Monthly Archives: February 2021

The last movie Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy made in America was called The Bullfighters and it came out in May of 1945. I think it was the weakest film they made in this country…a view that has plunged me into a number of more-or-less friendly debates with other lovers of Stan and Ollie. It's not an argument I feel is worth a lot of discussion time so let's just say I have friends who think it ain't as bad as some others.

We all though seem to agree that their last film, which was made overseas, was more painful — painful to watch and reportedly way more painful to make. The Boys left for France on April 1, 1950 for what was supposed to be a twelve-week shoot. Due to illnesses, tech failures, budget problems, the fact that many who worked on the film did not share a common language, bad weather and the need to constantly rewrite a script no one liked, they didn't get back to the U.S. until 4/1/51.

It was a full year of disasters with the health of its stars chief among them. Laurel was sick, then Hardy was sick, then Laurel was sick again. Scenes were shot out of order so you can literally see Stan's weight change from scene to scene and Oliver's, as well.

The film was oddly edited in various configurations and released in different countries at different times under different names. It was called Atoll K when it came out in France in 1952. It was called Robinson Crusoeland in England in 1952. It was called Utopia when it got scant release in the U.S. in 1954. Some versions were longer than others and none were very good. Stan, it is said, disliked all of them.

Since the film went public domain, it received wide distribution on cheapo videotapes of dubious quality and completeness. I once owned a $3.99 Beta cassette of it that was actually missing an entire reel somewhere in the middle. Believe it or not, that didn't hurt the film much. At least it was over sooner.

Ah, but there's a new version now. A gent named Joe Ramoni recently did some recutting and rearranging and he has created what he calls "The Fan Edit." He threw out certain scenes and dubbed in new music by The Beau Hunks, an orchestra that re-creates some of the wonderful music heard in the films that Stan and Ollie made for the Hal Roach Studio in their glory days.

Did he turn it into a great movie? No but he made it into a better one. I watched all of it, which is something I don't think I managed with any of the previous cuts unless you count the one missing a reel.

His cut runs 75 minutes and I don't expect you to watch it now. But if/when you have time, here it is. And if at your own peril, you want to tackle one of the original versions, here's a link to one that runs 82 minutes. The only reason to watch the old one is to see what Mr. Ramoni managed to improve, much of which involved turning a Laurel & Hardy movie into a Laurel & Hardy movie.

I am generally against tampering with artists' work and as poor as it is, I hope the original version of Atoll K (to use its most-used title) is always available. But every so often, there's an instance where tampering seems appropriate and this is one…

A lot of folks who read this blog seem to be fascinated with the career of the late, great voice actor Paul Frees. They probably know that on the 1955 to 1960 TV series The Millionaire, Mr. Frees anonymously supplied the voice of the never-seen-on-camera character, John Beresford Tipton. What they might not know is that Frees occasionally did on-camera roles on that series playing someone else. Here's an example of that. He speaks for Mr. Tipton in the beginning, then plays the role of Clyde Monroe later in the episode.

Among the other familiar faces in it are Lurene Tuttle, Bill Baldwin (for a change, not playing a newscaster) and Howard McNear, who would later gain TV immortality as Floyd the Barber on The Andy Griffith Show.

So California is today reporting 233 new deaths due to COVID-19. It was up over 750 a month ago so that's a good sign. I wonder how much of the change is due to vaccinations. My sense is that a lot of folks who didn't think they needed to wear masks or avoid large gatherings have quietly, without admitting out loud that they were wrong, backed off from those positions.

Not everyone, of course. There will always be some shrill person outside Costco, arguing with the door person that they have a God-given, constitutionally-protected right to walk into a private business with a naked face and buy toilet paper and a rotisserie chicken. But when I go out in public on those rare occasions these days when I go out in public, it sure feels like more folks are complying. Maybe it's just where I go.

And here's another video by Adam Ragusea. This one is not about cooking. This one is a cautionary tale about success and yes, I have seen this happen…

I just received an e-mail from the company that gave me my first COVID vaccination telling me that by Tuesday, I'll receive an e-mail and a text message telling me when I have been "auto-booked" for an appointment this week for Shot #2. Good to hear.

I'm not posting this because I think you care when I get my second vaccination. I just thought you'd like to hear that a system seems to be working. These days, that's always nice.

