Boomer Bust

Prime Time Saturday Morning

2012-01-07T15:16:00.000-08:00

In the early days of Saturday morning programming, the late fifties and early sixties...the main purpose of the cartoon blocks was to sell toys and cereal. Most of Hanna-Barbera's early output was sponsored by Kelloggs

General Mills and its ad agency created the Total Television catalog. Ideal Toys sponsored mid-sixties HB characters. And there was even a series based on the cereal box characters for Post:

By the time I quit watching Saturday morning cartoons in the late 70's, there was a trend to cross-merchandise toys and video games with the programs. Especially in the 80's. The beginning of the end of the golden age (in my opinion) was "The Smurfs."

In the seventies cartoon producers were hawking corny lessons about safety and civility due to pressure from anti-violence parent organizations. (It is hilarious to think about where that got us....the lack of civility and the ultra-violence and crassness of programs that kids are exposed to now is breathtaking.)

Characters were drawn from comic books (superheroes from DC and Marvel; funnies from Archie and Harvey), pop music (Jackson Five, The Osmonds); sports (Harlem Globetrotters, Muhammed Ali); and real-life showbiz (Jerry Lewis, Mr. T and Gary Coleman...as an angel).

Along those same lines, The New Scooby Doo Movies featured real-life celebrities in animated form helping those meddling kids solve mysteries: Don Knotts, Tim Conway, Dick Van Dyke, Jonathan Winters, Sandy Duncan, Jerry Reed, Sonny and Cher and, believe it or not, this rock music diva: (Aaah, the seventies)

Most of the unoriginal characters were derived from prime time TV shows, however. It is interesting that the TV series that were being hi-jacked for kiddie consumption in the seventies were actually from the sixties and being rerun to death in local syndication. With a few exceptions. Here are examples of cartoon remakes or outright movie parodies during this time period:

The Brady Kids (Filmation, 1972 ABC): Concurrent with the actual run of the parent series, this cartoon found the kids, sans Mike and Carol, having magical adventures with a mystical mynah bird and Chinese-speaking twin panda bears. The actual kids did their own voices the first season. Legal issues kept half of them from returning for the second season.

Thank God for the panda bears.

The Barkleys (Depatie-Freling 1972 NBC): One of my favorites as a kid, this show was a take-off on "All in the Family" as a family of, yes, dogs. Bigoted, outspoken Archie Bunker was replaced by..well, not really bigoted (this was kiddie time) but, yes, outspoken Arnie Barkley and his dysfunctional family of hipsters and hippies and a dingbat spouse. Great theme song.

The Houndcats (Depatie-Freling 1972 NBC): I never really saw this one as such a tie-in but it was marketed as a "Mission Impossible" for kids. Just a bunch of varied animals that listened to a self destructing message.

Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan (Hanna-Barbera 1972 CBS): Extremely Un-PC take on Charlie Chan as he and his horde of children solve crimes and play bad rock songs.

Jeannie (Hanna-Barbera 1973 CBS): This was an update of "I Dream of Jeannie" with a teenage genie and her teenage master. Although he wasn't an astronaut, he was voiced by a future Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill).

My Favorite Martians (Filmation 1973 CBS): Uncle Martin returns with a nephew who has only one antenna...poor guy. He also had an alien sheepdog. A point of contention with me was how different Detective Brennan looked on the cartoon from the actor in the original series. Well, I mean cartoon Martin didn't look like Ray Walston either, but the animators didn't add a stinking mustache to the character. Yes, I had no life as a child.

Emergency Plus Four (Fred Calvert 1973 NBC): The famous TV paramedics were joined by four kids who somehow didn't get in the way of Gage and Desoto.

The Dogfather (Depatie-Freling 1974, theatrical): Supposedly these theatrical shorts were featured on The Pink Panther Show but I don't remember them: "The Godfather" gang reinvented as...you guessed it...dogs.

The Addams Family (Hanna-Barbera 1973, NBC): Based more on the Charles Addams magazine cartoons than the sitcom, the macabre family toured America in a giant, well, hearse.

Star Trek (Filmation 1973 NBC): This classic animated series, using the actual voices of the original Enterprise crew predated the Star Trek films by five years. Gene Roddenberry actually contributed to the series writing and this cartoon is considered to have some of the best stories according to certain Trekkies.

Lassie's Rescue Rangers (Filmation 1973 ABC): You can tell 1973 was a year bereft of originality. Lassie herself leads a pack of human adventurers as they perform feats of heroism

Partridge Family: 2200 AD (Hanna Barbera 1974 CBS): The rocking family of teen idols is reimagined in the age of The Jetsons. They were really far out this time. I think Ruben Kincaide was replaced by a robot dog.

These Are the Days (Hanna Barbera 1974 ABC): An animated take on "The Waltons." How's that for excitement, kids? And the family dog was not even cute. Snooze.

The New Adventures of Gilligan (Filmation 1974 ABC): As reruns of "Gilligan's Island" were more popular than the actual series was in the sixties, this was a no-brainer. The original cast returned to provide voices as the castaways learned more things...except how to build a boat. Years later, Filmation animated "Gilligan's Planet"...where I think they met the Partridge Family...or the Harlem Globetrotters....or something.

Return to the Planet of the Apes (Depatie-Freling 1975 NBC): Although CBS had a TV series for this franchise in prime time the same year, this cartoon was based more on the popular movie series from the cinema. I would always much rather watch the live actors in makeup than this version. They were actually better animated.

Secret Lives of Waldo Kitty (Filmation 1975 NBC): Based on the "Walter Mitty" character created by Danny Kaye in the movies, this cat (opening in live action sequences) would imagine himself as animated characters from literature in order to save himself from a bad dog.

The Oddball Couple (Depatie-Freling 1975 ABC): Felix and Oscar were reimagined as...drumroll please....a dog and cat. More suprises: The dog was messy and the cat was neat. People were paid to come up with this.

M*U*S*H (Filmation 1975 ABC): This anthropomorphic animal parody of M*A*S*H was a segment on the kiddie show spoof "Uncle Croc's Block." Instead of 1950's Korea, the comic adventures took place in a frozen outpost somewhere. Good call.

Mister Jaw (Depatie Freling 1976 NBC) and Jabberjaw (Hanna-Barbera 1976 ABC): The most popular thing that year was the murderous shark ("Jaws")...so naturally, let's make him funny and surround him with a rock band. Both Mister Jaw (featured on the Pink Panther show) and Jabberjaw were wiseacres. Lessened the pain when they ate somebody.

Mumbly (Hanna-Barbera 1976 ABC): Part of the Tom and Jerry/Grape Ape Show" the only tie-in here was that the famous Muttley character was now wearing a trenchcoat as a detective. Like "Columbo." His superior was a Kojak lookalike. HB had to change the name of the famous snickering dog because the rights to Muttley were owned by another company.

Baggy Pants and the Nitwits (Depatie Freling 1977 NBC): I could never figure out what the programmers were smoking when they came up with this. One segment featured Charlie Chaplin as a cat. The other segment and animated version of the Ruth Buzzi-Arte Johnson characters from "Laugh-In." I almost decided to start doing drugs as a kid just to understand this one.

Heyyy, It's the King (Hanna-Barbera 1977 NBC): This was the first "Happy Days" ripoff. Featured as a segment on the "CB Bears" show, Fonzie was a lion surrounded by sycophant forest creatures all wearing fifties clothes. And I don't even think it took place in the fifties. Were lions even cool then? Of course they were!

Robonic Stooges (Hanna-Barbera 1977 CBS): Originally, a segment on "The Skatebirds," the Three Stooges were super-robots. And even though they were super and robots they still screwed everything up. I'm sure the new Three Stooges movie coming out will make no reference to this series.

Godzilla Power Hour (Hanna-Barbera 1978 NBC): Based on the Toho Film series, Godzilla was joined by a family of adventurers and the cute little Godzooky.

The sad Garry Marshall troika on ABC with the original voices...as if Ron Howard, Henry Winkler, Penny Marshall or Robin Williams needed more money at this time in their careers:

Fonz and the Happy Days Gang (Hanna-Barbera 1979): Fonzie and a cuddly dog travel through time with Richie and buddies.

Laverne and Shirley (Hanna-Barbera 1980): The wacky girls join the army (just like they did on the real show) for animated hijinks with a cuddy pig.

Mork and Mindy (Ruby-Spears 1981): I think there was a cuddly space creature added that looked like Conrad Janis.

The Dukes (Hanna-Barbera, 1983 CBS): I had thrown my TV out by now, but this was an animated "Dukes of Hazzard." It may have been better than the movie remake.

Also of note, in 1973 and 1974, ABC featured a cartoon anthology called the Saturday Superstar Movie. Each week featured different characters in adventures, most of them derivative. In addition to the pilots for "Brady Kids" and "Lassie's Rangers", the series featured the animated exploits of "Gidget" (Gidget Makes the Wrong Connection, Hanna-Barbera), the kids from "Bewitched" (Tabitha and the Clown Family, Hanna-Barbera), "That Girl" (That Girl in Wonderland, Rankin-Bass), "The Munsters" (The Mini-Munsters, Fred Calvert), Nanny and the Professor (Fred Calvert); and Lost in Space (Hanna-Barbera).

In the late eighties, SNL and SCTV characters (Martin Short's Ed Grimley and John Candy) were fodder for a lot of programs.

Saturday Mornings are pretty much gone now as a cartoon programming block and cartoons have become more sophisticated (read: ribald) for prime time and cable outlets. But if the old system were still in place with the poorly animated, cutesy infested churn-out, can you imagine what cuddly animals would populate the animated versions of "Breaking Bad", "Sex and the City" or "Mad Men?"

Boomer Christmas

2011-12-10T16:10:00.000-08:00

You wouldn't know it by this picture, but those little houses are nearly falling apart, the angels are tarnished, the last surviving reindeer has one antler, and the quintuplet of bendy elves are now only twins. Although not having retrieved these items from storage for over twelve years, I lugged the old suitcase out (also full of tinsel remnants...who are playing at Stubbs tomorrow night by the way...and fake snow the color of fake ash.) The idea was to use them in a "nostalgia" display at the store, which just didn't happen. So as Kelly and I were beginning the task of putting ornaments on our previously lit tree, she was hijacked by a phone call and I took the opportunity to lay out this "village of the damned". As I had conveniently ducked away to the back room to avoid a look of horror I subconsciously was expecting, I heard the "Umm...honey?" Kelly's predicament of having her beautiful living room enlivened by the decorative equivalent of mildew was just too much. "But I put these up as kids!!!" I nasally protested. When I saw the beautiful ornaments she had ready to hang, I realized my little town of Reverie should be condemned. I knew I had a future blog out of it though. But being the creative good soul she is, Kelly salvaged my nostalgic dream and created, with some new snow and creative lighting, the scene you see.

Retro is the big thing this year for the holidays. You can read about the trends here. Thanks to the appeal of the series Mad Men and the retro chic style throwbacks, the holiday season is the perfect time to express our sense of, well, cheerful fatality.

In spirit with the theme of my blog, I will share a few of my Christmas memories. As a good geek, most revolve around the television set. Why is it we rail against commericalism nowadays when so much of our childhood was actually informed by such, maybe not as crass and crude as today, but consumer-driven nonetheless. Starting with the Macy's Parade....a department show hosting previews of Broadway musicals and a parade with cereal character balloons and current prime time tv stars....Santa's visit down the wintry Ed McMahon-lined avenue ushered in the new toy commercials to come on Saturday morning.

You knew you would catch the annual screening of Rudolph and the Peanuts gang. Or this

chestnut, remember?

This was before the advent of cable or vhs..appointment tv it was called. (Actually, the vinyl records of soundtracks provided the only PLAY ON DEMAND we had in those days. And what's hot now? Vinyl!! )

San Antonio was a great place to grow up for Christmas. We had the Windcrest lights and Santa at North Star Mall. But anyone who grew up in SA during those days will never forget the spectacle of a Joske's Winter Wonderland. Man, if it weren't for department stores what would we have done? Let's not forget fast food. It's hard to even walk into a McDonald's these days, but as a kid there was no better place to imbibe on Apple Pies and twenty five cent cheeseburgers.

And what would Christmas Eve be without the thirty-minute Tonight Show replacement featuring Doc Severinson and the NBC Orchestra which was repeated over and over for years.

So what is it about yesterday's memories that hasten a reliving? Why are the boomers holding sway with their dysfunctional pasts? (I really shouldn't let us take all the blame....the eighties have co-opted the retro boom revisiting video games that this technophobe stil hasn't heard about.) I can only speak for myself (which is what a blog is for, I suppose) but it seems that time moves so fast now, what with the 24-hour news cycle. Current events stay current for maybe twenty minutes before your facebook feed alerts you a new headline. Trends are timeless only in that they last for hardly any time at all.

As I notice that the rerun of Rankin-Bass's Rudolph garnered top 10 network ratings last week, it shows me that people are hungry for family programming that still has some innocence, that isn't rooted in snarky humor based on bodily functions and pre-teen sexual innuendo that is so common nowadays. I remember attending the Zilker Trail of Lights in Austin one season and one of the sections featuring cartoon characters, for all the kids to enjoy, had cutouts of old Warner Brothers characters, Peanuts characters, some Smurf action, Woody Woodpecker, Disney and Dr. Seuss and.....South Park? That's right.
Soon we will consider it quaint to watch a Soprano's Family Christmas Celebration or the Snoop Dog Blunt Holiday Special. We already have a Victoria Secret Christmas.

The boomers are to blame though. We have created an environment of permissiveness in media content and advertising that has taken away the charm, the warmth of the Charlie Brown tree search and replaced it with in your face SNL jokes about holiday "Schwette Balls." Give the audience what they want. The audience that you helped create, I guess. Now we can watch a foul-mouthed Cartman tear down all traditions in the name of satire and this is now considered family viewing. It all has it's place, of course, and what some people call "adult sophisticated entertainment" nowadays I call lazy crude bathroom humor. But those of us who haven't grown up with that kind of abrasiveness as the norm do revert back to the quiet, sensitive, good-natured entertainment, and, yes, advertising of the good ol' days.

By the way, my little village didn't make it to the store, but I put together a nostalia display featuring old cartoon Christmas albums, vhs tapes and children's books reflecting the sixties and seventies. In front, I placed a stack of books, "Christmas Wishes" regaling all these commercial Christmas memories with photos and essays.....and only one is left.

