I love images — still or moving — of old Los Angeles. Here are some of the moving kind as filmed back in the thirties. The audio and color work are fake but the rest of what you'll see is real…

My favorite game show is…well, if you go way back, it would be something like I've Got a Secret or What's My Line? that gave witty people a chance to be witty, usually on live, anything-can-happen television.  If we get into more recent ones — polished, edited, taped five or more a day — I really liked the original daytime version of Press Your Luck. It ran on CBS from 1983 to 1986 and was hosted and hosted well by Peter Tomarken. It was was a game that was cleverly crafted to create frequent moments of Sudden Death and contestants going head-to-head. Unlike a lot of game shows, there was some genuine strategy involved. If you wanted to win, that is.

The current prime-time version hosted by Elizabeth Banks is okay but it does feel a little overproduced to me, like someone always has their finger on an APPLAUSE button and all the contestants are receiving a constant intravenous solution of pure glucose. The video below consists of moments from the original daytime version. This is what's called a Sizzle Reel — a collection of highlights that someone makes up to sell the show to some potential buyer or something. Since the series had been on the air a while before this was made, I'm not sure who they were trying to sell with it. Perhaps it was to entice buyers in other countries to buy the rights to do a version of the program for their local markets. There were a number of them.

Whatever the purpose, this reel shows off the excitement of the original show well. Beginning around the 4:35 mark, there's an excerpt of a spin-passing battle between two ladies and it actually went on a lot longer than what is shown here. I remember seeing the whole thing when it aired and thinking that when this occurred in the studio, one of the creators of this game — like, say, Bill Carruthers, whom I'd met — turned to someone and said, "See? That's exactly what this game was configured to make happen sometimes!"

The main thing folks remember of the original series is that a man named Michael Larson figured out a way to "beat" the game board, got on the show and hit them for a then-staggering $110,237. That would be three-to-four times as much in today's money but it would still be only mid-range impressive when many game shows offer a shot at a million and up. Still, Larson's take-home pay was Game Show History at the time and it's still a very rare example of a turn of events on a game show that its producers did not anticipate.

The exact outcome of a game show is not pre-determined. They don't know in advance who'll win or what they'll win but the result is always something they knew could and would occur, Michael Larson being one of the rare exceptions. If you have the time, you might enjoy this documentary that was made a few years later that explains what happened, how it happened and what happened afterwards to Larson. One of the "talking heads" you'll see interviewed in there is a friend of mine, Bob Boden, who has worked in every corner of the game show world for many years now, including time at CBS (when Mr. Larson worked his Whammy-avoidance wizardry ) and helping found the Game Show Network, for which he caused this documentary to be made…

As you saw if you watched it, or can guess if you didn't, it's a fascinating story and there were several attempts made to dramatize it into a motion picture. I think the first person who tried it was me. I had a friend other than Bob who worked on the show then and she called me the evening of that fateful tape day and told me what had transpired. She was still in a state of semi-shock.

What intrigued me about the story was the panic and uncertainty that transpired offstage and especially in the control room.  After Larson passed $20,000 or $25,000, they got to worrying: Was the game board broken?  Had someone tampered with it?  Someone who was in collusion with Larsen?  There was the obvious concern about how much dough he might be taking away but CBS had that much in petty cash.  Some folks behind-the-scenes were more worried about the show being damaged, perhaps irreparably, by whatever the hell it was that was happening on that stage.

There was also a big worry about getting an airable show out of whatever resulted.  The half-hour format for Press Your Luck allowed for one game per episode.  In the past, they'd always over-taped the host chit-chatting with the contestants so they could fill out the time if a game was short.  If the game ran long, they could do judicious editing and trim a minute or so.  But the way things were going with Michael Larson, the show would run too long to edit down to thirty minutes.