That's not the best photo of our pal Mel Sherer who has just passed away but it's all we've got right now. Mel had a brilliant comedy mind and along with his partner Steve Granat, he created scripts for Laverne & Shirley, Married…with Children, Joanie Loves Chachi and many more. He did a lot of uncredited work punching up comedy screenplays (including some for Steve Martin) but he was probably proudest of his work — rarely credited — with a number of top stand-up comedians including his good friends, Kevin Nealon and Andy Kaufman.

Mel could talk for hours about Andy, which we did on a number of occasions. Mel had written a lot of Andy's most famous (most outrageous) stunts and when he could, he played bit parts in Andy's TV specials. A lot of folks know of Bob Zmuda, as a writer, confidante and co-star of Kaufman's. Mel, who kept a lower profile, should have been mentioned in more of those articles and books about Andy.

I don't believe I saw Mel in person this century; not since a long string of illnesses began keeping him confined to his home for weeks, even months at a time. One day I remember, we spoke in the afternoon and I mentioned that that evening, I was going up to The Improv to see a comedian friend perform. Mel asked me to please, please call him when I got home and tell him all about it.

I did and he kept asking me who I ran into and what they were up to and what comedians impressed me. There was a time when Mel practically lived at clubs like that. Now that his health prevented him from actually going to one, he wanted to visit, in absentia, and rekindle a bit his connection to that world.

Fortunately for Mel, he had his sense of humor and a lot of friends who took good care of him, dropping by with supplies, checking in on him, keeping his spirits up…folks like Mark Miller and Shelly Goldstein. And when you talked to him, he got yours up and kept them there…a very funny, lovely man. I wish I could get him on the phone right now.

Tuesday is the day I should be getting my second dose of the Moderna vaccine but I've heard nothing from the agency that is supposed to e-mail me about when to come in for the shot. The website says "Due to supply uncertainty and site closures due to weather and holidays, appointments may be scheduled further out, but within the CDC recommended window of 28 to 42 days." I'm going to assume that is so.

I should have said this a few days ago here: I feel really bad about what's happened to so many people in Texas. Some of the louder residents of that state have long put out a strong anti-government "We don't need anybody" vibe and there's the temptation to say, "Well, they asked for this" and to suggest the Federal officials should let them suffer. But of course, they're Americans and real human beings and only a small number of them put out that vibe.

You — because you're a thoroughly decent human being as I like to think I am — wish for the suffering to stop and for steps to be taken to make sure this never happens again. I heard someone on one of the cable channels say that was unlikely because "that would mean some state officials would have to admit they did some very wrong things." That is not, of course, a valid reason for not fixing problems but it's one that sometimes prevails in this world. You and I, decent humans that we are, hope that is not so.

And by the way, I'm really sick of people who never grasped (or chose not to understand) the concept that "Global Warming" would lead to more extreme weather problems, both hot and cold. Every time there's a major blizzard and temps at or around zero, you can find them saying, "Well, so much for that 'global warming' bullshit" when, of course if anything has been proven, it's the opposite of what they think.

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I've read Abraham Riesman's new book on Stan Lee, True Believer, and I've also read a lot of reviews of it, some quite negative but most so far, just the opposite. My feelings about it are mixed but at the moment, generally positive. I'm going to wait a few days, give it another read and then see if I can unmix some of those feelings and write something here about it. It is certainly not, as one guy on Facebook insisted, "a hatchet job."

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The other day here, we watched a video clip of a very funny moment on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show. Actor-writer Douglas McEwan sent me this…

Re: your story about that 1969 Carson show. You wrote, "Well, you had to be there." I WAS!!!!

I was in the room when that happened. I'd been hanging out all day on the Laugh-In set. They were on a dinner break, so I wandered down the NBC halls to where Johnny Carson was shooting that night's Tonight Show, and slipped in a door. (As you could do then but can not do now, as you know.) I stood beside an audience bleacher next to someone else who had come in that door, the local KNBC 11 pm news anchor then, Tom Brokaw. I witnessed all of that from mere feet away, and Tom Brokaw and I were laughing our heads off together. I know it was 1969, not 1970, as I did not spend any of 1970 hanging out on the Laugh-In set.