So I am grateful for my memories this year. But more grateful to have someone to make new memories with!

MTM Enterprises - The 70's

2011-10-15T09:54:00.000-07:00

Last night, after acquiring Season 6, I had the pleasure of sharing with Kelly this scene from "The Mary Tyler Moore Show", considered the funniest moment in TV history. It inspired me to write this blog about this classic comedy factory.

Mary Tyler Moore, fresh off her success reteaming with Dick Van Dyke in a comedy special (revisiting them their Dick Van Dyke Show personas, Rob and Laura Petrie), was tapped by CBS to star in her own sitcom in 1970. She formed a production company with her husband Grant Tinker and the rest is herstory.

The number of sitcoms created by MTM Enterprises in the 70's were only eclipsed by those of Norman Lear (All in the Family, Sanford and Son) and Garry Marshall (Odd Couple, Happy Days). Whereas Lear's videotaped sitcoms were loud,brash, controversial, and populated with Broadway stage actors, MTM's filmed output provided slick, well-written and consistent entertainment with film and TV professionals...rivaled only by "Barney Miller." This was due mainly to bringing on incredible writers ( James L. Brooks, Alan Burns, Lorenzo Music, Patchett and Tarses) and directors (Jay Sandrich and Jim Burrows).

As I did in my last post regarding Norman Lear, I want to take a look at the MTM programs that didn't quite last as long as they should have. The shows you know about need no discussion: Mary Tyler Moore Show, spinoff Rhoda, Bob Newhart Show and WKRP In Cincinnati. The dramatic programs included Lou Grant (another MTM Show spinoff) and The White Shadow. Here are the shows in the 70's you won't find on DVD.

Paul Sand in Friends and Lovers. (CBS). This 1975 fall series was highly touted but lasted only a few episodes. Hang-dog character actor Sand played a Boston concert cellist. This premise once again set an elitist bar for sitcoms which at this time were mostly set in blue collar environs. Featured Penny Marshall (what didn't in the 70's?) and the recently departed Steve Landesberg ("Barney Miller").

Texas Wheelers (ABC). Another failed 1975 fall project, this single-camera sitcom featured no live audience..or even a laughtrack. A far cry from the urban sophistication of MTM's other shows, this one featured Jack Elam as a dad raising a family including future reality TV stars Gary Busey and Mark Hamill. This one should be on dvd for the curiosity factor alone but there probably weren't enough episodes. Busey and Hamill would go off into their own versions of outer space from here.

Bob Crane Show (NBC). This midseason replacement in 1975 featured the now-infamous Crane as a dad going back to college with his daughter. His Disney dads were probably a template for this format. This may have been one of his last jobs before his horrible murder. Crane may have been haunted by inner demons but I was haunted by the theme music from this series all my life for some reason. Here it is:

Phyllis (CBS). The second "Mary Tyler Moore Show" spinoff was not as popular as the previous "Rhoda" but still lasted two full seasons. It was actually funnier. Cloris Leachman brought her hilarious Phyllis Lyndstrolm character to San Fransisco after the death of her unseen husband Lars, leaving her penniless and looking for a way to support herself and her daughter.

She worked for a photographer the first season and a city councilman the second. The family she moved in with was a wacky crew headed by veterans Henry Jones, Jane Rose and the feisty Judith Lowry. "Phyllis" still shows up on reruns on cable, usually following "Rhoda" (just like in 1975).

Doc (CBS). Another fall premiere on CBS. A gentle sitcom about a NY family doctor played by Barnard Hughes and his wife played by Elizabeth Wilson. This show had a great timeslot and did well enough to be renewed. Unfortunately, it was retooled to the point of non-recognition. MTM decided to compete with Lear at this point, moving the good doctor to an urban clinic with all new characters and videotaping the series...a first for MTM. This was much cheaper than filming and with rare exceptions would be standard format in the future. I clearly remember a very young Steve Martin playing a guest role on this show during the first season.

Tony Randall Show (ABC/CBS). Probably one of the highest quality programs and one I would hope to end up on DVD. Randall played a widowed Philadelphia judge raising two kids with the wacky courthouse cohorts played by popular film actors of the day (Allyn Ann McLerie, Rachel Roberts).

This show (somehow failing next to Barney Miller on ABC) moved to CBS Saturday lineup the following season with minor changes....a different actress played the daughter (sitcom curse in the seventies, mocked on "Roseanne") and the addition of the great Hans Conried. Seinfeld's dad (Barney Martin) played the hapless court clerk.

Betty White Show (CBS). The now legendary White decided not to continue as Sue Ann Nevins after MTM but create a new character. She played the star of a "Police Woman" type crime show at odds with the director, her ex-husband, played by John Hillerman (Magnum). Georgia Engel followed her from MTM as her roommate. I feel if this show had followed a filmed format it would have hit the mark more. But that's just me.

We've Got Each Other (CBS). Also premiering in the fall of 1977 with White's show was this one (also videotaped). Oliver Clark and Beverly Archer joined another Newhart veteran (Tom Poston) in this sitcom about role -reversal in a marriage. Clark was the stay at home husband while Archer was the working wife. This one disappeared altogether as audiences stayed home but watched something else.

In the fall of 1978.Mary Tyler Moore tried to continue her success with a variety show, Mary. This lasted only a few episodes so at midseason they tried a revamp. Still an hour show featuring variety, The Mary Tyler Moore Hour was a sitcom about running a variety show. Very meta for the time. Still no audience, sadly. But she launched a lot of careers with this one: David Letterman, Michael Keaton, Swoosie Kurtz. Dave still thanks Mary for this one. Also some veterans including Dick Shawn were featured.

Last Resort (CBS). Playing to the new "Animal House" frat style humor, MTM ventured into unkown territory in this 1979 fall entry about a group of ne'er do wells working at an upscale resort restaurant.

Paris (CBS). A dramatic 1979 crime series featuring James Earl Jones. Highly praised but barely watched.

In the 80's, when Grant Tinker took over programming for NBC, MTM created a franchise that would inform dramatic programming for decades to come-.the dramedy.Hill Street Blues St. Elsewhere and LA Law would be critical and commercial darlings for years to come.

Many writers and directors from MTM would flourish with their own production companies in the late 70's and 80's. James L. Brooks and Alan Burns created the legendary Taxi. Their production company would create two more ABC sitcoms that were highly praised but lasted very few episodes: The Associates (1979) about a law firm (featuring Martin Short, Joe Regalbuto, Allye Mills, and Wildred Hyde-White) and Best of the West (1981,.a three camera sitcom about the Old West with Joel Higgins, Tom Ewell, Leonard Frey and Tracey Walters).

Great casts, no audience. The offspring of this creative group would end up creating Cheers, "Cosby Show', "Dear John," "Amen," Wings", "Frasier" , "Will and Grace", and other flops.

And of course Bob Newhart returned in 1982 with the long running Newhart...pretty much one of the few MTM sitcoms of the 80's. Starting off videotaped, Newhart evidently shared my opinions about that style and reverted to film for the rest of the run. Good for him.

Forbidden Lear Not Coming to a DVD Near You.

2011-08-20T08:51:00.000-07:00

As the three followers of my blog know, I am a huge fan of Norman Lear. I can say, there is no need to rehash his famous works for you, but the other day my twenty one year old co-worker had no idea who Archie Bunker was. But he's not reading my blog. My previous Lear post goes into more detail about his major works. In this blog, I'm going to revisit some of his not-so-well-known output.

In a nutshell, His CBS sitcoms groundbreakingly covered the gamut of controversial issues. The Lear Genesis started in partnership with Bud Yorkin and goes something like this: All in the Family (bigotry, politics, rape, Vietnam, transexualism) begat The Jeffersons (elitism, interracial relationships) and Maude (liberal hypocrisy, alcoholism, abortion, infidelity) which begat Good Times (racial strife, poverty, child abuse). Also with Yorkin, there was Sanford and Son (fake heart attacks) on NBC. Lear and Yorkin split around 1974. Yorkin later created TOY productions. Lear created TAT, starting with One Day at a Time (teenage suicides, drug abuse, runaways, divorce) and the soap parody Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman (depression, sexual dysfunction, waxy floor buildup). Lear's company continued into the eighties on NBC with Diff'rent Strokes (class structure, ethnic dilemmas, predators) which begat Facts of Life (losing virginity, self-esteem issues, physical disabilities). All these issues were handled with laughs and some really bad dramatic staging. They are quaint by today's standards but due to political correctness you could not CREATE these shows today (even though the message was clearly one of tolerance and open-mindedness as opposed to the mean-spirited Comedy Central variety of satire.)

The above-mentioned programs were all ratings hits during the seventies. But Lear struck out quite a few times. You will never see these shows on DVD. Some lasted only a few episodes. But the concepts and casts are incredible. I'll start with Lear's shows and move into Yorkin's output.

HOT L BALTIMORE (1975): Lear's first non-hit. This mid-season replacement on ABC started with dire warnings of adult content much like All in the Family in 1971.

Based on Lanford Wilson's long running Broadway play about run-down hotel filled with prostitutes, gays, junkies, momma's boys it boasted a cast of future Lear players and movie stars: James Cromwell ("Babe"), Charlotte Rae (Mrs. Garrett from "Facts of Life"), Richard Masur, Conchata Ferrell ("Two and a Half Men") and Al Freeman Jr.

THE DUMPLINGS (1976). James Coco and Geraldine Brooks played an overweight couple in love running a diner in NY. I guess by this time, Lear had tackled all issues so he moved into body types. A midseason replacement on NBC, it is amazing that this new hit on CBS, "Mike and Mallory", could call this show its forerunner. I remember watching this show, and it had a huge Broadway feel. Lear drew most of his actors from the stage and it showed here.

ALL'S FAIR (1976). On the CBS Fall Lineup, this one actually made it a year. And how this doesn't get pulled out of the vaults today I'll never know. It is all about the red/blue political divide we are seeing today. Richard Crenna played a conservative political columnist in DC and Bernadette Peters was a liberal news photographer. Despite the age difference, they develop a relationship. I think we are all familiar with the arguments they must have had. Was this how Matalin and Carville got started? Interesting casting note: This was Michael Keaton's first TV job, playing Manny Wolf, the President's joke writer. I'm not making that up.

NANCY WALKER SHOW (1976). Part of Nancy Walker's long journey to find her own show on ABC. She ended up back on Rhoda on CBS. Here she played a Hollywood talent agenct and her military husband comes back home and cramps her lifestyle or something like that. I remember the catchy theme song and the set recycled from Hot L Baltimore.
Can't find a damn thing on this show on the webs. She immediately went to work for Garry Marshall on an extremely ill-conceived Happy Days spinoff before rejoining the MTM stable.

ALL THAT GLITTERS (1977). Mimicking the format of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, this syndicated series was broadcast nightly in serialized fashion. The plot involved a corporation where sexual roles were reversed and women ruled the roost. It had an impressive cast but men didn't watch and feminists thought it was vapid.

FERNWOOD 2-NITE (1977). Running nightly in syndication to replace Mary Hartman during the summer, this hilarious talk show spoof is plastered on Youtube. Taking place in the same town as Mrs. Hartman, this local access show had Martin Mull and Fred Willard hosting in hilarious scripted or improvised interviews. Extremely irreverent for it's time. The issues were put aside here for just wacked out funny stuff. The following summer the show expanded to a national level and was renamed AMERICA 2-NITE.

A YEAR AT THE TOP (1977). More weirdness. Are you ready? Aspiring rock musicians Paul Schaffer and Greg Evigan decide to sell there soul to the devil (Second City's legendary Gabe Dell) to make it big in this CBS summer replacement series. Yes, THAT Paul Schaffer. And to make it stranger, Mickey Rooney was in the pilot.

FOREVER FERNWOOD (1978). After Louise Lasser left Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, they kept the show going briefly with the remaining cast members under this title. Not necessarily Forever.

IN THE BEGINNING (1978). This failed fall CBS premiere was part of McLean Stevenson's long post-MASH journey for acceptance. He played a conservative priest at odds with a young, you guessed it, liberal nun. This wasn't even on long enough for controversy to erupt.

APPLE PIE (1978). Fall of 1978 wasn't a good year for Lear. After Maude left the air, future Golden Girl Rue McLanahan starred with Dabney Coleman in the Depression era sitcom (it was bound to happen) on ABC featuring Lear's first blind character (played by Jack Gilford). Based on the play "Nourish the Beast", she basically assembles a family in 1933 Kansas City. She didn't outlast McLean though with only two episodes.

HANGING IN (1979). You can read the story of this one here. Reading that will take as long as watching the few episodes that were aired. Maude was supposed to continue as a congresswoman in DC. She didn't do it. So CBS kept the premise in a couple of different versions. It somehow ended up set in an elite college with Bill Macy (NOT playing Maude's husband here) playing the dean. Don't ask.

THE BAXTERS (1979). Lasting for two seasons on syndication, this program's first half was a sitcom about an average middle-class family and the second half involved questions and answers and discussion from the studio audience about the controversial topic tackled in that episode. Was this a precursor for reality TV?

HELLO, LARRY (1979). A sort-of spinoff of Diff'rent Strokes. Although this new attempt at a McLean Stevenson vehicle lasted two seasons, it is considered one of the worst shows in TV history. (It may turn up on DVD after all!). He's a radio talk show DJ with two daughters to raise. To give you an idea of how bad this show was, the quality improved the second season with a recasting of one daughter and the addition of Meadowlark Lemon PLAYING HIMSELF. I'm not making this up.

ARCHIE BUNKER'S PLACE (1979). This one is actually on DVD. After Mike and Gloria left All in the Family, Carroll O' Conner took over control of the franchise and this four-year program continued as a hit. It was more silly and Archie became the "lovable bigot" dealing with all ethnicities in his new bar. He took away the live audience (they watched a video feed instead for reaction) and the show was last breaths of a dying format. The first couple of seasons involved Martin Balsam as Archie's Jewish partner and that same year Edith Bunker "died." The quality had already died.

JOE'S WORLD (1980). I don't even remember this summer replacement show on NBC. It was about a blue collar worker and his family. Struggling in hard times is my guess.

PALMERSTOWN USA (1980). This was Lear's only non-sitcom. This critically acclaimed drama on CBS co-created with Alex Hailey (Roots) revolved around a black family and a white family in the 1930's south. Sort of a Walton's with a social mission. A young Michael J. Fox was featured the first short season.

