Category Archives: To Be Filed

It's hard to believe that in 2015, we're debating vaccinations. Well, maybe it isn't. There seems to be a strain of opinion out there that views science and expertise as weapons of tyranny. It's like, "How dare they try to tell me what's right just because they know better?" The folks who start out their speeches about Climate Change with "Now, I'm not a scientist…" all seem to be implying, "…and I resent having to listen to them."

The best thing I've seen written about the vaccination issue is this satirical piece over at The Onion. Here, I'll quote the first paragraph just to give you the premise…

As a mother, I put my parenting decisions above all else. Nobody knows my son better than me, and the choices I make about how to care for him are no one's business but my own. So, when other people tell me how they think I should be raising my child, I simply can't tolerate it. Regardless of what anyone else thinks, I fully stand behind my choices as a mom, including my choice not to vaccinate my son, because it is my fundamental right as a parent to decide which eradicated diseases come roaring back.

This morning, Chris Christie's people are scrambling to walk back and play down a comment he made about how parents "need to have some measure of choice" about whether or not to vaccinate their children. Didn't we just go through a scare in this country about Ebola? Do we need to start new ones about mumps, smallpox, diphtheria, polio and measles?

I ran this on November 5, 2002 here, following a period when episodes of Hawaii Five-O (the original one) were turning up all the time on my TiVo. I actually liked the show, which is why I didn't block the TiVo from recording them and why I didn't just delete them unwatched. A couple of fans on the series however reacted badly to this piece, missing the part where I expressed my fondness for the early seasons, acting like I'd trashed an acknowledged television classic. I've watched more episodes since then and I stand by my list…but I must admit to more affection for the show when I don't see it too often…

My TiVo recently decided I must like old reruns of Hawaii Five-O and has been recording them whenever it has space available. In truth, my TiVo is wise, though a bit out of date. I did like Hawaii Five-O, at least for the first half of its 284 episodes. Along about its eighth year, it began to get a bit too repetitive. I also had a little problem watching its star, Jack Lord.

Mr. Lord, rumor had it, ruled his show with an iron fist and the belief that he was its one and only S*T*A*R. Such was his mania to preserve this reality that word began to leak, even while the show was up and operating, that its cast and crew seriously disliked the man who played Supercop Steve McGarrett. Writers and producers complained — within earshot of reporters — that he was rejecting scripts because they even slightly showcased other members of McGarrett's squad or didn't properly portray his character as brilliant, flawless and loved by women everywhere. Other cast members, sometimes anonymously, suggested the S*T*A*R had come to believe he was all that and more in real life. (Here's a link to an article that ran in TV Guide in 1971. For its time, it was surprisingly harsh about a major TV star.)

Ordinarily, I would not take such bad press at face value. But I ran into Jack Lord twice in bookstores, and heard tales from friends who'd also had the dubious pleasure. The way he acted — brusque and demanding, treating salespeople as servants to be ordered about — certainly made the reports easy to believe.

And ordinarily, I would not let that affect my enjoyment of a TV show or movie. But in this case, it did…at least a little. It somehow made the whole character of Steve McGarrett seem pompous and hollow.

That, coupled with the repetition, kind of ruined Hawaii Five-O for me, at least as a weekly pleasure. Recently, thanks to TiVo, I've been watching a few again. I like them as an occasional treat, but am reminded of the fact that every episode seemed to be a new arrangement of about eight of the same twelve scenes. Here is a list of them…