22 years later, I met my friend Barry Humphries for the first time on that same stage. So thanks for that blast from my own personal past today. Twas a trip.

I used to slip in through those same doors at NBC to watch Laugh-In and Carson and Golddiggers…and Douglas is right. You can't do that there or anywhere these days. That was Stage 1 and while Show Biz History was probably made often at all the stages in that studio, more of it was made on Stage 1 at NBC than anywhere else in the TV industry. I'm so sorry there's nothing like that today. Thanks, Doug!

I don't drink alcohol. Never have, doubt I ever will. And I've wondered how much of it I've consumed in food I've eaten.

Well, here's my current fave Internet Cooking Expert, Adam Ragusea, answering my questions. Please note that I don't eat Twinkies either…

My e-mail suggests that a lot of you are interested in what's happening at the San Diego Convention Center…the structure in which many of us attend Comic-Con in any year when there isn't a deadly pandemic spreading around the world. Well, they just served the one-millionth meal to the homeless folks who have depended on the convention center for food, shelter and COVID testing and where necessary, treatment.

Operation Shelter to Home was launched last April and it's currently funded through the end of this April. Press reports suggest it will be extended again but no one's guessing for how long.

On Facebook and other such forums, I see a lot of messages from people who had an encounter with someone who was, to them, famous. They report on this experience and come to the conclusion that the famous-to-them person…

1. Couldn't have been nicer and more friendly or…
2. Couldn't have been a bigger a-hole.

None of what follows is intended to suggest that those deductions might not have been spot-on accurate. I would just like to suggest that some might not have been completely valid about the way that famous-to-you person is or was all or most of the time.

Obviously — and I'm sure everyone understands this is possible — there are moments when a person is not at their best and their behavior is affected by circumstances that may not be apparent to others. I'm going to use myself for an example or two here though this piece is mainly about people who are a lot more notorious than I could ever be or would even want to be.

But one time at a WonderCon in San Francisco, I was hosting a panel when I got a cellphone call that my mother back in Los Angeles had had a heart attack and was being ambulanced to a hospital. I decided I had way more important things to do than host the remainder of that panel. I excused myself and ran back to my hotel to make a few more calls to get information and to book the soonest-feasible flight back to L.A.

I was between the panel room and my hotel when a gent cut me off. He had a pile of Groo comics my partner Sergio had signed and he wanted me to autograph 'em for sale in his store. Which I would have gladly done except…well, you understand why not just then. He didn't. I explained to him why I'd have to do it some other time and I fled…and I never saw the guy or his stack o' Groos again. I did though see on the Internet where he posted how I was rude and didn't care about the fans.

(A side tip: If you want a comic book person to sign a number of comics, at least pretend you read the comic and love it. This guy actually said he just wanted them signed to raise their value. He and others like him are the reason so many professionals now charge to do this. I sign for free if the pile ain't too big and you can fool me into thinking you read some of it. Which is like tricking Charlie Brown into taking another try at kicking the old football.)

I'll tell you another story somewhat like this. Years ago, I was a guest at a big comic convention in Philadelphia. Saturday evening, I was in my hotel room and I heard someone yelling "Fire!" I looked out into the hall and there was smoke — not a lot but enough to make me think, "This is not a good place to be." Fortunately, I was dressed. I grabbed up my laptop computer in its case (which also held my airplane tickets) and I did what I'd always heard you're supposed to do in such situations. I located the stairs and began walking down…even though I was on something like the twenty-fourth floor.

I immediately found myself walking down with a couple I knew — Archie Goodwin and his wife Anne. I forget if Archie was an editor at DC at the time or at Marvel — he went back and forth — but he was one of those and a good friend. He was also the nicest man you could ever meet and that's not just my opinion. If you doubt me, stop and Google his name and make sure you don't get the basketball player or the character in the Nero Wolfe books with the same name. You can search every byte of the vast worldwide web and not find anyone who ever knew Archie who had anything bad to say about him.

Together, we walked down a couple dozen flights of stairs as rapidly as we could…and by the time we reached the lobby, there were firemen there announcing that the fire was out. It was not a big one but what there was of one was no more. Archie, Anne and I were exhausted from the vertical Bataan Death March to the lobby and we all flopped down on a couch there to rest and catch what we could of our breaths.

