The wonderful Laura Benanti performs as the person who will no longer be The First Lady tomorrow…

Randy Rainbow's been busy…

The evening of Saturday, October 26, 1996, I was in New York and a group of my friends and I went to see the Broadway musical of Beauty and the Beast, which was playing at the Palace Theatre. The Palace was and is located smack-dab in the middle of Times Square and enjoyed the show tremendously and we also enjoyed going backstage afterwards.

Someone in my party knew the lady playing Belle and she talked with us for a while, introduced us to other cast members and took us on a tour of the place. I love old theaters so that was as fun as watching what all those skilled performers had done on that stage. That extracurricular add-on took maybe an half hour and then we said our goodbyes and walked outside into…

…absolute bedlam.

There was screaming and dancing and yelling and crying and cheering and hugging and groping and drinking (there was a lot of drinking) and singing and shoving and some women with their tops off and one guy with everything off and smoking (some of it apparently even tobacco) and hysteria and police trying and failing to control the crowds and more outrageous happiness than I have ever seen in my life.

The Yankees had just won the World Series. Their first in eighteen years, I believe.

Not long after, someone who knows a lot more about baseball than I do — which is only like four-fifths of this nation — explained to me that with any other team, eighteen years between World Series wins would be an acceptable interval. Most go a lot longer between 'em and the Chicago Cubs once went 108 years. But the Yankees, this fellow told me, expect to win it every year. "They regard it as their birthright," he said. "They feel they're disgraced if anyone else wins."

I have never been in Times Square for the big ball-drop on New Year's Eve but it could not possibly be louder and more crowded and more alcohol-driven than the crowd that evening. It took a long time for us to get through the throng to a few blocks away where we were able to flag down a couple of cabs and proceed to our next destination. I was amazed at what I was seeing and I still can't think of anything that could make me as deliriously happy as some of those people were that night.

If I suddenly won a billion dollars and the secret of Eternal Life and had every woman I've ever found attractive lined-up to service me and they finally rid the world of cole slaw, candy corn and Donald Trump and I suddenly had the power to make famine, poverty and disease disappear and I could bring a lot of people I miss back from the dead, I'd be happy. But maybe not that happy.

I mean not like that naked guy in Times Square who had climbed and was trying to dry-hump the statue of George M. Cohan.

And here's the thing: From my vantage point, most of those people partying there hadn't won anything.

The team they chose to follow had won. Those players got rings and trophies and World Series bonuses and probably better contracts and a helluva lot of bragging rights. Maybe some of the celebrants had wagered and therefore won money on the Series. But some of them were merely ecstatic that "their team won." I understand being pleased about that but not that pleased.

It's something I just don't "get" about sports. I admire athletes and their skills. I understand being excited about masterful performance. I even understand picking a team and being pleased that you picked the right one.

But I don't understand having so much of your personal happiness hanging on whether that team won. I just don't.

Do you know what a Bait Car is? In some areas, police use these things called Bait Cars to catch car thieves. The car is rigged up with a hidden camera and audio recording. It has a tracking device on it and in most cases, the cops can remotely disable the engine and lock the doors so the folks inside can't get away.

Then they park them on the street, sometimes leaving keys in the ignition or otherwise making them easy to steal…and they wait until they catch some rats in their trap. There are a lot of Bait Car videos online but this one is kinda funny. Can you imagine being the prosecutor who has to prove his case in court and you have something like this? Rudy Giuliani would probably blow it but no one else…

P.S. Yes, yes. I know this is a skit. But the real ones go a lot like this.

When I sit down to write posts for this blog lately, I ask myself a question: Do I want to write about what's going on in the world today or get my mind (and therefore maybe, yours) off those oft-depressing topics? The topic of Trump leaving the White House is both joyous and depressing in so many ways, especially when you think how poised everyone is at the moment for the peaceful transfer of power to not be so peaceful. At times, I wish my life was playing out on my TiVo and I could press that little button on the remote control that skips me ahead.

I'm installing and configuring a new computer system this week. There's much to do there and in a way, I welcome the distraction. I do find it helps me to not watch the news a lot. During the 1/6 rioting in D.C., I followed some of it and then at one point, because my sleeping lately has been so erratic and so disconnected to any form of Normal Sleep Hours, I suddenly needed a nap.

