Here's my pal Ronn Lucas a year or two ago on David Letterman's show. Ronn is one of those guys who does an act and you find yourself thinking, "Jeez…nobody could do this any better." He did the musical finale Friday night in his performance at the Magic Castle and seeing it live in a small showroom without microphones was utterly astonishing.
This clip is a tiny bit out of sync but it's still watchable. It reminds me of a time years ago when we were in a coffee shop at the old Flamingo Hotel in Laughlin, Nevada. Ronn was telling me how he'd been practicing and further perfecting a feat he sometimes does in his act — talking out of sync. His lips move ahead of his voice.To demonstrate, when the waitress came over, he ordered that way and I wish you could have seen the expression on her face. She looked at me as if to say, "What's wrong with your friend?" and I explained he watches a lot of old movies. She thought for a second and then said, "Ohhhhh," as if that explained it.
Here's Ronn and his pal Scorch appearing as part of Ventriloquist Week on The Late Show…
In 1970, having hosted The Tonight Show for a then-amazing seven years, Johnny Carson sat down with Phil Donahue for an interview.This is about 40 minutes of that conversation (it cuts off before the end) and it's fascinating — especially, as with the Steve Jobs interview I just mentioned, since we know the subsequent history.There they are, talking about if Johnny can possibly host that program for another two or three years…and here we are, well aware he did for another 23. Donahue's callers and audience members ask some fairly lame questions but there are some good ones in there, too.This is in three parts which should play one after the other in the little player I've embedded below…
I've already written here about the wonderful Dick Van Dyke Show salute last Saturday evening at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood. Here's about five minutes of it as shot by someone who had a much better seat than I did. This is part of Carl Reiner's explanation of how the series came to be…
And then later in the festivities, Mr. Van Dyke and his musical group The Vantastix, sang the theme song. The song was written by Earle Hagen as an instrumental but later Morey Amsterdam took it upon himself to write lyrics. They were never published anywhere but Dick had a copy…
This runs 38 minutes. It's a 1985 special that Penn & Teller did for PBS featuring routines they did then, one or two of which are still in their active repertoire. I remember seeing this when it first aired…and I still have a tape of it on Beta.
I had previously seen them live in a local club that was kind of a pick-up joint…the sort of place where no one cares much what's on stage; only with who they might be able to take home after the show. I think a friend of mine and I were the only ones laughing but we laughed enough to make up for the rest of the crowd. Not long after, I began to see them on TV shows and it was this special that convinced me they were going to be around for a while. Even though the whole program was obviously made for like $35, it's a nice little show. It's in three parts which should play one after the other in the little player I've embedded below…
Here's two minutes of Dean and Frank having fun with a song from Guys & Dolls. They did these numbers singing live with a live orchestra and usually there was little or no rehearsal. You can spot each of them looking often at cue cards with the lyrics…and not knowing where to look when the other is singing even though there's only one camera on them. In some of the numbers on The Dean Martin Show — not this one — you can spot Dino giving little hand signals to indicate that he needs to have the audio playback (the band was in another studio) made louder or that the cue cards aren't being flipped quickly enough. Another performer might have stopped the number, had them make the adjustment and then started over. But on Dean's show, they liked to get it in one take, especially when Frank's limo was parked outside with the motor idling.
I watch this and two thoughts come to mind. One is "Do you ever see numbers like this on television anymore?" How often do they just stick two singers in front of one camera and have them sing live with no other production values, no video tricks, no dancers or sets or anything? I can't think of when I've seen that lately. I can't think of anyone these days who could pull it off like Dean, Frank or certain other performers of their era.
And the second thing is that — and I know this is probably just me — I find myself liking Frank Sinatra less and less. Yes, yes: I know he is the most acclaimed pop vocalist of his generation and that I am vastly outnumbered in this opinion…and I will also concede that his popularity was not built on goofing-around numbers like this one but on his records. But almost every time these days I hear one of them, which is like every time I'm in an Italian restaurant, I find myself thinking he sounds insincere and that the voice does not connect with what he's singing, like an actor who cares about how he delivers the line, not what the line is about. I even listened to a number of once-favorite Sinatra recordings here at home not long ago while not eating linguini, and I kept thinking, "Gee, what did I ever like about this guy?"
I guess my tastes are just changing. I stopped liking In-N-Out Burgers and now I'm losing my fondness for Sinatra. By this time next year, I'll probably be putting down Creamy Tomato Soup, Laurel & Hardy and Jack Kirby. Anyway, here's about half a Rat Pack…
Here's a clip of Woody Allen from back in the days when he did stand-up.This was taped in the U.K. for some sort of show there in, they say, 1965. It runs a little over ten minutes with one or two jump-cut edits and if you don't have time for the whole thing, know that he does a version of the Moose story starting just before the seven-minute mark…
When Penn & Teller perform at the Rio in Las Vegas these days, they do a trick called "Helium" that involves Teller escaping from a large trash bag full of that gas. During that feat, Penn takes a flash picture of the audience. Here's a year or so worth of those photos set to the Penn & Teller theme. My friend Mickey Paraskevas and I are in there somewhere…
Nine minutes and fourteen seconds of people in movies telling each other to shut up.There's some coarse language in this and if you don't like it, shut up.
We interrupt this weblog for a commercial featuring my pal Neil Gaiman. It's shrewd of Dark Horse Comics to try and tap into that all-important Siamese Twin demographic…
We all know about Product Placement; how a fee is paid and suddenly, a product is featured in a scene in a new movie or TV show that's currently in production. Well, it might interest you to know what it's being done in old movies and TV shows, too. Current products are being digitally inserted…
