If you're wondering about the songs played during yesterday's disco roll call at the D.N.C., here's the set list. A lot of someones put a lot of time, thought and effort into this.

I was not prepared yesterday to get so interested in the Democratic National Convention. I don't recall watching any of these with any intensity once we passed the stage where the nominees were in doubt before the gathering. Once that variable was eliminated, conventions basically became infomercials and very predictable. Even the speeches by folks I agreed with lacked a certain sincerity and spontaneity. But that roll call really impressed me, in part because I'm the kind of guy who watches television and is often more interested in how they did it than what they did.

That show was live — no edits, no retakes, a thousand possibilities for something to go wrong…and they pulled it off, taking what would ordinarily be a boring ritual and turning it into a moment of genuine television excitement. And then some — not all but some — of the speeches that followed were just plain good, gripping speeches. Betcha next time we have political conventions in this country, both sides study tapes of DNC 2024 and say, "Okay, this is what we have to top."

In case you missed the roll call, here's a link to watch it. It runs an hour-twenty and I couldn't turn away. The sense of happiness and excitement and the mix of career politicians and folks just workin' for a cause was stunning to me. I'm going to try not to watch much today because I have work to do but I'm not going to miss Pete Buttigieg or Bill Clinton…and I think Tim Walz, who's also turning out to be a helluva speaker, are on the schedule. So I'll probably end up watching more than I want.

I'm not going to get my hopes up yet but a Southern California real estate firm has announced they're bringing back the Koo Koo Roo chain of fast food restaurants…or maybe we should say they're trying to bring back the Koo Koo Roo chain of fast food restaurants. And maybe I should explain that Koo Koo Roo was "fast food" only in that it usually was served rather quickly. But the food they offered was somewhat healthy, non-fried and very delicious. Most folks loved their skinless but very tasty chicken.

I loved their cuisine and wrote an obit for the chain here when they closed the last one in 2014. From what I've heard over the years, it sounds like the chain was financially sound but there was a lot of financial mismanagement as they attempted to expand their locations and expand into other businesses.

I would very much like the chain to return and I'd like there to be an outlet near me and have it deliver and be just as good as it once was. I'm sure that's too much to ask. Over the years, I've had an awful lot of favorite eateries close and I've sometimes heard they were making a comeback…but I can only recall a few that actually did come back and it usually turned out it was in name only. The new versions never became favorites.

But…gee…maybe this time??? Maybe?

I planned to just tune in to see Bernie Sanders, Michelle Obama and that guy she's married to. But I peeked in early to see what was going on and they were doing the roll call, not as stodgy speeches but as some super-energized disco dance party with delegate after delegate saying wonderful things, not just about the candidate but about America and hope and optimism and about giving a damn about each other. What little I saw of the Republican convention was about Donald and only Donald.

So I got hooked watching the DNC roll call because it was so great to see such happy, energized people…so many faces of all different colors and ages. It was oddly exciting especially when you consider that the outcome was not in doubt. I'm sure there are folks out there who'll decry it as silly but it put me in a very good mood.

I wound up missing Bernie but I'll catch up to him online. I did see "first gentleman" Doug Emhoff, Michelle Obama and Barack, and I don't think I've seen three better speeches in a row at any of these things. Yes, the two Obama speeches were a bit repetitive and could have used cutting but they both did what they had to do and managed to sound like real people who cared about other real people. I don't think it's possible to do that when you're talking about Donald Trump.

Whoever put this show together did a great job. Oh — and I liked that all the signs I saw in the audience were about PEACE and HOPE and U.S.A. and FREEDOM. Nothing out there about MASS DEPORTATION.

Here are five more and these may be the last of them here. Or they may not. You never know with this blog…

In 1971, the Rankin-Bass studio made the deal that gave us Jackson 5ive — that was how it was spelled — featuring the adventures of what was then one of the hottest rock acts out there. Actual records of the Jacksons, including Michael, were used but the brothers were too busy performing (I guess) to record the speaking parts. Voice actors did that, though Diana Ross reportedly supplied her own voice in one episode in which she appeared as a character.

Many years later, I worked on a proposed Saturday morning cartoon that was to feature Michael and his little menagerie of pets. I never quite understood how this deal was made because Michael really didn't want to do it. He did not have fond memories of the 1971 show and really did not want to be a cartoon character, lest it tar his self-proclaimed title as The King of Pop for all ages. The show never happened and I assume he was happy that it didn't. So here's his one turn as a cartoon character…

Mister Magoo was developed in and around the U.P.A. cartoon studio in 1949. His cartoons were often pretty funny, thanks in large part to the voicework of Mr. Jim Backus who, it is said, would not (or maybe could not) record a track without several alcoholic beverages in him. The studio fell on hard times in the late fifties, stopped making cartoons and sold off its library and characters to a producer named Henry G. Saperstein.