1. The governor puts pressure on McGarrett. Someone is murdering people all over Hawaii and getting away with it, but the governor somehow thinks that alone doesn't motivate McGarrett to catch the killer. The state's chief exec has to make it clear that, despite the fact that McGarrett's office has solved every crime in the state for the last ten years, they'd damn well better wrap this one up soon or there could be some big changes. (This scene sometimes prompts a brief outburst from McGarrett — "Get off my back!" — but he quickly recovers his equilibrium, apologizes and promises to work harder. And the governor understands that McGarrett is under a lot of stress because he cares so.)
2. McGarrett seals off the island. With a known criminal out there somewhere, McGarrett decides to prevent anyone from arriving on or departing the island of Oahu. "This island is like a rock," he usually says. "No one gets on or off until we catch this guy." One can only wonder what impact this would have on Hawaiian commerce or tourism if the Hawaiian police did it once, let alone every other week.
3. McGarrett sends the Hawaiians to search the island. The Hawaiian aides who work for McGarrett are there largely to be sent out on ridiculous missions. So McGarrett has evidence that the suspect eats grilled cheese sandwiches and he says to Kono (played by Zulu), "Get the boys and search the island. Visit every delicatessen, every coffee shop, every place someone could possibly get a grilled cheese sandwich. Someone must have seen something."
4. The Hawaiians quickly find an incredibly good witness. This one usually connects with the previous one: "We're in luck, Steve. Chin Ho found a druggist who runs a lunch counter on Molokai. Seems he distinctly remembers selling a grilled cheese sandwich to a man just four days ago. He thought the man was acting odd so he watched him walk to his car and wrote down the license number."
5. McGarrett gets philosophical. Sitting alone in his office, usually late at night, McGarrett muses on the nature of the criminal they're pursuing. One of McGarrett's aides (usually Danny Williams) finds him there and hears a speech that includes the phrase, "What kind of man…?" as in, "What kind of man would murder six accordion players, three stationers and an overweight nun, and leave a large bowl of tapioca to identify himself?"
6. McGarrett gets mad. This usually consists of him staring out his office window and saying, "He's out there, Danno…and he's mocking us."
7. The beautiful witness in swimwear. McGarrett, in a suit and tie despite the 90-degree weather, visits and interrogates a beautiful woman who is lounging by a swimming pool. She is obviously attracted to him.
8. McGarrett goes casual. McGarrett's underlings visit him at home or on a weekend retreat with either a new nugget of information or just to hear him brainstorm the problem at hand. In this scene, they're all in suits and ties despite the 90-degree weather while McGarrett is lounging by a swimming pool wearing shorts, a loud Hawaiian shirt and a broad, floppy straw hat. Just to show he's a regular guy who doesn't always wear a suit and tie.
9. McGarrett is windswept. This one seems to have begun in the later seasons, when comedians and TV critics were making jokes about Jack Lord's hair being sculpted of plastic. At some point, McGarrett's investigation would carry him to a high cliff or pier where breezes would blow his hair around. (Also sometimes achieved by having him meet someone coming off a helicopter or riding in one, himself.)
10. The Amateur Actor. After about the third season, there was apparently a shortage of professional actors in Hawaii who hadn't appeared several times on the show, and the producers didn't want to fly someone in from the states for a bit part. So there's always one scene where someone (often, a uniformed cop) has two lines and is so awful, you just know it's one of the camera operators or the caterer's brother. This one is invariably a highlight.
11. Some innocent remark gives McGarrett the answer. This one was actually seen in about half the TV detective shows ever done. Someone makes a stray comment like, "Well, let's get your mind off the case for a while. How about a cup of coffee?" And then Mannix, Barnaby Jones, Cannon, McCloud, McMillan or McGarrett says, "Wait a minute…coffee. Coffee is made of beans. That's it! The killer is hiding in the old abandoned bean warehouse, just outside of town!" And, of course, he is.
12. "Book him, Danno. Murder one." He didn't always say this as the last line of an episode of Hawaii Five-O. It just seemed that way.

Apart from #10, I grew tired of seeing some sequencing of these scenes in every episode. If you think I'm oversimplifying, they run the show every morning on the WGN Superstation. Watch and see. Aloha!

Right again!

I'm not watching.

I predict that every year and so far, I've never been wrong.

My favorite musical group, Big Daddy, takes recent hits — in this case, not so recent — and rearranges them as they might have sounded in the Golden Age of Rock 'n' Roll. This is their most recent video and the premise here is: "What if 'Stayin' Alive' had been recorded in the style of the Coasters?" What they did was like the Coasters' "3 Cool Cats" record, which I think was the "B" side of one of their biggest hits, "Charlie Brown."

This tune and others like it can be heard on their latest CD, Smashing Songs of Stage & Screen. It's highly recommended and available from Amazon via this link and also somewhere on iTunes. What they did to "New York, New York" alone is worth the price.