A (slight) sigh of relief was exhaled when his run seemed to be lasting long enough that they could cut it into two shows.  But then there was the "When will he stop?" worry that he'd keep going for a million or more.  He finally stopped shortly after reaching the $100,000 mark.  Worry over?  No because he still had four spins and he had some mystical way of never hitting a Whammy and always landing on a square that gave him moola plus a free spin.  If he had hit a Whammy and gone down to zero, he could have started building the total up again…and again…and again.  They could have wound up with a round that ran for hours.

And if this guy wound up hitting record amounts and then crashing and going home with a case of Turtle Wax…well, that wouldn't have been a pleasant thing to broadcast, would it?

Oh — and what if one of those worries about a game board malfunction or collusion turned out to be  true?  Would they have to void the game and not award the money?  What kind of legal mess would that create?  What kind of bad publicity?  Would CBS find some reason to cancel the show because of this?  The panic went in so many directions that it sounded like a great movie or (more likely) TV movie to me…or maybe a book.

With my friend's help, I visited the set of the show on its next tape date.  I think I was more curious to find out how the show was done than I was to turn the story into a writing gig.  I talked to Peter Tomarken (the host), Rod Roddy (the announcer) and others who were there.  The stagehands had the most intriguing tales to tell…but then they always do.

Soon after, I had a meeting with Bill Carruthers, the head guy behind the program. With his blessing, I showed an edited version of the incident to a major producer of TV movies as part of a "pitch."  He pitched it in turn to buyers (including CBS) and for a while there, it looked like it might turn into a TV movie and he even had a great idea as to who he wanted to have play Michael Larson: Mickey Rooney.  I had an idea as to who should play Peter Tomarken.  I wanted to use the actual video footage of Peter Tomarken from the show.

But like many things in Hollywood, the TV movie never materialized.  We got as far as my agent and the producer negotiating what we'd demand the network pay me for a script if any network had enough interest to commission a script.  Alas as it turned out, there were those at CBS who wanted to pretend the whole thing never happened.  They began, I was told, arguing with the division that was considering buying it.  I was also told that at this point, CBS still had private detectives investigating Michael Larson to determine if there was anything more to his story than just some guy on his own finding a loophole in the  way a game board worked.

Meanwhile, the other networks weren't sure they wanted to air a movie about a rival network's program.  They weren't sure they did and they weren't sure they didn't.  Also, Larson was still alive and sounding very litigious and/or demanding, especially after (as you saw if you watched the doc) he lost all the money he'd won on the show. There were other hurdles so it didn't happen for a while…and then it didn't happen for a longer while…and then a longer while still…

…and that's the way a lot of projects in show business don't happen. There's never a moment when anyone says it's off. It just percolates for so long without going forward that everyone just kind of forgets about it. I forgot about it…though there were occasional reminders and occasional attempts by others who had the same idea. At one point, a movie was reportedly in the works with Nicholas Cage attached not as its star but as one of its producers. They had Bill Murray, they claimed, lined up to play Michael Larson. Bill Murray might have been a real good idea but again, it didn't happen for a while…and then it didn't happen for a longer while…

Recently, someone actually did make such a movie. It's called The Luckiest Man in America and it was directed and co-written by Samir Oliveros and, according to IMDB, shot partly in the U.S., partly in Colombia, partly in Canada and partly in Chile. Here's the trailer for it…

You can probably catch it streaming somewhere but I don't recommend it. I saw it and it's one of those films — and I could name many — when filmmakers fictionalized too much of a true story where the truth would have been more interesting. They made Peter Tomarken (a helluva nice guy) and many of the behind-the-scenes people look like clueless boobs.

Mostly, they invented scenes…like in the middle of the taping, when Larsen still hadn't won all that money and could still have lost every dime, they had him wandering off the set and onto a nearby stage where he somehow became a guest on a live-in-progress talk show hosted by a Tom Snyder type. They also had the producers, in mid-taping, find out via some detective-type work what Larsen was up to, whereas in reality, they had no idea.