I turned off CNN, went to sleep for about 75 minutes, then got up, turned on CNN again…and nothing had changed. I was hearing the same newspeople saying the same things as they narrated the same footage of the same protesters breaking the same windows. I really did feel like my life had done one of those TiVo skips. While I like the concept of 24/7 news, one has to remember that there isn't enough news to fill 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They have to repeat, repeat, repeat…and also find ways to make it sound new when they repeat, repeat, repeat.

They also have to dig up a lot of rumors and statements that might at some point be news but aren't yet. I feel like we've now seen every single person in or around an elected office call on every other single person in an elected office to resign that elected office.

In my younger days, before we all lived on this Internet thing, I'd follow breaking news stories like my life depended on not missing a beat. Now I have to remind myself that that's not necessary. Whatever it is, it will be replayed again and again and again, etc., plus it'll be on YouTube or some other site. You almost can't not see it, whatever it is. Have to remember that the next few days while I need to set up my new computer.

CNN announced the death of Phil Spector with a headline that read, "Grammy-Winning Record Producer Phil Spector dies of natural causes." I suspect a lot of people complained because it's now been changed to "Grammy-winning producer and convicted murderer Phil Spector dies."

I dunno what kind of Journalism classes would suggest that the fact that he went to prison for murdering someone was kind of an aside in his life…and then there's the question of cause of death. The New York Times article said…

The cause was complications of Covid-19, his daughter, Nicole Audrey Spector, said. He was taken to San Joaquin General Hospital in French Camp, Calif., on Dec. 31 and intubated in January, she said.

But the CNN piece still says…

Music producer and convicted murderer Phil Spector died of natural causes on Saturday at the age of 80, according to a statement released by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. An official cause of death will be determined by the medical examiner for San Joaquin County.

Not sure how they can say "natural causes" and then say someone's going to try and determine the cause of death but okay.

I had more than a little interest in his trial for the murder of Lana Clarkson because I'd met Ms. Clarkson, thought she was lovely and smart and in no way — as the defense tried to argue — the kind of person who'd kill herself. I also know a lot of people who knew her better than I did and they all agree.

And I read a lot about the trial and I was about as sure as you can be without sitting in the jury box that he killed her. I'm amazed that it took two trials to convict him but at least they did. From that point on, I had no interest in Spector. Life in prison does not seem to me a whole lot better or worse than being executed unless there's a chance of someday proving your innocence. Which in this case there wasn't.

Our video today is a complete episode of The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast, this one from 2/8/75 with roastee Lucille Ball. I find these shows kinda fascinating for the cut-'n'-paste assembly methods. Greg Garrison, who produced and directed just about everything Dean did on TV for years, was a master of shooting a TV show rapidly and without all its performers present. Dean's regular series was full of clips spliced together from here and there, taped on different days. As a general rule of thumb, if you saw someone on that show do a stand-up routine or sing a song and you didn't see them in a shot with Dean, he wasn't on the premises when they taped that spot or song, and some of them never met him.

When the show went to its roast format, Garrison pulled all sorts of tricks to make it seem like he had a huge dais of celebrities but only rarely were they all present at the same time. In the opening of this episode, you see a whole bunch of 'em enter…

ENTERING FROM THE LEFT: Jack Benny, Don Rickles, Ginger Rogers, Totie Fields, Milton Berle, Nipsey Russell, Vivian Vance, Foster Brooks, Gale Gordon, Dean Martin.

ENTERING FROM THE RIGHT: Dan Rowan, Bob Hope, Dick Martin, Henry Fonda, Rich Little, Phyllis Diller, Lucille Ball.

You will notice that you almost never see any of these folks pass other dais members on their way to their seats. That's because a lot of them weren't there at the same time…or even in Las Vegas where the main portions of the episode were taped. As Lucy enters, she passes some empty seats, then Diller, Little, Fonda, Martin and Rowan. Bob Hope ain't there.

And then when they cut to the wide shot of the dais at 1:14, there are five people on the left (including Dino) and six on the right (including Lucy). Seventeen stars entered but suddenly there are only eleven. Later, Ruth Buzzi and Gary Morton join a dais making nineteen people allegedly at a table that seats about thirteen.