And just at that moment — ignoring our obvious-to-anyone-with-eyes fatigue and the fact that the lobby was full of guests in their jammies and firefighters and hoses and police officers — a young man walked up to Archie and asked him to look at his portfolio and maybe hire him to draw comics.

It was at that moment that I witnessed something that folks who knew and worked with Archie probably never witnessed. I witnessed Archie Goodwin yelling at someone.

As yelling goes, it wasn't bad. I've seen people yell more when they got unwanted guacamole on a burger in a restaurant. But Archie yelled at the kid. And if he hadn't apologized a minute later, that kid would have gone around forever saying what a rude, nasty man Archie Goodwin was.

So that kind of thing happens and I've just decided I'll have to do a Part Two and probably a Part Three to get through the other reasons why brief "celebrity encounters" are sometimes not a judge of what that "celebrity" is really like. SPOILER ALERT: One reason has to do with the context of who you are and if they think you're any kind of threat to them, and another is about famous folks who are scared to death of being recognized or approached and don't handle the situation well.

Those parts will be along soon and, again, I'm not suggesting that observations made from brief encounters are not sometimes valid. Sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar and sometimes, an a-hole is just an a-hole.

• My Spam filters can cull out most of the e-mails that want to sell me medical cures or porn or manhood enhancers or get me to send my banking info to strangers. How come they can't weed out the messages in Chinese or Japanese or some other language?

I'm due for my second shot of Moderna next Tuesday but shipments of it to Los Angeles have been delayed by bad weather and probably some bad planning…so I've yet to be notified as to when my appointment will be. The website says "the second dose may be given up to 6 weeks (42 days) after the first dose" and I had the first dose on January 26 so I guess they have until March 3rd to get the stuff into me. Not worried.

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In other news: I've decided to do my blood pressure a favor and not watch the Woody Allen/Mia Farrow documentary that begins airing this weekend. As I've written here before, I think the case against Mr. Allen is very weak…and I don't say that because I admire him as a comedian. I had no trouble thinking Bill Cosby was guilty of what he was charged with and I admired him as a comedian. (That is, by the way, the only analogy between the two men that I think is valid.)

Anyway, I've spent enough hours of my life thinking about this. Let me know if and when anyone ever makes a documentary about this and interviews Moses Farrow or anyone who will really give Woody's side of it.

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You may recall that I was watching episodes of the old detective show Vegas — the one starring Robert Urich as Dan Tanna — at the rate of two or three per evening, working my way through a set of them all. A friend of mine one told me he didn't like watching old fave shows this way because, to approximately quote him, "You hit a point where every episode is the same as the one you watched before and the one you watched before that."

I hit that point with Vegas — where almost every episode was about some unknown killer out there who was plotting to kill Dan Tanna, an employee of Dan Tanna's, a longtime friend of Dan Tanna's, a relative of Dan Tanna's or a longtime friend or relative of a longtime friend of Dan Tanna's. I'm also getting to the point where I think I could pick Robert Urich's stunt double out of a police lineup that included Robert Urich. That is, if if he were still with us.

I'll try watching more episodes in a few weeks. And I'll try to remember that weekly shows weren't made to be watched this way.

Floyd Norman is back with another tale from his days at Disney Studios, back when Walt walked the lot. Pull up a computer chair and let Floyd tell you the story of "Amby's Bass Fiddle"…

Ted Cruz — hated by everyone in America except enough Texans to keep being re-elected — came up with a solution to the awful, cold and powerless conditions in the state he represents. He flew to Cancun to get away from it. There was outrage and he came skying back with one of those excuses that no one believes — his daughters needed his help with something — but which those who support the guy could pretend to buy into.

But this post isn't about that. It's about his trip there being reported. When I first heard about it, I went to the Snopes site, which specializes in debunking or confirming news items…and they're super-cautious about this. I checked in all day with their site and even after every major news source had said it was so, Snopes thought the sourcing was a little iffy and refused to say it was true.

Finally when Cruz issued a statement, that was proof enough and they said, "Yes, it's true." Everyone else was ahead of them but they set a higher bar for confirmation. I suppose some would say they were bad reporters of news because they didn't run it sooner…but I think it's refreshing and worthy of a salute or two. You can see some (not all) of the process they went through on this page.