Mr. Saperstein began marketing the library — mainly the nearsighted Magoo — to television and below is the opening title for a syndicated show that featured the best of that library. Eventually new Magoo cartoons were made for TV, most notably the 1962 special, Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol and a prime-time weekly series that was covered in an earlier list here. At one point around 1997, there was going to be a Magoo animated feature and I was going to write it but that went away when Mr. Saperstein died in 1998. Still, I like the opening to the syndicated series…

The characters on The Linus the Lionhearted Show (1961) all originated on boxes of Post cereals. Linus — voiced by Sheldon Leonard — was the mascot for Post Crispy Critters, an awful cereal (I thought) with good commercials (I thought). Post had the clout to get this show on Saturday morning — new shows for one year, reruns thereafter. It was a pretty good series with voice work by, among other celebs, Carl Reiner, Jonathan Winters, Ruth Buzzi, Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, and a few others whose names you won't see in the credits here.

I always thought the big unbilled cameo was in the opening song. One of the singers you'll hear is Thurl Ravenscroft, the voice of that other big cat from a cereal box — Tony the Tiger on Kellogg's Sugar Frosted Flakes. I don't think they've changed the recipe since then but they took "Sugar" out of the product's name.

As the long-running Mighty Mouse Playhouse on CBS Saturday morning lost audience in the mid-sixties, the Terrytoons studio sought to stave off extinction by introducing a new segment — The Mighty Heroes, created by animator-producer Ralph Bakshi. In 1966, the show became Mighty Mouse and The Mighty Heroes and Bakshi's super team more or less squeezed the mouse out. This is not the complete mini-main-title for the team because, as you'll see, it doesn't give the title. But it was something fresh on a somewhat stale schedule…

The Amos 'n' Andy radio show was very popular in the forties and fifties. It starred two white guys playing two black guys — Freeman Gosden as Amos and Charles Correll as Andy. Eventually, a character named George "Kingfish" Stevens (also voiced by Gosden) became more popular than Amos or Andy. In the early fifties, the program was turned into a TV series with black actors playing those roles — and Kingfish becoming the real star of the proceedings. It was a funny show but various groups found it racist and eventually, CBS (which owned it) canceled the show and later on, buried the reruns.

In 1961, someone got the idea that the show could be revived as a prime-time animated series with the characters turned into animals. Andy (voiced by Correll) became a bear named Calvin, Kingfish (voiced by Gosden) became a fox and Calvin and the Colonel went on the air in October of 1961. It was an immediate flop. It was yanked off the air, then it came back with a new opening and closing, then it moved to Saturday morning and syndication where it was around for a while.

I liked the theme song so here's the original opening and closing in color followed by the second opening and closing in black-and-white…

And that's it for now…I think. But maybe not.

DC Comics just issued a facsimile edition of House of Secrets #92, the 1971 comic that introduced Swamp Thing. I haven't seen a copy of this but the ads say "Written by Len Wein, Joe Orlando and Virgil North, Art by Bernie Wrightson, Bill Draut, Dick Dillin, Alan Lee Weiss and Tony DeZuniga." This makes me think that someone thought Joe Orlando wrote the second story in that issue. He didn't. I did with some help from Jack Kirby. The story ran with no credits but it was called "After I Die…" and was drawn by Bill Draut. I think I'm owed a few bucks.

If you're in or around Los Angeles, you have a rare chance to see my pal Frank Ferrante perform An Evening With Groucho on September 29 at the El Portal Theatre in North Hollywood. And you don't even have to wait for the evening because he's doing it in the afternoon. Get your tickets here and get them soon. Every time Frank does this show anywhere, I get an e-mail from at least one person who attended who writes to say, "You were right! He's amazing!"

Since we're remembering Groucho today, here's a little under six minutes of lines from his movies…

Well, some of it. I think those things are always too long, especially with an audience that cheers every mention of the candidate's name and any sentence about them winning. Cutting down (or out) a few speeches would have eliminated repetition, made the rest of the evening more effective and gotten the star of the night — Joseph Robinette Biden — on in prime time for the east coast.

But I listened to Biden and to Shawn Fain (president of the United Automobile Workers), Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Hillary Clinton, Rep. Jamie Raskin, the ladies who talked about their lives with a lack of Reproductive Rights, Gov. Andy Beshear and Senator Raphael Warnock and I thought they were all real good. I liked the general positivity — no calls for Mass Deportation that I heard — and all the reminders of what this country is all about. Maybe if I hadn't muted the speeches I muted, I would have come away with a different impression.

And maybe I missed the part where Biden declared, as Trump told us he would, "I want my presidency back. I want another chance to debate Trump. I want another chance!" I'll check YouTube and see if that clip's there. Trump couldn't have been wrong about that, could he?