HBO has a new special, Mel Brooks Live at the Geffen, which debuted earlier this evening. If you didn't record or watch it, it's on about eight hundred times in the coming week. And in those rare moments between now and next Friday morn when they're not running that, HBO is rerunning last Friday night's Real Time with Bill Maher, upon which Mr. Brooks guested.

This was posted here on June 16, 2002 and I have nothing to add, nothing to change…

Everyone who ever avidly read comic books has a couple of issues in their past that made a big impression on them; that linger forever in the memory like a favored childhood toy. They may not be the best comics ever done but they hit you at just the right moment with ideas and imagery that were at least new to you. Just like a guy never forgets his first girl (or vice-versa), you never quite forget your first favorite comic book.

For most folks who are around my age — I hit the half-century mark last March — that favored first comic is usually a DC or Dell from the late fifties/early sixties. My friend Al Vey — the comic book artist with the shortest name in the biz, one letter less than Jim Lee — always remembered a Dell/Disney special called Donald Duck in MathMagic Land, which came out in 1961. He told me this some years ago at a party at one of the San Diego Conventions and, by one of those loopy coincidences, we were standing next to Don R. Christensen when he said it. Don is a lovely, older gent who has been in animation and comics forever, and who was an extremely prolific funnybook author. When Al said what he said, I immediately turned him around to face Don and made him repeat it. The conversation went as follows:

Al: I was just telling Mark that my favorite comic book when I was growing up was a special called Donald Duck in MathMagic Land.

Don: (after a moment of reflection) Oh, yes, I wrote that.

I love moments like these: Al was thrilled to meet the man who'd created his favorite comic book. Don was thrilled that someone Al's age (and in the business) remembered the book all those years and loved it so.

Anyway, it wasn't the first comic I bought or even the hundredth but I always liked Around the World With Huckleberry and his Friends, a Dell Giant that came out the same year as Al's fave. The book was drawn by Pete Alvarado, Kay Wright, John Carey and Harvey Eisenberg. Years later, when I began writing comics, I got to work with the first three of these gents and — I have to admit — there was a giddy little thrill there. It was the same as the thrill I got working in TV with people like Stan Freberg and June Foray, whose work I vividly recalled loving as a kid. Never got to write a comic drawn by Harvey Eisenberg — he died before I got into the field — but I did work with and became good buddies with his son, Jerry.

The writers are unknown but, at the time, a lot of these comics were being written by Vic Lockman, Jerry Belson, Del Connell, Lloyd Turner and several others. Lockman and Don R. Christensen were the most prolific writers but Don tells me he didn't work on this particular book.

Its contents may seem unremarkable — short stories of various Hanna-Barbera characters of the day, each dispatched to a different foreign clime. Huckleberry Hound went to Africa, Pixie and Dixie to Switzerland, Yakky Doodle to Australia, Augie Doggie and Doggie Daddy to Ireland, Yogi Bear to Egypt, Snagglepuss to Spain, Snooper and Blabber to England, Hokey Wolf to Italy and Quick Draw McGraw to the Sahara Desert. I can't tell you what I found so delightful about it and I really don't want to oversell it, since the joy of most of the stories was in their simplicity. But the Hokey Wolf tale, to name one, was about a criminal who was running around Rome, chopping up all the spaghetti so it was impossible to get long strands. At age 9, that premise and its resolution (the culprit was a messy eater, traumatized by having stained his clothes, determined to make chopped-up spaghetti popular) struck me as outrageously funny.

I'm not suggesting you seek this comic out. Unless you're nine, it probably won't have the same impact on you…and it also helps to have a certain fondness for the early H-B characters, as I still manage to retain. I don't like everything that I liked then but somehow, the early Hanna-Barbera output — the characters primarily voiced by Daws Butler — still strike me as amusing. And of course, when I devoured the comic books of them, I had Daws's superb voice and comic delivery in my head, and was able to read the word balloons accordingly. It all made for a comic that has stayed with me for more than forty years. Best twenty-five cents I ever spent…

John Oliver was on David Letterman's show the other night and Chris Wade makes an interesting point in comparing the two men. Letterman's act has really devolved into doing jokes about how lame his show is. I don't think it's that lame and I doubt he does, either…but that has become his main topic.

