Me and Stephen Down by the Schoolyard

Paul Simon reviews Finishing the Hat, the new and long-awaited book of Stephen Sondheim lyrics with history and commentary by Mr. Sondheim, himself. I received my copy last week but haven't had the time to give it the attention it deserves. If you're the least bit interested in musical theater or just the art 'n' craft of creating lyrics, you probably already ordered one but just in case you haven't, here's an Amazon link. The book only covers Sondheim's work through 1981 and another volume is in the works.

I'm not sure what to make of Simon's article which takes odd detours into discussing his own work. I would like to think he doesn't call Sondheim "…the theater's finest living songwriter" to hint that the composer of "Bridge Over Troubled Water" is the best one who doesn't write primarily for the theater. I believe I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.

Halloween Hosts

It's a measure of something — what, I don't know — that you can buy a mask and go trick-or-treating this year as Jay Leno, Dave Letterman or Conan O'Brien. With Bill Carter's book about to come out, Conan's show about to debut and Jay and Dave finishing lately in a near-tie, I find myself wondering why I or anyone cares that much about The Late Night Wars. You have here three men who, no matter what happens, will remain multi-multi-millionaires who've gotten around 97% of everything they could ever have wanted in their professional lives. And this is working in an industry where the average player is lucky to achieve 2%. They are all loved and admired by millions. They are all wealthy beyond any human standard. If they were free agents, they would all be flooded with offers of new projects — maybe not the precise ones to achieve the missing 3% of their dreams but they'd never be unemployed. Given what he makes in Vegas and other locales where he does stand-up, if Leno were to lose The Tonight Show, his income might very well go up…and for doing something he clearly loves to do.

I'm not sure why so many people are interested…or even why I am. A bit of it is a nod to the impact that Johnny Carson had on America. He was about as close to royalty as we've ever had in this country and royalty is one of the few places where you can be someone special without proving you can do anything. You certainly can't for very long in the comedy business. It's like in sports. Being picked to play centerfield for the Giants today wouldn't mean you were Willie Mays — you still have to catch the ball — and being on NBC at 11:35 doesn't make you Johnny and never will.

I knew an actor who was up once for the lead in a very prestigious series. He spent months auditioning and screen-testing and doing meet-and-greets with the network. For 90, perhaps 120 days, his life revolved around whether or not he would get the part and it was very real, high drama…because pretty much his whole life was at stake. If he got the part, he was convinced, he would suddenly become rich and famous and also powerful. Whatever reasons he had for getting into show business in the first place would soon be realized, either directly or indirectly. Even if all he cared about was doing good work as an actor, and even if the show had been fluff, the resultant stardom would have put him in a position to do other things of his own choosing. He ultimately did not get the job and took it very badly…and I think we can all understand why. He was thatclose (typo intentional) to getting everything of which he'd ever dreamed.

The battles fought over Johnny's time slot are quite different. Jay, Dave and Conan were all rich 'n' famous long before they entered that contest. Our fascination with something like Deal or No Deal has a lot to do with the possibility of seeing someone win life-changing money. The contestants are always folks who have little or nothing when they walk in. For them to maybe walk out with a check for a million is a very big deal for them and therefore for us as spectators. We can also fantasize maybe that it's us up there picking Case #22 and scoring the mil. Imagine how uninteresting it would be to see a rich guy play that game.

And yet the Jay/Dave/Conan battle matters to us…I think, in large part, because we've all watched one or more of them enough to have some sense of who's a good guy. Some of that may be illusory. I know folks who've met those gents for real and for good or ill, come away with a sense of, "Gee, he's not at all like I expected." Johnny was like that, too. An actress I used to know had a strong crush on Mr. Carson until she was cast in a sketch on his show. She came away thinking that the Johnny Carson she loved and thought she knew was not the real person…and I'm not sure she ever watched his show again. I saw it happen the other way with others. A writer I knew thought Carson was a lightweight expert at exploiting the skills of others. Still, when my friend had an offer to work on the show, he took it anyway…and came away convinced Johnny was a genius who earned every nickel. (For what it's worth, knowing a lot of folks who've worked for Jay, Dave and Conan — and having limited contact with all three, myself — my sense is that they're all very good, decent men who are generally wonderful to their staffs…and maybe all at least a little childish about attaining that missing 3% I mentioned earlier.)