You can play a great game with these shows, trying to figure out who was there and who wasn't. Bob Hope was clearly not there. They cut in some shots of him laughing from his seat and you see him for a second with Dean — possibly a clip from some other roast they did — but he wasn't in Vegas where they shot most of this. There's no shot of him with anyone else there, not even the Guest of Honor. You can also tell because the video on him is sharper than it is on the people who were really in Las Vegas and Hope's timing makes it obvious there was no live audience there. He reads the cards, pauses for laughs and then they put in the laughs later.

Rickles was there. You see that shot above that shows him with Lucy? You don't see that shot of Jack Benny and Lucy, of Milton Berle and Lucy, not even of Vivian Vance and Lucy or Gale Gordon and Lucy. You see Benny walking past Ginger Rogers…but you don't see Ginger Rogers with Lucy. A lot of these folks finish their stints at the lectern by blowing the off-camera (and not present) Lucy a kiss.

They're there to show their love for Lucy. Why don't they hug her or kiss her? Because she wasn't there.

I haven't made a careful study but I would guess that when they taped at the MGM Grand in Vegas, they had Buzzi, Brooks, Russell, Fields, Rickles, Dean, Lucy, Rowan, Martin, Fonda, Little, Diller and Morton present. Everyone else was taped at another time, possibly while they were there taping a roast of someone else. And I'll guess Hope's main speech was taped on a set at NBC Burbank with just him there and not much more of the set than you see in the main shot of him. Since a lot of those people were on other roasts in the series and the men wear the same tuxedos in all of them, footage could have come from anywhere.

He was an actor, both on-camera and doing cartoon voices. He was a puppeteer and a stand-up comedian. He was a writer and perhaps the best Stan Laurel impersonator ever. He was Jim MacGeorge and he passed away peacefully this A.M. in his sleep at the age of 92. Oh — and he was also one of the best joke-tellers I ever heard.

Most of his on-camera acting was as Mr. Laurel, often with his pal Chuck McCann playing Mr. Hardy…though each was known to occasionally cheat on the other with a different Oliver or Stan. He also supplied the voice, not of Stan but of Ollie in the sixties Hanna-Barbera Laurel & Hardy cartoon series. (He should have done both but the Executive Producer insisted on playing Stan himself.) Jim was also a friend of Stan Laurel's — that's who put him and Chuck together — and an expert on The Boys and their work.

His puppeteering was mainly for Beany and Cecil. The original Time for Beany puppet show starred Daws Butler and Stan Freberg and when they quit, Jim was part of the team that replaced them, usually performing as Cap'n Huffenpuff, along with many of the supporting cast members and often, Beany. Later when Beany & Cecil became an animated series, Jim spoke for Beany, Cap'n Huffenpuff and many of the supporting cast members.

He was also heard in dozens of other cartoon shows including Kwicky Koala, Yogi's Space Race, The Flintstones, Duck Tales, The Bionic Six and many others. And he worked for a time as a writer for Jay Ward, mainly on Fractured Flickers and the Super Chicken cartoons.

And he did an awful lot of stand-up comedy work..usually, the last few decades, in a seated position. Just a few months ago, he was still performing, mostly for senior citizens' groups that adored him. Here's thirteen minutes of Jim MacGeorge that very much remind me what it was like to be around this lovely, funny man…

HBO has finally announced a date for John Oliver to return with Last Week Tonight. It's Valentine's Day, February 14. Here's a promo video…

I am now answering the following questions…

• What do you think is going to happen on Inauguration Day?
• What do you think Donald Trump is going to do before or after Inauguration Day?
• And when do you think America will be somewhat back-to-normal after COVID?

…with the same reply: "I don't know and neither does anyone else." And I mean that. I don't think even Donald Trump has a solid idea about what Donald Trump is going to do. Advance planning — or even doing what he said he was going to do — have never been his strong points. (He has about 72 hours to unveil that wonderful, terrific, cheaper Obamacare replacement he said he'd put in place right after he was elected.)