CHECKING IN (1981). Florence, the sassy maid on "The Jeffersons" was spun off on this show where she runs the staff at a ritzy hotel. Actress Marla Gibbs wisely returned to her previous series which stayed on the air way too long but resulted in a few Emmy nominations for her before 227 (distantly produced by Lear's company) came along.

GLORIA (1982). Sally Struthers returns in the role that made her famous on the CBS fall premiere. She has left Mike and works for a country vet. At this point, nobody cared about the Bunkers anymore.

AKA PABLO (1984). Lear finally entered the world of Latinos in this series. James Komack's Chico and the Man stole the thunder in this area in the seventies. A young Paul Rodriguez starred in the few episodes aired midseason on ABC. A la Seinfeld, he played a stand up comic who offended his tradional parents. Seems the Latino audience was also offended and stayed away.

SUNDAY DINNER (1991). Lear returned after a long absence with this one on CBS. Religion was the topic here as older widower Robert Loggia has a relationship with young Catholic environmental lawyer Teri Hatcher. Needless to say their families clashed over Sunday Dinner. Hatcher's character would talk to directly to God. I think Lear caught heat from evangelicals for casting God in a supporting role here.

THE POWERS THAT BE (1992). Lear returned to political satire in this hilarious show on NBC. John Forsythe played a daffy senator on this farce. The cast was amazing: Holland Taylor (Two and a Half Men, also to play Ann Richards on stage), David Hyde Pierce (Frasier), Peter Macnicol (Ally McBeal) and others. This show was as wacked out and daring as some of Parker and Stone's output in later years, like "That's My Bush."(Lear consulted with the South Park guys in later years).

704 HOUSER STREET (1994). Lear literally returned to his roots here. In Archie Bunker's house, there now lives a died in the wool African American Democrat (played by John Amos of Good Times) arguing politics with his conservative son who was dating a nice white Jewish girl (played by future star Maura Tierney). I wonder where Archie was at this point? In a strange way, Lear came full circle with this one, inspired by Rush Limbaugh, and it was his last.

Switching gears, Lear's early partner Bud Yorkin, created his own company, TOY Productions. His biggest hit was What's Happening!!. His short time series were:

GRADY (1976). The first Sanford and Son spinoff where the lovable Grady moves in with his family.

SANFORD ARMS (1977). When Redd Foxx and Demond Wilson called it quits on the original Sanford and Son, Yorkin produced this failed attempt at keeping the franchise going. The fall 1977 series featured a new owner of the junkyard/hotel with appearances by Aunt Esther and Bubba and Grady.

CARTER COUNTRY (1977). Actually lasting two season on ABC, this one played on race relations in a small Georgia town with Victor French as the sheriff with a new black deputy.

13 QUEENS BLVD. (1979). This summer replacement series on ABC featured Eileen Brennan and Jerry Van Dyke. It was about tenants in an urban apartment complex. I think.

ONE IN A MILLION (1980). Shirley Hemphill's character in What's Happening wins the lottery and leaves her waitressing job in this ABC midseason replacement.

SANFORD (1980). After Redd Foxx's failed journey into variety series on ABC, he returned to NBC as Fred Sanford in two different attempts to revive interest in another previously popular franchise. He wasn't quite as successful as Carrol O'Conner, as both formats failed to generate interest in Sanford without his Son. Keeping Rollo around didn't help the fact that Lamont was "replaced" by a white fat redneck guy.

ONE OF THE BOYS (1981). Mickey Rooney again? What? In this midseason NBC show, Rooney plays a grandad going back to college with his grandson and his best friend. Ouch. Who played the two boys? Dana Carvey and Nathan Lane. I wonder how they look back at that experience.
How you go to the most groundbreaking and controversial program in TV history to Mickey Rooney is still a mystery, but I've done it somehow.

Oh, one final note: Schneider, the nosy maintenance man on "One Day at a Time" was supposed to be spun off in his own series. It would be called "Schneider." It would never air. Sorry.

"Oh my...I can't believe it's not clutter"

2011-06-11T12:28:00.000-07:00

There are numerous blogs and websites devoted to nostalgia, especially of the retro variety. This is probably a result of the many baby boomers being bitten by the byte bug. My own nostalgia blog is informed by info from others research and postings. I know I’m not speaking just for myself when I exclaim the immense joy I get out of re-hashing the visuals of a package of Goofy Grape or hearing the roller-rink rock n roll of ELO. But where does this come from?

This morning, Kelly and I were discussing the art of Feng Shui, specifically the metaphysical aspects of “clutter.” And, completely aware of my completist-driven collection of DVD’s and VHS’s (consisting of ALL my favorite films and TV shows organized in the order release, not viewing), my scientifically-organized Hanna-Barbera comic books (which I began carefully curating after I discovered the ability to easily find them for a price on the world wide webs, resulting in the replacement of worn and tattered with good to near mint copies of same), my obsessive price- conscious acquisition of books about film, cartoons, and politics (the third rail of my loco motives), and finally, my thirteen tubs of newspaper clippings, gifts, memorabilia, collectibles, and whatnots from each chapter of the ever-unfolding, unpredictable narrative I call “MY LIFE.”

In a verbal defense of this behavior (which, by the way, was about as long and tedious as the above sentence), I actually had to stretch the limits of human logic to justify a monthly storage unit expense which could soon double. But, at least in my case, the “clutter” begins with the mental aspects.

Please allow me to wax in generalities. I am speaking of myself but I have a hunch many people of my time frame may find some “aha” moments in this. Or “uh-hem.” Or “Oh shit.” Or the most popular: “Oh shut the hell up.” I digress.

The internets, the paragons of modernity and progress, have basically been the breeding ground for much of this retro-grading. This manifests itself in two ways. First, the groundswell of the above mentioned forums detailing memories aided and abetted (appropriate terms here) by you tube clips, music files, Amazon/ebay postings, and Google images can be daunting and readily available for perusal with one search….which leads to another search. We can all relate. Facebook has provided a perversely necessary tool to disseminate these memories. I created this blog for these purposes and find myself bypassing it and going directly on my Facebook wall, leaving said blog feeling neglected and unwanted.

Secondly, the voluminous amounts of NEW information, true or untrue that is cast out on our beloved webs is, well, overwhelming. No matter what your interest, you can find the topic being discussed ad nauseum on millions of pages or feeds. Today, a Jack of all Trades becomes a Jacked-Up info junkie unable to leave his bedroom. Or just burned out. So rather than trying to decipher fact from fiction, trying to belabor a point to someone who may possibly be located in the insane asylum you will surely end up in, or simply valuing your sanity and realizing you can’t solve all the world’s problems….there is the simplicity of the past.

Now, of course, the sixties and seventies were not simple. In some ways, they were even more complex than today. But we could probably take one historical event from, say, 1973 and with a certain amount of time and money, collect all written and broadcast materials about that event. When it comes to video, many things of that era were just not kept…they are gone. But there is a FINITE end to it…somewhere. Today, Sarah Palin can stub her toe and we could send to the moon and back simply the first sentences of all items consisting of evaluation on that fascinating topic. (As a side note, I am a burned out political junkie…I still follow the news but have cut out most of the wasted time on what as basically become red vs. blue gotcha pr-d to death pablum.)

So when I find myself perching on the precipice of a three-hour debate regarding health care or paternity suits, I hear the calling of my newly found facebook friend from New Hampshire who just posted the cover of Gold Key’s The Munsters issue number 4 and an accompanying analysis of 12 cent price point. The resulting three hours ending in a video file of Tony Orlando and Dawn playing Robin Hood and His Merry Men was no more of a valuable time suck than some endless back and forth on the latest American Idol controversy.

I look back fondly at there being only three TV stations (and the PBS affiliate). At prime time (remember that?) starting at 7:00 you had a choice of two sitcoms, a family adventure or McNeil-Lehrer report. Simple. When something newsworthy happened, there was the network evening news, the morning shows, the newspaper or weekly newsmagazines. An interrupting news bulletin was REALLY news. And the follow-up journalism/criticisms/analyses/wrap-ups would not be packaged and ready for consumption two weeks later. Jeez, I remember VH1 doing an “I Love the 90’s” special in 2002. Come on.

So to go back to the Feng Shui discussion, I was justifying physical “clutter” with the concept of mental “clutter.” Which feeds which? It’s true that the acquisition of the material items has been suspended due to the time spent surfing about those items I still have not collected- or gathering more useless info on the items I already have. And this retro surfing is enhanced by the revulsion and, let’s face it, fatigue of the barrage of information related to everything nowadays. I could just get rid of my collections and start over. That would be the simplest and most painful solution. The “mental” clutter would probably follow due to the resulting nervous breakdown. Which would lead to a New Life with New Interests. Throwing out the “mental” clutter would give me time to re-evaluate my priorities in life. In that case, the “physical” clutter may sit in a closet and storage unit for awhile. Then, in ten years, I will rediscover it after I have produced three successful screenplays: one about a frustrated filmmaker, one about a psychotic comic book collector, and one about the undoing of a major political figure due to his unnatural hoarding instincts.

Then, and only then, can I know that I gleaned everything I need from those books, films, and life experiences to create something meaningful. And there is no need to hold on to them. No need to re-hash or re-watch or re-read. No need to have a “wall of memories”. I’ll just have three dvd’s with commentary, the resulting novelizations, the reviews of those films, the memorabilia from the making of those films, the documentaries and behind the scenes clips, the 6-volume reality show sets about my triumph in “removing the clutter”, the resulting self-help book titled “Removing the Clutter”, and an Academy Award.

I’ll have either that to replace all the other stuff. Or I can make a decision right now to divest myself of all of it in one fell swoop. Yes, all of it. Well, except that Dell issue of Huckleberry Hound with the balloons on it. Oh, and two-disc Dr. Strangelove, can’t part with that. While I’m at it I may need information from that book on Watergate for an upcoming screenplay..and well, come to think of it…there’s the--

Gotta go! While I’ve been writing this, Kelly has cleaned out her spare bedroom and we need to go to Goodwill. Oh, well.

The Great Nutrition Turn-on: "Mulligan Stew"

2011-04-14T07:28:00.000-07:00

Is this my first blog of 2011? It's about time!!

Anybody, remember this catchy theme?

Anyway, with all of the talk of funding cuts for public education and school programs, I am reminded of a multi-media (sort of ) approach to nutrition education that really worked for me. When I was in 5th grade, in 1973, I loved Saturday morning programming and I loved comic books. Well, evidently, some genius came up with a great way to reach the young members of the FGA chapter (Future Geeks of America).

One day, in my little country schoolhouse, our teacher handed out this comic book:

It had puzzles and activities and stories. And you followed along with a Saturday morning show. It was syndicated and followed the regular network programming. Fortunately, we had TV out in the country. This series was a very typical early 70's show with loud polyester, cheesy music, record-cover graphics, lsd-influenced animation, obnoxious (yet polite) kids, and token adults with porn 'staches.....kind of a low rent "Zoom" meets "Electric Company". Shot on 16 mm, it had the effect of being a driver's ed instructional video on acid. Speaking of porn, I think the character actor at 2:14 was featured in "Debbie Does Dallas."

"You gotta eat breakfast"..

What would a seventies kids show be without tambourines?

Just a fond remembrance. I don't have much else to say. My comic is in tatters, so I ordered a new one online. And thank God for Youtube.

More blogs to come this year. Lots stored up. Let's get this puppy moving.

ROCKY MEMORIES

2010-10-27T16:27:00.000-07:00

All these new facebook friends from my high school days in Seguin, Texas dredge up a lot of old great memories. So I decided to take a drive to Lake McQueeney, where I lived from 5th grade through high school, and check out my old haunts. As I'm driving, I'm listening to my Billy Joel "Glass Houses" CD.
This was THE album (or cassette tape at the time) for me my last couple of years there. I was not a music guy in school, wasn't really up on the latest rock, pop, whatever. I was a film and TV geek (when geeks were not fashionable but were outcasts and estranged) so my musical memories veered more toward the soundtrack varieties.

I practically memorized the lp's and cassette soundtracks from Altman's "Popeye" (Harry Nillson), "Somewhere In Time", "Grease", the rousing John Williams scores from "1941". With SNL and Animal House being THE huge thing, Bill Murray's "Meatballs" soundtrack (with "Makin' It") and of course ALL albums by "The Blues Brothers" were devoured. And the comedy of Steve Martin.

I was always ashamed to admit my love of the "Xanadu" soundtrack (ELO) with its disco awfulness until I recently found out a Broadway musical is on the boards based on it. Was I ahead of my time seeing as how all these are now fondly remembered as unsung classics? Yea, sure, maybe.

But NO music from the time rocked as much as "Rocky Horror Picture Show". I see a lot about it this Halloween season with the "Glee" takeoff and all. Rocky was around for five or so years before I saw it. It was in '80 I think. But the midnight screenings were still pretty fresh. One of my friends had a dad who had a vhs copy of it. I didn't hang around to watch it because I had no idea what it was. Then one night I was invited by the drama gang to go to San Antonio on a "field trip" to a midnight screening a la "Fame". At the classic, now demolished, Central Park Fox. How my parents let me go to this day I will not know. We get in somebody's car...a Pinto or a Mazda of some sort, I can't remember...and head to the big city of SA.

The Fox theater was a classic seventies theater with the two screens and the long middle aisle cutting through the audience. This was perfect for the performance I was about to see. The audience was actually dressed as these strange characters, parading down the aisle, and singing the songs WITH THE FILM, in the area in front of the screen. WTF? I remember feeling very estranged that evening...out of place. I had no idea what the plot was of what I was watching. I just remember the images and the feeling and the music within those theater walls lined with small stones.

But that was the first time I ever did anything where I felt like I was part of an "in" thing. So of course I bought the soundtrack. And listened to it, over and over. So much so that today, I can still remember the words to the songs even though I can't remember what I ate yesterday. And as I plop that CD in, driving to my past today, I sang loud and ROCKED! Anyone who knows me knows I don't do that often. And I proclaim it to be GREAT rock n roll and I verify that with my friends who know music much better than I.

I went to a few more "event screenings" in college, but probably never attended more than five in my life. But it stayed with me.

Today, there is something quaint and innocent about that transvestite and all his cannibalistic tendencies. At least there were no emo vampire teens.

