My pal Bob Bergen is one of the top voiceover artists in the business and it isn't just because he's really good in front of a microphone. Obviously, that has a lot to do with it and none of what he or I have to say in this long, long post should obscure or trivialize that. But in the increasingly-competitive field of voiceover — both for animation and all the other areas — it ain't enough.

And before I go any further, let me add that the core principles that Bob wrote about in this piece he put on Facebook also apply to on-camera or on-stage acting, writing, drawing, singing…just about any creative job/artform. Especially the part about bewaring that which seems too good to be true.

Bob is really sharp at understanding the field he's in and very realistic about where he is in it. Read this piece he wrote and then I'll meet you on the other end of it to add a few more points. Here's Bob…

Hi gang!

So, yesterday I had a conversation with a fellow vo professional whom I have the utmost respect. I'm keeping their identity private as it was a private conversion. But the issue they wanted my input on is rampant and frustrating, and it came up during the business of the business discussion on our recent VO Cruise.

For those of you who are interested in pursuing vo, or actively pursuing vo, I'm sure you have seen an internet trend with ads selling ideas such as, "You don't need acting training/You don't need to invest a lot of money/You don't need a broadcast quality home studio/You will make money," etc. Hogwash! If it looks too good to be true, it is!

These claims go against everything I stand for as a professional actor and coach. And, these claims go against the grain of whom I was chatting with yesterday, as they were just looking for some ideas/suggestions from me to address this and perhaps sway people from being taken advantage of.

NONE of this is new! It's just now. And due to the vastness of the internet, these charlatans reach far more than they did before social media.

When I first started studying vo in the late ‘70s, there were only a handful of workshops out there. And the community was small and tight. It was well understood by even the greenest of beginners, if a coach or acting teacher ever mentioned how to make money at vo, or how much money one can make at vo, shortcuts or how easy the whole thing is, you were to run fast in the opposite direction.

It was considered vulgar and unprofessional for anyone to discuss or guarantee an income upon completing a class. This is 100% true today as well. I myself cannot guarantee my own income, how could I ever guarantee a student's income? And you never, EVER took a class that offered a demo upon completion. You knew to stay away from "package deals." If everyone would be demo ready after a set number of classes, then everyone would be working!

Now, I took a very different slant on this issue than my fellow vo professional yesterday. I do not blame the charlatans. I blame those who seek them out or buy into their snake oil. One byproduct of the internet is the absence of merit, excellence and at times, common sense. People are looking to make money at vo, not to be great actors. Those who are great stand a better chance of working, but even a great actor does not always succeed. Hey, that's show biz!

People, consider the source! Caveat emptor! Wanna get vo career advice? Seek advice from those on a much larger boat than you, not from those on the same or smaller boat. I always had very high goals as a vo actor. I made it a point to only rub elbows with those who had the career I wanted. I studied with those who were the most respected by the top vo agents and casting directors. I invested and reinvested in my career, and still do. I wanted to be ahead of the herd, not amongst them. I pursued professional vo professionally.

Today, everyone at the top of the vo food chain is a mouse click away. There was no social media when I was starting out. So, how I did I rub elbows? I would befriend studio receptionists and ask to sit in lobbies in the event I could strike up a conversation with A-list vo actors, advertising producers/writers, etc. I would hang out in the parking lots of the top vo agents, just for the opportunity to bend the ears of the top actors in the industry.

People, you have no excuse today as everyone is at your fingertips on the machine you are reading this. You can listen to the top vo actor's demos on their agent's websites! Atlas, DPN, SBV, CESD, AVO, VOX, etc. No excuse to not know what makes a great vo demo! No excuse to not reach out to working actors to research who produced their demos.

Why are so many so attracted to the charlatans? Because the charlatans are just giving em what they want and want to hear. This is not just an issue with actors, this is an issue with people. Too many want to feel good, not do good. Too many want life easy. Too many want huge returns on the smallest of investments. Too many do not have the work ethic to strive for excellence, yet they want to be compensated for mediocrity. And then they complain/play the victim when things do not go their way.