There are other departures from reality that I think make the whole thing sound unreal. It's like in that recent Saturday Night movie, they had Lorne Michaels — minutes before the show we now call Saturday Night Live was going to go live with its debut episode — wander out of the studio.  He wound up in a bar where he watched a bad stand-up comedian and hireds the guy's writer to add jokes to the show they were minutes from broadcasting.  Or the decision to air the show being made one second before they did.  Or the whole thing with Milton Berle.

No one was expecting a documentary but there were many moments when that film ventured into "That could never have happened like that" territory. I do understand that a true story must sometimes speculate and fictionalize, and some of my favorite movies did. But I don't think it's always the right way to go.

Then again, you might see The Luckiest Man in America and love it, especially if you aren't familiar with the real story that they chose to sort of tell.  If you aren't and you might someday see the movie, maybe you shouldn't watch that documentary that I recommended you watch thirteen paragraphs ago.

Here's a tour of the office and home of Mr. Robert Petrie, the head writer of the popular program, The Alan Brady Show. The folks who put these together, carefully researched what we saw of those locations on The Dick Van Dyke Show and ad-libbed their way around the other parts. When we're looking at the office, the host tells us this is how it would have looked if you were in the audience looking at the set. Well, I was in the audience once looking at the office set and their version looks like what I remember seeing except that I think their re-creation is a lot more spacious.

I remember noting how much smaller the office looked in person. (Before anyone asks: The episode I saw filmed was the one in which Rob and Laura bought their house in New Rochelle and the only scene that took place in that house was in the basement. In that basement there was a huge rock which had not been there in an earlier episode in which Rob was hustled in a pool game that took place in his basement.) But it's all a fascinatimg exercise in architectural rendering — or whatever you'd call this kind of 3-D tour…

Hey, remember Kilmar Armando Abrego García? The man that ICE and its associates deported, then admitted he'd been wrongfully deported but it was impossible to bring him back, then they brought him back and now he's getting some Due Process and standing trial? I know, I know…so much has happened lately that it's hard to remember what you were outraged about just a few weeks ago.

So he's on trial and the case against him is said (by this attorney) to be "wobbly." In public, Attorney General Pam Bondi said they had an airtight case against him for a whole list of nefarious crimes. Well, now that it's in court, they aren't even prosecuting him on some of those crimes and the proof for the others looks, like the man said, wobbly.

So what is the Trump organization going to do? Well, they might be able to stop the trial if they deport him again. Read both links in that order.

Here we have an intriguing question from the fine funnybook artist, Christopher Cook…

Hey, Mark! In your youth, did you have any cartoon crushes? The cartoon girls who you wish were real so you could get to know better? The girl you'd readily offer a shoulder to cry on?

My first cartoon crush was Betty Rubble. I melted when she was crying in the episode were she and Barney try to adopt Bamm-Bamm. Since then, I've had cartoon crushes in my teens and, unhealthily, adult years. These included Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Melody (from Josie & the Pussycats), Velma (from Scooby-Doo), Dotty (from Clue Club), Brenda Chance (Captain Caveman), Lydia Deetz (Beetlejuice) and Blossom (The Powerpuff Girls, which I got to work on for DC Comics for eight terrific years).

If we're just talking animation, no. I had a lot of what you might call "crushes" in my teen years but they were all about flesh 'n' blood ladies — a few at school, some on TV. The latter list included, in no particular order, Mary Tyler Moore, Barbara Eden, Yvonne Craig, Julie Newmar, Susan Silo, Judy Carne, Sue Ane Langdon, a couple of Golddiggers on The Dean Martin Show…it was a long list and some of those infatuations didn't linger after the object of them had her TV show canceled.

But cartoons? I can't think of one. I guess the thinking — to the limited extent that I was thinking — went something like this: If you're going to fantasize about a woman from afar, it's healthier to go with the one-in-fifty-million chance of even meeting a real person (like Mary Tyler Moore) rather than the zero-or-less-in-a-million chance of Betty Rubble coming to life and then I get to meet her. Oddly enough, I eventually met — in some cases, briefly — most of the real ladies on my list. A lot of things have happened to me, good and bad, that I never imagined were possible.