Ode to The Flintstones

2010-09-29T19:19:00.000-07:00

At midnight tonight, “The Flintstones” will turn fifty years old. September 30, 1960. The program premiered on ABC on the prime-time schedule and lasted six seasons. It was the first animated sitcom. It was the first original prime-time cartoon. History was made….thirty years before Homer Simpson came along.

I’ve had a love affair with this cartoon since I was in tiger-skin diapers. I couldn’t tell you why. That’s the beauty of it. I can’t tell you the famous quotes from whichever episode in whatever season. I couldn’t tell you which artist had Fred with a protruding bottom lip versus a overlapping lip. I couldn’t tell you which comedy writer developed the famed “Yabba Dabba Doo”. I’m not a “Flintstones” trivia expert at all. But that show informed so much of my life

I guess it was the beautifully simplistic line renderings of the early Hanna-Barbera cartoons. The bright inks and colors. The jazzy Hoyt Curtin background music. The brilliant sound effects and transition cues. Or the laughtrack. I loved that friggin’ laughtrack.

It’s visceral. I spent twenty years actually living my life, dating women, acting, making money in sales…you know, normal stuff….and now, three years shy from the big fifty…with no wife, kids, career or political affiliation…I find myself constantly ruminating on the past….the sitcoms, the cartoons, the cheesy films. With the advent of social networking tools, we become self-absorbed, inward-looking freaks of human nature. I’m not gonna write about “The Flintstones”….on their big day…I’m gonna write about ME! Or not.

Somewhere seeing “The Flintstones” and other Hanna-Barbera creations on television appealed to me when I was a kid. HB also created Yogi Bear, The Jetsons (the second prime-time family), Top Cat and Jonny Quest..all for TV. They pioneered the “limited animation” concept…a cost-saving way to animate for the quantitative demands of television. Jay Ward (“Bullwinkle”) was successful at this at the same time, writing great scripts animated by Gamma Studios in Mexico.

But HB was the shizit (or something like that, as the kids say)…It was Hollywood…the jazzy music, the great character voices…and since I had no brothers or sisters (cue the violin music), my best friends were these characters…or rather the PRESENTATION of these characters….as I said, I couldn’t tell you a plot or anything from a Snagglepuss or Touche Turtle cartoon…it’s just about the FEEL…of it.

Of course, I got older and graduated to Saturday morning cartoons, with the breakfast cereal and Hot Wheels ads….waking up at six in the morning, sitting through the farm report…to watch the 7:00 rerun of whatever pablum the huckster’s were selling us. But at that time it involved….Scooby Doo, Wacky Races, Speed Buggy, Hong Kong Phooey, Roman Holidays, and the ORIGINAL Sealab 2020. Looking at those masterpieces now, I see them for what they were….poorly animated, unoriginally conceived babysitters.

But it was innocent…no judgment, no critique…it was what it was, to quote some of my more “centered” friends.

Oh, yeah…”The Flintstones”….I found out that Alan Reed…who did Fred’s voice was actually an ad specialty salesman like my dad…and me. Weird.

And I have almost all “Flintstone” comic books….nearly all the Gold Key and Dells…all the Marvels….I didn’t collect all the Charltons…I remember being PISSED OFF that they inked Fred’s tie black instead of the blue as it was in the cartoon. And then I was so disappointed when I realized that in the later Gold Key issues, Fred’s tie was black as well. This is what happens when you are a kid who was a nerd before the term even became “hip” (as it became thanks to a sitcom about the fifties….I haven’t figured that one out yet either.)

I digress. The world is nuts. It was nuts in the sixties and the seventies. But it’s a different kind of nuts now. It’s technology information overload anything goes sarah palin kind of nuts. And the comfort I find…..in these simple colors…these clean line drawings…that laugh track…those boings, bwaps, and Curtinized theramined noises from heaven….take me away from the Calgon of Current Catastrophes.

My dad was an artist…drew cowboys and characters for advertising….I don’t think he admired me much for “copying” the Hanna-Barbera characters…but I was known in high school for zapping a Fred Flintstone out on pen and paper in milliseconds. I still can. Means nothing. But I can.

So, I want to thank Fred and Barney and Wilma and Betty and Dino and Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm for giving me, not only a false sense of security about the “real” world….prehistoric times bode well in the current but not the future….oh, but hey are the future…what? Snap! ( As the kids say.)

I don’t know what it is....but all these HB characters represent some kind of simplicity, some kind of animated logic….a sense of place in a world losing its place….There is a whole generation raised on South Park and Family Guy…and I don’t get it…not because I’m a prude…but because it’s cruel, mean-spirited, and ugly….I go to indie films for that….cartoons…I’ll stick with Fred.

Pufnstuf at North Star Mall

2010-09-07T15:49:00.000-07:00

North Star Mall is turning 50 years old this month. There is a celebration going on with a time capsule being opened. I put together some memories and photos for an Express-News submission.

For some reason, what always sticks in my mind is the red tile on the floor It was brick or saltillo, I can't remember. And the popcorn smell in the Walgreens. The high ceiling in the main "drag" by Luby's (still there)

And field trips to see movies at the General Cinema Theater: "Scrooge" with Albert Finney and "Oliver." I saw the feature "Pufnstuf" based on the cult Saturday Morning series. Many years later, I remember going to see "The Jerk" or "Black Hole" (not sure which) and being turned away due to the theater filling up and having to endure "Scavenger Hunt" in twin theater.

I remember one time going to see Anissa Walker ("Buffy") from "Family Affair." The crowds were so unruly and large for this doomed young starlet, that she had to be carried around on someone's shoulders.

The following pictures, taken by family friend Jimmy Kafka, detail an event I attended which featured HR Pufnstuf and many Krofft characters along with the iconic SA fixture Captain Gus. This must have been at least 1971 or so as "Lidsville" wasn't released until that fall.

The Rockstar arrives sans Witchiepoo - HR Pufnstuf:

The Krofft brothers denied it, but here is Pufnstuf tripping:

I just asked Pufnstuf if I was on acid at the time:

A couple of characters from another Krofft show: "Lidsville":

Trying to swing with a star:

The North Star Mall "Mascot" was hot.

No event would be complete without Captain Gus. He hosted the local Channel Five kids show which featured Popeye cartoons and Little Rascal shorts, "Ahoy Mateys".

Captain Gus. All these kids had been on his show at one time or another.

The politically incorrect "Frito Bandito" was replaced by this character-WC Fritos, a child-hating drunk.

I couldn't wait to get some Pufnstuf:

Puf was checking out the North Star - didn't even notice me there. Damned stoned dragons.

Future Tea Party members await their LSD-inspired puppet icons:

Coming of age- Not only did I have to deal with the North Star-let, but Pebbles was growing up as well.

A Colossal Mess of Roman Proportions

2010-08-19T18:04:00.000-07:00

Forty years later, I finally have the answer. The fact that this is a topic that has remained on the fringes of my consciousness for so long speaks volumes about my neurosis. But thanks to the World Wide Web (as it's called), someone finally addressed this issue.

In 1969, I purchased this one-shot Gold Key comic:

I noticed in the publisher information that it was created by "Total Television" which were the cartoon producers behind "Underdog", "Tennessee Tuxedo", and "Go Go Gophers". They were animated by Gamma Studios, a cartoon factory in Mexico that was contracted to make cartoons for General Mills cereal ads. And this place also animated the Jay Ward cartoons: "Bullwinkle and Rocky" and "George of the Jungle". Many people are confused by this, thinking that these were all made by the same creative teams. They just looked alike.

Anyway, I never saw an animated version of this. Or even heard or read of one.

So two years later, on Saturday morning on NBC, we have "The Roman Holidays", a Hanna-Barbera sitcom with similar characters (and even a lion). I bought the first issue of that comic book.

But thanks to Scott Shaw's blog, based on information from Mark Arnold's book, we have an answer. I am grateful, that I am not the only uber-geek over forty who obsessed over this.

So buy Mark's book. Support my fellow cartoon geeks.

Powder Puff Comedies

2010-08-10T15:53:00.000-07:00

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Chevy Chase in his finest comic performance:

The "drug of choice" in the early 80's, at least for comic fodder, was the white stuff. It was almost an obsession with filmmakers leading up to the penultimate "Scarface". But in today's politically correct world, wacky comedies can only rely on masturbation and murder. Does that mean today's comedy writer's get inspired by....well, self-gratification and homicide? Oh-well. Here are three examples I remember vividly from that era.

"National Lampoon's Heavy Metal" with a voice cast from SCTV including Eugene Levy, Harold Ramis and John Candy:

"Jekyll and Hyde...Together Again" starring Mark Blankfield, written and directed by Jerry Belsen, who wrote for Dick Van Dyke and Odd Couple:

"Modern Problems" with Chevy Chase and Nell Carter:

And here I thought The Great White Way referred to Broadway.

MUNSTERS AND ADDAMS AND SPAWNS..OH MY!

2010-08-03T16:07:00.000-07:00

Most of you know about the conspiracy/controversey regarding the Addams Family/Munsters scheduling. Both premiered in fall of 1964 and ran two seasons on different networks (ABC and CBS respectively). The Addams, however, had a long history. The macabre family was started as a single panel comic strip in the New Yorker by Charles Addams many years before. The Munsters, a throwback to the Hammer Monster films, was a relatively new creation.

After six years of being rerun, Hanna-Barbera animated the Addams Family (based on their original comic look) for an episode of Scooby Doo Movies in 1972 which led to their own cartoon series the following year on NBC. And there was a barely remembered reunion special with most of the original cast on NBC in 1976. After that, more animated versions appeared and two financially successful feature films were produced.

As for The Munsters, the original run was followed by a feature film, "Munsters Go Home". The only animated version was called "The Mini-Munsters" produced by Fred Calvert for a one time special run on the ABC Saturday Superstar Movie in 1972.

But there has been massive confusion regarding the proliferation of monster "families" during the sixties in cartoonland. For instance, Hanna-Barbera had "The Gruesomes" (almost a cross between the Addams and Munsters) featured in a Snooper and Blabber cartoon.
They would later be prehistorisized and become regulars in episodes of "The Flintstones".

Also, Hanna-Barbera created "Mr. and Mrs. J. Evil Scientist". This more sophisticated gruesome family appeared in a "Snagglepuss" episode. Although they never had their own cartoon series, they were featured in their own four issue Gold Key Comic in the sixties.

Strangely, around this same time (1964...also then the Munsters and Addams started TV sitcoms) Gold Key created their own monster family "The Little Monsters" which ran succesfully through the seventies. This was never animated.

Similar looks and styles abounded on Saturday morning: Hal Seeger's "Milton the Monster", "Frankenstien Jr."(Hanna-Barbera), the Gruesome Twosome on "Wacky Races" (also Hanna-Barbera), and, of course, Sabrina's friends "The Groovy Goolies" (Filmation).

And also, in 1967, Rankin-Bass created a feature film using their puppet-style animation (see "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" for "The Mad Monster Party". They animated a sequel to this, also for the Saturday Superstar Movie' the same year as "The Mini-Munsters".

Confused yet?

January 12, 1971

2010-03-26T18:55:00.000-07:00

January 12, 1971. The following words appeared on a television screen:
"The program you are about to see is All in the Family. It seeks to throw a humorous spotlight on our frailties, prejudices, and concerns. By making them a source of laughter, we hope to show -- in a mature fashion -- just how absurd they are”.

“All in the Family” premiered. At the time, it was shocking, controversial, considered subversive by some….brilliant by others. If you don’t know what this series is, look it up.

I remember watching it weekly a couple of years later. Mostly, I caught the daily reruns CBS “stripped” after the game shows during the summer.

In a nutshell, Archie was a bigoted, profane conservative. Mike, his son-in-law was a long-haired, liberal academic. Their arguments were well-written, timely, and very very funny. I have written ad nauseum about how our current “culture wars” simply regurgitate Archie and Mike. I’m not going to wax politic about that particular dynamic here. I want to talk about comedy and satire.

Norman Lear’s series, which included “Maude”, “One Day at a Time”, “Good Times”, “The Jeffersons”, “Sanford and Son”, and
“Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman” were different than previous sitcoms. They were videotaped and looked very much like stage plays. The live audience was very present. You not only heard laughter but gasps and groans. They were not always funny, sometimes they were mini-dramas (and not very good ones at that).

But the comedy, the satire. Lear has been labeled a liberal. He is. He founded People for the American Way, a First Amendment-protecting organization. He owns the Constitution, literally. He also served in World War II, flying 52 combat missions and being awarded the Air Medal with four Oak Leaf Clusters. He comes from a generation where liberal/conservative labels didn’t define someone to the point of derision or ridicule. He paid his debt to his country. His point of view was reflected in his works.

Archie Bunker (although based on a British character) was inspired by Lear’s own father. Maude Findlay, Archie’s sister-in-law, a liberal whose politics outmatched Archie’s in terms of self-immolation, was inspired by Lear’s wife. The art is personal.

Lear’s early sitcom work was extremely well-written, funny, and character-driven. It was topical and dealt with the issues of the day. Later, it became rather stagy and pedantic. But look:

1971: “All in the Family”: Racist Anglo blue-collar man shares house with Liberal “hippie” son-in-law and progressive daughter. They both fall on their face sometimes, mostly Archie though.
1972: “Sanford and Son”: Racist African American runs a junk yard with his son in Watts, as in riots Watts. He falls on his face sometimes with his son saving his ass.
1972: “Maude”: Politically correct liberal woman deals with being a feminist in a world not ready for her. And sometimes falls on her face with her family saving her ass.
1974: “Good Times”: An African-American family deals with the trials and tribulations of living in the projects. Striving and struggling for the American dream. Nobody falls on their face here because hypocrisy isn’t an issue.
1975: “The Jeffersons”: An African -American family has made it and moves to a high-rise in Manhattan. The patriarch, an elitist racist, often falls on his face, saved by his wife.
1976: “One Day at a Time”” A newly-divorced young woman with two daughters tries to make it on her own in a world of changing sexual politics. The only one falling on his face is the nosy, lecherous super.
1976: “Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman”: A middle-American housewife has the longest nervous breakdown in TV history.

So, you see this isn’t “Beverly Hillbillies”, “Andy of Mayberry”, “Bewitched” or “Leave it to Beaver”. While the concurrent stable of Mary Tyler Moore-produced sitcoms were intelligent and slick, they rarely ventured into controversy. Garry Marshall’s sitcoms wallowed in nostalgia. Others of the era were awash in titillation, innuendo, and insults. “Barney Miller” stood on it’s own as an understated comic masterpiece. “MASH” was irreverent and subversive, eventually leading to preachy literate boredom (and, the highest rated finale of all time, go figure).

