take two surgeons and who knows how many units of blood. And what's worse, he'll never make it.

HAWKEYE

And meanwhile, we may lose some of the others.

HENRY

Pierce, I have a lot of trouble with this kind of decision.

HAWKEYE

Henry, he should never have been brought in here in the first place.

And then Henry/McLean takes a telling pause and tells an orderly to take the kid back outside.

If you can ever catch that episode, watch that scene. Watch the whole episode of course but really watch that scene.

You can see the agony of the situation on McLean Stevenson's face. You can see Alan Alda/Hawkeye wisely understanding that while he knows what has to be done, he can't pressure Henry into it. Henry's the guy in charge. He's the one who has to make the decision and then live with it. He supports Henry but gives him the room to make that irrevocable choice. The writing and the acting are just perfect and it's exactly what that show was all about.

It wouldn't have worked as well with any member of that cast as it did with Henry Blake. It wouldn't have been as gut-wrenching for Potter, who'd lived through a lot more wars. Henry was the one who emotionally was least-suited to be deciding that someone would have to die so others could live. M*A*S*H had a lot of great moments and episodes after "Abyssinia, Henry" and the death of Henry Blake…but that's the moment I best remember.

In the interview below, Larry Gelbart talks about the scene that would be a close second and the decision to have Henry not make it home. Larry was a brilliant man when writing and equally brilliant when you were just talking to him. I wish I'd gotten to do more of that.

He's wrong about one thing, though. In the video, he says that the scene where Radar announces Blake's death was in the tag to the episode. Maybe they originally decided to do it that way but if you watch the above video, you see it was in the last scene before the last commercial break. Then the tag was a montage of Henry Blake footage from previous shows.

But otherwise, I'm sure everything Larry said was so. It's a nice bit of insight into an important moment in TV history, described by a guy who created a lot of it…

If you have the stomach to read more about the Bill Cosby case, here's another recap of what he allegedly did, as told by those to whom he allegedly did it. By this point, it's hard to feel anything but anger at this man for what he did to so many women…and for the lesser crime of letting down so many people who once loved him.

I hate it when I see on the news that one or more police officers killed someone who may not have posed a threat to anyone. It feels worse when it's a black guy because it seems to happen more needlessly to black guys. In some cases, it feels like the authorities are in a rush to get to the point where the officer is exonerated in any killing and the rush is three times as great when the victim was black.

But it's also terrible when it happens to people who aren't black guys. Or when it's a police officer or…well, actually anyone.

I am against people being shot…or for that matter, strangled or stabbed or otherwise killed.

The one exception I would make is if there's a real chance that they're about to kill someone else. Even then though, I would prefer they be stopped and apprehended via non-lethal methods. The police are supposed to be trained to detain suspects without resorting to physical harm. We give them weaponry and power because we trust they'll be used responsibly. We expect that and when the killings are investigated, we expect justice, not a fast tap dance and then we're supposed to put the whole thing behind us.

Right now in the news, we have a couple of recent reports of black guys being killed by police officers. And we have reports of at least five police officers being killed last night by snipers. I am against all of that. That may seem like an obvious stance but as I prowl the 'net, I see a lot of people who are horrified by one or the other so I thought I'd point out that you don't have to take sides on this. You can be horrified by both. You don't even have to decide which is worse.

So that's what I wanted to say.

And also, on a related note: I don't think you should use the term "senseless killing" unless you're able to define what would be a sensible one. I've given the matter a lot of thought and the best I've been able to come up with is if someone were to murder the people in some other country who call you up, claim to be from Apple or Microsoft Tech Support and tell you you have a virus and they need remote access to your computer in order to remove it. I'm still against murder but killing them…I could get behind that.

Tickets to the Broadway musical Hamilton can cost upwards of sixty of those pieces of U.S. currency with Alexander's picture on them. I know a few folks who paid the high prices and felt it was good but not worth the price…but I doubt anyone who attended the April 16th performance did.

April 16 was the 40th anniversary of the debut of A Chorus Line on that very same stage. Following the performance of Hamilton, its star-creator Lin-Manual Miranda and the cast presented a post-curtain tribute to its predecessor in that building. Here are some excerpts from it…

[UPDATE: Okay, I was misinformed by a post on another blog. This video is from April 15, 2015 when Hamilton was at the Public Theater, which is where A Chorus Line also premiered. It's still a great video. Sorry for the confusion and thanks to the many folks who wrote in to set me straight.]

The latest revelations concerning Tony Blair and his "massaging" of facts leading up to his nation's involvement in the Iraq War are advancing a belief that many of us already had: That the Iraq War was "sold," here and abroad, dishonestly and with lies. Daniel Larison has more.

Leonard Maltin tells us about some of the great new film restoration work that's being done on silent comedies. It's hard to believe that archivists are finding lost footage and better prints for movies that are close to a century old. But it's so.

Marvel Comics has commissioned a 13-foot bronze statue of Captain America. It'll be unveiled at Comic-Con week after next and then it will be trucked east to its permanent home in Prospect Park in Brooklyn. Why there? Because according to the current mythos of the character, Steve "Captain America" Rogers was born in Brooklyn.

But he wasn't always born in Brooklyn. In the original comics by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, the hero was born in the lower east side of New York, just like Kirby. As this article notes, some folks are upset about the change. I'm not sure I have an opinion on this.