Posted on Wednesday, December 25, 2024 at 11:25 AM
Christmas Eve, a friend of mine and I watched the new documentary on the life of Christopher Reeve…a man who played Superman about as well as anyone ever could, then sustained a crippling injury and lived what remained of his life about as heroically as anyone ever could. I liked it but maybe not the mood it put me in afterwards. I felt so very sorry for him but also for those who suffer from similar problems and don't have his money, his celebrity, his fan base, loving friends and family, etc. For what it's worth, I met Mr. Reeve once pre-accident and for the five or so minutes I was around him, he was exactly the person the documentary makes him out to be.
Like so many documentaries, the film could make all its points and convince you of everything it wants to convince you of in about ten minutes but it runs way longer — an hour and 44 minutes in this case. Still much of the footage, especially his post-accident appearance at the Academy Awards and the scenes involving his close friend Robin Williams, is fascinating. My friend also enjoyed it but she too felt is got repetitive at times.
It's available all over the Internet and you may be able to view it for free on some streaming service to which you subscribe. We watched it, sans additional fee, on my pay-per-month version of YouTubeTV. If you do watch and partway through, it isn't holding your interest, hang in to the end. Very much worth your time.
Posted on social media this morning by the producers of Gypsy at the Majestic Theatre in New York…
Due to continued illness within the company, tonight's performance is cancelled. We apologize for the inconvenience. Please check with your point of purchase to exchange or refund your tickets.
That's the bad news. The good news is that as of this moment, you can still go to Stubhub and buy great seats for tonight's performance for $921 each.
I've decided — and remember, this is Mark's Xmas Video Countdown, not yours so if you don't like it, get your own Xmas Video Countdown — to declare a tie for first place this year. For the first of the first place winners, here's a nice rendition of that immortal holiday classic, "Deck Us All With Boston Charlie," made famous by the wickedly wonderful Walt Kelly, creator of the comic strip Pogo….and no, I don't know when the next volume's coming out, nor what the tariff-laden price will be for a book printed in China by then.
Here's Mr. Kelly's lovely tune — one of so many things that makes me think, as I do often, of his lovely daughter…
The second of our first place winners this year is by the a cappella group, Pentatonix. It's a song written by Jerry Herman from the Broadway show Mame and while a lot of folks have done their versions of it, this is the one I like best. Pentatonix did a formal music video of it and you can watch that here if you like. I prefer this "live" version from one of their concerts…
Before you dig into Part 3 below, make sure you've read Part 1 and Part 2, preferably in that order. I'll start this one with a photo taken over a half-century ago…
Another person I visited a few times when I was spending days in and around Santa Barbara in the seventies was the man they call "The Good Duck Artist," Carl Barks. In the above photo, the gent at left is my pal Dwight Decker and on the right is another pal, Dan Gheno, who is now a very important artist and art teacher…but don't take my word for it. Go look at his website and see. You can probably guess which of the two remaining people in the photo is Carl.
Since I seem to be dressed the same as I was in the photo in Part 2 about Dan Spiegle, this must have been taken on the same day. In fact, I'm pretty sure Dan G. took the photo of Dan S. and me in Part 2, whereas this one was taken by Carl's wife, Garé, who was a pretty impressive artist on her own.
The Barkses lived in Goleta, which is about ten miles north of Santa Barbara. At the time of this visit, which was my first, Carl was writing the Junior Woodchucks stories that appeared in Gold Key Comics and also doing his famous paintings of Donald Duck, Uncle Scrooge and other characters he'd drawn for years for Western Publishing Company.