There are times in our lives when I don't know what's going to happen but I think it's good to have a plan if "A" happens, a plan for if "B" happens, a plan or if it's "C," etc. And if I were in charge of security at any government facility this week, I think I'd have them for every letter of the English and Greek alphabets. But as a spectator from afar, it's sometimes more comfy not to make plans when you don't have a clue what problems you'll have to solve with them.

Meanwhile, Marty Golia wrote to ask me…

I was wondering if you were aware of and/or had any thoughts on the reaction on various FB groups when people shared Neal Kirby's statement on what Jack would've thought about the insurrectionists dressing as Captain America. Some — even in groups about Kirby — felt it shouldn't be shared in a "politics-free zone." Others felt they had to stand up to (paraphrasing) "people telling others what Jack would have though when they don't really know." At least one group splintered. Others took down posts as soon as they went up.

Well, first of all, I think it's fine for anyone who sets up a discussion forum to declare that certain topics are off-limits…and if you don't like that rule, there are only about eleventy-trillion other places on the Internet where you can post what you like. Secondly, most (not all but most) of the "politics-free zones" I've seen on the 'net are really "No posting of things I disagree with or which might invite rebuttals that I don't like" zones.

Jack was pretty consistently anti-bully, anti-Nazi and anti-deifying charismatic leaders in his work and in interviews and conversations. His wife Roz said he voted the straight Democratic ticket all his life. Whenever he didn't like the Dem nominee, he liked the G.O.P. one less.

Might he have changed his worldview if he'd lived to today? I dunno. If he were alive today at the spry old age of 210, Abe Lincoln might have decided that "freeing the slaves" jazz was a huge mistake…but I don't think speculation of that sort leads to any sort of answers about anything.  It's just a way of trying to dismiss powerful lessons and statements of the past. ("Yes, I know what God said about coveting thy neighbor's house or wife or anything but I'm sure He'd grant me an exception if he saw Harry's girl friend and his new Lamborghini.")

On the other hand, I think if anyone has the insight and right to say what Jack Kirby would have felt about matters today, it's a child of Jack Kirby.

If you don't want to listen to him, fine. But don't pretend that your speculation is just as good as his. I'm pretty sure your parents would be horrified if they caught you doing that and I know (or knew) them much, much better than you do or did.

The Temecula Dance Company does a jazzy interpretation of "A Musical" from the show Something Rotten. They're lip-syncing to a highly-edited track from the cast album but they're doing wonderful things with the choreography…

Bill Turner sent me this…

I know in previous years you have posted about Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. I watched it again this year, for probably the 50th time, and am wondering whether you can tell who sang which singing parts, particularly on the Plunderer's March ("We're despicable"). My family still remembers my high school buddies and me belting that out back around 1968.

Sure. Let's go through all the voices…

As we all know, Jim Backus played Quincy Magoo and Jack Cassidy played Bob Cratchit and they sang for those characters. Les Tremayne played The Ghost of Christmas Present and he didn't sing but Jane Kean, who played Belle did. That's the same Jane Kean who took over as Trixie, wife of Ed Norton, when Jackie Gleason brought The Honeymooners back to television in the sixties.

Laura Olsher played The Laundress, the kid with the turkey, Peter Cratchit, Mrs. Cratchit and she supplied the speaking voice of the daughter in the Cratchit family. Marie Matthews played Scrooge as a young boy. She sang as him and also she did the singing for the Cratchit daughter. John Hart, who was The Lone Ranger for one season on TV, played Mr. Billings and the Stage Manager. He didn't sing in the show.

Royal Dano played Marley's Ghost who had no songs but Dano did do the singing for the Junk Shop Owner. Paul Frees did the speaking voice of the Junk Shop Owner and also voiced The Director, Fezziwig, The Undertaker and the hapless gent who asked Scrooge for a donation.

Joan Gardner played Tiny Tim, The Charwoman and The Ghost of Christmas Past. She is often confused with voice actress Joanie Gerber who was not in this show. Neither was June Foray, who used to be credited all over the place as being in it, including in some TV Guide listings and on the box for the Beta and VHS releases of Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol.