Boy, I liked this guy, once upon a time. I really do hope he resurfaces in some new show but it would be nice if it was a show that challenged him and fired up his enthusiasm. What that show might be and where it might air, I have no idea.

Speaking of ineptness: Did you see the two episodes of The Late, Late Show hosted by Regis Philbin? It felt like some amateur was out there, not running a talk show but instead doing his bad impression of Dana Carvey's good impression of Regis Philbin. Mr. Philbin's rep as a broadcaster has long seemed to me to be based on endurance…and he gets some solid hurrahs for that. But like Larry King and sometimes Letterman, he long ago seemed to have reached the point where it was all about Showing Up and nothing else except sometimes a certain amount of self-parody.

Last week, one website reported — unsourced — that Jay Leno had been invited to appear with Dave before Mr. Letterman leaves the 11:35 berth. Other sites picked this up and treated it like it was a huge story, which it isn't. It's been reported before and it's kind of obvious both sides want it to happen. It's in Jay's interest to go on because it'll show the world Letterman doesn't loathe him and because Dave will be gracious and it will end that aspect of The Late Night Wars.

It's in Dave's interest to have Leno on because…well, I'd like to think it's because Letterman is a bit embarrassed by how much he trashed his one-time friend and contemporary and wants to undo some of that. Even if that isn't the case, it would be a big ratings bonanza and it would probably be a real good show. So I can't see why it wouldn't happen and I assume they're just trying to figure out when.

Here's Buster Keaton doing a candy bar commercial in the sixties when he was not a young man. Watch the physical move he makes when he is "mooed" off the platform…

Back in this post, I mentioned Johnie's Coffee Shop, an L.A. landmark that is no longer really a restaurant. It was a restaurant but now it just plays one on television. TV and film companies rent it out as a filming location and it's been in more movies than Michael Caine. Our friends over at Eater LA recently got a tour inside the place.

While you're over at that fine site, they have a list up of 26 Classic Restaurants Every Angeleno Must Try. Here's a rundown on them from my Lifetime Angeleno perspective…