At one point during our visit, Carl asked to speak with me in private and we adjourned to a separate room. There, he explained to me that he wanted to stop writing scripts for the comics. The paintings were a more interesting challenge and with a bit of Uncle Scrooge in his voice, he noted that they paid waaaaay better. He'd been doing the scripts, he said, as a favor to his editor (and mine) at Western, Chase Craig. He asked if I'd go to Chase and volunteer to take over the Junior Woodchucks scripts. He said, approximately, "Every time I ask off the assignment, he practically begs me to do one more…and then one more and one more. I can't say no to him. Maybe if you asked him…"
If Carl Barks had asked me to take poison — or worse, eat cole slaw — I wouldn't have been able to say no to him. So a few days later when I was delivering scripts to Chase's office, I told him what Carl had said. He thought for a moment and said, "Well, I guess if he wants to stop, I should let him stop." But he didn't want me to take over writing Junior Woodchucks. He wanted to move someone who'd been writing Porky Pig to that book and have me write Porky Pig. That was fine with me — better, actually — and before I left the office, I heard him phone Carl and tell him, "You're free!"
And that, dear friends, is how I was responsible for ending the comic book career of the great Carl Barks. There are a few others I wish I could have gotten out of the business but for different reasons.
I did Carl and his wife one other favor. I never dragged them over to Santa Claus Lane to eat at Santa's Kitchen. Carl might not have made it to the age of 99 if I had. Hell, he might not even have made it home that day. But he and Garé told me that they'd visited Santa Claus Lane a few times and that the kitchy-ness of it all — I think that was the word she used — had either inspired one of the paintings Carl had done or given him the idea for a future one. I leave it to other Barks scholars to speculate on that.
He went on happily painting his duck paintings. He had a long wait list of fans who wanted them and to thank me, he moved my name from the end of the list to somewhere in the top third. At the time, the way it worked was that he would paint what he wanted to paint and often, it was what whoever was at the top of that list requested. When it was done, he'd send a photo of the finished painting to that person and if that person wanted to purchase it, he could…for around $500 or at the time. For a more elaborate painting, he might ask more.
I'm not sure how it worked if the person didn't want that particular painting. I'm not sure if anyone ever didn't want any painting he did. All I know is that Carl stopped doing them long before my name reached the top of the list. The last few at the time were auctioned for prices in the high four figures and one recently sold at auction for $312,500.00. It was not the one above of Uncle Scrooge diving through his money bin. I picked that one to display here though because I believe that in this painting, the bin is holding $312,500.
If you want to see this photo larger, click on it.
I visited Carl and Garé at least one, maybe two more times in Goleta before they moved to Temecula, way to the south of L.A. I don't think they did that to try and hide from me but if that was their intent, it didn't work. One very long day a few years later, a bunch of us drove down there to see them. Garé took this photo of — left to right, Scott Shaw!, Bob Foster, m.e., Carl and Sergio Aragonés. There's another photo from later in the same visit over here. They were always very charming, friendly people and once you met Carl, you could tell where all the wonderful humor in his stories had come from.
Still later, the Barkses moved up to Oregon where they became the neighbors of someone who was a neighbor when I first visited the Santa Barbara area. I'll tell you about that neighbor in the fourth and final part of this series. (Hint: He's the guy listed in The Guinness Book of World Records for the "Longest running daily cartoon strip by a single author.")
I'm declaring a tie for second place this year and also for first. These two videos have more or less taken turns being my #1 pick in years past and they both have fans among those who drive by this website. Since I get to make up the rules as I go along here, I'm disqualifying them from the top spot and awarding them both second place this year. Hope you enjoy 'em both. No, I know you'll enjoy them both…
I'm spending Christmas Eve Day writing and hoping that Santa brings me a better ending for the piece I'm working on. But I have stuff here to post too, starting with these two items…
An old pal of mine, Steve Darnall, produces a very fine magazine called Nostalgia Digest, which is full of articles about old TV shows, old radio shows, old movies and the folks in them. He also hosts a weekly program of vintage radio shows broadcast live every Saturday from 1 to 5 PM Central Time on WDCB 90.9 FM in the Chicago area and at this website.