The closest I came to crushes on females who were drawn, not born, were a few comic book characters but only when drawn by certain artists. I was fond of Supergirl but only when drawn by Jim Mooney, Kurt Schaffenberger, Mike Sekowsky or Bob Oksner. I was fond of Wonder Woman but only when drawn by Mike Sekowsky. I was fond of Mera in the Aquaman strip but only when drawn by Nick Cardy.

In fact, I was fond of any female character in a comic book drawn by Cardy, Sekowsky, Dan Spiegle, Wally Wood, John Romita or one or two others just as long as the lady depicted wasn't wearing a mask. A good analyst could probably spend hours explaining me not being attracted to any woman wearing a mask. My Yvonne Craig crush was limited to her portrayals of Barbara Gordon, not Batgirl.

I can't think of a character in the world of animation that ever did it for me…although when I was the writer-editor of a Jetsons comic book, I did have the artist draw Judy Jetson in a bikini. Does that count?

I've decided to end the daily posts of various folks singing this song, though more may grace this site in the future. You and I need a break from these so here's three more and then tomorrow, I'll post something different. This is a group called The Overtones…

This is a group made up of Chris Bandy, Cory Blackmon, Cooper Case, Mark Denman, John Frederick, and JP Stephens…

And finally — for now — here's Billy Joel himself doing it with Boyz 2 Men…

If you want to know how our bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities turned out — and wouldn't that be a nice thing to know? — Fred Kaplan has written an article that's free from partisan spin and premature conclusions. Those two flaws seem to be the trouble with most of what we've heard so far. The truth is that there's a lot that just plain isn't known yet and there are folks out there unwilling — or unable because of their job descriptions — to wait for solid information.

To put it in simpler terms: Fred's article is entitled "The Iran Strike Seems to Have Been More Effective Than Initial Intel Suggested." It may be a while before it is known how much more effective.

As we mentioned yesterday, Boop! The Musical is closing July 13 on Broadway. A cast member who wishes to remain anonymous (hint: It isn't Pudgy the Dog) wrote to thank me for my cheerleading and to also say these sad words: "I'm sorry you didn't get to see it. I would have gotten you house seats up front."

This person also said there's a backstage rumor that a big tour is being arranged. I hope that's so for their sake, mine and maybe yours but I'm a bit guarded in such hopes.

Every time I've been around a project that ended, someone sought to temper the bad news with a light of some sort at the end of some tunnel. Your TV show gets canceled and someone more or less in charge says, "Don't worry…we already have interest from another network." Once in a while — but only once in a while — that turns out to be so. I'm hoping Boop! is one of those onces.

As you may have heard, Barret Hansen — known far, near and wide as Dr. Demento — is hanging up his turntable. I was an avid fan of his radio program almost from the start and he started in 1970, playing records no one else on radio played. In some cases, he played records no one else had. I was a huge fan of some of the vintage stars he showcased like Stan Freberg, Spike Jones, Tom Lehrer and so many more. I collected comedy records but the good doctor's stash of such material towered over my collection and maybe everyone's.

When I first discovered him, I taped his show every week using a reel-to-reel tape recorder, a radio, a timer and a couple of wires that formed what now looks like a stone age VCR for audio only. When Dr. Demento played something I didn't have in my collection — which at the start was, like, every week — I'd splice the tape of that tune onto a big reel I had. I'm sure I wasn't the only listener who did this and I'm sure the doctor knew and approved.

He was one of the few on-air radio personalities who played records and didn't talk over the beginning and/or end of each record. He left them clean for those of us who were recording them. Back in those pre-Internet days that was the only way I could get a copy of something he had that I wanted to have a copy of for myself.