Take ownership! Again, if it sounds too good to be true, it is. Strive to be a great actor, not a working actor. Wake up every day with the passion and drive to do more than everyone else, and then do even more. Check fast and cheap at the door. (Side note: it is far cheaper to pursue professional vo today than it was when I was starting out!! Gone are the days of snail mailing reel to reel demos, which cost me on average10 grand a year for decades, until the internet made marketing online free!)

Bottom line, as much as I appreciated the frustration from my fellow vo professional yesterday, I didn't have the same sympathy for those being taken advantage of. They/we are all responsible for our own business decisions.

We are responsible for our work ethic, or lack their of. We are responsible for vetting and seeing through the charlatans. If you want to play with the big boys, emulate them. Use commons sense if you are being sold a bill of goods that sound too good to be true. Consider the source and consider the source of those who fell for the BS. And consider the career path taken by THE most successful vo actors working today.

And if ya fell for any of this, check victimhood at the door. Own your choices and own your mistake. Look in the mirror and figure out what it is you did wrong and (or) fell for. Mistakes are only bad if repeated. I worked my ass off to get to where I am in my career, and I work even harder to stay here.

me again. That's one of the problems in the world today: People who are way too quick to believe what they want to hear. And I suppose there will always be those who see profit and/or power in telling that kind of person what they want to believe but the Internet has made it way too easy.

Like I said: What Bob wrote applies in a lot of areas besides voiceover. I think it's important for everyone to remember that if you want to make it in the real world, it's necessary to live in one.

So did anyone really think that panel of three DC Circuit judges was going to rule that once you're President of the United States, you're allowed to break any laws you want? The Supreme Court won't say you are either though they may take their own sweet time about it.

Trump keeps losing and losing and losing and losing and I wonder if/when any of his supporters are going to get antsy backing a guy who doesn't seem like he could win a game of Old Maid with marked cards. Biden should be out there posing the question, "What if he ran the country the way he's running his legal defenses?" Ask them if they were accused of a crime, would they hire Alina Habba to defend them?

In 1980, ABC attempted an undisguised knock-off of Saturday Night Live called Fridays featuring a rep cast that included Mark Blankfield, Maryedith Burrell, Melanie Chartoff, Larry David, Rich Hall, Darrow Igus, Brandis Kemp, Bruce Mahler, Michael Richards and John Roarke.

The show does not seem to be well-remembered…or even remembered at all by some. I always found enough clever material in each episode that I taped (on Beta, I think) and watched each episode…and sometimes on a Friday afternoon would watch a run-through of that evening's telecast live in person. You can do that when you're working on the same lot.

I did though sometimes have a little trouble telling who was who in some sketches. My pal Steve Stoliar, who is wise in all things Marxian, sent me this link to a pretty good Marx Brothers skit. I recall spying on a rehearsal of this but even then, I wasn't sure who was playing who. The Groucho and Harpo are especially good. Can anyone identify the players?

Readers of this site know well of my oft-mentioned loathing of cole slaw. Truth be known, there are a lot of foods I will not eat — some because of my many food allergies; others because I simply don't like them. And on my "Will Not Eat" list, there are some where I'm not sure. I just know they fall into at least one of those categories if not both.

I can though say with some certainty that my body loathes spicy or "hot" (in the sense of being spicy) foods. There are folks, including seemingly-sane people, who love such foods. I do not and my tummy does not.

So you will never find me in a situation like the show Hot Ones where guests are peppered with questions while gnawing on increasingly-lethal hot wings. I don't know why anyone would do such a thing but if John Oliver is going to subject himself to such torturous interrogation, I'm going to watch…

Vanity Fair has an oral history of the early days of Late Night with Conan O'Brien. I was an instant fan of the program, mainly because of the surprising quantity of solid and ingenious comedy writing. As the years rolled on, the quantity and ingenuity of the writing declined and it seemed like someone decided that the "gold" of the show was Conan ad-libbing and, often, trying too hard to top his guests. But I sure liked the early years that this piece is about.