You can also hear each show a few days later on the Nostalgia Digest website and that's where at this moment, you can hear last Saturday's show. If you go there right now, it's the one labelled "Listen Now to Our Most Recent Broadcast." If you go there after next Saturday's show is posted, you'll have more trouble figuring out which one I'm calling to your attention.
On the episode I'm calling to your attention, Steve did a very fine reading of my oft-read, oft-plagiarized story about Mel Tormé. But he didn't steal it and I'm quite delighted with his presentation. If you want to hear it, it starts around 1:58:40. While you're there, look into a subscription to Nostalgia Digest. I always find much to enjoy in each issue.
Meanwhile, in this post I showed you excerpts from a 2014 staging that the Actors Fund did with live actors performing Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. What I didn't show you because I didn't know they'd done it again in 2019 with a mostly-different cast, are these excerpts from the 2019 production…
My buddy Bob Elisberg was the first of many to send me that link and he also sent this: It's a recording (audio only) of an overture to the cartoon special that was recorded in case it was ever released as a soundtrack album…which it wasn't. Someday, someone's going to wise up and mount a real, Broadway-budgeted musical of that special but for now, here's the overture…
If you haven't read Part One of this series, you might want to do that before you proceed.
When I was reading Dell Comics in the fifties, I had a favorite artist not only before I knew his name but before I was fully aware that comic books were drawn by anyone. Until about the age of six, I thought they just magically appeared…you know, the way cartoons on TV did. If I'd given the matter any thought, I might have suspected that the guy at the drug store where we bought my comic books was creating them when he was not busy filling prescriptions.
My favorite artist, it turned out, was a man named Dan Spiegle.
Oh, I liked other artists as well but Dan did a lot of adaptations of movies and TV shows and when he drew them, the people he drew not only looked like the people on the screen, they pretty much acted like them too. They had the perfect facial expressions and body english to go with what was in the word balloons over their heads. Even at a young age, I was more impressed by that than by an artist's ability to draw a cool-looking monster or a powerful fight scene. I would appreciate him even more when we began working together.
In 1962 when I was ten, some Dell Comics branched off and became Gold Key Comics (explanation here). Dan branched off with them and drew for Gold Key — Maverick, Korak, Space Family Robinson, lotsa Disney movies, etc.
In the seventies when I made little field trips up to the Santa Barbara area, as I explained in Part 1, I would always visit Dan Spiegle. He was as nice as he was talented and he was one of the most talented artists in the business.
The first time I made one of these expeditions to the Santa Barbara/Carpinteria area, some friends of mine and I first visited Dan. He was then drawing, among other assignments, the Scooby Doo comic book that I was writing for Gold Key Comics. We would later collaborate on a great many projects including Blackhawk for DC, Crossfire for Eclipse Comics and more Scooby Doo comics for several different publishers, not all of them in the United States. As you may have figured out, that's me on the left in the above photo and Dan on the right. We're in his studio in Carpinteria. It was a big shed amidst a forest of avocado trees.
At the time, I was unaware how close we would become and how often we'd work together…but if I'd known then, I would have been quite pleased. I had met him briefly before at Richard Kyle's bookshop in Long Beach…at its grand opening party, I think. That day in Carpinteria, Dan barbecued lunch for me and my friends — something else he did quite well — and we had a wonderful, long talk. Later, there were other visits and once or twice, we met Russell Myers at Santa's Kitchen, the restaurant at Santa Claus Lane, for lunch.
That work we did on Scooby Doo turned out to be the start of a about a forty-year relationship. I wrote and Dan drew stories published by Western Publishing, DC Comics, Marvel Comics, Eclipse Comics, Archie Comics and several foreign publishers.
Not once was Dan late with anything. Not once did he disappoint me. And I can think of at least a half-dozen times when, on projects that did not involve me, he was a true hero producing superior work on impossible deadlines. Often, it was because some other artist had botched the work or could not possibly have gotten it done on time. He was just amazing…and we never had an argument of any kind.