Morey Amsterdam — Buddy Sorrell from The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Human Joke Machine — played two tiny parts as the gents on the street discussing the death of Ebenezer Scrooge. Why only two tiny roles? Because he was hired for a larger part which was recorded and cut out of the finished show.

So the speaking voices of the four Plunderers (as you call them) were Olsher, Gardner and then Frees spoke for both men. Since even the great Paul Frees couldn't sing two parts at the same time and they wanted to record the four characters together, he only sang for the Undertaker. Mr. Dano sang for the Junk Shop Guy.

I verified these credits in Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol: The Making of the First Animated Christmas Special by Darrell Van Citters. This is the only book that focuses on the special and since it's so well-researched and exhaustive, it's the only one you'll ever need. Here's a link to buy the paperback edition. There was a beautiful hardcover edition but it's beastly hard to find and I ain't parting with mine. Hope this helps.

• When Trump is signing that huge stack of pardons early next week, I hope he has time for mine. I have a list of TV shows and comic books I've written that certainly deserve some clemency…

The Daily Show salutes The Heroes of the Insurrection. It is worth remembering that while many of these folks claimed there was "a mountain of evidence" that Trump won the election, most of them never saw any of it and the ones who saw this "evidence" never released any of it to the public, nor did they present anything convincing to any court, not even ones run by Trump appointees…

Neal Kirby, son of Jack, issued a terrific statement the other day. Here it is…

Statement to Insurrectionists

My father, Jack Kirby, along with his partner Joe Simon, created Captain America in 1941. Perhaps the most iconic symbol of patriotism since the "Spirit of 1776," Captain America has stood as a symbol and protector of our democracy and the rule of law for the past 79 years. He was created by two Jewish guys from New York who hated Nazis and hated bullies. Captain America stood up for the underdog, and, as the story was written, even before he gained his strength and prowess from Army scientists, always stood for what was righteous, and never backed down.

At 72, I have a fairly vivid personal memory of every political and cultural upheaval since Castro's revolution in the mid-1950s. Add to that my father's stories, and I could probably paint a picture of the battlefields of northern France surrounding the city of Metz in WWII as well. However, the events that transpired at our nations' Capitol on Jan. 6, an insurrection inspired and fomented by our own president, will be the event that haunts me forever.

While watching one of the horrific videos of the storming of the Capitol, I thought I noticed someone in a Trump/Capt. America t-shirt! I was appalled and mortified. I believe I even caught a quick glance of someone with a Captain America shield. A quick Google search turned up Trump as Captain America on T-shirts, posters, even a flag! These images are disgusting and disgraceful. Captain America is the absolute antithesis of Donald Trump. Where Captain America is selfless, Trump is self-serving. Where Captain America fights for our country and democracy, Trump fights for personal power and autocracy. Where Captain America stands with the common man, Trump stands with the powerful and privileged. Where Captain America is courageous, Trump is a coward. Captain America and Trump couldn't be more different.

My father, Jack Kirby, and Joe Simon, the creators of Captain America and WWII veterans, would be absolutely sickened by these images. These images are an insult to both their memories. If Donald Trump had the qualities and character of Captain America, the White House would be a shining symbol of truth and integrity, not a festering cesspool of lies and hypocrisy. Several of our presidents held the same values as Captain America. Donald Trump is not one of them.

I try not to put my words into Jack's mouth because…well, they could never be as brilliant as things Jack actually said. But Neal knew the man better than anyone alive and he's his son and if anyone's entitled to speak for his father, it's Neal. And I will say that I think Jack would be applauding every word of the above.

In the meantime, comedian Patton Oswalt tweeted something yesterday and I have a dozen requests to "fact-check" it. He wrote…

When the 1st issue of Captain America hit the stands, with a drawing of Cap punching Hitler, Nazis showed up in the lobby of Marvel's building. They called Jack Kirby's office and told him to meet them downstairs. Kirby ran down to meet them but they'd already fled.

Here's all I can offer in the way of a fact-check: I wasn't there (of course) but Jack told that story many times and I believe it. I don't think Jack ever said it was over the first issue and if he did, I wouldn't trust his memory on a teensy detail like that. But if you'd heard him talk about the incident, you would have absolutely believed it happened some time during the ten issues that Simon and Kirby produced of Captain America.