So we get this idea in our heads that Jay is the good guy and Dave is the bad guy…or vice-versa or Conan can be either. Maybe we replay old personal injustices: You're Dave and Jay represents that guy who beat you out for that job you wanted twenty years ago. Or you're Conan and NBC is that evil boss who fired you your second week on the job. Or you can be Jay doing your job and succeeding in it and then Conan is that young punk who shoved you aside. I mean, whatever professional grudges you may hold, you can probably find some analogy in there. But in reality, it comes down to which weathy superstar is going to get to do his talk show on which station…and who gets to call his The Tonight Show and imagine a montage of his face alongside Steve Allen, Jack Paar and Johnny.

A few months ago, an agent who was close to the whole Jay/Conan slapflight (not participating but he had real good spectator seats) gave me his whole take on it. He thinks it was just a case of a network screwing up a couple of key decisions — something everyone who works at any network will tell you happens all the time. He also thinks both men or their reps made some bad career choices…and with all those bad bits of judgment occuring on top of one another and fueled by so many egos, you had a Perfect Storm and therefore a disaster. I asked him, "So why should anyone who did or didn't get a job out of it care?" He said, "They shouldn't. But we also don't share in the bonus that our team gets when they win the World Series, and we didn't score the winning run and we didn't do anything to make them win and we don't even really know the people who did…but we still care who wins." I think he's right about all that.

Anyway, if you'll excuse me, I have to get ready to go out and trick-or-treat. It was difficult but I managed to find and buy a Carson Daly mask. I'm going to put it on and see if I can find a guy in a Jimmy Fallon mask to follow around tonight. Still hope I don't get any candy corn.

Have a Groo-some Halloween!

groolight

Eager to scare the living bejeesus out of the kids in your neighborhood? Well, you could show them any commercial Glenn Beck has made lately but that would be too, too cruel. Far better is this: Carve yourself a Groo-o'-Lantern! Our friend Ryan Claytor figured out how to do it and he's more than willing to share his secrets and the pattern with you at this site.

And while you're there, take a look around. Ryan is a clever cartoonist whose work I've recommended in the past. This Halloween, why not give yourself a treat and order a volume of his "And Then One Day" autobiographical comics? Start at the beginning so when you get hooked and need more, you can go chronologically.

Today's Video Link

In honor of the day…or night…or however you want to phrase it. Just don't give me any candy corn.

Back Where I Belong

I am home and without any decent anecdotes from today. Had my business-type breakfast meeting. Went over to Voice One, a fine San Francisco recording studio and classroom and caught a little of a lecture on music theory by my pal and occasional collaborator, Ed Bogas. Then it was off to the airport…and here I am.

I therefore saw none of the Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert rally in Washington but if TiVo has done its job, I can watch it later. I did however receive an e-mail from one of my Conservative acquaintances arguing that it was a flop, that only about ninety people showed up and they were all paid to be there and bussed in by Teamsters.

Hey, you notice how you don't feel like you're really home until you (a) unpack and (b) do one thing unrelated to travel that you couldn't do on the road? For me, it's usually typing on a real, non-laptop keyboard.

Hail Him!

ferrantecaesar01

Regular readers of this blog are probably sick of items wherein I rave about my pal, Frank Ferrante. Frank spends about half his year touring in a one-man (plus piano player) show called An Evening with Groucho. In it, Mr. F. creates a jaw-dropping and very funny tour de farce as that Marx fella. I will soon be linking you to a calendar of his upcoming Hackenbushing but in this post, I will not gush about Frank's portrayal of Julius "Groucho" Marx. No, in this post I'm going to gush about his other job.