Dan didn't live far from Santa Claus Lane…about three miles. It's impossible for me to think about the place without thinking about stopping there on the way to his home…or on the way home from his home…or eating there with him on some visit. The food was awful but the company was always gourmet quality. I can't tell you how much I miss that man.
Here's part of a message Audra McDonald posted online…
Hi friends! You know that nasty cold that's going around right now? Maybe some of you have it? Sore throat, cough, etc? No fun right? Well that little bugger is racing through the Broadway community right now too including here at Gypsy and including yours truly. So I'm hoping all of you that are coming to shows this holiday week and next can give a little grace to us folks up onstage and backstage as well.
If you bought your tickets through the box office or Telecharge, you're entitled to a refund or an exchange for some other night…and of course, you're outta luck if going to see the show tonight involved travel expenses, a hotel room, etc. Or if you just plain can't go any of those other nights for which you can exchange your tix. If you bought 'em off Stubhub or some other reseller…well, I dunno. It may depend on where those seats came from.
This kind of thing is, of course, unavoidable with live shows. Performers do get sick and there are various Acts o' God that cause performances to be cancelled. There was a lot of that during the main thrust of COVID and COVID may not be over yet. I have nothing clever or informative to say about any of this. I do know that there are people who won't buy tickets to the kind of show you don't want to attend if the S*T*A*R is out. Even if it's only a 2% chance, they don't want to take it.
I have been to shows when the star is out and occasionally seen a real terrific understudy. Audra probably has one — Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster had them for the revival of The Music Man and both went on at times — and I'm wondering if they could have done Gypsy tonight or if just too many cast members were ill. I guess I'm just happy I didn't say to Amber, "Hey, let's fly back to New York and see Audra McDonald do Gypsy two days before Christmas and I'll spend whatever it takes to get good seats!"
My three favorite Christmas TV cartoon specials are — and I don't have a preference among them — A Charlie Brown Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas and Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. In 2014, The Actors Fund staged a one-performance-only benefit concert presentation of Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. I wish I'd been there to see it and so do you…but we do have a little montage of snippets from some of the songs and I'm declaring this #3 in our countdown. I'm not 100% sure but I believe that's Douglas Sills as Magoo/Scrooge and Joshua Henry as Bob Cratchit…
Here we have this year's edition of TCM Remembers, scrolling quickly through a list of folks in the movie business who died in the past year. I like these because they cover so many people who weren't actors. I think though sometimes these are a little too artsy-sombre and they get too carried away with graphics that don't have anything to do with the deceased people. Can someone explain to me why visuals of Richard Lewis and Bob Newhart are projected inside a train car?
Actor Barry Gordon was six years old when he recorded "Nuttin' for Christmas" in 1955. It immediately became a million-seller and other artists rushed out their versions of the tune. We'll get to my favorite in a second but first, here's the original…
Now then: My favorite was Stan Freberg's cover. Not that many years ago, it was turned into a very clever video by artist Doug Compton. Stan did the voice of the kid and the voice of the burglar…
Woody Fraser died this morning at the age of 90. He was one of the most prolific TV producers in the business for several decades, specializing in talk and light news shows. A very partial list of his credits would include The Mike Douglas Show, The Dick Cavett Show, The Della Reese Show, The Bill Russell Show, The Virginia Graham Show, one of the many programs called The Steve Allen Show, Good Morning America, America Alive!, That's Incredible!, Those Amazing Animals, The Richard Simmons Show, Nightline, Life's Most Embarrassing Moments, Jimmy Breslin's People, On Trial, The Home Show, What Would You Do? and I don't know how many others.
In some cases, as with Mike Douglas and Richard Simmons, he discovered a talent and built a show around them. In other cases, he was hired to invent a show and a format and then pass it on to others. He "mentored" a staggering number of people who went on to successful careers in broadcasting. One of them was Roger Ailes.
