Above is a ticket to attend the filming of one of the first episodes of the TV show, Our Miss Brooks. It was a fine show and it's the fiftieth entry in our sister website, Old TV Tickets. Every day or so, we add a new ticket for an old show and tell you all about it. After you get through here, go take a look.
Once upon a time, if you were utterly incompetent at your job…if you made mistakes that cost people their homes and even their lives, you got fired. But this is George W. Bush's America where the only sin is to speak against the Bush administration. Screw up but remain loyal and you can get a medal or a promotion or a no-bid contract…
…or you can even become a Keynote Speaker and a consultant in the area you couldn't handle.
We now have an Amazon link to pre-order The Laurel & Hardy Giftset which, as explained here, is a new DVD collection of three of the later films of my all-time favorite performers, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. The movies are Great Guns, Jitterbugs and The Big Noise, all of which were made for Twentieth-Century Fox in the forties, all of which represent them at their not-best. Still, the not-best of Laurel and Hardy was a lot better than the best of many other entertainers.
Having said these films are inferior, I am laying myself open to several angry e-mails from Laurel and Hardy buffs who not only like these films but who react to negatives the way you'd react to someone saying your momma was funny-looking and stupid. I disagree with these folks but in a way, I envy them: They have more Laurel and Hardy movies to enjoy without reservation. There are moments in all three (though fewer of them in The Big Noise) that I can savor. Most of all though, I find myself fascinated that two comic geniuses could take such a tumble merely because they stopped making movies at a studio over on Washington Boulevard and began filming for one over on Pico. We like to believe that it's the talent that matters, not the employer, but we're all aware that the employer can shackle or misassign the talent so as to handicap it.
A lot of things went wrong with Laurel and Hardy movies after The Boys left Hal Roach studios, starting with the fact that they didn't have as fine a support team, either in terms of supporting actors or writers, nor did Stan have as much control of scripts as he'd had at Roach. But also, there is something wrong with Stan and Ollie in the films, and it isn't just that they were getting too old for slapstick. Their timing, always so superb in earlier films, is just a beat off throughout their films for Fox (and the two they made later for MGM). Even the good jokes have a heavy-handedness that diminishes them. Both men — but Hardy, especially — always had this perfect sense of scale. Every reaction, every gesture was perfectly modulated for the camera, being just broad enough without being too broad. They — and again, Hardy especially — invented a kind of character comedy on film, perfecting it in the early sound era. When everyone else was scurrying to figure out how to replace wordless pantomime with wordy banter, Laurel and Hardy found the perfect balance almost from Day One. And left it behind when they abandoned the Roach lot.
It's not surprising. No great comedian has ever gone out on top. Charlie Chaplin's last films were embarrassments. Harold Lloyd's were disappointments. The Marx Brothers went Love Happy. And after talkies came in — and not because of sound — Buster Keaton made one movie after another that seemed calculated to make us forget what everyone once loved about Buster Keaton. Only W.C. Fields didn't despoil his exit from the screen with a lot of unworthy efforts but that was probably because he had the good fortune to die when he did. If he'd lived another ten years, we would have had some really lousy W.C. Fields movies.
The three movies on this new Laurel and Hardy set are not really lousy, except maybe in comparison to their previous efforts. The Boys fit the classic definition of the True Movie Star, which is someone you want to watch even when they're in a bad film…and like I said, there are moments in all of these. I'm glad they're finally being released on DVD in what promises to be a first-class presentation of prints and extras. I just wish I could watch them without thinking, "Gee, that scene reminds me of the really good version they did ten years earlier."
What does it say about the people running our country when the only politician out there giving passionate, activist speeches about righting terrible wrongs is Al Gore?
Here's a link to the website and trailer for the new Albert Brooks movie, Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World. I'm eager to see it because I love Albert Brooks, even though I didn't care for his last few films. I'll probably always go to see Albert Brooks movies, even if they keep to that standard, because I will never shake my memory of how funny he once was.
One time in the mid-sixties, Carl Reiner was on The Tonight Show and Johnny Carson asked him to name the funniest person he'd ever met. He said, "I'm going to give you two names…Mel Brooks and Albert Einstein." After the audience laughed at the second name, Reiner explained he didn't mean Albert Einstein, the physicist. He meant Albert Einstein, the kid who played with his son, Rob. This Albert Einstein was the son of comedian Harry Einstein and even in his teens, Reiner said, as funny as anyone he'd ever met. And not long after, this Albert Einstein changed his name to Albert Brooks, began doing standup comedy and it became obvious that Carl Reiner was right.