Comic book fans and pros alike are mourning the reported passing of José Delbo, the prolific Argentine artist who was probably best known for his long runs on the Wonder Woman comic book. We have no word on a cause of death but he was born in 1933 which would make him 90.

José was a comic artist in Argentina until 1963 when political unrest forced him to flee to Brazil. Two years later, he migrated to the United States where he secured work from Charlton, Dell and Western Publishing's Gold Key line. Among the many comics he illustrated were Billy the Kid, The Monkees, Ripley's Believe It Or Not, The Brady Bunch, Hogan's Heroes, Twilight Zone, The Mod Squad and Gold Key's adaptation of the movie Yellow Submarine. He began drawing for DC in 1969 and his first of many issues of Wonder Woman was in 1976.

He also taught. On Facebook, artist Steve Lieber wrote, "I met him in my first year at the Kubert school. A great teacher- funny, smart, and unwilling to accept any less than our best effort. ‘Mr. Lieber, your horse looks like a dog. Go home and work.' I will, José. Thank you."

José was a charming gentleman and a dedicated craftsman. We could use more like him.

One of the best things I've seen on Broadway was the 1998 revival of the musical 1776. In fact, I saw it twice, once near the beginning of its run and once near the end. The two videos below are from early as indicated by the presence of Brent Spiner as John Adams.

The evening of my first visit, they had a small (but loud) Revolutionary-era marching band outside the theater, celebrating that it had been named some sort of "1776 Week" in New York and there was a pre-show speech by then-Mayor, then-Liked-by-Somebody Rudy Giuliani. Then came the play and it was just perfect. Here's how it opened…

And here's the Press Roll featuring excerpts from the show. See why I liked it?

After years of rumors and even announcements that proved to be premature, it's finally happening: The Tropicana — one of the oldest mega-resorts in Las Vegas — will close April 2 and will soon after be torn down and asunder to build a big, huge, colossal baseball stadium to house the A's.

The word is that this is not the end of that hotel; that they'll tear it down, build the new stadium and then at some point build something that will be called The Tropicana on whatever remaining ground there is to build upon. But it's certainly the end of what's there now.

Which doesn't bother me one bit. It has long been a place that seemed likely to fall down on its own if urban renewal didn't beat gravity to the punch. It was an unremarkable place offering nothing that twelve dozen other casinos aren't offering and offering better.

No, my regret (if you can call it that) is that another vestige of Old Vegas is biting the felt. Old Vegas, like New Vegas, existed so you could lose oodles of loot at the slots, the tables, the wheels and every other kind of gaming they could offer.

The difference was that your losses in Old Vegas could be mitigated a bit by cheap food, cheap shows, cheap rooms and cheap tourist-trappers. New Vegas does away with all that unprofitable mitigation. Oh, you can sometimes score a cheap hotel room but it's only cheap until they tack on the Mandatory Resort Fee.

And there's plenty to look at but eventually you're going to need to eat. Or do something besides sight-see. Anyone want to guess what they'll charge for a seat to see a game or anything at the [Whatever Corporation Buys The Naming Rights] stadium?

I used to love going to Old Vegas. All I can do now is hope maybe they're hiding it in Reno or Laughlin.

As I said, the lost posting on this site has been located and restored — and in record time. I posted my request for it at 11:17 AM and helpful responses began arriving at 11:27, starting with one from Corey Klemow. You people are amazing.

The restored post can be viewed here for those who missed it. The video link may now be only watchable on YouTube and the bookmark may be off a few seconds but you can figure that out. Thanks, Corey!

Thanks to many of you, the missing post has been found. It will reappear in its rightful place shortly.

A few weeks ago here, we were discussing the Python/Marty Feldman skit I was calling "The Bookshop Sketch."  Remember that?  Of course you do.

