Monthly Archives: July 2007

See that picture of Jack Benny above? Well, it's not Jack Benny. It's my pal, Eddie Carroll, a man of many talents. Eddie is a writer. He used to write for Hanna-Barbera, often working with a partner named Jamie Farr. Yes, that Jamie Farr.

Eddie also does voices for cartoons. Most notably, he took over the role of Jiminy Cricket for Disney after the original Jiminy, "Ukulele" Ike Edwards, croaked.

And Eddie plays Jack Benny. He tours now and then in a wonderful one-man show that really is like spending an hour or two with The Man. It's not just that he manages to look like Benny and sound like Benny and even play the violin like Benny. That would all be impressive enough but Eddie manages to replicate the superb Benny timing. That's the hard part and he's got it down, as you'll see if you go see him perform. Where can you do this? Check out this page on Eddie's website to see if he's going to be in your neck of the woods soon.

Since he probably isn't, you'll have to settle for this. Tomorrow (Wednesday), Eddie will be the guest on Stu's Show, which is heard on Shokus Internet Radio, a station you can hear on your computer for free if you'll only log in via this page. This is not a podcast which you can download or listen to whenever you like. This is a radio broadcast over the Internet and Stu's Show airs live from 4 PM to 6 PM West Coast Time. The broadcasts then repeat for a week in the same time slot.

We recommend the channel any hour of the day. Tune in right now if you like and see what they have on. But we especially recommend it tomorrow when Eddie Carroll is on. I'm going to try to call in and ask a pithy, incisive question. Let's see if I can come up with one.

Here are some clips of Tom Snyder's stint on the Tomorrow program. I'm sorry it doesn't include the night that Snyder was interviewing the singer Meat Loaf and for some reason, kept calling him "Meatball."

George W. Bush's nominee to head the Joint Chiefs of Staff thinks, regarding Iraq, that "no amount of troops in no amount of time will make much of a difference." Here's a report on his testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee where he said that and other things that would be called "defeatist" if uttered by a Democrat.

Jeffrey Toobin on an unsolved murder case that has a little something to do with the case of the fired U.S. Attorneys.

Con fatigue finally caught up with me. Though we got home late Sunday night, it was late Monday afternoon before I suddenly got that Bataan Death March sensation. In fact, I began to feel a lot like the above fellow, whose photo I snapped in an aisle at the con. It may be a few days before normal blogging resumes on this site.

As I said, I had a great time. I sometimes think that anyone can have a great time at that convention if they'll only do a little advance planning and make the effort to find the convention they want to attend. There are a lot of conventions occurring simultaneously in that hall, ranging in intensity from the high-tech, high-pressure trade show located where the toy and videogame companies are situated, all the way down to the friendly and creative low-tech con in and around Artists' Alley. What interests you is probably in there somewhere but you have to go looking for it. It won't find you.

I've received a lot of e-mails from folks who agree with my wish that the con would bar light sabers…and all kinds of swords and staffs, for that matter. There were a lot of people in the hall who had them but few seemed aware that one end of them might be gouging passers-by. Those giant tote bags that Warners handed out to people did a lot to make the aisles more crowded than they had to be. I'd also like to see the convention start charging triple to any exhibitor who insists on having a microphone at their booth.

Before I forget: We've been telling you here for some time that, despite rumors to the contrary, the convention was not (repeat: NOT) about to move to another city. The convention management has now confirmed this, announcing that they've secured firm dates in San Diego through 2012, which is about as far ahead as any city or convention will ever commit. The 2008 convention will be July 24 through 27.

Also: If you shot video of any of my panels — especially Sunday's Cartoon Voice Panel with Maurice LaMarche, Jess Harnell, April Stewart, Gregg Berger, Tom Kenny and Michael Bell — please drop me a line and I'll tell you how to e-mail me a copy.

There will be more postings about the con. I just need a little more sleep before I can get to them.

I have to write a little something here about Tom Snyder, the longtime broadcaster and newsguy who died yesterday at the age of 71 from "complications from leukemia." I'm not sure why it isn't just that he died from leukemia — he had it and that's what killed him — but that's how they phrase these things. You'll see that given as the cause of death in the obits like this one.

As I noted in this piece over on our sister site, oldtvtickets.com, Tom Snyder was the last of the single local news anchors, at least in the major markets. For several years on KNBC here in Los Angeles, he was the local news and he was darned good at it. I don't know how much of his own copy he wrote but he was the direct antithesis of the kind of "rip and read" newsman parodied by Ted Knight on The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Snyder did not read you the news. He told you the news. He was a smart guy who knew the news business and, more importantly, knew the world on which he was reporting.

Shortly after I posted those tickets and the article, I got a very nice e-mail from Mr. Snyder, thanking me for the compliments and for "nailing" (his term) what went wrong with the Tomorrow Show once it expanded to ninety minutes. He then wrote…

It's tough when the suits get involved with egos involved. I've never minded getting notes from the suits if they've actually watched the show but that is rare.