I worked for Woody for several years and he was like the little girl in the rhyme: When he was good, he was very, very good…but he was not always good. He was good to me but not to everyone. It's going to take time to write something about him that celebrates the very good part without condoning or ignoring the other side. I'll get to it but maybe not for a while.
A whole batch o' memories were just seriously jostled loose when I came across the above photo on the 'net. It's of a little place called Santa Claus Lane that used to be along the west side of the 101 freeway between Santa Barbara and Carpinteria. It was kind of like a strip mall before I ever heard anyone use that term. Basically, it was a cluster of several small Santa-themed businesses side-by-side with a nice parking lot out front. If you were driving down the 101, especially when heading south, it was an easy place to pull into, use a bathroom, buy some snacks and/or sodas or mail letters.
Mailing letters was a big thing at Santa Claus Lane because they had a tiny post office and its postmark was "Santa Claus, CA." An awful lot of people would travel there just to mail out their Christmas cards with that stamped on them. It was always Christmas at Santa Claus Lane, 365 days a year, especially with that huge Santa figure you see in the photo setting the tone of the mall.
It's been a good half-century since I was there and I don't recall how many stores there were. In addition to the post office, there was a restaurant called Santa's Kitchen and at some point, it added on a bar called The Reindeer Room where, I guess, you were guaranteed to leave with a shiny nose. There was a pottery shop and toy store and a juice bar. The juice bar specialized in "date shakes" and also sold fruit you might give or send as a gift to someone…but mostly dates.
Somewhere in there, there were places you could purchase snacks and sodas and souvenirs of Santa Claus Lane. They sold a lot of postcards of the place and I found a few online which I'm using to illustrate this series of articles. Here's one now…
There was also a little toy train which a very, very small child (smaller than I) might possibly have been able to ride around on a small track that encircled the property. That was if the train was working, which every time I was there, it was not. And there was also usually some guy on the premises in a shopworn Santa suit, wandering around posing for photos and, you could kinda tell, contemplating the career path that had brought him to that exalted, surely high-paying position.
In the sixties, my parents and I sometimes took vacations to the north…up to Carmel and/or Monterey and/or San Francisco. We passed Santa Claus Lane on the way up and the way back and we'd stop on the way up or the way back or both. We also stopped at Pea Soup Andersen's, a great restaurant that I wrote about back here. Don't hold me to this but I believe it was about fifty miles north of Santa Claus Lane on the 101.
I basically remember us stopping at Santa Claus Lane so I could use the bathroom and…well, from that time period, about all I recall is us stopping and me using the bathroom. I think we bought some snacks or drinks just to legitimize our use of the bathrooms.
But I also remember being there without my parents in the seventies…several times. There was a period when every few months, I would drive up there — often but not always with a carload of friends — to visit at least two of three people, all of whom were supremely talented. One was Dan Spiegle, one was Carl Barks and one was Russell Myers. I'll tell you about those visits in Parts 2, 3 and 4 of all this memory-jogging.
And we'll discuss what became of Santa Claus Lane, which (sadly) ain't there no mo'. The Big Santa, thankfully, has survived and I have a hunch the guy in the ratty Santa costume is still wandering around on the property like a Japanese soldier who was never told the war was over.
Referencing the previous post here, G. Robson wrote me to say…
The religiously-minded would perhaps point out that the scientific discoveries that cured those 10 diseases came about as a result of prayer (and a lot of research and hard work of course).
And that's fine. I personally don't think praying does anything except make the person doing the praying feel better and perhaps pleasing others who have a personal stake in what is being prayed-for occurring. But that's not nothing. And as far as I can tell, no one can or should stop anyone from praying at any time for anything. They can maybe stop you from insisting others pray along with you or they can say, when what was prayed-for comes to pass, that it's not the praying that did that…that it wouldn't have happened without the science.
On the other hand, it's quite possible to impede or even stop science from advancing or being applied. That can be fatal and often is.