You could not put these shows on now. Oh, sure, we live in the most permissive TV environment blah blah blah. No, we don’t.

Lear, an avowed liberal, created shows that were SATIRE. “All in the Family” was the perfect example. He made fun of ALL types of characters. Like real-life, everyone had flaws. No one was a saint. No one was pure evil. It was a reflection of society. It mirrored the dichotomous nature of humanity. He didn’t just trash conservatives. He trashed liberals. He trashed minorities. He trashed them all lovingly. What does this mean? It means he loves people, regardless of who they are. That’s why he’s a great American. I remember seeing an interview with a WW 2 veteran who said that the famous “Vietnam” episode of AITF aided and abetted the enemy during the final years of that war. No. He humanized the conflict that Americans were experiencing during one of the most horrific times in our history.

And you see, the thing is….this is where nothing has changed. When anyone tries to examine the human condition….from a political satire standpoint…it is considered seditious. Why? Unless an observor follows a “formula” of red or blue, they are fringe.

So where are we now? What is shocking and subversive (in the good sense of course). Oh, “South Park”, torture porn, something on HBO or Showtime because it allows profanity and nudity. Bullshit. This is shock. How far can we go? No redeeming message comes out of this. No enlightenment. But, you say, it’s “entertainment”. Fine, and I feel sorry for you. But don’t fool yourselves into thinking it is daring, thought-provoking, or groundbreaking. It’s just childish and prurient. “All in the Family” could not get greenlit today. It has no nudity, graphic sex, f-bombs, torture, gore, rape, bodily fluids, racial insults, humiliation, pornography, or disembowelments. Wake up, America. These “daring” elements are corporate-borne profit-makers. It takes no intelligence or thoughtfulness to write this tripe.

Norman Lear was a pioneer. And he blazed a trail that would soon be covered up and forgotten for the sake of profit and sensationalism.

Yeah, he was a consultant on South Park for a while. I guess he understood that those guys were satirists in their own way. At least they make fun of EVERYONE, even if it’s done in a juvenile way. And Sarah Silverman, as funny as she is claims it’s ok to make fun of EVERYONE EXCEPT WOMEN. Well, that’s fine…but if you make fun of disabled and mentally retarded people, all religions, all ethnicities…..and give exception to any one group, you are not a satirist but a self-indulgent comic.

And, yeah, as Lear’s shows grew older they became more silly (see “The Jeffersons”) ar more soapy (see “One Day at a Time”) or ruined by showcasing one badly-drawn character (see “Good Times”) or more star-driven (see “Archie Bunker’s Place”).

But he did something no one has done since. He examined the American condition without prejudice, without cruelty, with humor, with pathos, with talented acting and writing, with thoughtfulness, with fairness, with bravery. Sounds like the American ideal to me. Thank God he owns the Constitution.

TOP STUDIO FILMS OF THE DECADE PLUS THE SCOTTY AWARDS

2009-12-20T17:09:00.000-08:00

My “Top Films of the Decade” list is very subjective for two reasons. First, I haven’t seen enough films over these past ten years to give a comprehensive and diverse overview. Second, the best films I’ve seen are revisited or new viewings of amazing films of the 60’s and 70’s. To compare apples to apples, I have three categories: Top American Studio films; Top Independent/Festival films; and Top Documentary Films. Here is my Studio list:

Note: Many of my Studio films were released as “independents” but if they include major star power, second generation power directors, or are produced through a mini-major boutique studio, they are considered studio films here.

Top Ten Hollywood Films (followed by the obligatory obsessive compulsive second top ten and my Scotty awards):

Sideways (Alexander Payne) Payne proves again that he is the closest director we have to the humanistic, literate character-driven comedies of the 70’s (see Hal Ashby). Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church create the Odd Couple of the new millennium in this film that speaks to everyone who has a dream, gave up on a dream, is in love with life and in love with misery. In other words, being an artist and being human.
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (Shane Black) Black’s directorial debut was the closest I felt to the sheer cinematic excitement I felt upon my first viewing of Raiders of the Lost Ark over thirty years ago. (And I told him so in the Driskill lobby.) Simply
thrills, great acting, hilarious and chilling surprises, insane premise, and surprises galore. Downey was born to play this role and Kilmer starts his grand stroll into excellent character acting.
Dogville (Lars Von Trier) Once again, pushing the envelopes of taste and propriety, Von Triers has created a world (literally) on a stage that shocks, reviles, amazes, and is the truest reflection of society, scarily. A much-needed whack in the head released in the buildup of the new culture wars.
Ghost World (Terry Zwigoff) This film spoke to me on so many levels….the nerd, the outcast, the comic book collector. In a strange world between modern grime and retro chic, this Ghost World is a funny and tender meditation on our obsession with the past and our uncertainty about our future (among many other things) in a politically correct world.
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry). Jim Carrey in his best role and Kate Winslet at her most organic (save, maybe Holy Smoke) in this psychedelic tone poem with a socko soundtrack. What could be pretentious turns into a universal story about unrequited love. One of the best casts of the decade and a killer script by Spike Jonze.
Little Children (Todd Fields). Don’t be fooled by the subject matter. Based on the book by Tom Perotta, this adaptation adds to the themes, rather than diminishes them. A biting satire in the guise of a haunting melodrama, this is one of those films that takes you into a world for two hours and it feels like one. From the inspired spoken narration to the mesmerizing Oscar-nominated comeback performance by Jackie Earle Haley, Little Children pulls no punches in examining groupthink and mores in modern America suburbia.
Return to Me (Bonnie Hunt) Yes, my cynical ass has hated formula romantic comedies for some time…except this one. Written by, directed by, co-starring the Chicago wunderkind Hunt (my wife in another life, I’m sure), Return to Me is funny, sad, smart, heartwarming, sardonic and, even with a contrived premise, believable. And a Dean Martin soundtrack to boot. Rom-coms shouldn’t die off, they just need to be all made by Miss Hunt.
Lost in Translation (Sophia Coppolla). This is the part Bill Murray was destined to play and it resurrected his career into an Indiewood Icon. From the inspired setting in Tokyo and the show-biz in-jokes scattered throughout to the sexily sullen Scarlett Johansson and the appropriately ambiguous ending, Coppolla captures the angsts and longings of young and old. Beautifully shot and scored.
Monster’s Ball (Marc Foster) Much has been said about the lovemaking between Halle Berry and Billy Bob Thornton in this terrifying slice of southern gothic, but the real thrill lies in the brutally honest yet hopeful portrayal of race and class relations since Ashby’s “The Landlord”.
Watchmen (Zach Snyder) Save “Ironman” I haven’t jumped on the superhero bandwagon. But this film, based on Alan Moore’s graphic novel, is much, much more than an action film. It is Forrest Gump on an acid trip with Dr. Strangelove. The revisionist history and political satire are thankfully ramped up from the source, creating an over-long but satisfying study on what makes a hero in a world of anti-heroes.

Runners-Up (Next 10)

Bobby (Emilio Estevez). Through the music, settings, and costumes, this ensemble film about the few hours leading up to RFK’s assassination accurately reflects the shattered dreams of a confused America in 1968 witnessing Her third earth-shattering tragedy in five years time.
School of Rock (Richard Linklater) Much as Bonnie Hunt did with a formula revamp in “Return to Me”, Linklater proved that comedies about underdog kids overcoming adversity doesn’t have to pander to audiences through cheap sentimentality, crude gags, and cartoonish characterizations. This film is the closest he came to the original Bad News Bears.
Punch Drunk Love( Paul Thomas Anderson) Anderson figured out how to use Adam Sandler’s talents in this off-beat and delightfully uneven love story. Instead of playing his stuttering man-child with a temper for laughs, PT and Sandler created a complicated, tortured protagonist with some real anger issues…who falls in love. Everything from the act-changing visuals to the “Popeye” soundtrack add to one of the most bizarre love stories since Harold and Maude.
The Cooler (Wayne Kramer). Much as the Ocean’s Eleven remake tried to do, The Cooler,
with strikingly honest performances by William H. Macy and Maria Bello, portrays a Las Vegas that is dying and leaving behind its Rat Pack roots to wallow in corporate servitude.
Maria Full of Grace (Joshua Marsten) With a beautifully realized star-turn by Catalina Sandino Moreno) this film is a chilling and hard-hitting exploration of the sordid lengths one must go through to escape a horrendous situation only to be in a new world of continued but slightly more hopeful depravity.
Reservation Road (Sam Mendes) Although slightly marred by Leo’s histrionics, Mendes’s best film since American Beauty is a journey into the past that peels the skin off of the Man in the Gray Flannel Suit and exposes the blood and guts of unrealized potential, dreams unanswered, torrid attachments, unsatisfied yearnings, and finally, the ultimate betrayal.
Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead ( Sidney Lumet) Lumet (“Network”, “Dog Day Afternoon”) still has it, resurrecting the edgy realistic tension of the best seventies crime thrillers (like Spike Lee’s “Inside Man”also did this decade).
Pursuit of Happyness (Garbriele Muccino). Surprisingly uncheesy, unpreachy story of hope with Will Smith in one of his best performances.
Michael Clayton (Tony Gilroy). Another welcome throwback to seventies conspiracy porn, this feature (with the last on-screen performance of the great Sidney Pollack) is well-paced and smartly written with Tilda Swinton providing one of the best characterizations of the decade.
Art School Confidential (Terry Zwigoff) A second cousin to Ghost World, “Confidential” takes the hilarious mocking of the pretensions of the art world in the former and expands upon it.

Wild Card:
"Once" (John Carney) Not sure how to classify this one....foreign film, indie, musical, drama...whatever. Anyway, this Irish film was a beautiful narrative rendition of the relationship between two people. Effectively using songs (hard to do) to convey emotions and conflict. Sadly, I saw the leads, Glen Hansard and Marketa Iglova, perform at Stubb's and watching the worshipping fan-base swoon over the Swell Season, took away the melancholic underdog vibe of the film.

SCOTTY AWARDS for the decade:

Scene Stealer: Fred Willard in “Best in Show”
Funniest Woody Allen film: “Hollywood Ending”
Best Meet-Cute: Mickey Rourke and Marisa Tomei in “The Wrestler”
Better Than Ever Female: Marisa Tomei
Overall Female Performances: Kate Winslet
Most Consistently Good Female Performances: Laura Linney
William H. Macy Pinch Hitter Award: JK Simmons
Overall Male Performances: Phillip Seymour Hoffman
Better Than Ever Male: Josh Brolin
Consistently Good Male Performances: Tom Wilkinson
Biggest Disappointment: Men Who Stare at Goats
Best Justification to see sex and violence: History of Violence
Best First Five Minutes in the Biggest Unrealized Potential of a Film: “Idiocracy” (Mike Judge)
Biggest Loss: Robert Altman
Biggest Fraud on the Moviegoing Public: “The Terminal” (Steven Spielberg)
Most Eagerly Awaited and Most Easily Forgotten:
“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls” (also Spielberg)
Worst Trend: Torture Porn
Most enjoyable studio film I only saw ‘cuz it was shot locally: “Miss Congeniality” (Donald Petrie).
Guilty Pleasure: “Down with Love” (Peyton Reed)
Biggest emotional punch in the Stomach: “In America”(Jim Sheridan)
Best Western: “The Proposition” (John Hillcoat)
Best Western: Hotel
Worst Trend in Independent Films: Independent Films following an Independent Film Formula and sadly, succeeding (see “Napolean Dynamite”)
Most welcome and needed return of a genre: satire
(see “Thank You For Smoking”, “Bamboozled”, “War, Inc.” , “Pretty Persuasion”, “The TV Set”, and “Tropic Thunder”)
Straight to DVD special mentions: “Come Early Morning”, "The King", “Oh in Ohio”, “Pretty Persuasion”, “Diggers”.
Best neurotic return to indie filmmaking of yore: "Frownland"(Ronald Bronstein)
Favorite festival find not released on DVD: "Sexless" (Alex Holdridge)...Woody Allen meets Richard Linklater, a template for my dream project.
Favorite festival find released on DVD: "Easy Listening" (Pamela Corkey). This Boston-shot indie is a "Marty"-like story of love set in the 60's. Set in the world of elevator music, the film evokes the nostalgic feel of those Capitol Record album covers and the cool, almost hip but not quite feel of the era.

Stay Tuned for my indie and doc lists.

From Get Smart to Get back into movies: Brooks and Henry

2009-08-23T18:21:00.000-07:00

In 1965, the classic "Get Smart" was created by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry. Mel Brooks, already known for his zany contributions to Your Show of Shows, would later bec0me a comic icon for writing and directing "The Producers", "Young Frankenstein", "Blazing Saddles", and "Spaceballs". Buck Henry would later be known for writing "The Graduate" and "To Die For" among many other films, as well as his many stints as guest host on early SNL episodes.

During their successes on the big screen, Brooks and Henry made some forays into network TV sitcom-land.

Henry's immediate follow-up to "Get Smart" was 1967's superhero sitcom parody "Captain Nice" (NBC) starring William Daniels.
Similar to the "Munsters-Addams Family" controversy, a competing bumbling superhero program appeared during the same time on CBS ("Mr. Terrific"). It lasted half a season.

Brooks followed up his early 70's cinema successes with "When Things Were Rotten", a Robin Hood parody on ABC in the fall of 1975.
Oddly, he would make a successful Robin Hood feature film parody in the 90's. I always wondered how much material he stole from this series...which lasted a couple of months by the way. Great theme song though. And what a cast: Dick Van Patten, Bernie Kopell, Dick Gautier (all hold-overs from Get Smart) and the incredible Misty Rowe.

Henry, having co-directed "Heaven Can Wait" with Warren Beatty, decided to create the cience fiction satire "Quark" on NBC in 1978.
Hot on the trail of the new "Star Wars" phenomenon, this well-cast and well-written sitcom starring Richard Benjamin just didn't gel with audiences. Either that or the adventures of a garbage scow in outer space just was to expensive to produce. This will be a cult classic someday much like Brooks "Spaceballs".

So now I'm waiting for these guys to team up again on a script called "The Creators" about the travails of creating followup TV successes when you become hotshots on the big screen. Now with all the quality cable programming, it seems the tables have turned. Of course, Mel is on Broadway now and Henry is signing autographs at film festivals.