It was a great loss for the world of comedy that he gave that up. Heck, it was a great loss for me…but at least I got to see one of his last live standup appearances. I laughed 'til I thought I might have to leave the room lest I injure some essential body part. No one who ever saw Brooks at his best will doubt that was a clear and present danger.
I have one personal Albert Brooks anecdote. When Lost in America opened, I took a date to see it at the first matinee on opening day in Westwood. We both enjoyed it up until the scene where Julie Hagerty goes on a gambling binge in Las Vegas and loses most of the money they have in the world. It's a funny scene but when I looked over at my lady friend, she was trembling and crying.
As she later explained to me, someone in her family had destroyed many lives by doing pretty much the same thing and it was just too painful a memory for her. "I'll wait out in the lobby," she said as she got up from her seat. Since I didn't know what the problem was at the moment, I got up to go with her, much to the annoyance of all the people we had to climb over to get out of our row.
As we headed out into the lobby, I caught a glimpse of a man sitting in the aisle seat in the last row. It was Albert Brooks and he looked like we'd struck him over the skull with a Louisville Slugger. Here it was: The first day his new movie was open and two people were walking out on it. I felt bad about his pained expression for days.
This was in 1985. Three years later, the Writers Guild was on strike and I was working the tables at a mass picketing of one of the studios. Everyone whose last name started with A-G had to check in with me. I remember I logged in Michael Blodgett, star of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, and then the next two people in line were Albert Brooks and James L. Brooks, who had apparently arrived together.
I thanked them for showing up in alphabetical order, which made it easier to find their names in my paperwork. Then I said to Albert, "Listen, I have to apologize to you for something…" I told him the story of our walkout and why it had occurred and I assured him that I went back on my own a few days later and thoroughly enjoyed the whole movie. I said, "Now, I know you don't remember this but –"
And he interrupted and said, "Remember that? I had nightmares about you two. I thought you were the leaders and your walkout would give everyone else the idea and they'd all go, 'Hey, those people are right. This sucks! Let's get out of here!'" Then he grinned and said, "No, I don't remember that at all."
I hope he really didn't and that he just wasn't being nice about that last part. I've always really enjoyed his work and I wouldn't want to cause the man one sleepless moment. So just in case, when I go see Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World, I'm telling Carolyn we're staying to the end, no matter what.
The other day, I posted an anecdote about Shelley Winters going in to see a youthful casting director, being asked what she'd done and hauling out her two Oscars in response. I warned that it might not be true and we still don't know if it is or it isn't. We'll never know…but I did receive a couple of interesting messages about it. This first one is from Tom Collins…
Regarding your story about Shelley Winters and the casting director, I recall hearing a slightly different version of the story (maybe you have, too). Same basic set-up as the version you printed. Winters is called in to a casting director's office to audition, which she felt was beneath her. So she comes in, sits down, but doesn't say a word. She reaches into her handbag, pulls out an Oscar, thunks it down on his desk — still wordlessly. She waits a beat, then reaches back into her bag, pulls out the second Oscar, plunks it down on his desk. She lets it sink in for a moment. Finally, she says, "Some people think I can act."
What a bold, brassy broad in the best sense. Aren't many like her left in Hollywood, more's the pity. I'm just amazed one of those Oscars wasn't for Night of the Hunter.
She didn't even get nominated for Night of the Hunter, which probably amazes everyone who's seen it. But you know what's wrong with this story? It may well have happened that way but what's wrong with it is that most auditions are not about whether someone can act. They're about whether the person is right for a particular part, and you could be the best actor in the world and still be wrong for a given role. Leaving aside all question of whether it actually occurred, the version I told is just a better story. A casting director who calls in Shelley Winters and is so ignorant of film history that he has to ask her what she's done deserves to have those Oscars rubbed in his face. That's also the case with this version of the tale sent to me by Jack Lechner…
It's possible that something like this happened with two different people — or that it never happened in either case — but I heard a version of this story about Fred Zinnemann. As in the Winters story, 70-ish Zinnemann sits down with a young executive. The exec says to Zinnemann, "So tell me about yourself." Zinnemann responds, "You first."
And I heard of that exchange, only it wasn't Fred Zinneman. It was Billy Wilder. Meanwhile, here's a note from George Haberberger…
Regarding your story about Shelley Winters pulling out her Academy Awards during auditions: I read in an obit this weekend that she donated the one she got for The Diary of Anne Frank to the Anne Frank Museum. Maybe your story happened before she donated it but that's what I read.
