Recently, I wrote here about the Archie Comics fan club and noted how little it gave you for your dime. That's how I felt at the time…but Jim Newman (producer of this fine show) points out that a good condition Archie fan club kit recently sold on eBay for $40. That's a 40,000% return on […]
Less than 17 hours remain in the eBay auction of the motorcycle stars have been signing on Jay Leno's show and it's only at $125,100. The first time they did this, the chopper went for $360,000 and the second grossed $800,100. Jay keeps saying they're hoping for a million so the bidding's going to have […]
Okay, let's imagine you're staging a horror movie convention this weekend out in Northridge, California. Let's imagine that you line up as guests, the usual array of fright film actors who'll sell and sign photos of themselves. Let's also imagine that this kind of convention hasn't been doing so well lately and some are anticipating […]
Jerry Juhl, who was one of the main creative forces behind The Muppets died Monday from complications relating to cancer. Jerry and his wife Susan worked for years for the Jim Henson Organization — 37 years in Jerry's case. He wrote for Sesame Street, served as head writer for The Muppet Show, and was a […]
Why is it so hard to get food in a restaurant the way you want it? A little while ago, while walking around my neighborhood on some errands, I decided to stop in a Sizzler for a meal…which I guess was my main mistake right there. What I wanted was a grilled or broiled chicken […]
House Majority Leader Tom DeLay has been indicted in what is being described as his participation in a campaign finance scheme. I have no idea how strong or weak the evidence is against him. Lots of folks get indicted and then the case has a way of evaporating. And of course, lots of people get […]
Dr. John McCabe was the first and best historian of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy As I recounted in this article, he wrote the first book about them, Mr. Laurel and Mr. Hardy, and it had a deep, positive impact on me. (When the piece was first published, it brought me a nice letter from […]
This will only interest you if you're really into the real minutiae of comic book history. It's a P.S. on that Get Smart sample I posted a few hours ago that I said was by Steve Ditko and Sal Trapani. The weblog of someone who calls himself "Sleestak" has reproduced more of it over here. […]
As you may recall, the New York Times is now charging half a c-note per year for special web access that incudes their opinion columnists. As you may also recall, I was curious to see how "available" they'd be to folks who hadn't subscribed, and I was using Frank Rich's weekend column as a test […]
Here, as sorta promised, is the Get Smart promo poster drawn by Jack Davis. This is the only decent likeness of Don Adams I can ever recall seeing anyone drawing. For a couple years there, NBC would put out a set each year with four promotional posters of shows from their schedule. The 1965 set, […]
The passing of Don Adams brings questions about the Get Smart comic book. Here is everything I know about it: It was published by Dell Comics from June of 1966 (cover date) to September of 1967. There were eight issues, although #8 was an exact replica of #1, except that the price had gone up […]
Fred Kaplan explains what's wrong with the proposed Iraqi constitution — or at least, what he thinks is wrong. If anyone can point me to a reasoned "opposing view" of this situation, please do. It sure sounds like Iraq is about to vote in a constitution that will make things over there worse, not better. […]
Operation USA is the preferred charity of this website. This is in part because I've met some of the folks who run it and seen that they do not use your donations to buy themselves big homes and cars under the guise of "administrative costs." They really put the money to good use. The other […]
Members of the Screen Actors Guild have elected a more "militant" slate of officers and so have the members of the Writers Guild. The new WGA officials have begun by dismissing John McLean, who has functioned as the Guild's Executive Director since 1999. The news reports may not tell you this but Mr. McLean was […]
Sony Pictures has refused to release a new feature by Albert Brooks so it's going elsewhere. Patrick Goldstein has all the details. […]