Monthly Archives: April 2013

In the above photo, the gentleman on the left is the great (sadly, late) Carl Ballantine. Carl was one of the funniest men who ever strolled this planet — a regular on McHale's Navy, a comic actor in so many TV shows and movies, and the performer of a comedy magic act where none of the tricks worked but every one of the jokes was a masterpiece. I have never laughed more in my life than when I was around Carl.

The lady at right is his daughter, Saratoga Ballantine. Carl showed his love for betting on the horses by naming each of his children after racetracks. Sara is an actress of grand ability who started as a child in TV sitcoms and is now heard voiceovering in many commercials, cartoon shows and videogames. We love her, too. And among the many things we love her for is the loving, diligent way she took care of her father in his final years. Having lost my remaining parent not long after, I really respect someone who handled that delicate matter as well as she did.

Sara will be talking about his career, her career and taking care of an aging Jew comedian tomorrow. Where will she be doing this? Why, on Stu's Show, of course.

You know the drill by now: Stu Shostak interviews great guests from the world of entertainment on his weekly Internet Radio program each Wednesday. The show starts at 4 PM Pacific Time (he does it live) which is 7 PM Eastern and other times in other zones. When it ends is a good question but it's always at least two hours. It has been known to run three.

The best way to hear it is to listen live when they do it. That's free. Shortly after it ends — like a half-hour or so — you can purchase it as a podcast from the Stu's Show website. That's also where you go to hear it live. Single shows can be downloaded for a most-reasonable 99 cents each…but get a bargain. Pay for three and you get one free. There are hundreds there to choose from, some of which don't even have me as the guest.

Stu's a great host. Sara will be a great guest. She has wonderful stories of her wonderful career and wonderful father and you'll have a wonderful time. That's tomorrow (Wednesday) on Stu's Show.

Newt Gingrich says that a deal is close that would have him starring on the right-wing wing of a revival of Crossfire on CNN. Of course, Newt Gingrich once claimed he'd all but won the 2012 Republican nomination for president so take that with a grain of sodium chloride. Then he also says of the period when the hosts of Crossfire were Tom Braden and Pat Buchanan…

People forget but for the first 10 years it was a very serious program. I remember doing it as a junior member. It was a real workout. It was a destination for people to hear both sides discuss serious issues in an entertaining way.

I remember it not unlike a rowdy pro wrestling match where half the time you couldn't hear what one person was yelling because the other person was yelling louder. I suppose there were moments like Mr. Gingrich recalls but the show wasn't about them. There was a period when Michael Kinsley represented the left and his gentle nature seemed to dial down the fire-exhalation a bit. Or maybe it wasn't his manner so much as the fact that he wasn't that liberal. He was slightly left of center and didn't disagree that much with most of his opposition. I don't recall the show having too many liberals who were as liberal as its conservatives were conservative.

I do recall a lot of hosts who were fierce about their side "winning" to the stage of intellectual dishonesty. Among those who deal in opinion journalism and punditry, there's a kind of person who strikes me as being an advocate for a position they truly and deeply hold. There's also a kind who seems to have discovered that there's money and fame in spouting a certain viewpoint…so spout that viewpoint they do — incessantly and giving no ground lest it diminish their careers. Crossfire, to me, had too many of the latter kind.

Anyway, knowing full well no one from CNN reads this site and that if they did, they'd dismiss the following suggestion as unlikely to draw ratings, I would like to present an idea. The idea is to revive Crossfire not with Newt Gingrich or his left-wing equivalent, but with two people who won't nuke their future careers if they occasionally admit the other guy has a point there. The Newts of the world have too much to lose if they're viewed as squishy by the rabid elements of their base. At times, the old Crossfire seemed like you had opposing versions of the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail squabbling, each denying he'd just had a limb severed. The goal wasn't even to win so much as to act like you'd won.

Furthermore, I would add to the mix a third individual — a good, non-partisan Fact Checker who, when one combatant claimed GDP was up and the other insisted it was down, could weigh in and settle the dispute. If I were CNN, promoting myself as the most trusted name in news, I'd be concerned about a show on my network throwing off so many unsupported, misleading "facts." Whenever I see a not-on-Fox-News interview of Brit Hume or Chris Wallace — two men who purport to be newsmen first and advocates second — I feel the squirming over things said during the "opinion" hours of their network. It's like a station with the word "news" in its name isn't responsible for outright disinformation on certain of its shows. On my version of Crossfire, the debaters could offer hard evidence that the Fact Checker was in error but would agree to accept his or her final rulings the way lawyers in a courtroom must provisionally accept the judge's.

No one will ever put such a show on the air. There might not be enough shouting on it to qualify for the current definition of Good Television, measured as it is by tune-ins of people aged 18-49. But I've had political discussions that ended with one side admitting the other side was right about something…or of both finding areas of agreement and common ground. I just can't recall seeing too many of them on television, particularly on a show with the name, "Crossfire."