I've probably since found every song I "saved" that way. He established there was a market for old Spike Jones material and there were many Dr. Demento records and CDs of stuff from his library. And these days, a lot of that material — being public domain in many cases — is downloadable from somewhere on the vast World Wide Web. In the seventies though, the only source was Doc Demento's Sunday night broadcasts.

I got to meet him a few times. Once at one of Laraine Newman's birthday parties, "Weird Al" Yankovic introduced me to Dr. Demento and I thought that was appropriate since Dr. Demento had introduced "Weird Al" to me and to the world. I've never addressed him as Barret because he seemed to be Dr. Demento in front of a microphone and away from one. But we talked about great comedy and novelty records and talk about your Walking Encyclopedias of Knowledge…

I just re-read the above and it sounds a bit funereal and it shouldn't. The guy's not dead. He's just not doing his show anymore. I just wanted to salute him for doing it, doing it for so long and doing it so well. I wish him a happy retirement.

And here's how they did it on the TV series, How I Met Your Mother…

As we feared, Boop! The Musical has announced its closing on Broadway. The final performance there will be July 13, they say…though there have been shows which announced a closing date and then had a stampede to the box office so they extended for a while. Even if that happens here, there's no way I can get back to New York in time to see it. It opened April 5 so if there's no extension — and there probably won't be — it will have played 25 previews and 112 regular performances.

Everyone I know who saw it loved it…so we now have the question of whether it will tour or have some sort of afterlife. There will at some point probably be regional productions of it but those won't be the same as seeing it with this cast — Jasmine Amy Rogers, especially — and these costumes and that staging. It may turn out be remembered best for launching the career of Ms. Rogers, who is probably already being approached with offers.

Sorry to see it go. One friend of mine who saw it during ten days of seeing as many shows as possible said it was the only one he saw with a sense of joy and a cast of talented folks who "looked like they were ecstatic to be performing for us." I also feel bad for the people who've been trying to engineer a comeback for the cartoon character as a viable "today" property.  I also feel bad for whoever backed this show because they probably lost a helluva lot of money.

Did the U.S. bombing raid on Iran leave that country's nuclear capabilities "totally obliterated?" Trump says they did and seems furious when anyone suggest they didn't. That's even though his vice-president, when asked that question, hedged his answer and didn't say "Of course!" Here, Politifact tackles the question and — SPOILER ALERT! — their answer is that it's too soon to tell. Of course, it wasn't too soon for Trump to declare the mission a smashing success and to begin planning his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech…

…while FactCheck.org says the answer is "no."

And here's Ed Kilgore explaining about how meaningless it is for anyone to be "nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize." Someone — anyone — just has to send the right letter to the right address. It's kind of the same way we accept nominations for the Bill Finger Award for Excellence in Comic Book Writing. We've had hundreds of people nominated for this award, a great many of whom do not remotely qualify.

We still have that guy who keeps sending letters nominating Curt Swan — a wonderful artist who did not, as the criteria for the award demands, have a body of work as a writer. This gent who keeps nominating Swan over and over, even though multiple nominations of the same candidate by the same person carry no weight, has a simple explanation…

It's basically that we all agree that Curt Swan was the most talented person to ever work in comics so it's unthinkable not to give him every single award that is ever bestowed on folks who do comic books. I'm thinking the late Mr. Swan will receive a Nobel Peace Prize for drawing Superman comic books before Donald Trump gets one for anything he does.

And here's how they did it on the TV series, Glee. (I'm talking about performing the Billy Joel song, "For the Longest Time," not humiliating Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — although both are very popular on YouTube…)

Congresswoman Kim Schrier (D-WA) questions our Secretary of Health and Human Services. As you watch this, just remember that Donald Trump picked people like Robert F. Kennedy Jr to make up his cabinet and staff…

Seth Meyers gets a informative (and very funny) segment just by quoting everything Donald Trump said and everything he did about the Israel/Iran situation…