A Tale of Two Islands

2009-05-31T20:33:00.000-07:00

Hanna-Barbera created two live action "wrap-around" shows for Saturday Morning. Basically, they were costumed characters engaged in skits and music who introduced various cartoon shorts.

The first, on NBC in 1968, the iconic "Banana Splits Adventure Hour" (with characters created by Sid and Marty Krofft) included a live-action serial called "Danger Island." Remember "UH-OH CHONGO" or words to that effect? These very colorful and well-made episodes starred Jan Michael Vincent and were directed by Richard Donner who would go on to help "Superman: The Movie", "The Omen", and the "Lethal Weapon" franchise.

Nine years later, "The Skatebirds" premiered on CBS. Less revered than its predecessor, these roller fowls introduced the live action "Mystery Island." You think they could have come up with something a little different. Well, there was a little more sci-fi to compete with the Filmation live-action kidvid at the time.

Pray For the Wildcats

2009-05-23T21:39:00.000-07:00

On the last post, I made reference to this ABC Movie of the Week where Andy Griffith plays a sadistic businessman torturing his professional co-horts on a desert motorcycle trip. This is one of the most bizarre TV movie memories I've had (a close second is retiree Martin Balsam beating up gang members in "Siege"). This is a cast made in boomer heaven: William Shatner (playing the good guy), Robert Reed and Marjoe Gortner (child preacher). Watch this clip at your own risk.

Andy Griffith / Dick Van Dyke : Same timeline

2009-05-23T18:01:00.000-07:00

I had recently seen Andy Griffith in a marvelous performance in the indie film "Waitress." He did this film a couple of years ago playing a lovable but crusty cafe patron. Yesterday, I saw Dick Van Dyke make an appearance on "The Bonnie Hunt Show." It dawned on me that with all of the celebrities of yore that have passed on lately, these two guys are still going strong. And then I pondered on how their careers paralleled. I have lots of free time.

1960-1968: "The Andy Griffith Show" CBS. Major hit.
1961-1966: "The Dick Van Dyke Show" CBS. Major hit
Both produced by Sheldon Leonard with connections to Danny Thomas and Desilu studios.
Andy Griffith was a spinoff from the Danny Thomas Show and Dick Van Dyke had similar styling to the Danny Thomas Show.

Both guys left hit series in the late '60's. Then in the early 70's both came back. Both on CBS.
After Griffith failed in a comedy-drama "Headmaster", he immediately did "The New Andy Griffith Show" in 1971. He tried to rekindle the old magic with some of the same writers and similar small-town settings. It didn't work.
.
Van Dyke came back with "The New Dick Van Dyke Show." Also in 1971. But this show had many format changes over a three year run and never really found its legs. Also created by Carl Reiner with inside TV jokes.

Then in the early 70's, both made controversial made for TV movies for ABC.
In "Pray for the Wildcats," Griffith played a crazed businessman that takes three cohorts on a motorcycle trip through the desert. He was nuts.
In "The Morning After," Van Dyke (in a semibiographical performance) played an alcoholic. Very dour stuff.

In the eighties and nineties, both guys would come back playing in detective/lawyer shows.
Griffith: Matlock
Van Dyke: Diagnosis Murder

Both Griffith and Van Dyke are TV pioneers.

Do Pirhannas Dream of Diving Pigs? Remembering Aquarena Springs

2009-05-23T14:17:00.000-07:00

Do you remember Aquarena Springs in San Marcos?

This was a laid-back theme park on the San Marcos River. Attractions included: A glass-bottom boat, a mermaid show, Ralph the diving pig, a skyride (every park had a skyride in those days), a "space needle" with a viewing room that went up and down, a hotel, a golf course, a "submarine theater", a midway with dancing chickens and other "carnival-style" animal abuse, and a gift shop.

In the seventies, my parents and I would drive up from San Antonio and meet our Austin relatives there for a picnic (near the golf course). Later that decade, when I lived at Lake McQueeney, I remember a "casting call" for hot girls in bikinis. This was for the low-budget "Pirhanna" which was shot at the park. This girl Peggy, who I had a crush on in high school, regaled us with tales of being on this Hollywood set and participating in "panic" scenes a la Jaws. This involved screaming and running out of the swimming area with other scantily clad teenagers and beer belly locals.

Fast forward a couple of years and I actually was attending Southwest Texas State University (now sadly renamed Texas State University) and educumakatin' myself right near the park. I took a couple of hikes back in the lush hill country behind the hotel but never really took in the attractions much. Some twelve years or so after graduating I was doing some writing and decided to drive up from SA and stay at the hotel to do one of those "solitary retreat" things. Little did I know, the park (which had been sold to the university years earlier and remade into an aquatic educational center) was going to close soon. This retreat turned into "The Shining." The old hotel had a moldy, mildewy smell. The halls were vacant. It was dark and grungy. But cool, in a "Barton Fink" kind of way. I would lay at the pool with my tablet. Just me and the swans...I believe Ralph had retired by that time and was taking care of the abused chickens.

Two years ago, the wonderful Alamo Draftouse had an outdoor screening of "Pirhanna" at the park. What a wonderful night. The park was closed. Most of the attractions were still there but ghostly and vacant. The skyride launching pad, the submarine, the gift shop, the needle. And in the distance, you could see "Old Main." That was the university landmark: a beautiful old castle-looking building that housed the journalism department. The full moon, Old Main peeking out ominously from trees, the broken down carnival, and the reliving of killer fish where the blood originally flowed led to a surreal evening. The film was shown on a large screen right on the waterfront. The director, Joe Dante ("Gremlins", "Twilight Zone", "The Howling", etc) was in attendance and couldn't have been more kind as I asked him if he remembered Peggy in the polka-dot bikini. John Sayles, who wrote this script, was not there but he should have been. I think he would have been inspired to do a character-driven piece on old amusement parks that end up closed down:

Thanks for being there. They are eating the guests.

DAVE AND TONY AND TOM AND JAY

2009-05-17T21:55:00.000-07:00

One year after "The Odd Couple" went off the air, Tony Randall ("Felix Unger") returned to ABC prime time in a situation comedy produced by MTM. In "The Tony Randall Show", Tony played a judge in Philadelphia. This was an extremely funny and well-written show. It was produced by Tom Patchett and Jay Tarses, the two comedy writers-producers responsible for the classic "Bob Newhart Show". Pretty good pedigree. I have very fond memories of this show and its theme music. Tony's hangdog assistant was played by Barney Martin who later played Jerry's dad on "Seinfeld". After one season, the program moved to CBS for a season. This show needs to be released on DVD.

After writing and producing a surprisingly tasteless "Animal House" rip-off originally titled "Mad Magazine's Up the Academy" (directed by cult filmmaker Robert Downey Sr.), Patchett and Tarses produced an ABC sitcom about a convenience store which lasted a couple of episodes after tons of hype. They had an interesting guest star in one episode:

Speaking of Dave, he often had Tony Randall as a guest on his show. Randall, always classy, was a great sport usually appearing in a gag sequence. Some funny clips from early NBC-era Dave and lastly a classic clip from CBS Dave:

Odd dog mind meld

2009-05-10T11:54:00.000-07:00

No, this isn't the newest band.

In the early seventies, there were two hippie trippy programs that somehow were the same thing in my memory until I was able to sort it out later in life. This is one reason why those of us growing up during this time THOUGHT we were on drugs but weren't. It's kind of like an acid trip for geeks.

"The Point" was an ABC special broadcast in 1971. It was based on a fable and music (and album) by Harry Nillson. Nillson's music is definitely one of the more pronounced soundtracks of this time what with the hit "Everybody's Talkin'" from "Midnight Cowboy" and the Coconut song popularized by the Muppets among his work. I had a pretty progressive speech-drama teacher in sixth grade and he showed us "The Point" on a TV monitor in class. This was in SEGUIN, TEXAS mind you. Dustin Hoffman provided the voice of the father, but Ringo Starr dubbed the voice for the British release on VHS. I can't remember which voice I heard. Here's the music and premise:

"The Boy and His Dog" is an incredible film based on a novella by famed writer Harlan Ellison. It's an post-apocalyptic vision (very Mad Max for its day) with a young Don Johnson scavenging for food and sex with his talking dog. Well, they speak telepathically.Alvy Moore (Hank Kimball in "Green Acres") co-produced it and actually had a decent part in it. Now, I never saw this movie as a kid. It was R-rated and difficult to find on video in later years. I have no idea where my memory of it comes from except perhaps reading about it. I finally saw this film around six years ago and it blew me away. Here's why:

So, the POINT of this blog about a BOY and his DOG is....well, there is no POINT. I just can't understand why these two very different stories about A BOY AND HIS DOG (albeit both pharmaceutically inspired) somehow conjoined themselves for thirty-odd years in my brain.

If anyone out there has similar media mind melds, I'd love to hear about them!

Every celebrity who was alive in 1978

2009-05-04T21:02:00.000-07:00

Some stage manager got fired after this fiasco. You don't tick off Archie Bunker, Bea Arthur, Lucy, Carol, Ed Asner, Lassie, Sheriff Taylor, Mike Wallace, Glen Campbell, Matrshall Dillon, John Amos, Dale Evans, Bert Convy, Wonder Woman, Captain Kangaroo and half the Waltons and get away with it! It's a good thing Andy Rooney wasn't there.

Facebook Import: ABC- Still the One...then came Cosby, Seinfeld, Rachel, etc

2009-05-04T20:35:00.000-07:00

In the fall of 1977, the coolest hippest thing (at least for a guy starting high school as I was) was to be watching ABC. This was when the network was king. The "t and a" revolution was just starting -- jiggle TV they called it.
I had my Farrah poster and a huge crush on Kristy McNichol. It started with "Happy Days'. Then came "Barney Miller", ", "SWAT", "Charlie's Angels", "Welcome Back Kotter", "Baretta", "Starsky and Hutch", "Family", "Laverne and Shirley", "What's Happening", "Three's Company", "Battle of the Network Stars", "Donny and Marie", "Hardy Boys-Nancy Drew", "Bionic Woman" "Six Million Dollar Man", and "Eight is Enough".
With the epic mini-series "Roots" and "Rich Man Poor Man", ABC had quality programming to add to it's credentials but CBS with it's roster of Norman Lear sitcoms, MASH, and the MTM stable of comedies and dramas still had the upper hand in that department.

This fall, ABC brought out "Love Boat" and "Soap" (with all the added controversy) and Redd Foxx's new variety show (which lasted only a few episodes but I loved it). Also premiering was a sitcom that took place in Plains, Georgia called "Carter Country" (read Jimmy) dealing humorously with race relations in the south. Finally, "Fantasy Island" would arrive midseason.

Oh, yeah--and "Monday Night Football" to boot. Plus Barbara Walters just moved over to ABC from "The Today Show".

It was this weird mixture of post-Brady Bunch/Partridge Family teenybopper family fare with innuendo and pushing the limits (Three's ( Soap, and Redd Foxx's variety show) and the aforementioned "T and A" (Three's Company, Charlie's Angels).

So, Justin Timberlake talks about Bringing Sexy Back. Well, ABC brought it back the First Time....and on network TV...scarin' the hell out of everybody.

Two fun clips:
This one is an overall promo touting ABC as ending world hunger and curing cancer.....but it so exemplifies the mid-seventies. Whereas contemporary TV shows and films try so hard to mimic this era , this clip speaks volumes.

And this clip, from 1978, is great. It shows all the stars at the time in this big happy gathering. We added "Mork and Mindy", "Taxi" , "Vegas" (before Paris was there--both of them) and "Battlestar Galactica (The FIRST ONE, with Papa Cartwright) . Ya gotta love it! This is almost as good as Robert Evan's Anti-Drug NBC lovefest in the early eighties. Put your disco ball up for this one.

Norman Fell went out with a smile on his face, I'll tell you that!

More on ABC in another post

Fred Silverman, Nancy Walker, and Scooby Doo

2009-04-28T19:26:00.000-07:00

I was just reading about Fred Silverman. He was an influential programmer and innovator for network tv in the 60's and 70's. His career highlights seem to greatly influence the elements of programming that meant the most to me.

Silverman started programming for CBS in the mid-60's. He brought all of the superhero shows to Saturday Morning. All the cartoon product tie-ins which have been so prevalent in childrens programming really started with this guy. Yes, there were sponsorships by toy companies and cereals in the early 60's but Silverman really got the whole programming block concept going on Saturday mornings. So, not only did he greenlight Space Ghost, Frankenstein Jr., Herculoids, and the Wacky Races but he was responsible for bringing one of the most popular characters in the history of animation to audiences: Scooby Doo. Scooby started a whole decade of meddling, crime-fighting teenagers with goofy animal buddies. He also brought back the Flintstones in new episodes with a teenage Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm.

When he began programming prime time, he was responsible for the "rural purge". He cancelled every show with a tree in it, regardless of the ratings. So "Beverly Hillbillies", "Mayberry RFD", "Green Acres" and "Hee Haw" were axed. Silverman decided to cater to the new baby boomers with a much more sophisticated brand of sitcom. Thus was born "Mary Tyler Moore Show" and "All in the Family".
Basically, he was responsible for making CBS the Tiffany Network. At this time, the quality of programming was unmatched (to this day, in my opinion). The Lear and MTM labels flourished in the early 70's. Also, "Sonny and Cher", "Good Times", "Bob Newhart Show" and "The Waltons" became sensations.

Then ABC grabbed him in '75. Now Silverman became responsible for what became, for me as a young male, paradise. He made ABC a powerhouse with the "jiggle TV" concept. He put "Happy Days" in front of a howling studio audience. Now, he did for Garry Marshall and his stable of comedies what he did for Lear and MTM on CBS. The Fonzie phenomenon started a trend of shows devoted to sex symbols and wet t-shirts. Along for the ride, some stars were made: Farrah ("Charlie's Angels), Travolta ("Welcome Back, Kotter"), Suzanne Somers ("Three's Company"), Robert Blake ("Baretta"), Donny and Marie, "Love Boat" and "Fantasy Island". He brought "Roots" to TV, starting the trend of miniseries. Oh, and "Battle of the Network Stars". Well, the latter seems more like an entry in his next chapter. He also brought Scooby Doo to ABC with all these huge Saturday morning blocks with Laff-a-Lympics, Scrappy Doo, Dynomutt, and Scooby Dum. Velma even looked a little hotter.

