Thursday, October 12, 2006

Jerry Belson, R.I.P.

Sorry to hear of the death of Jerry Belson, a fine comedy writer who died last Tuesday at age 68 due to cancer. Obits like this one will tell you that Belson was a top scripter of TV sitcoms (The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Joey Bishop Show, The Lucy Show and many others) and of screenplays (The End, Smile, Fun with Dick and Jane and more).

What they won't tell you is that Jerry was also a prolific writer of comic books for a time. From around 1961 through 1966 — which means even while he and his then-partner Garry Marshall were writing some of the top TV shows on the air, Belson wrote Gold Key Comics for the Los Angeles office of Western Publishing Company. Among the comics he wrote for were The Flintstones, Uncle Scrooge, Daffy Duck, Bugs Bunny, The Three Stooges and Woody Woodpecker. I believe he wrote the one-shot comic with the best name ever on a funny animal comic book: The Tasmanian Devil and His Tasty Friends. (What? You don't believe they put out a comic with name? When will you people learn not to doubt me?)

I never met Jerry in person but I always admired his work and we had a couple of long phone conversations in the early seventies when I was writing some of those comics. He told me he enjoyed writing them because, even with the occasional editorial interference, it still felt like a vacation after days spent arguing with actors, producers and even his collaborator. I seem to recall him saying — this is going way back — that "Joey Bishop won't perform my jokes as I write them but Bugs Bunny will. Which is why the world will remember Bugs Bunny long after Joey Bishop is forgotten."

Neither will the work of Jerry Belson. If you've never seen Smile or The End, you've missed a couple of real good movies.

• Posted at 10:11 PM · LINK

A Pair of Steves

The Comedy Central website is a better joke than anything on that network. It's a mess of pop-ups and tracking cookies and ActiveX JavaScript trickery, plus it's just plain poorly designed. I don't understand why a major corporation goes to the time and expense of establishing a website full of great video clips and has it configured so you can't find many of the clips and even if you can, there's a fair-to-middlin' chance your browser won't be able to play it.

So with the warning that you may not be able to view them, I'm going to tell you about some terrific video segments they currently have over there. A few years ago on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, they'd have Steve Carell and Stephen Colbert do these little one-on-ones in a department they called either "Even Stevphen" or "Even Stepvhen." It was spelled both ways and I think a few others. By any name, each was a funny parody of debating conventions and there are nine of them presently posted.

This link might take you to one of them and if it does, you may be able to find your way to the others. That's if they even play at all on your computer, which they might not. If it doesn't get you there, you could rummage around on the site and try to find them but I wouldn't. There are better things to do with your time on the Internet. Like play Online Sudoku against Larry the Cable Guy.

• Posted at 9:40 PM · LINK

TeeVee on DeeVeeDees

I don't think anyone's announced it yet anywhere but we are about to see the release of the first season of Saturday Night Live in one boxed set...reportedly the first in what the folks behind it hope will be season-by-season releases. One does wonder how sales will be on Season 6, the "Jean Doumanian year." On the one hand, that's the year everyone hates. On the other, it's the year that you rarely get to see.

No word yet on when the first set will be out but I'm told that Columbia House, which sells DVDs on a membership deal, is already advertising the thing. I'm going to guess that if the first one does well, they won't go season-by-season in order but will start releasing some of the later seasons in a hurry.

TV Shows on DVD, which is the best place on the web to learn what's coming out on DVD, is reporting that there's been a minor alteration on the new Addams Family, Volume 1 set. At two points in the episodes, Morticia was (past-tense) heard singing, "It's So Nice to Have a Thing Around the House," a parody of "It's So Nice to Have a Man Around the House." This has been omitted from the DVD, reportedly because the issuers were unable to clear the song.

Music clearances are a problem in DVD Land. They're the reason we probably will never see unexpurgated releases of WKRP in Cincinnati or Solid Gold or several others. Those programs used too many popular records that would have to be cleared...and by "cleared," let's understand that it often isn't a matter of not being able to get the rights. It's often a matter of not being willing to pay what the rights holder is asking for permission. In a few cases, it's even a matter of not being willing to pay anything. A friend of mine is now assembling a proposed DVD collection of an old TV show and he's been told by his bosses, "If it's gonna cost us an extra cent, cut it out." Needless to add, if and when the set does materialize, the excuse for the omissions and alterations will be, "We were unable to clear certain songs," not "We're cheap bastards."

(For clarification, I should add that I have no idea if cheapness was at work with the changes on the Addams Family DVD, or if those who've contemplated some of the others are being niggardly. I just know that stinginess is sometimes the operative reason on these things and that no one likes to admit it.)

Also, elsewhere on TV Shows on DVD, we learn the following: There are releases now of Whose Line Is It Anyway? in two versions — censored and uncensored. You'd assume that the uncensored versions restore all the bleeps and visual-fuzzing that occasionally occurred in the shows when they ran on ABC. And you'd be wrong.

• Posted at 3:31 PM · LINK

Today's Video Link

Here's another one of the Private Snafu cartoons that the Warner Brothers animation operation produced during the last World War. For some background on this series (and another cartoon) see this earlier post.

This one is entitled "Spies," it runs four minutes and it was released in August of '43. It was directed by Charles M. "Chuck" Jones and written by Ted "Dr. Seuss" Geisel, Phil Eastman and the gag men then working on the Warner Brothers cartoons. Carl Stalling did the music and even incorporated a few lines of "Powerhouse," which was the tune he usually used whenever there was machinery or anything mechanical. In this short, it's heard as Snafu melts the padlock in his brain with whiskey.

Mel Blanc provided all the voices, including those of Snafu and Hitler. Mel did a pretty good Hitler, don't you think?

• Posted at 12:46 AM · LINK

October 13, 2006 • Current • October 11, 2006