According to this page at the site of the Anne Frank Museum, Winters did indeed donate that Oscar to their exhibit in 1975. I get the sense that the anecdote in question, if it happened, happened later than that. Shelley was still getting starring roles in notable movies in '75. One possible explanation is that I believe the Academy has occasionally allowed people who've lost their Oscars to purchase replacements and perhaps someone bent the rules to allow Shelley Winters to have her Oscar and give it too. Anyway, here's a message from Neil Polowin…
Not sure whether you've seen it, but the Shelley Winters story about her pulling her two Oscars out of her bag has been immortalized in film, in the opening scene of 1994's Swimming With Sharks. Frank Whaley's character (assistant to studio exec Buddy Ackerman, played by Kevin Spacey) tells the story to a few other junior executive wanna-bes.
I never saw Swimming With Sharks but that's interesting to know. The great thing about most show biz stories, of course, is that it almost doesn't matter if they're true if they're useful. A number of times, I've asked people who were involved in famous anecdotes to tell me what really happened and the response is, "Wish I knew…I've heard and told so many different versions, I've lost track." Or they've told tales I was present to witness and told versions that did not match what I saw at the time. Stories get fabricated or exaggerated because they're more useful in that form. If the tale of Shelley and the Casting Director helped make a good scene in that movie, that doesn't make it true…but it makes it true enough for show business.
Today might be a good day to watch a little of the famous "I have a dream" speech by Dr. Martin Luther King. Here's a link to an online excerpt.
Here's a webpage with photos of some of the top cartoon actors. In real life, some of them aren't quite this skinny. (Thanks to Jeff Stone for the head's up.)
My computer monitor, a KDS Radius I've had for three or four years, died on Friday the 13th. For about a week before, it flickered now and then and I kept checking the connection to make sure it was in tight. I finally realized the flickers were a quiet cry for help from one who'd served me well for so many hours. Then the blood drained from it and it lost all its color. Everything was black on grey. I rebooted and from that point on, every image on the screen stayed there. I clicked from my desktop through four or five websites and suddenly had all of them, superimposed one on top of another. It was very sad…like the monitor was sobbing to me, "I told you I was sick."
That was it for the KDS. Since the new monitor I ordered hasn't arrived yet, I hauled out my old, smaller, non-LCD monitor and I'm using it right now. There's some sort of "evolution of technology" that impacts your sensibilities. Not all that long ago, this device — working exactly the way it does now — was an impressive, state-of-the-art wonder. Now, it's small and clunky and I feel like I'm typing onto an Etch-a-Sketch. We get spoiled real easily. Two years ago, I had to do without a cell phone for a few days and it was like not having running water. You wonder, "How do people get along without this?" forgetting that for most of your life, you did.
In the meantime, I just received the new TV I ordered for my office. I used to have a 19" Sony placed where I could watch it while I worked. I can do that if I'm in the mood and if what I'm writing isn't attention-intensive. I can have the TV on while doing e-mail or browsing the web or sending out my daily output of 1,000,000 Spam e-mails to people asking if they want to buy cheap drugs from strangers…or even while doing this. For more serious assignments, I either have to have the TV off or use it like a night light, paying it little or no nevermind. (Jack Kirby, laboring at his drawing table, usually had a TV on but tuned to a Mexican station. He liked the music and the "company"…and since he didn't understand Spanish, he wasn't distracted by what was said.)
My Sony had been flickering for months and I finally got around to replacing it with a 32" LCD set with HD. That's a picture of the new arrival above. It's the Philips 32PF7320A/37, which is one of the few models that size with a built-in Hi Def tuner. I ordered it from Costco via this page…and get this: They say "The estimated delivery time will be approximately 7-10 business days from the time of order" but I ordered it last Monday around 3:00 in the afternoon and a nice UPS man brought it to me Wednesday just after Noon. That's all the more impressive when you realize that I didn't pay for the express delivery which promises it in 3-6 days.
So far, I'm delighted with the sound and picture. The biggest flaw I've been able to find — and this is pretty minor — is that the automatic screen format feature sometimes gets confused. It's supposed to detect a widescreen video signal on its own and adjust the margins accordingly but I sometimes have to grab up the remote and change them manually. Not a big deal. I'm hesitant to recommend the thing since I've only had it a few days but I'll let you know if it blows up or gets fuzzy or starts displaying only Geico commercials or anything.
What's frustrating is that I have an HD set but my beloved Series 2 TiVo doesn't record HD signals. I can watch local channels live in high def, pulled in right off my old roof antenna…but I can't record or pause them. Owning a TiVo has ruined live TV for me — another "evolution of technology" spoilage. The DirecTV people offer a TiVo-like video recorder that will interface with my satellite dish and handle HD but I test-drove one at a store and found it clunky and poorly designed. I've decided to await the Series 3 TiVo which will work its magic with HD and which has been announced for later this year. (Possible drawback: TiVo has not been great at having upgrades and new products out when they say they'll be out.) I really think the company folks dropped the ball by not getting a Hi Def TiVo out sooner, though I suppose they had their reasons.