Jonathan Sloman takes to Facebook today to weigh in…

I put forward the theory that the interviewer is producer and one time Head of Light Entertainment at Granada, Johnnie Hamp. Not only was he producing Cinema at the time, but he had also past dealings with Woody Allen, convincing him to perform an excellent stand-up special for Granada in 1965, which Hamp also produced.

Jonathan goes on to offer the video on this page as a sample of Mr. Hamp's voice which he believes is a match. Remember that I have no opinion on this matter.

Meanwhile, Stephen Saunders disagrees with the theory that the interviewer is Barry Took…

Sorry I couldn't let it go. In 1971 Barry Took was Head of Light Entertainment at London Weekend Television, a competing company to Granada, the producers of Cinema. So, unlikely. He was a writer on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In in 1970 though, which has nothing to do with it, but something I didn't know. Thank you for your time and understanding. I need a life.

Please continue to remember that I have no opinion on this matter. What I do have is a message from Nigel Parkinson…

Sorry I haven't checked your blog until today, or I could have told you that it is indeed Barry Took doing the interview. You may remember he was Marty Feldman's comedy writing partner in the 1960s and was a stand-up comic before then. He was also instrumental in getting Monty Python together, as well as other UK comedy shows. A very significant figure. And, he doesn't sound anything like Peter Cook! I met Barry Took in the 90s and he was an extremely jovial and entertaining man, much missed.

So there you are: More disagreements. Feel free to form your own opinion…as long as you remember that I don't have one.

Since 1970 when he first took to the radio in his secret identity, Barry Hansen has been a champion of funny records. He has made many careers by promoting the music of new, up-and-coming performers and he has introduced veteran performers like Stan Freberg, Spike Jones and Tom Lehrer to a new generation or two. Wearing the top hat of Dr. Demento, he has been a fixture of radio and its Internet equivalents and done oh so much to preserve old recordings.

Some folks are fixin' to do a documentary about the guy and to fund it via Kickstarter. As of this moment, they've had $64,774 pledged but their goal is $100,000 and they have only three days to get to it. I urge you to go to their Kickstarter page, browse about and consider joining me by pledging some dough. It seems like a most worthy cause to me.

Meet 11 People Who Bring the Muppets to Life, including my pal Dave Goelz.

I should've linked to this a few weeks ago but it's still good…

Jim Haberman is the guy who fingered Peter Cook as the interviewer in that great Woody Allen video. He's sent me a message he titled, "My closing arguments on the Woody Allen interview." Here it is…

Never expecting to stir up so many conflicting opinions on Woody Allen's interviewer's identity, I did what any borderline OCD comedy nut might do and scanned all 300+ comments on the piece over the last 4+ years on YouTube, then checked out each candidate mentioned as well as I could in every way online. About 2/3 of those offering an opinion there voted for Peter Cook, but the others split between Russell Harty, Derek Granger, two others each with a lone vote — and the man I'm now a bit embarrassed to admit probably was the actual culprit.

After poring over bios and carefully listening to the available audio on all the suspects, it's fairly evident that the 2nd-place vote-getter in those YouTube comments, Barry Took, was likely Woody Allen's interviewer there. Took had been a stand-up comic, sitcom writer, TV host (in Brit-speak, presenter) and finally, the TV exec apparently responsible for assembling the Monty Python group, reason alone for immortality right there. Videos of his Point of View BBC commentaries in the '80s a la Andy Rooney reveal a vocal style quite similar sounding to Cook's natural speaking voice but with softer undertones and a more rapid-fire tempo, both in evidence in the Allen interview. Like Cook, Barry Took was also quite active in London media in and just before 1971, including doing lots of interviews and hosting.

I'll also admit my first analysis was based mainly on the more subdued first half of the interview, and on closer inspection of the latter part, it was troubling to hear so much noisy giggling from the interviewer, not a Cook trademark at all. And since Barry Took had strong comedy roots, it's very plausible that he, like Cook, would have been capable of pulling off the kind of deadpan send-up done here. So although none of your respondents actually mentioned him, I now change my plea to 80% probability that it was Mr. Took asking the questions, and will beg for humble mercy from the court. And suddenly I'm very worried about the fate of "Geoff's sister" as well.

I still have no opinion on any of this but am glad to have encouraged one more round of pointless Internet argument about a trivial matter. Those of you who are irate about me pointing out what a rotten president George W. Bush was, please note how much space I devoted to this as opposed to that. Thank you.

Just saw this on Twitter…

And now I'm worried: What kind of chaos is going to occur during the NBC4 News at 11 tonight?

Paul Krugman reminds us what a terrible, terrible president George W. Bush was.

Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner did a live chat this afternoon as part of some sort of ComedyFest thing that Comedy Central is doing. Judd Apatow moderated and there were a few tech-type glitches in it, including the first few seconds getting lopped off.  But funny things were said so here's the video of it…

Ezra Klein on the subtext of some of Barack Obama's jokes at the White House Correspondents Dinner. Yeah, I think there may have been more point to some of those lines than was immediately apparent.