Frank, you see, has this other identity — a flamboyant, outrageous gent named Caesar who intermittently stars in productions of Teatro ZinZanni…and now, here's the hard part 'cause I have to explain what Teatro ZinZanni is. Imagine a grand tent inside of which you find a swanky restaurant that serves a gourmet meal as a bevy of wonderful food servers and performers put on a show all around you. There are singers, dancers, comedians, acrobats in the style of (the comparison is unavoidable) Cirque du Soleil and artists whose skills are awesome but utterly unidentifiable. This all transpires not on a faraway stage but up close and personal. The aerial acts are practically over your head in the intimate theater. The dancers are sometimes performing not just near your table but actually on it, skillfully not stepping in the fine soup you have just been served.

This is a fine description but I need to explain more. It is sometimes difficult to tell where the attractive wait staff leaves off and the equally attractive cast takes over. Some of each serve you. Some of each entertain you. The performers roam about in character, chatting you up and entertaining you while you dine. That's when they aren't dancing…or hustling you up out of your seat to dance with them. The show is quite interactive…and did I mention the sensational live five-piece band? The compleat ZinZanni experience runs about three hours. They serve you the first course. They perform for a while. Then they serve you the second course and perform while you eat it…and so on. You leave quite well-fed and, of course, utterly entertained.

Two Teatro ZinZanni venues exist in this country — one in Seattle and one in San Francisco. I was at the latter last evening, catching Frank Ferrante and friends in the latest, soon-to-close production. (It will be replaced by an all-new one next week and it'll probably be wonderful though Frank and the other follks I saw won't be in it. Frank is tentatively slated to appear at the Seattle location the middle of next year for a while.) Boy, was he funny. Caesar is allegedly the evening's chef and he keeps popping up throughout the show to describe the bill of fare, woo the leading lady — Cleopatra, of course — and bring audience members up to participate in good-natured scenes and sketches. There's a lot of a certain mustached Marx Brother in Caesar but also plenty of Frank, a very quick-witted improviser indeed. I really enjoyed watching him work.

Which is not to say he's the whole show. Everyone in it is great but I'll only mention the two others we spoke with after the festivities. Dreya Weber plays the breathtaking Cleopatra, looks the part and sings as well as she looks. You'd think that would be enough but she also does a dazzling aerial act and is very funny in her role as Caesar's love interest. Then there's Tim Tyler, an Australian comedian and juggler with a face of pure, unvulcanized rubber and a happy spirit that pervades the room. He does a bit with ping pong balls, blowing them into the air and catching them in his mouth, that is one of the most unforgettable (in a good way) acts I've ever seen. Some of the physical feats, like the couple that runs up and down a big metal pole like Spider-Man and Spider-Woman making out, leave you thinking, "I did not just see that." But you did.

In case you haven't figured it out by now, I had a very good time. Everything was grand, except maybe the most impossible feat of the evening, which turned out to be getting a cab in the rain after the show. For a while there, I thought maybe we'd have to stay until tomorrow night's performance. And you know something? It would have been worth the wait. Thanks, Frank.

Helllo, Frisco, Hello!

I'm in San Francisco on what I can honestly tell the I.R.S. is (mostly) business. At Security at LAX, I was subjected to a pat-down and wanding so thorough, I got to wondering if maybe I was a terrorist and had merely forgotten what I was up to.

Once they'd decided I was safe to board, I got in the little line at Gate 1 where Southwest wants you to line up in numerical order according to your boarding passes. Mine was A-24 and when I asked a fellow traveller what his number was, I got the following response — and to capture his delivery, you have to imagine Jesse Ventura delivering these lines. He said, "I don't know from this stupid system they have here. All I know is I was the ninth person to line up here and I'm gonna be the ninth person to get on that friggin' plane and nobody'd better try and stop me if they know what's good for 'em!"

Nobody tried to stop him and he was, indeed, the ninth one on the plane. That system works, too.