There was one moment on Wednesday that seemed almost symbolic. Before I could put up my new LCD set, I had to take down the old Sony, which was a tube-type set. I lifted it off its perch atop some filing cabinets and its plastic housing splintered in my hands. Like the KDS monitor, it had served me well for thousands of hours but now its time was up and its outsides practically disintegrated. What is it with electronics equipment these days? Why can't they just stop working? Why do they have to commit suicide in front of you?
I should have noted this a week or so ago when Tom DeLay made his fall from power official. I'd forgotten about the Doonesbury comic strip holding a "Tom DeLay Political Deathwatch." It started in April and I guess Garry Trudeau expected "The Hammer" to come down quicker…but it's interesting to re-read those strips now. Start here and read forward.
We were wondering when DirecTV would begin carrying Sleuth, the new cable channel that just runs old detective shows and movies. Turns out the answer is later this year.
First one of the new year! For the benefit of those of you who can't remember all the way back to 2005, here's how it works: We give you five links to five alleged websites. Four of these actually exist out there in the way-out worldwide web, whereas the fifth is a despicable fraud being perpetrated on you by the untrustworthy operator of this unlikely-but-real weblog. What you need to do is figure out which of the five below ain't Kosher. As always, there are big cash prizes to be won…but not here. Okay, go to it…
Real-but-unlikely websites suggested by Bill Stiteler, Joel O'Brien, Tony Isabella and Casey Roberson. If you folks want to see this game more often, send me some links to real websites that sound like I made them up.
Frank Rich asks if Jack Abramoff will turn out to be George W. Bush's Monica Lewinsky. In the meantime, I'm asking what I'm doing up at this hour.
Sorry to hear of the passing of Dennis Marks, a prolific writer, mostly of animation. Dennis was one of the main writers of the Beatles cartoon show and of many other successful programs, including Batfink, The Transformers, The Superman-Aquaman Hour and Josie and the Pussycats. He was the head writer of the 1981 Spider-Man cartoon series and the 1982 Incredible Hulk show and did occasional voices on both. In theatrical animation, he wrote the 1990 movie of The Jetsons and worked on Tom and Jerry: The Movie, which was released two years later. He also produced the childrens' TV series, Wonderama, for many years and wrote a few scripts for DC Comics in the sixties. I worked with Dennis on the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon show, which he co-created. He was a clever guy and very passionate about everything he did.
A memorial service will be held on Friday afternoon, January 20, at the Magic Castle in Hollywood. Dennis was a longtime fixture of the Castle. Every Friday lunchtime for years, he could be found on the same stool at the Owl Bar, nursing a straight-up martini and holding court about what was wrong with the world. Wherever he is now, he's giving them an earful.
I haven't seen it in any of the obits that are online so far but there's a great story about Shelley Winters that other actors tell. I must have heard it a dozen times just from Howard Morris.
It took place late in her career, about the time she hit age seventy. She had a string of auditions with directors and casting directors who looked like children to her and who, she felt, were not showing her the proper respect. She was, after all, Shelley Winters. So when her agent sent her to meet one particular gentleman who was casting a new feature film, she went prepared.
She sat down in the casting director's office, right in front of his desk. After some pleasantries, the man said to her, "Now, Ms. Winters…remind me what you've done."
Shelley Winters reached into a big bag she'd brought with her, pulled out an Academy Award statuette and slammed it down on the man's desk. "That was for The Diary of Anne Frank," she announced. Then she pulled out another Oscar and put it next to the first one. "And that one was for A Patch of Blue. Now, why don't you remind me what you've done?"
I don't know for sure that happened. But it should have.
I met Ms. Winters only once and only for a few minutes. Chuck McCann introduced us at a restaurant and I said something real geeky. I think it was, "You know how everyone who meets you tells you what a great actress you are. Well, I agree." And she really was great in just about everything she did, ranging from the films for which she won those statuettes to fluff like Bloody Mama and a guest villain role on the Batman TV show. I also admired the incredible candor she displayed in her books and talk show appearances. One time, she was telling Johnny Carson about how she'd go to a Hollywood spa every week and sit around the sauna, discussing the men of Hollywood with other actresses of all ages. Johnny asked, "What's the main topic?" And though NBC bleeped it, you could tell from the audience reaction and Mr. Carson's expression, she'd answered, "Penis size."
Just when the laugh died down, she added, "Your name came up the other day." Johnny quickly decided it was a good time for a commercial…and I'm not sure he had Shelley on his show again after that. He should have. She was one of the best.