The last posting I did about that had as its subject line, "More About The Bookshop Sketch" and it seems to have disappeared. Some tech glitch in the software or something.

I know that among those who read this site, there are those who use readers that capture the postings here or otherwise retain copies for offline reading. If you have a copy of the post called "More About The Bookshop Sketch," please help me to its proper place on this blog's chronology. Thank you.

Anthony Escartin sent this one in…

Good day, Mark! I become one of your many fans when Groo was at Epic. When I found your blog, I realized I'd been a fan of yours for even longer, starting from when I was reading Bugs Bunny comics as a child and watching The Wuzzles.

I have a question for you regarding some of the projects you've worked on, and some projects you didn't end up working on. How do you decide which projects you can (or can't) disclose on the blog?

I mean, aside from the legal stuff like non-disclosure agreements. I ask because in a recent post, you talked about meeting for a job on Barbie and the Oscars, but I'm dying to know about other projects that you don't mention by name. For example, what was that one show that you worked on for Lou Scheimer and Filmation? Thank you for your time!

In the 52-or-so years I've been writing for a living, I've had literally thousands of what some would call "offers" but a fairly small percentage of them had any real possibility of turning into real projects. Even if I'd said an enthusiastic "Yes, yes, yes" to that Barbie movie or the chance to write on The Oscars, I'm not sure either of them would ever have turned into anything more than talk.

So a lot of the things I don't mention here or anywhere are things I never allow myself to think were going to happen or had even a 20% chance. I have friends who get wildly optimistic about every opportunity that's so much as lightly dangled and that, of course, can only lead to cyclonic disappointment.

I did work on one show for Filmation — a bible and pilot script for a series. A network bought it, I received my series sale bonus…and then the crew at the studio began monkeying around with it, mostly to add elements that could be merchandised. I didn't like what it turned into so I removed my name from it and am not going to reattach it here. I've done that a few times and I think it was the right move. Just in case it was, I'd like to keep it that way.

This is a partial rerun of a post that ran here on November 11, 2019…

In 1977, the film The Goodbye Girl was a surprise smash hit. It had a screenplay by Neil Simon and its two leads — Marsha Mason and Richard Dreyfuss — were nominated for Academy Awards, as was the film itself. Dreyfuss won his category, becoming at the time the youngest Best Actor in Oscar history. Very much a successful film.

In 1992, it was announced that Mr. Simon was transforming his screenplay into a Broadway musical of the same name. If ever an upcoming show looked like a guaranteed smash, this was it. Just the fact that it was Neil Simon and a beloved storyline sold a lot of tickets. When it was announced that David Zippel and Marvin Hamlisch were doing the music and Michael Kidd was directing, they sold more. And they probably couldn't have found two bigger stars to star than Bernadette Peters and Martin Short.

The advance sale was huge. So were the problems during rehearsals and tryouts. So was the disappointment of many when the show finally opened on March 4, 1993. The previous Neil Simon musical, They're Playing Our Song, ran for 1,082 performances. The Goodbye Girl closed after 188.

How could "the show that couldn't fail" fail? There were many factors and in his autobiography, Mr. Simon blamed everyone but Mr. Simon, implying he thought it was a terrible idea to try to make that movie into a stage musical. He didn't really explain though why he agreed to do it. I mean, it wasn't like he needed the money or the credit.

I saw one of the 188 performances and we somehow got tickets at the last minute…in the front row! I liked parts of it, especially David Zippel's lyrics which I thought were often funnier than what was coming out of the actors' mouths when they weren't singing. Before I explain what I didn't like, give me a sec to put up one of these…

There. Read on at your own risk. Like most musicals, the plot was about two people who shouldn't be together and maybe don't even like each other for most of Act One winding up very much in love. Anna never imagined she'd fall for the King of Siam. Marian the Librarian was repulsed at first by the traveling salesman, Harold Hill. Eliza Doolittle never dreamed she'd care about Henry Higgins…and in The Goodbye Girl, Paula McFadden (Bernadette on stage) never thought she'd have anything but disdain for Martin Short's character, Elliot Garfield.