It has become an odd "talking point" that the president should be doing more to deal with a Republican congress that assures its supporters that they won't deal with him except maybe to arrange his surrender terms. I keep being reminded of the 1985 Writers Guild strike. Our negotiating committee went in to present demands and proposals to the producers' representatives. The producers' representatives handed our negotiators a take-it-or-leave-it offer (a very bad one) and left the room. Their position was that there would be no negotiations nor would they even listen to our proposals. This is a strategy that sometimes has worked rather well for them but when it doesn't, we get long strikes because it takes a long time for them to budge from that position.

During the strike, I kept running into writers who felt we'd been months walking picket lines because our leaders didn't know how to bargain. I kept having conversations that went like this…

OTHER PERSON: They should get in there and negotiate.

ME: Negotiate? With whom?

OTHER PERSON: With the producers, with the other side. You get in there and you establish a dialogue.

ME: They're refusing to talk with us.

OTHER PERSON: Then you make them talk to us. You establish a dialogue. You get in there and bargain.

ME: How do you do this?

OTHER PERSON: I keep telling you. You establish a dialogue. You sit down with them and present ideas to them.

You wouldn't believe how often I had that conversation. Eventually, our Chief Negotiator had some back-channel conversations with their Chief Negotiator and when the strike had gone on for a while and the producers were looking for a way to budge without appearing to budge, something was worked out. But there was never that head-to-head bargaining where they accept something we offer and give us something for it. The producers felt that to just listen to us was to lose. Just as a lot of Republicans want to be able to go back to their constituents and brag that they didn't negotiate with Obama.

We eagerly await Mark Cohen's biography of Allan Sherman, Overweight Sensation. You can advance order a copy of it here.

As readers of this blog know, I was a huge fan of Sherman's during the short time that much of America was a huge fan of him…and I remained one after his career self-destructed. A lot of his work was "of the time" and does not endure today but an awful lot of it holds up well. Some of the lyrics are so clever that the songs are fun to listen to even if you don't get all the references…and there's something very endearing about his delivery. I've heard a lot of different people perform Allan Sherman songs and never liked any of them that much. Later today, by the way, I'll be posting a parody of an Allan Sherman song. That's right: A parody of a parody.

In the meantime, Josh Lampert has a review of the book which will tell you much about the too-brief roller-coaster ride that Allan Sherman called his life. I have a higher opinion of the art of the song parody than Lampert does but his view of Sherman's story is an interesting one. Thanks to Bruce Reznick for the pointer.

I just watched and enjoyed a nice "little" movie — and I don't use that term disparagingly. I'm impressed by films that put something on the screen besides money and special effects and where the hovering presence of CGI doesn't add an air of unreality to the entire proceedings. I'm also interested in the world of magic and all this made me a good candidate to enjoy Desperate Acts of Magic, a new "independent" film that was written, co-directed, co-produced and co-edited by a clever magician named Joe Tyler Gold. And oh, yes — he's also the star of the film which is clearly fictional but just as clearly derived from his years doing magic, not always in the glamorous venues.

I don't think a lot of people understand the hard, often impossible work that goes into (a) developing a solid magic act and (b) finding some way to "monetize" it, as they now say in every seminar about anything these days. And I don't mean the magician's out to make a ton of money off his art/craft. I mean he just wants to make enough to pay for the props and to keep doing the act. I once heard a top sleight-of-hand wizard say, "I consider myself a success as long as I don't have to go out and get a real job." And as he said that, he riffled a deck of card and all four aces flew out onto the table.

In the interest of Full Disclosure, I should mention that I know a few folks involved in this film. One of them sent me a video and asked if I could give it a plug here. I usually don't do things like that and I always cringe when a friend asks that because, you know, what if it sucks? But I started watching and got hooked. Mr. Gold (who I don't know) plays what I'm guessing is kind of a variation on himself, living a life that could have happened to a guy like himself. In truth, I know, he worked a lot of the dreadful, low-paying gigs that his character endures in this movie. Being a magician is such a difficult career that many of the top ones still respond with nervous facial tics if you say the phrase, "Birthday party for about two dozen children." So the film's about that kind of Baptism of Flash Paper and also about trying to build a relationship (like, with a woman) in that world. Valerie Dillman is quite charming as the lady who first encounters Joe when she lifts his wallet and later lifts his spirit and career, and there's a lot of other good acting in there.

I'm trying to sell this without overselling this so I'll just recommend you give it a look. That part may not be easy since it's just now rolling out with screenings in the next few week in Los Angeles and New York. I assume those will lead to wider distribution and video availability. Remember that name — Desperate Acts of Magic — and check it out when it comes to a theater or cable channel near you. Here's a link to the website where you can get the screening dates and other useful info, and here's the trailer…

Costco treats its employees well and limits CEO compensation to a few million per year. McDonald's doesn't treat its employees so well and pays its CEOs a lot. So…which is a better way to run a business these days? Guess.

A lot of folks are upset because Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was read his Miranda rights. Some of them appear to think that the man did not have those rights and that the reading somehow bestowed them upon him…but never mind those people. Let's deal with the ones who are simply outraged that the alleged Boston Marathon Co-Bomber was informed of the rights he already had. Why was this done? Well, according to Adam Serwer, it's because the law requires this.