• Philippe the Original — Terrific (and cheap) dip sandwiches in a very old building with very old prices and very old clientele. Fortunately, the food is fresh so any time I'm in the area…
• Cole's — Great old quasi-cafeteria but in a bad neighborhood with (sometimes) very bad parking. You can get much the same chow easier at Philippe but try Cole's some time just for the feeling of history that comes with the food.
• Musso & Frank Grill — Billed as the oldest surviving restaurant in Hollywood, this is a superior place to eat steaks, chops, seafood, chicken pot pie when they have it…almost anything except the Italian dishes, which I find substandard. Any item on the daily menu with the word "braised" in it will be delicious and your waiter, who is not an unemployed actor, will be super-efficient.
• Dan Tana's — Never been here. Keep meaning to. Haven't gotten around to it.
• Polo Lounge — Every time I've been there, it's because someone important insisted on having a breakfast or lunch meeting there. That's a good reason to go and as far as I can tell, the only one.
• Tam O'Shanter — Another oldie, this one run by the folks who own Lawry's. I used to love the place, then I had several bad meals in a row there and dealt with Management that responded to my polite complaints with the attitude of "We're a legendary restaurant and no one else is complaining so you're wrong." So I now love the place from afar.
• Pacific Dining Car — Not unlike Tam O'Shanter. Loved it. Had an ugly time with a Manager who insisted I was wrong about an inedible steak — and who scolded our server who sided with me. I always thought the Pacific Dining Car was overpriced for what you get and that visit ended my love affair with it.
• Formosa Cafe — This used to be a fun, folksy place to get traditional Chinese Food. Then one day, apparently under new management, it went all trendy and "Asian Fusion" on me and stopped offering anything I wanted to eat. So off my list it went. I don't think people go there to eat, anyway. They go to drink and if they're hungry, eat.
• Taix French Restaurant — Never been there. I'm indifferent to French restaurants so I've never been motivated to try this one.
• El Cholo — Never been there. I rarely see anything I want to eat (or given my food allergies, can eat) at Mexican restaurants. I've only been to a few, always under protest, and this is not one of them.
• The Galley — Decent, friendly seafood served in an environment that's usually so crowded and cramped, you want to take your entree out to the parking lot and eat it there.
• Tom Bergin's — This Irish Pub was wonderful once but it went so far down in quality, I stopped going there. So many others did as well that it closed. It's reopened under new management and I haven't been back yet.
• Pink's Hot Dogs — This world-famous hot dog stand is proof that world-famous (and a much-promoted celebrity clientele) does not equal good. It just ain't worth the long lines or cramped seating. Skooby's and Carney's (among others) have better dogs.
• Lawry's the Prime Rib — A class act all the way, and they really do serve the best Prime Rib in the business. Did I ever tell the Jack Nicholson story on this blog? I must have. Anyway, make sure you get the creamed corn and that you help yourself to the free homemade potato chips in the waiting area.
• The Apple Pan — Once, and I'd like to think forever, one of the greatest burger stands in the state. My last two visits were disappointing but I'm not ready yet to give up on the place.
• Langer's Delicatessen — Hailed by many for the best pastrami in the country. The location and limited hours make this deli less than desirable and I'm sorry…I don't think the pastrami's worth the effort. But then I prefer corned beef to pastrami anyway so maybe you don't want to listen to me on this vital topic.
• Canter's Delicatessen — My favorite deli…and it's open 24 hours. If you ever have a cold, go there, eat the Chicken-in-the-Pot and you'll be cured in 20 minutes.
• Taylor's Prime Steak House — Good, folksy place to get a decent steak without having to take out a Reverse Mortgage on your home. Not a good location, though and you may have to climb many stairs to your table.
• The Fountain Coffee Room — Never been there. Never heard of it before this.
• Yamashiro — High up (too high for me) on a mountain top, it serves eclectic Japanese cuisine that looks to be too eclectic for my tastes and allergies. So I've never been.
• Dominick's — Like Dan Tana's, I hear good things about it and keep meaning to try it.
• Dresden — Never been there. Dresden is right across the street from Il Capriccio, which is one of my favorite restaurants in the world…so when I'm dining in the area, that's where I'm dining.
• Du-Par's — This is a historic chain of coffee shops that's terrific for Breakfast, so-so for other meals. They're open 24 hours but at 3 AM, I prefer Canter's.
• The Original Pantry — If you're Downtown and you want a decent economy steak, it's fine…and fun. They're also open 24 hours but beware: When you sit down, they try to serve you cole slaw without even asking. The best thing I can say for the Pantry is that even that doesn't keep me away.
• Casa Vega — Another Mexican restaurant I've never been to.
• Tito's Tacos — Need I explain?

If I'd made up this list, it would have had most of these places plus the original Tommy's, Carney's, The Palm, The Grill on the Alley, Andre's, a couple of stands in Farmers Market, maybe Zankou Chicken, Nate 'n Al's, The Smoke House…I'm not sure where to stop because I'm not sure of the geographic restraints of the list. But it ain't a bad list even if some of those places do serve cole slaw.

Here's another interview with me in which I talk about some of what I've done lately. I don't talk a lot about this stuff here so if you care, there it is.

One thing: It says on a caption there, "Mark Evanier co-created Groo with Sergio Aragonés." No. Sergio created Groo. Mark came along as of the second story. If I'm going to go around pointing out when co-creators are not properly acknowledged, I have to correct when I am wrongly credited. Fair's fair.

Well, Dame Edna was extremely Dame Edna. The show I saw last night is being advertised as the last-ever tour for comic actor Barry Humphries as his outrageous character. The last time I saw him in the same building, it was, too. At the end, last time, he took a bow as himself and that seemed to confirm it. This time, he again came out sans drag as himself again and this time, he said some things in a curtain speech that cast doubts on the assumption that we'd seen the last of Edna. So I don't know and he may not, either.

Before that, we got two hours of the colorful Grand Dame standing on stage insulting the audience. Carolyn and I had great seats in the fifth row. That's the place you want to be because you're close enough to see Edna's great expressions but Edna's gaze — "her" ability to pick out people to pick on — doesn't seem to extend past the fourth row. He/she did have harsh words for the "paupers" who bought the cheap tickets in the second balcony but they were demeaned collectively, not individually.