You know how it's going to end before they even start the overture but you're going to pretend you don't, just as you pretend you don't see the wires that fly Peter Pan around, just as you pretend you don't know the ending of any play you've seen before. Well, with The Goodbye Girl, it was hard to pretend. From the moment he set foot on that stage, Martin Short was so funny and so adorable that you got angry with Bernadette's character for not falling in love with him ten minutes into the play. After fifteen, I wanted to marry him. That she kept treating this hilarious, wondrous guy like crap was more frustrating than amusing.

I also thought the set was confusing and that Short snuck in too many Ed Grimley gestures along with the occasional taste of Jerry Lewis. He made you laugh but as Martin Short, not as Elliot Garfield. I liked him better (but laughed at him less) a few years later in a revival of Little Me.

But you can see a little of the show for yourself here. This is the Press Reel offering video excerpts for TV reviewers to use in their reviews…

Another Chita Rivera number. She did this in a show I saw her do at the Westwood Playhouse in — I'm guessing — 1979. I didn't know until I saw this clip that it was written by Kander and Ebb but I probably should have guessed. The video is a bit out of sync but she never was…

Here's a letter from my longtime pal Bruce Reznick…and lemme tell you how long I've known Bruce. The year we first met, Charlie Chaplin released his last movie, Muhammad Ali was still Cassius Clay and he was stripped of his boxing championship for refusing to go fight in the Vietnam War, and the highest-rated TV program in this country was The Andy Griffith Show,

Bruce will probably write and tell me I have the year wrong and if he does, he's probably right since he's one of the smartest guys I've ever known. His specialty is mathematics and he took time out from trisecting angles to send me this about writing on a computer…

Hi, Mark. I can tell you my experiences, which are different from yours, but lead to the same conclusion.

Typing a math paper usually requires symbols and letters from other alphabets, and when I started, before word processing computers, it required special symbol balls on IBM selectrics. (On PhD theses, which are not actually published, a lot of symbols were written in by hand.) You wrote your paper as best you could and sent it to the typist, and didn't do much revisions after that.

Once mathematicians got computers, we got programs that let us write symbols ourselves and papers ourselves. It takes a little longer because we go through way more revisions, but we can get the paper to look like what we want.

My father used to say of a draft that it "needs to be run through the typewriter again". A disadvantage of the current system is that you can passively keep parts you don't want to think about, even when it would be better if you started from scratch.

I had issues with typists because my handwriting wasn't very good. My favorite example was a paper in which I wrote in pencil "One often is interested in questions of the following kind," and the very patient typist wrote: "One of ten is interested in questions of the following kind". I wish.

The more I write on a computer, the harder it is to believe that I wrote my first work on that little Olivetti-Underwood manual portable that I have in my garage. It really now looks like something I must have found at a toy store.

I used that Fischer-Price plaything for my earliest professional work including scripts for DC, Disney and Gold Key. Then I upgraded to electric and Selectric and finally to my first word processor. I think my work was getting better during this period — or as some might say, less rotten — and some of that was simple experience. But some of it was the tool of my trade: The computer. I know it led me to do more revisions and had other benefits as well.

My friend Harlan Ellison worked the way he worked and it obviously worked for him. But one time at his house, in a workroom built to disadvantage someone of my height, he sat me down at his desk and asked me to type out, on his typewriter, some notes for an article he was doing for Playboy on the then-current comic book scene. If you're wondering how Groo the Wanderer got into that article…well, that's how.

Harlan wrote brilliant stories and essays on that typewriter on that desk sitting in that chair. I couldn't write so much as a colon..and not even a whole colon but one of the semi variety. I wound up sitting on the floor doing it in longhand on a legal pad. The way some of us work is simply that personal. We can make exceptions for special circumstances but our main, real work is done how and where we feel at home. Which is why I would never tell another writer how he or she should work or what they should write on.