That was written from retirement. Back when he was doing the Tomorrow Show, I had a memorable encounter with him in what was then Hampton's Restaurant on Riverside out in Toluca Lake. It was a favorite lunch place for folks working down the street at NBC and one day, I was part of one such group and he was part of another. Table-hopping between the two was a man named Bruce McKay, who had worked for Snyder but at the time was an NBC exec associated with a show I was writing. After we finished our meal, he said, "Tom would like us all to join him" — and join him, we did.

But even before that, I felt like I was having lunch with the guy. He was a tall man — taller than me, I think, and I'm 6'3" — and loud and boisterous and when he was in a restaurant and in that mood he was in, you felt like you were eating at his table even when you were across the room. He "held court" in the nicest of ways, conducting a mass talk show with everyone at his table and those that were adjacent. He was interested in everyone. He had an intelligent question to ask each person…and did, in what struck me as an actual curiosity about everyone around him. He had something interesting to say about any topic that happened along. And most of all, he had that wonderful laugh that so many impressionists got wrong because they made it sound forced and phony. It wasn't. It was the genuine article and so was he.

It may be a day or three before I have the time or words to give a real overview of this year's Comic-Con International. I had a great time. No, I had the greatest time. But I have to be up in the morning for something and there's unpacking yet to be done. Good night.

Fred Kaplan discusses a proposal for how the U.S. might extricate itself delicately (but not completely) from Iraq. It seems interesting but we're still stuck with a chief exec who thinks leaving is losing.

Superman meets Tennessee Tuxedo in this vintage commercial for Soaky toys. That's not Don Adams, the usual voice of Tennessee, speaking for the penguin. I don't know who it is.

I'm having a great time at the con, all my panels are fun, the place is crowded, blah blah blah. You know the drill by now. I always have a great time, all my panels are fun, the place is always crowded. I'm getting as bored with writing these con reports as you are reading them.

I will say though that despite the fact that today was sold out and that Saturday is usually the elbow-abrasion day of them all, the hall didn't seem that crowded. That is, if you were smart enough to avoid certain aisles. At one point, I had to go to a meeting at a booth in the 5400 aisle and I — logically but foolishly — assumed that was somewhere near the 5500 aisle, which I could see was the absolute rear of the convention hall. I walked all the way back there only to discover that the 5400 aisle was in the absolute front of the hall, from which I had just come. It's a dumb numbering system but my point is that it didn't take long to walk through the entire convention twice that way. And on a Saturday, no less.

Apparently, there has been some exciting news in the Hollywood front, with monumental film projects and castings announced. But I don't care about that stuff and neither, if you have an ounce of sanity in your soul, should you. I mean, by all means go see the movie if it interests you but I refuse to go all atwitter because some big film may be shot next year and released in Summer of '09. I wish the film buying public could find some way to say to the film studios, "Look, we'll promise to buy tickets if you'll stop trying to get us worked up about the movie two years before it hits the Cineplex."

Last night were the Eisner Awards, and you can probably find a zillion websites (this one, for instance) that'll tell you who won. So I'll just tell you that it was an amazing ceremony — amazing in length (three hours and twenty minutes) and for the fact that most of the audience had such a good time that they didn't mind. The presenters were generally entertaining, especially Jonathan Ross and Neil Gaiman, who took the stage at the very end, at an hour where you'd figure the crowd would be asleep or yearning to be, and tore the place apart with a hilarious presentation. If I tried to describe it here, it would all sound like it was in very bad taste, and that would be misleading because it was actually in very, very bad taste. That doesn't always equal funny but when it does, it really does.

I got a lot of nice comments on this here weblog but as is inevitable I guess, I had one nasty encounter with a guy who wanted to debate my politics, then and there on the convention floor as people dressed like supporting players from the Batman franchise swarmed around us. He seemed to be under the impression that all would become right with the U.S. effort in Iraq, and that the 70+% of Americans who think it's a misguided effort would line up behind George W. Bush if only the guy who writes Groo the Wanderer could be brought around to his side. I'll tell you about our brief but enlightening discussion some time when I'm not dozing here between sentences.

I want to post this before Midnight so it'll have a Saturday time stamp instead of Sunday, which means I'd better wrap things up. I have three more panels tomorrow and then it'll be over for another year. The more crowded with activities that four days is, the faster it seems to go. It's a shame that the good times work like that and the bad ones drag on forever instead of the other way around.

I've linked before to D.S. Karroll's weblog, which is devoted to the work of illustrator Henry E. Vallely (1886-1950). Of particular note is how many of Vallely's illustrations were blatantly swiped by early comic book artists, especially Bob Kane for the earliest Batman stories. Karroll has just posted this amazing example.

Many of you have written to me to tell how you used to, like I, avidly collect the 8mm masterpieces that were known as Castle Films. In the age before home video, they made you feel like you had an actual home film library.

The most widely-circulated Castle Film was Have Badge, Will Chase, which was a four minute chunk of a not-great movie called Abbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops. It was one of Bud and Lou's biggest flops and I think you can see why just from the title. If I said we can watch Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, you think of scary monsters and Lou Costello playing terrified and lots of opportunity for unexpected things to occur. If I say we can watch Abbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops, you think, "Hmm…one washed-up comedy team running into another." Even in '55, no one was sitting around saying, "You know what the movies need? The return of the Keystone Kops." Heck, they didn't say that in 1926.