Edna occasionally sang a tune assisted by a pianist and four back-up performers but otherwise, it was just "her" talking and often outrageously funny. I don't usually agree with the L.A. Times drama reviewer, Charles McNulty, but I felt as he did that while the show was very amusing, there were moments when it felt much too long.

Humphries is a great improviser, which is to say that while most of the show is written, he obviously doesn't follow his own text precisely and as he interacts with the audience, things are said that couldn't possibly be planned. With such performers, you almost yearn for something to go wrong so you can see what they do with it. At one point in Act Two, Edna brings a man and a woman (strangers to each other) up on stage and proceeds to unite them in the Dame Edna Everage version of Holy Matrimony. Much of that seemed quite spontaneous and hilarious…though you do get the idea that nothing could possibly happen up there that Edna couldn't handle…and probably hasn't handled before.

The bit was supposed to be buttoned by Edna making a live phone call to the mother of the "groom" to inform her of her son's marriage but that didn't happen. At first, it seemed the problem was that the mother was in Mexico and the phone couldn't call Mexico. Then they switched to calling the gent's sister and it seemed he didn't have the number right. Then it turned out the phone simply wasn't working properly at all and the call had to be abandoned. Edna greeted each new screw-up as something to be milked for all possible humor…and even in the fifth row, you could see that Humphries was pleased he had something to play with.

At the end, Edna and her dancers threw gladiolas to the front rows and led us in the choreographed raising of them in salute to…her. We were encouraged to take photos, tweet and blog in celebration of her — I couldn't blog in the allotted time — and it was quite a lovely ending if, indeed, it was her "Final Farewell Tour." If it turns out there's another, I'm going to feel a little baited 'n' switched…but I'll probably go again then, anyway. One of these has to be his/her last time around. And anyway, Edna is still very funny.

Bob Elisberg writes that he thinks he has the two Rex Harrison clips mixed up. The first one, he says, is probably from when Harrison was originally doing My Fair Lady and the second is from his 1981 tour. They're both still fascinating to see.

I'm going out for the evening. If you need me, I'll be down at the Ahmanson Theater where, for the very last time apparently, I'll be seeing this person…

In case any of you don't know, I operate a couple of other websites, most of which I haven't updated since the Bush Administration…and we're talking George Herbert Walker here. One that I do update every few months is www.oldlarestaurants.com, which is a site for my remembrances of now-defunct restaurants in Los Angeles…although sometimes, I eulogize one of them and then it becomes funct again.

I keep track of my city's restaurant news at an excellent site called Eater LA (there are other Eaters for other cities) and they're currently running a series of pieces about this town's oldest places to dine. In connection with that, they recently did this interview with me. Just in case you can't find anything else to read on the Internet.

I'm cribbing this from my pal Bob Elisberg, who found it online. It's Rex Harrison performing "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face" from My Fair Lady…twice. The first part is from an appearance he made in 1981 promoting the "farewell" tour he was then on with a revival of the show. I saw him at the Pantages in Hollywood then and…well, it was great to be able to say "I saw Rex Harrison do My Fair Lady" but neither he nor that production really sparkled as the original must have. He forgot a lot of lines, including part of the lyric in this particular song, and there was a certain lack of energy throughout the whole show.

Anyway, the most interesting part of this video is the second rendition of the song, which is from the original 1957 production. Today, it's not difficult for someone to take a camera into a theater, even unauthorized, and capture a performance. Back then, this must have been a bulky 16mm movie camera using existing light and I'd be fascinated to know who did it and how. (Actually, I think I know who did it and I'll verify that next time I run into the guy…)

One interesting point about this song. Harrison was an unusual musical comedy performer. He was not trained to be one and he did it with his own approach, which was just to start singing and let the orchestra follow him, instead of the other way around. As a result, it is said he never did any number exactly the same way as the night before. When they made the movie, its makers found it didn't work to have him pre-record his songs and then lip-sync in front of the cameras so they worked out a way he could sing them live on the set…and apparently, each take was quite different in both phrasing and physical action. Here's how he did it one time in '81 and one time before that in '57…