It was a short flight. I only got as far as the outdoor speakers shaped like tiki gods in the SkyMall catalog. A friend of mine used to have this theory that airlines in this country were secretly releasing a special gas into their cabins that made you a bit more docile and acted as a kind of tranquilizer. His main piece of evidence was how you almost decide to order something from the SkyMall catalog. You flip through it, page after page, thinking to yourself, "How could anybody want this crap?" And then you come upon the one item — and it's different for everyone — that could make your life so much better. It's crap to everyone else who leafs through the ads but to you, it's the greatest scientific breakthrough since the Magic Bullet. "At last," you cry out. "Someone has finally made a trowel that can teach a man to speak Hebrew!"

You jot down the ordering information or you tear out the page…or maybe to make sure, you take the whole damn catalog. And you fully intend to order at least a dozen of whatever it is until you get off the plane and step out into the terminal. There, you breathe non-spiked air and you go "Naaah" and toss the ordering info away. Every time.

That's my friend's theory. I used to argue with him that the narcotic was not in the air but was instead in the coating on the honey-roasted peanuts. He almost agreed but then the airlines switched over to pretzels or crackers and we were still almost ordering styrofoam barbells from the SkyMall catalog so maybe I was wrong. All I know is that the air on the plane did smell a bit odd and the edible bedroom slippers looked awfully tasty.

Makes No Difference Who You Are…

vaultofwalt01

Back around '03, some of us in the animation community were saddened to hear that our friend Jim Korkis was going to stop writing his wonderful and informative pieces about the history of the Walt Disney Studio. Though many have covered that territory, Jim had a unique way of finding out about stuff that no one had previously documented. No more Korkis articles? What a shame.

Fortunately, around the same time as Jim's announcement, a new Disney scholar suddenly began appearing in most of the same venues — someone named Wade Sampson who had the same knack as Korkis for ferreting out hitherto-uncharted Disney lore. Sampson even wrote a lot like Korkis…and before long, it was the worst-kept secret that the new guy was the same guy, writing under a nom de mouse. I knew because Jim told me but others figured it out…and it's no longer classified information. Jim even cops to it in this fine new book I'm recommending to you…The Vault of Walt. It's an engrossing "must have" for anyone interested in Disneyana. Jim covers things like Walt's ventures into radio shows, movies that were never made, things you never knew about movies that were made, etc. It's 478 pages of that kind of thing, unauthorized and uncensored but also reverent and respectful. (Walt's eldest daughter supplied the foreword so if you're expecting scandal, you're looking in the wrong place.)

Here is an Amazon link to order your copy. If you're even remotely fascinated by Mr. Disney and his amazing company in its creative heyday, click and get yourself one. Of all the folks who've written major works about Walt this year, Jim Korkis is my favorite. And Wade Sampson is a close second.

Today's Video Link

Speaking of which, here it is…

VIDEO MISSING

Burning Question of the Day

So…does anyone know what that song is that they play on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson when Secretariat dances through or runs through or whatever it is he does?

By the way: Funny bit.

Que Sera Sera

dorisday01

Doris Day is one of the last of a vanishing breed: A bona fide Movie Star of Hollywood's glistening era. A lot of folks probably don't know she's still alive because after she completed her TV series (1968-1973), she did a couple of TV specials and then retired. She has spent the time since working for causes that help animals and declining a stream of offers to act or accept awards. She will not appear on camera. She will not fly on an airplane. She has reportedly discouraged talk of an honorary Oscar (she never won a regular one) for the former reason and turned down a Kennedy Center recognition for both reasons. And for the last quarter-century, she has been interviewed infrequently enough to make J.D. Salinger look overexposed by comparison. She does about one — audio only — about every ten years.

This decade's is coming up this weekend. An hour (plus) long conversation about her singing career and her friendship with Frank Sinatra was recorded by phone in September by Jonathan Schwartz, host of the radio show, High Standards. He'll be playing it around 1:30 on his show which airs from Noon until 4 PM on Saturday and Sunday on WNYC in New York and at the same time on Sunday on Channel 73 on Sirius Satellite Radio, their Sinatra channel. If you don't have Sirius, you can hear it streaming on the WNYC website.