Most Castle Films were sold in stores or mail-order catalogs and came in two versions — a one-reel edition with 200' of 8mm movie film…or a 50' reel which ran around four minutes. Have Badge, Will Chase only existed in the 50' length and most copies were given away free when you bought a certain brand of 8mm movie projector. For some reason, many camera stores wound up with hundreds of 'em and were just giving the films away or selling them for fifty cents each, back when the other 50' Castle Films were two bucks.

It was quite common back in the sixties…and now someone who still has a copy (someone else besides me) has transferred it to video and posted it on YouTube, which is a nice intermingling of generational video. I like the fact that they didn't add music to the transfer since silent is the way I always experienced this film. (To clarify: The 1955 version was, of course, a talkie. But most Castle Films until late in the company's run were silent since sound 8mm movie projectors weren't common.) If they'd added in the sound of a whirring projector and put the whole thing on the wall of my childhood bedroom, the experience would be complete. Here's the film…

In case you haven't heard, Friday memberships at Comic-Con International are sold out. That means that if you ain't already got one, you ain't getting in. Saturday sold out some time ago. Sunday may sell out soon. What this probably means is that we're answering the long-asked question of how large the San Diego Con can get. Answer: About as large as it gets this year. Next year, the whole event will probably be a matter of advance registrations — up to the point where they sell out — and nobody registers on-site.

Along with the news of these days selling out comes the inevitable (I guess) rumors that the con is soon to move to larger facilities in some other city. The people spreading this rumor know not of what they speak. It's just speculation and it's wrong. You might take heart in the knowledge that the hotel situation should be a little better next year and a lot better as of 2009. More hotels will be opening up and there will not be as many competing conventions in town. This year, for instance, a huge chunk of rooms at the Hyatt were not available to Comic-Con attendees because of a convention of folks in the car insurance industry.

Preview Night (Wednesday) was mobbed. Thursday seemed a little less cramped, at least at the end of the hall away from the big videogame and toy exhibitors. They probably had as many attendees at the con Thursday as they did Wednesday night but Wednesday night, there were no panels or other events to take thousands of people out of the main hall. So they were all in every aisle I tried to walk down.

A tip to the convention organizers: I know you're concerned about crowds and also about safety. It would seem to me you could help both situations a bit if you barred Star Wars style light-sabres from the floor. In fact, I saw a lot of awkwardness and a few near-injuries because people toting around swords and staffs seemed oblivious to how much space their weaponry requires when they walk about the hall.

Not a lot to report on my end. Did three panels. Talked with a lot of people. One reader of this blog I'd never met before walked up and handed me a DVD set of The Complete Captain Nice, which was…well, nice. I walked around for a little while with Gary Owens and it was wonderful watching him tell people he was a fan of theirs as they were telling him they were a fan of his. (Did I get that sentence right? It's been a long day.)

As usual, the Ralphs Market a few blocks away was the place to be. When Gary and I were walking around, it was in part because he wanted to locate Rubén Procopio, a fine artist who's been responsible for some of the best conversions I've seen of animated and comic book chartacters into three-dimensional sculpture. (Here are some samples of his work.) Well, Gary and I never did find him in the convention hall but later in the evening, when Carolyn and I hiked over to Ralphs to get some necessities of life, there was Ruben, right next to the Glad Sandwich Bags. I may skip the con next year and do my panels there, maybe over near the deli case.

Hey, here's something I've been thinking about for the last six or seven conventions I've attended. I've been thinking about Hot Pockets. You know those little frozen calzone things that are full of ham and cheese or beef and cheese or meatballs and cheese or something and cheese. You pop 'em into the Microwave for two minutes and they aren't bad as far as quick snacks go. Why doesn't someone sell those in these tourist-trappy places instead of or in addition to the rotten hot dogs? I know why snack bars sell hot dogs: Because people need (and will pay for) a nice shot of protein when they can't get away to an actual restaurant, and hot dogs are about the easiest thing in the world to prepare, plus they don't require a lot of plates and forks and spoons and such. But Hot Pockets aren't that much more difficult to cook or handle, and some of us actually like them.

Come on, convention center operators. Get rid of the hot dogs that everyone hates but they eat because they're famished. Dump the inedible mini-pizzas. Give up on those stale nachos with the cheese sauce that you made out of the Exxon Valdez oil slick. We want Hot Pockets. All you need is a freezer, a couple of small Microwaves and a teenager who knows how to press a "start" button. What could be simpler?

I think that's it for the Thursday report. Tune in tomorrow. Same bat-time, same bat-station.

Norman Ornstein has an intriguing thought: That the '08 presidential nominees may get selected at their parties' conventions, rather than weeks or months in advance. I don't believe it will happen but it would sure make those boring conventions worth watching.

Hey, remember that post about the big Felix the Cat sign down at the L.A. car dealership? Here's another perspective on it from the family that owns the place. I think I'm inclined to side with them on this matter.