Just settling down to work on a script with one eye on the Democratic Convention. It's taking place in Chicago but when Joe Biden takes the stage, I expect to be able to hear the ovation without having my TV on. I just saw Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC make an interesting sports analogy. Biden's like the pitcher who threw a winning game for five or six innings, faltered in the seventh and just plain couldn't go on and finish the game. Kamala Harris in the relief pitcher who steps in and tries to win those last few innings.

It's one of those analogies that only extends as far as it extends but it's not bad, especially in an election year where there are close to zero precedents. So much is happening that's never happened before. And someone else just pointed out that at the G.O.P. convention, there were no former presidents or vice-presidents…not even Trump's own vice-president. It was like the Republican Party never had any president except Donald. The Democratic gathering's going to have Biden, Obama, Clinton…and the good wishes of Jimmy Carter.

Prediction: The TV ratings for this convention will be higher than they were for the Republican one…and Trump will be screaming that it's all a lie. You know, like the election he lost was a lie, Kamala's crowds are a lie, every Trump indictment was a lie, every verdict against him is a lie, every statistic that shows the economy is good or crime is down is a lie, every poll that shows her leading is a lie…

47 years ago today, Groucho Marx passed away — an event that did not come as a surprise to anyone who'd seen him in the last few years of his long, monumental life. I had visited his home in the Trousdale area not long before for a surreal — and in many ways, sad — afternoon. Groucho's secretary/assistant Steve Stoliar was almost certainly there that day but somehow, I did not meet Steve, who has since become a good friend.

That home had an "open house" feel to it that day with people — some very famous — dropping by, some staying only long enough so that they could say, "I was there." Some left hurriedly when his companion/guardian/I-don't-know-what-to-call-her Erin Fleming put the moves on them to hire her for acting work because Groucho, she said, would appreciate it.

There really wasn't much to do there that day for them except to avoid her, talk to each other and partake of the snacks and beverages. A conversation with Mr. Marx was almost impossible…as I found when someone (I dunno who) led me over to him, introduced me as a young comedy writer and plunked me down to baby-sit a Comedy Legend.

Sadly, there wasn't much of him left by that point. I said things to him about how much I loved him and his movies and the quiz shows. He said things to me in a voice that was weak and hard to hear. I laughed and nodded, pretending I understood every word he said but I didn't. Fortunately, that was not the only time I met the man.

One earlier afternoon at Hillcrest Country Club, we had an actual conversation when he was able to have an actual conversation and I said all the respectful, affectionate things I wanted to say to him then. I got the feeling that he really liked that a kid my age — then, mid-teens — knew all his work and loved it and was also aware of the brilliance of George S. Kaufman, Alexander Woollcott and others of his world.

If I'd had more time with that Groucho, I would have elaborated on why he and his work meant so much to me — the wit, the fearlessness, the sheer funny in just about everything he said, everything he did. I also talked with him a tiny bit when he visited the set of Welcome Back, Kotter when I was working on that show.

That evening, he was so "out of it" that he could not tape the wordless cameo appearance he'd come to do. It did not occur to me that evening that he really wasn't up to even coming there but that the controversial Ms. Fleming had pumped him full of some sort of drug just to get him there…for her purposes more than his. In hindsight, I kinda wish my contact with the man had ended in that big dining room at Hillcrest.

So it was not a shocker when he died; only that a gent known for his masterful timing had mistimed his exit. It came too soon after the death of Elvis Presley for Groucho to get his proper press coverage and national mourning. Happily though, it was not the end of the man born Julius Henry Marx. His influence is still everywhere — in movies, on TV, in cartoons and especially in the way some of us talk. He left a few generations of admirers who can't help but incorporate bad Groucho impressions (or at least, attempts at his rhythms) in their everyday speech.

You probably do that. I know I do. I've done it many times with people who for one reason or another, were never exposed to the genuine article. My lady friend Amber has heard plenty of inept Groucho mimicry, much of it from me, but she's never seen a Marx Brothers movie, nor have I taken her to experience the expert Groucho replication of my pal, Frank Ferrante. One reason is that I want her to see the real Groucho before she sees the faux guy.

And I want her to see the real thing in one of his best movies not via a DVD in my den but in a real movie theater with a real audience watching and laughing at…oh, any of them. It could be Monkey Business or maybe Horse Feathers or Duck Soup or A Night at the Opera or A Day at the Races. Hell, she'd even love him in The Big Store if she had nothing to compare it to. Only then will I take her to see Frank and only then might she grasp how important this Groucho Marx guy was to nurturing what passes for my sense of humor. In some ways, a lot of us are Groucho impersonators. Frank just does it better than anybody and gets paid for doing it.