Prime Time sex stars olympics:

Scooby's olympics:

Quicky, it is interesting to point out that Silverman also really capitalized on the spin-off phenomenon. On CBS there were the All in the Family offspring: "Maude", "The Jeffersons", "Good Times". And the MTM children: "Rhoda", "Phyllis". On ABC, "Happy Days" bred "Laverne and Shirley" and "Mork and Mindy".

He also must have really liked Nancy Walker. She played Rosie in the paper towel commercials, remember? Well, she rose to fame and won Emmy nods for playing Rhoda's mother on MTM and "Rhoda". When Silverman moved to ABC, Lear created a show for her on that network aptly titled, "The Nancy Walker Show" (she played a Hollywood talent agent). That was cancelled very quickly in the fall of '76 and she starred in "Blansky's Beauties", a very strained spinoff of "Happy Days". She ran a showgirl chorus line in a Vegas casino in the fifties...I think Chachi worked with her. She ended up back with Rhoda on CBS. Funny, she worked with all the big sitcom producers in the 70's at one time or another.

Back to Silverman. After his phenomenal success at ABC, NBC made him president and CEO. Can he pull off a hat trick? Well, while ABC continued to titillate and CBS went back to huge audiences by going back to the country ("Dukes of Hazzard" "Flo", "Dallas"), NBC refused to escape from its seventies doldrums. So Silverman tried a Love Boat type show called "Supertrain". Flop. A quality Larry Gelbart-scripted dramedy called "United States". Flop. HIs own cornpone country show spinoff, "Sheriff Lobo". Sort of flopped. He brought back his favorite family, The Flintstones, in prime time. Flop. He brought back friendly animals, "Here's Boomer". Flop.

He brought back the only hit character NBC had in his own show, Fred Sanford himself. Flop. He created a weekly "Big Event" which could be anything. Flop. His main success at this time was a new family of sitcoms derived from "Diff'rent Strokes" ("Facts of Life" and, oooof, "Hello Larry"). But he woudn't let us down. Before he left NBC, he brought us "Hill Street Blues". When David Letterman failed in his morning show, Silverman kept him at the network until he launched the now legendary late late night show after Carson. Whereas launching the eighties with Bochco inspired dramedies and Letterman lunacy leaves a wonderful legacy, he also left us with "The Smurfs" and started reality tv with "Real People". Ouch.

Well, my fondest memories of TV in my favorite TV years were thanks to this guy. Tiffany TV, T and A TV, and NBCTNT TV. Yes, I have fond memories of the bad NBC years. That's just me. The Flintstones, Scooby Doo, McLean Stevenson, and Nancy Walker all thank you.

Plop Comics

2009-04-25T19:50:00.000-07:00

My favorite comic book, my guilty pleasure was DC's Plop comics. I was trying to figure out how to create an entry on this and I came across this incredible youtube video which tells the whole story. Thanks to RevSpike:

Videotaped vs filmed sitcoms

2009-04-11T20:25:00.000-07:00

As a kid, I always realized when a sitcom was "taped before a live studio audience" or "filmed before a live studio audience". And it's funny that the fact that one of the cast members told me at the end had nothing to do with it. Funny, I've never been a technical person, but I always bugged my family and friends with this fascinating observation. The reply was usually, "I don't really know but the show is funny (or lousy)."

In the fifties, Desi Arnaz created the three camera studio audience setup with "I Love Lucy". Most comedies were broadcast live across the nation (kinescope), and were never saved in any way for posterity. In the mid-fifties, sitcoms started using the recorded laughtrack in lieu of a live audience. This allowed for more intimate closeups and outdoor shooting (you know, for when the Beav confronts the bully). In the sixties, most sitcoms used laughtracks due to the special effects (Bewitched, Jeannie, Beverly Hillbillies....well actually the special effect on the Beverly Hillbillies was that it was a top-rated series for eight or so years). Dick Van Dyke and Lucy were the few exceptions during this time.

Mary Tyler Moore's sitcom premiered in fall of 1970 with the three camera audience setup. Then four months later, Norman Lear brought All in the Family to the forefront of the American scene. Lear based many of his landmark sitcoms on British series and like those series he realized the cost savings in shooting on videotape. Videotape is cheaper than film. He even eliminated establishment setting tags (like the musical cue with the apartment/office building zooming in). So his made the shows pretty cheap to film.
To complete the history, M*A*S*H was one of the few seventies sitcoms to use a laughtrack (and that was controversial). In the 80's most sitcoms decided to go cheap and they looked cheap on video. Newhart's second series started on video and for reasons I will explain later, switched to film for the next seven years. In nineties, almost all sitcoms (ala Friends and Seinfeld) had that filmed studio audience. This became the standard "look". Otherwise there was no audience at all (The Office, 30 Rock, Arrested Development). I believe a lot of the "filmed before a live audience" sitcoms these days are actually done on video that mimics film. If you close one eye and stand on your head you can see it during any unfunny scene.

For some reason (or many obvious reasons), filmed sitcoms seem so much more realistic. With taped sitcoms, it was like being in the audience, a stage play almost. You could hear the audience coughing sometimes. This worked with the Norman Lear comedies because they were a form unto themselves. The acting and writing were superb at first. Then as the seventies moved into the eighties, poorly written sitcoms with stagey acting were taped. This just made filmed shows look so much better.
Videotape hell:

At first, it was shocking. Soap operas and variety shows were taped. Not sitcoms. They were bright, heavily lit. The sets looked like sets. When four people sat around the dinner table hey left a gap for the audience to look in (like a play). I have no idea why this "table" thing was different for film--the medium shouldn't have anything to do with staging. There were more up close close-ups. The audience had to applaud when the actors entered. Actually, Garry Marshall did this on his filmed sitcoms...enter Fonzie or Laverne.

Speaking of Happy Days, remember the first episode filmed in front of an audience? Fonzie dated the stripper? Still the funniest episode.
Did you know the first season of The Odd Couple was filmed with a laughtrack and no audience. It moved to a soundstage in 1971 during the second season. That set would end up as Laverne and Shirley's apartment. It is now the condo from Two and a Half Men. (It's a good thing Laverne and Shirley moved to Hollywood in 1980).
Did you remember that the first season of "Newhart" (the innkeeper in Vermont version) was videotaped? The remaining seven seasons were filmed. Bob just had to be filmed. It seemed that the original Bob Newhart Show always hued brown earth tone colors amidst a sea of checkered polyester. Here is rare videotaped Bob:

And did you know that even though Barney Miller was taped during its entire run only the first two seasons had an audience. After that, the producers would screen the finished episode to a live audience and capture the reactions. All in the Family did this as well during the Stephanie year and all the Archie Bunker Place episodes. This allowed more improvisation on the set I suppose.

Speaking of Barney Miller, that was was the best looked videotaped sitcom. The producers used a filter to give it a grimy, New York feel. Very effective.

Best 60's cartoon introduction

2009-04-05T09:14:00.000-07:00

Scott's reviews Ghostbusters television series

2009-04-04T20:05:00.000-07:00

My young celebrity encounters

2009-04-04T19:53:00.000-07:00

Meeting HR Pufnstuf at San Antonio's North Star Mall circa 1970.

Annissa Lewis (Buffy from Family Affair) made a rare appearance that year as well at this mall. There was such a throng of people, someone had to carry her on his shoulders.

I was a guest in 1970 on San Antonio's Captain Gus show. It was on the CBS affiliate. They showed Popeye and Little Rascals. "Ahoy, maties"

Facebook import: Bad Sitcom theme songs - two late seventies styles

2009-04-04T19:38:00.000-07:00

Well, not bad really, just really cheesy.Here are some good examples of late seventies-early eighties openings. :Here is the filmed Garry Marshall-esque comedy opening for "Angie". Note the "entering the circle" cast motif. I had a huge crush on Donna Pescow. See Doris Roberts in an early role....still playing the mother, whats up with that.

This one is considered one of the worst sitcoms in tv history. A good example of the Norman Lear-esque videotaped sitcom opening. Say what you will, but McLean Stevenson was the best thing about MASH. Also note Joanna Gleason, Dirk Diggler's mom in Boogie Nights...and MEADOWLARK LEMON!!!!

CHARLTON COMICS

2009-02-21T17:14:00.000-08:00

With “The Watchmen” film coming out, I thought I would write about Charlton Comics. The superheroes from the The Watchmen characters were purchased and licensed by DC Comics in 1986 from Charlton. In the fifties and sixties, this relatively obscure comic book publisher had created a number of superheroes that it never used in its comic lines. Alan Moore had the idea of using many of these characters in his own comic, thus the transition.

That being said, this entry deals with my experience and memories of the Charlton line in the sixties and seventies. As with many of my journal entries here, I deal mostly with cartoon and television adaptations.

Charlton comics had a certain feel. Due to the fact that they cut costs by printing on a second hand press that was used to print cereal boxes. This accounted for the yellowish, dull look to their pages and covers. Compared to the brightness and color of, say, a Gold Key comic or the density and detail of a DC or Marvel, this line of comics always seemed a bit inferior. I won’t go into the early history of the comics. As the superhero years wore down in the late sixties, I was introduced to the Charlton line.

At that time, and through the seventies, the main genres were war-themed comics, gothic horror stories (in a manga style, ahead of its time), and romance stories. And a few superheroes still popped up, E-Man most noticeably of which I still own my copy of the first issue.

In 1970, Charlton took over the Hanna-Barbera cartoon franchise from Gold Key. I found the artwork to be inferior, the covers rather pedestrian, and was disappointed that HB (my favorite cartoon franchise) was singled out for this relocation. Whereas Gold Key continued with the current Saturday morning titles such as Scooby Doo, Charlton took over the older titles, even bringing some back which GK had let slide. The titles were The Flintstones, Yogi Bear, The Jetsons, Top Cat, Huckleberry Hound, Quick Draw McGraw, and Magilla Gorilla. A year little a new title, Hanna-Barbera Parade (10 issues) was created to include all the pre-1964 Hanna-Barbera characters in various stories. These covers were often quite exciting as they included a menagerie of characters in some theme (much like GK’s earlier “Bandwagon”).

An important note here: Charlton actually published a HB title based upon their cartoon shorts of Abbott and Costello starting in 1968, predating the other titles. This was always odd, as GK still took care of all HB titles. This title actually lasted 22 issues and dovetailed with the aforementioned HB infusion through 1971.

Most of these HB titles lasted no later than 1972, with The Jetsons and Top Cat going 20 issues through 1973. However, Yogi and The Flintstones lasted until Marvel took over the franchise in 1977. The Flintstones actually became a Charlton touchstone begetting sequel comics featuring Barney and Betty Rubble, Dino, and Great Gazoo. Even the new teenage version of Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm had a long lasting run by Charlton starting in ’72. When GK completely abandoned the HB line in 1975, Charlton took over Scooby Doo until the Marvel takeover. They also published issues based on current HB Saturday morning fare: Valley of the Dinosaurs (with Pat Boyett artwork), Hong Kong Phooey, Speed Buggy, Wheelie and the Chopper Bunch, and Korg: 70,000 BC (a live-action show). A couple of issues of The Grape Ape followed this. By this time, the quality of the artwork was improving and certain artists were lending themselves exclusively to HB titles (such as Fred Hines for Barney and Betty)

Personal note: Both Pat Boyett and Fred Hines were San Antonio-based artists which led to much excitement on my part in those days. I think I remember my dad, also an artist, trying to set up a meeting with these guys, but my memory is hazy.

In 1970, Charlton also took over two Jay Ward titles from GK, Bullwinkle & Rocky and Dudley Do-Right, each for seven-issue runs. Also, Underdog (similarly animated by GAmma Studios) had a short run at this time. These titles would revert back to GK by 1973, a fate not afforded the HB titles. To wrap up the Saturday morning titles, Charlton published a short run of the Krofft live-action puppet show The Bugaloos (another odd choice given the other Krofft shows were represented by GK). Also, Ronald McDonald had his own Charlton comic in the early seventies…talk about tie-ins.

Charlton also carried many King Features comics from the newspapers at this time: Popeye, Hi and Lois, Beetle Bailey, Blondie, Mandrake, The Phantom, Tiger, and Snuffy Smith.
As for prime-time series, Charlton had a run of the comedy-variety show Hee-Haw (a really strange choice) and the sitcom The Partridge Family. The heartthrob star of The Partridge Family, David Cassidy, even had his own title as did another icon, Bobby Sherman, possibly based on his sitcom “Getting Together”. And a short-lived syndicated science-fiction program called “Primus” had a Charlton run. There was a single issue based on the musical film “1776” which was even stranger.

The mid-70’s saw the now-classic Sci-Fi series Space: 1999 get a Charlton treatment. This continued with successful runs of The Six Million Dollar Man, The Bionic Woman, and Emergency. Whereas Gold Key always used live-action photos melded with cool title graphics on their covers, Charlton always used artwork to depict the characters on the covers.I believe that is all the TV-related titles from Charlton although in the fifties, I believed they carried “My Little Margie” a popular sitcom at the time (recently shown on ION television).

CBS Highlights - Has Tiffany Tarnished?

2009-02-16T20:43:00.000-08:00

Of the three major networks, I would have to say that CBS had the most impact on me in the 70s. I rarely watched the network after the early 80’s.

In the 50’s and 60’s CBS consistently carried the highest rated programs. CBS seemed to be the “authority” with Walter Cronkite himself helming the evening news.

Although ratings were great and credibility was unparalleled, the programming tended to get a bit, shall we say, low-brow in the late sixties. My vague memories of the sad final color years of the Mayberry saga, continued Hooterville inanity (of course, “Green Acres” was always spot on vaudeville), “Hogan’s Heroes”, and “Family Affair” were supplanted by Fred Silverman’s new reality. The new programming chief made it a point to cancel every program with a tree (read “rural”) and change the dynamic of network television.

So at this time we have witnessed the birth of the “Tiffany Network”. This label was mostly associated with the Saturday night lineups of the time. Oddly, the “perfect” lineup was just one season, 1973-1974. Permutations of this lineup occurred during most of the seventies keeping the label intact. That ’73 lineup was “All in the Family”, “M*A*S*H”, “Mary Tyler Moore Show”, “Bob Newhart Show” , and “Carol Burnett Show”. “M*A*S*H” would end up moving around more than these other programs and “The Jeffersons” would be a staple of the night later on in the decade.