I was going to recommend her 1976 "autobiography" (clearly written by her co-author, A.E. Hotchner) but I see it's out of print. You can pick up a second-hand "collectible" copy for a hundred bucks or so…or a cheap reading copy for under five bucks if you search eBay or Amazon. It really is a remarkable life story of tragedy and triumph, with a lot more of the first. If you're ever in the mood for a Hollywood memoir by someone who really had a story to tell, this is the one. Or you could just wait to see if she talks more about herself in her next interview some time around the year 2020.

Babalu Bonanza!

The other day here, we gave you the chance (for one day only) to buy all eight seasons of The Andy Griffith Show for $94. That deal's gone — it's back up to $145 — but here's an even better offer. Get all nine seasons of I Love Lucy on 34 DVDs for $85. That's like a quarter for each time Ricky or Lucy says of the other, "I'm going to teach him/her a lesson he/she will never forget!" You can't beat the price but you have to order today…which you can do by clicking this link. Don't dawdle.

Late Night Wars: The Sequel

Vanity Fair is offering an excerpt from Bill Carter's The War for Late Night: When Leno Went Early and Television Went Crazy, a copy of which may be ordered via this link. A friend of mine who's read the whole book thinks Leno comes off as kind of passive and almost naïve…and certainly not as the evil plotter that some believed him to be. Against that, O'Brien comes across as a guy who shouldn't have had The Tonight Show handed to him and shouldn't have had it taken away so abruptly. Both men were harmed by some bad decisions at the NBC executive level but both men also benefited…and I'll probably write more about this after I get my copy of the book.

Go See It!

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA to you) summarizes the case for Climate Change (Global Warming to you).

Now I just know I'm going to get an e-mail from my friend Roger saying, "Hey, there's plenty of evidence that Global Warming is a hoax" and he'll link me to the website of a junior high school science teacher in Bayonne, New Jersey.

My Annual "I Don't Like Halloween" Post

Here's a rerun of an item I posted here a few years ago…

At the risk of coming off like the Ebenezer Scrooge of a different holiday, I have to say: I really don't like Halloween and never have. Even as a kid, the idea of dressing up and going from house to house to collect candy struck me as enormously unpleasant. I did it a few times when I was young because it seemed to be expected of me…but I never enjoyed it. I felt stupid in the costume and when I got home, I had a bag of "goodies" I didn't want to eat. In my neighborhood, you got a lot of licorice and Mounds bars and Jordan Almonds, none of which I liked.

And of course, absolutely no one likes candy corn. Don't write to me and tell me you do because I'll just have to write back and call you a liar. No one likes candy corn. No one, do you hear me?

My trick-or-treating years were before there were a lot of scares about people putting razor blades or poison into Halloween candy. Even then, I wound up throwing out just about everything except those little Hershey bars. So it was wasteful, and I also didn't like the dress-up part of it with everyone trying to look maimed or bloody. I've never understood why anyone thinks that's fun to do or fun to see.

I wonder if anyone's ever done any polling to find out what percentage of Halloween candy that is purchased and handed-out is ever eaten. And I wonder how many kids would rather not dress up or disfigure themselves for an evening if anyone told them they had a choice. Where I live, they seem to have decided against it. Each year, I stock up and no one comes. For a while there, I wound up eating a couple bags of leftover candy myself. The last few Halloweens, I've switched to little boxes of Sun-Maid Raisins, which are a lot healthier if I get stuck with them. Maybe I ought to switch to candy corn. That way, I wouldn't have to worry about anyone eating it. And if no one comes, I could just keep it around and not give it out again next year.

The only thing that's changed since I first wrote that is that my sweet tooth has disappeared to the point where I don't even like Sun-Maid Raisins. I've stocked up on little bags of peanuts to give out if any kids show up…which is highly unlikely. And also I've received about six dozen e-mails from liars who are trying to get me to believe they like candy corn.