We haven't spoken in a long, long time and even then, we didn't agree on much. Still, I was saddened to hear that my ol' friend Victoria Jackson is suffering from medical problems that could end her life sooner rather than later. I hope, of course, this turns out to be wrong. She was sweet, she was funny, she was honest…in fact, she had the kind of honesty that sometimes got her into trouble. There's such a thing as being too honest — or at least just honest at the wrong time or place.

I'd like to think she's still sweet and funny and honest and that we could get along again. If we stayed far, far away from the topics of politics and religion, that might be possible but I doubt our paths will cross again. So I'll just think good thoughts about her and wish her only the best and a lot more years than she thinks she has.

A few weeks ago at Comic-Con in San Diego, two Bill Finger Awards for Excellence in Comic Book Writing were awarded — one to Jo Duffy, who was there to accept it in person. The other was awarded — posthumously — to Ralph Newman, who wrote a staggering number of stories for Harvey Comics characters including but not limited to Casper the Friendly Ghost, Wendy the Good Little Witch, Sad Sack, Little Audrey, Little Lotta, Richie Rich, Spooky, Little Dot, Hot Stuff and The Ghostly Trio.

If you'd like to know more about Mr. Newman, check out this article.

Here are five more of these, starting with Tennessee Tuxedo and his Tales, which joined the CBS schedule in 1963…one of those occasional attempts to make children's television a bit more "educational." Don Adams at the time had a recurring role on The Bill Dana Show on NBC and hadn't yet signed on for Get Smart, and Larry Storch hadn't yet been cast in F Troop. Thus, they were available to be in the voice cast of this show…

Speed Racer was another dubbed Japanese show that came over here in 1967 and was quickly embraced by many eager fans. I was not one of them but I liked the opening…

In 1962, Hanna-Barbera produced a block of cartoons called unofficially, The Hanna-Barbera New Cartoon Series or sometimes, The New Hanna-Barbera Cartoon Series. Neither title ever appeared on the air. What it was was a package of three different cartoons, each with its own main title. Wally Gator was one, Touché Turtle and Dum Dum was another and Lippy the Lion and Hardy Har Har was the third. They made 52 shorts of each and the local stations that bought 'em programmed them every which way, usually with a local host between the different segments.

My favorite was Wally Gator and though I liked his little main title and tune, it puzzled me. As you'll see, it showed him zipping around a swamp as the singers referred to him as a "swingin' alligator in the swamp." Okay, fine…but in the cartoons that followed this, he was always in a zoo and not a swamp. That baffled ten-year-old me but Wally's voice was done by Daws Butler and I could never dislike a cartoon character voiced by Daws Butler…

Jonny Quest (1964) was one of the first real attempts to do an adventure show in animation for television. (Clutch Cargo and Space Angel both preceded it but I'm not sure if you'd call what they did on those shows "animation.") Jonny Quest was a Hanna-Barbera show created by Doug Wildey, a brilliant and incorrigible artist who I am proud to say I knew well…maybe too well. I'm still a little pissed, as Doug was, that his credit line was removed from the end titles of some prints of some episodes.

One thing I liked about this show was that the lady who headed up Standards and Practices for ABC in the eighties — a lady with whom I often mud-wrestled — despised it. It was to her, the show which ruined television animation by introducing "violence" into the arena. That was a silly charge, especially if you saw what passed in her eyes for "violence." On Jonny Quest, it never got much worse than what was in this main title which, incidentally, was mostly not animated for Jonny Quest. All the shots without Jonny or other recurring characters were from a demo that H-B made for an unsold pilot film for a show based on the old radio series, Jack Armstrong…

And lastly for this time around: The DePatie-Freleng cartoon studio did more than all those Pink Panther cartoons. In 1966. they gave us Super 6 with a theme song sung by Gary Lewis of Gary Lewis and the Playboys…or maybe Gary Lewis without his short-lived rock band. Can't say I was ever fond of the show but as you've seen from these lists, I could like the theme song without liking what followed…

I'm going to post five more of these in a day or two and then I'll probably move on to some other topic of vital importance.

My confidence that Harris/Walz will prevail in the election stands at about 85% and it's not based wholly on the polls. They're still a bit too close, bouncing around their margins of error as they do. My optimism has a lot to do with the way once-President/never-again Trump is acting, coming across more and more like an uncle at a Bar Mitzvah who's had way too much Manischewitz and has no idea what he's supposed to be saying.

You see him belittling military veterans and you have to wonder why. There are no votes in doing that but many to be lost.

Based on clips from the last few days, the outstanding issues in this election for his team seem to be that he's so much better looking than Kamala, his crowd turn-outs are bigger no matter what the news footage might indicate and that once in her life, at a moment of great stress, she consumed an entire bag of Doritos. That's just about all they've got. They'll come up with something else but right now, that's about all they've got.

Here's Kate Zernike with a look at the role that Abortion Politics could be playing in this country. I think it'll turn out a lot more voters who want Harris in office than want Trump there.