Holdovers from the sixties still anchored the network. Monday nights with “Here’s Lucy”, “Doris Day Show”, “Gunsmoke”, and “Medical Center”. Thursday nights with “The Waltons” gave lie to the “deforestation” theory, but, thanks to the quality and warmth, it held it’s own.

But back to Tiffany. CBS was the first to try new things, to expand the consciousness of TV so to speak. Through sitcoms. The huge stool of boldness and freshness had three legs: Norman Lear, Mary Tyler Moore, and a bunch of doctors in the Korean War.

Norman Lear: “All In the Family” started it all. It was daring, political, profane (for the time), hilarious, racy, raunchy, and a number one hit for five or so years. The first “water cooler” show. The first videotaped situation comedy. It felt like you were watching a stage play. The audience was part of the show. The feel and tone was much like the British sitcoms Lear used as a template for so many programs. Also “Maude”, “Good Times”, “The Jeffersons”, and “One Day at a Time”. These shows all taught me values about society and influenced me. I watched them religiously. “One Day” got me through puberty thanks to Valerie Bertinelli. These shows have all been analyzed ad nauseum. Let me bring up one: “All’s Fair”. Lear’s political sitcom had Richard Crenna and Bernadette Peters battling it out in DC as a conservative columnist and liberal photographer respectively. Michael Keaton was the president’s joke writer, Manny Fox. Lear was way ahead of his time.

Mary Tyler Moore. Probably the greatest sitcom of all time. Her stable of comedies was defined by slick production values, incredible acting and writing, and timeless stories and situations. “Mary Tyler Moore Show” was followed by “Bob Newhart Show”, “Rhoda”, “Phyllis”, “Doc”, “Tony Randall Show”, “Bettty White Show”, and “WKRP In Cincinnati”. As well as the dramatic “Lou Grant” and “White Shadow”.

M*A*S*H. Eleven years on CBS. Only the first three with Henry Blake and Trapper John were funny. So much has been written about this show, I’ll just say, yes, it became a Monday night ritual until it’s incredibly top rated finale in 1983. Plus Trapper had his own drama, “Trapper John MD” with a different actor; and the actor that played Trapper originally had a new sitcom based on a different movie, still playing a doctor in “House Calls”. Got it?

Other prime time highlights:

The variety programs: Along with Carol Burnett on Saturday nights, we had Sonny and Cher, we had Tony Orlando and Dawn, we had the Hudson Brothers, and we even had Shields and Yarnell (mimes, yes you heard me right).
The crime shows. Besides Hawaii Five-O ,Mannix, and Kojak most of these were produced by Quinn Martin: Barnaby Jones and Cannon being the most memorable. Switch with Eddie Albert and Robert Wagner was also a treat. The themes to these shows were so cool as well.

The Peanuts gang, Rudolph and other Rankin Bass puppet creations, live dramas and comedies reminiscent of the golden age (I remember this great one about a Christmas tree with Jason Robards, and Jackie Gleason reunions )

Daytimes were fun when I stayed home sick from school. Along with All in the Family stripped reruns, you had the raunchy fun of Match Game and Tattletales, and the antiseptic fun of The Price is Right.

Captain Kangaroo would send me off for the day when I wasn’t sick.

>
CBS Saturday mornings was the birthplace of Scooby Doo and all his early incantations such as “The Movies”. CBS was home to all the Archie variations. Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. Wacky Races and all the derivative shows: Dastardly & Muttley and Penelope Pitstop. Harlem Globetrotters. Hair Bear Bunch. Pebbles and Bamm Bamm as teenagers and The Flintstones in middle age. Live-action variety shows with The Hudson Brothers (again!) and the REAL Harlem Globetrotters.

The cartoon house Filmation produced many live action shows which defined Saturday mornings for me mid-decade: Shazam!, Isis!, The Ghost Busters (probably one of my favorite unsung shows of all time), Ark II.

And remember, CBS, home of 60 Minutes, produced short news segments during the Saturday morning lineups called In the News. Now THAT’S class.

Back to primetime. As the seventies wore on, CBS reverted back to its rural roots with major hits: Alice (and spin-off Flo - “Kiss mah Grits!), Dukes of Hazzard (and spin-off Enos), and Dallas (and spin-off Knot’s Landing). With the exceptions of any variation on the Bob Newhart phenomenon over the next two decades (“Newhart”, “Bob”, “George and Leo”), I rarely watched what would become “America’s Network”. Well, I watched “Walker Texas Ranger” ‘cause I was on it once, but enough about that.

Actually the CBS arc is quite interesting when you compare it to today’s political discourse . Seems CBS became very “Blue State” and urban during the “Tiffany” years and then reverted back to “Red State” to become “America’s Network”. Now, with all the CSI shows, it’s “Dead State”, I guess. Ah, we have our memories.

See you next with ABC.

NBC Highlights - Peacock Envy

2009-01-28T20:58:00.000-08:00

There was something magical about television before cable and vcr/dvr. I believe NBC coined the term “Must See TV” or “Appointment” television. LIke on Thursday nights with Cosby and Cheers. That’s when you must actually watch a show when it is broadcast or be banished to the world of a second rerun during the seasons run. In the late 70’s, NBC had something called “The Big Event”, a primetime block of two hours once a week, which could encompass a variety show, a sporting event, unsold pilots, or large anti-drug extravaganzas produced by major movie studios (I’m talking about you, Evans).

The three main networks gained their identity this way. There was no cross-broadcasting of shows with sister cable stations. Season one or two didn’t end up on DVD before the season was even over. You could actually read the credits at the end of a show with no advertising crowding out the name of the wardrobe person.

Those “identities” manifested themselves in my TV addicted days and each network had a feel to it. A look. CBS was course but clear. ABC was smooth and sometimes had double images. NBC was very smooth and bold.

Here are my fond NBC memories through the years:

**The Macy’s Parade was a commercial event yet not too commercial. The balloons and Ed McMahon. The bad Broadway showcases in front of the main doors of Macy’s. The tie-ins to holiday programming.

**Variety. NBC always had interesting programming. Dean Martin’s celebrity roasts were a highlight, from the MGM Grand in Vegas. The psychedelic Laugh-In went over my head. The incredible Flip Wilson. The 70s had some very short runs of a few memorable variety series: Dick Van Dyke in ’76 with a young Andy Kaufman; the infamous Pink Lady and Jeff (noted as one of the worst programs in history--look it up); Mac Davis (that’s right!); and animators Hanna Barbera had a show called “Happy Hour” with marionettes. And this is where Bob Hope would plop his specials, getting cornier by the year.

**Sitcoms. Friday nights belonged to Sanford and Son. Followed by Chico and the Man. CBS and ABC owned the sitcom world in the 70’s so there weren’t too many but the few were very memorable. Didn’t last long and obscure as hell: Norman Lear’s “The Dumplings” about fat people in love; Danny Thomas wearing a bad wig in “The Practice”; Brian Keith in Hawaii in “Little People”; Don Rickles in the Navy “CPO Sharkey” (a favorite); sci-fi spoof “Quark”; Sanford spin-off “Grady; an MTM-produced sitcom starring Bob Crane as an ad-executive father.(not long before he was killed); McLean Stevenson’s first solo outing after leaving MASH (bad move); Joe Namath in “Waverly Wonders”; Jim Belushi in “Who’s Watching the Kids?” set in the showrooms of Las Vegas; and David Brenner as a hairdresser in “Snip”. “Snip” never aired but it was hyped so much in ’76 I felt it had.

Late night:
Two words: Johnny Carson. You felt like you were in the studio.
Three more words: It’s Saturday Night. That’s the way Chevy Chase would introduce the show after a “fall”. I can remember watching live the first season. I think Robert Klein hosted the first one I saw. There is no way to describe the feel of those early SNL years. It looked dingy and felt like a hangover and was so new and daring. Hosts like Ron Nessen, Carter’s press secretary. Buck Henry, Steve Martin, Elliot Gould, Candice Bergen (who loved Belushi’s antics). Akryoyd’s Tom Snyder and Laraine Newman’s waif. Acerbic Jane Curtin and the brilliant Gilda Radner. Bill Murray taking over for Chevy and the comedy team of Al Franken and Tom Davis. Oh, and Andy Kaufman and Muppets!
Oh, yeah, Tom Snyder on Tomorrow Show after Carson.
When Lorne Michaels left SNL after the fifth year I lost interest. But, SCTV was broadcast Friday nights and I was introduced to an odd group from Canada, the incredible skits with Bob and Doug; Count Floyd, Edith Prickley, Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis as Bob Hope and Woody Allen, anything Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara did. Heaven with a slightly off-kilter laughtrack.

**Daytime

The Today Show before heading to school. Jane Pauley in a ponytail, Tom Brokaw, Bryant Gumbel, Willard Scott, and Gene Shalit. And that theme. The very cool and relaxed riff on the “peacock” chord. Always a great lead-in to the Thanksgiving parade.
Hollywood Squares. Need I say more?
The first Letterman show. A ninety-minute talk/comedy show that was on after Today Show. Lasted a couple of months. I think Dave has people excommunicated for mentioning it.

**Saturday Mornings belonged to the Pink Panther in all his incarnations. And one season, he shared the show with this crazy comedian called Lenny Schultz and the Ritz Puppets. The Inspector. Ant and the Aardvark.
Remember Pink himself exiting the sports car in Burbank?

**More Saturday Morning notes:
A childrens version of Hollywood Squares where celebrities dressed up as storybook characters.
Rebroadcasts of Underdog and The Jetsons. One season of each was originally produced and they ran forever!
The beginnings of really wacked out LSD-inspired fun for kids in ’68 and ’69: The Banana Splits, HR Pufnstuf, and The Bugaloos.
I particularly remember loving the ’72 lineup with The Barkleys, The Houndcats, The Roman Holidays and the ORIGINAL Sealab 2020.
Great live-actions series: Land of the Lost, Sigmund and Sea Monsters, Run Joe Run.
The animated Star Trek.
Inch High Private Eye, Butch Cassidy, Wheelie, and CB Bears.
In ’76, there was a lineup of live-action sitcoms produced by the guys that brought you “Love American Style”:
“McDuff, the Talking Dog”, “Monster Squad” and my favorite, “Big John-Little John”.
Godzilla’s Power Hour and Yogi’s Space Race in ’78.
Reruns of Space Ghost, Frankenstein Jr. and Jonny Quest. Yea!

Right before the 80’s, NBC really bit it when Fred Silverman moved over as programmer from his success at ABC. Prime-time was a wasteland. It was bad tv at it’s best: Supertrain, Number 96, Sheriff Lobo, Here’s Boomer. The only redeeming show was “Buck Rogers in the 25th Century”. Thanks to a new lineup of comedies spawned from “Diff’rent Strokes” the ratings started picking up. (I must admit to watching the first couple of years of “Stroke’s spin-off Facts of Life as I was hot for snotty Blair. Always liked the snobby girls in high school)

Then: something amazing happened:

“Hill Street Blues”…..My first few years in college were with NBC. “Hill Street” was amazing as was “St. Elsewhere” (featuring Denzel himself). Then came “Cheers” on Thursday night. Dave had his late-night show after Carson and those early years of Letterman felt like the early years of SNL: raw and fuzzy. Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo were the only reason to watch SNL these years.

The remainder of the 80’s basically involved sporadic viewing of the new Thursday night power lineup of Cosby, Family Ties and Cheers. And Golden Girls on Saturday night (when I was home, OK?). And the incredible Hartman-Carvey-Hooks years on SNL.

Epilogue: NBC continued to be my most watched network, mostly on Thursday nights: Seinfeld, Mad About You, Newsradio, Just Shoot Me. I stuck with the entire runs of Friends, Frasier, and (still, aaaahg), ER. (Like a bad heroin addiction).

Today, I still go there on Thursdays for The Office and 30 Rock. And struggle through the now sold-out SNL that caters to Lorne Michael’s political whims.

But that’s another post.

Here’s to the peacock!

Acid Reflex

2009-01-24T21:40:00.000-08:00

This blog is part nostalgia, part therapy, part distraction, and, hopefully, fun.

I was born in September 1963. My parents took me to the airport in San Antonio to see JFK as he arrived in Texas, not long before that fateful day in November. Many people feel like that is the time America, maybe even the world, lost hope. Things began to change. I guess that’s the dynamic represented in the hit series “Mad Men”.

Being born in ’63 put me at the tail-end of the baby boomers. There is a group of us that don’t really know where we belong. We defy description. Personally speaking, I never fell in the “boomer” category except for a few years in the mid-eighties when I was a young salesman and embodied the yuppie persona when it was in its infancy.

Other than that, my childhood, awash in pop culture of the day, has come back to me. Being overwhelmed by the media in all methods of delivery and content, there has been a level of comfort in revisiting all things 60’s and 70’s. Things were simpler yet at the same time dangerous. The changes in society, post-Eisenhower, became blatant after November 11, 1963 and started manifesting themselves at a feverish clip.

I was a child during earth-shattering assassinations, a costly and devisive war, and criminal presidencies. I was an innocent little kid during free love, peace marches, and satanic mass murders. Yet now, five years from being half a century old, I feel a need to re-examine that time. So much of today’s politics, social mores, entertainment and culture is informed by this brief but powerful time in our history.

Where am I going with all this? I was an only child and without a large family. Television (all three networks and PBS) and comic books were my preoccupation. Mostly, comic books based on television series. As I left high school and started in college, moving on to careers and other avocations, my interests in the media turned to film…of all kinds. My near-maniacal devotion to seeing EVERY film released in the 80’s morphed into to an appreciation of independent films in the mid-90’s and beyond. And now I rent dvd's and vhs tapes of obscure sixties and seventies films. Interesting.

But I’ve lost interest in most current film and television. Thanks to DVD’s, Youtube, and, well, just the internet in general, the content of my youth is begging to be revisited and, yea, obsessed upon. Thus, this blog.

Also, I have found that many young people are appreciating the television and films of those years. Quite often, I find myself pontificating to an eager audience of young film students, video geeks, and cartoon archivists. The minutia that was crammed into my head, then forgotten for over twenty years (and deemed irrelevant and trivial and, yes, regressive) is now total pop culture gold.

In this blog, I will mostly write about my memories in pop culture and somehow relate them to the present media trends of which I know less and less about each day, of which I feel more alienated from the older I get. Sometimes, I may write about history, politics, society (usually in the context of mass media but maybe not). Actually, I don’t know what I will write about. Let’s just see what happens.