Category Archives: Video Links

Paul Rubin, not to be confused with the guy who plays Pee-wee Herman, is a master in the art of flying actors around on stage. Once upon a time, it used to be "Flying by Foy," an old family business that specialized in this art. Rubin started with them, then branched out on his own and he's taken the skill to (the puns are unavoidable) greater heights. Here's a little montage of his work, which has included devising and staging flying scenes for theme park shows and Broadway productions, including Cathy Rigby's Peter Pan.

Ms. Rigby, by the way, is soon to embark on her — how many is this? Ninth? Fifteenth? — farewell tour in the role. I don't care how many times she says she's going to stop doing it just so long as she doesn't stop doing it. She's really wonderful in the role…and the more she grows up, the more impressive it is that she can play a boy who doesn't grow up. She'll be hovering at Madison Square Garden in New York this December and out in La Mirada (which is probably as close as she'll get to Los Angeles) for June of 2012. I'm not sure where else she'll be soaring yet but wherever she flies, it'll probably be with the help of Paul Rubin, the man who can make performers do things like this…

Yesterday in this space, we brought you The Railrodder, the 1965 short subject that represented Buster Keaton's last real starring role in anything memorable.

As I explained twenty-five hours ago, while they were making The Railrodder, they shot a much-longer documentary about how the film was made. In it, you get to see Buster in his natural habitat: On a movie shoot, trying to figure out how to make things work. Here it is — all 55 minutes of Buster Keaton Rides Again…

One of the last films Buster Keaton appeared in was a 1965 short subject called The Railrodder. It was shot in Canada by director Gerald Potterton and in it, Keaton toured Canada from one end to the other in about 25 minutes. It's an interesting film…or at least a lot more interesting than the unworthy array of beach party movies and TV commercials that otherwise kept him employed at the time. If you've never seen it, you're in luck. The whole danged thing is embedded below.

The thing I like best about it is that the National Film Board of Canada concurrently filmed a "making of" documentary that was about twice the length of The Railrodder. It was called Buster Keaton Rides Again and it gives you a rare look at how Keaton's mind worked as a filmmaker, plus it's full of great anecdotes and great clips from his best work. That will be presented in this space tomorrow. For now, here's The Railrodder…

The latest installment of my favorite talk show…

Penn Jillette explains why he's never used drugs or alcohol…

Hey, remember that great high-def video tour of Las Vegas? Well, here's an even better one of Manhattan, shot from hotel rooms all over the city. Take this one full-screen and enjoy…

At times, we can all identify with the dog in this video and sometimes even the duck…

And here he is again, folks — Sidney Spritzer…

As you know, we love old variety acts on this blog and have enjoyed introducing you to some of the great performers of the past. Here's Gene Sheldon, who performed mime and played the banjo on every variety show of the fifties. Walt Disney was a tremendous fan of his and often employed Sheldon in the Golden Horseshoe Revue at Disneyland and even stuck him in a couple of TV shows (like Zorro) and movies (like Babes in Toyland).

When I was a kid, my parents took me to a Disney Night at the Hollywood Bowl where performers from Disney projects and costumed characters from Disneyland performed. The two highlights I remember vividly were a Zorro sketch involving Henry Calvin (Sgt. Garcia) and a man in a Zorro costume…and Gene Sheldon, who came out and held that huge audience captive with his pantomime and banjo playing. To those in the cheap seats, he must have been the size of an ant and there were no big projection screens then…but the crowd still loved him.

Here he is on Stage Show, which was a TV show from 1954 to 1956 hosted at first by Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, then later by Jack Carter. This is from the Dorsey days and you'll get to hear Tommy Dorsey introduce the act as "Gene Nelson," then make a point of mentioning the correct name at the end. I'm sorry Sheldon doesn't play the banjo in this clip because that was usually his big finish…

Here's a follow-up to yesterday's video embed. It's from the same Disneyland ceremony to dedicate a Main Street window display in honor of Richard and Robert Sherman. Richard plays one of the songs they wrote for Mary Poppins — the one that was Walt's favorite…

In March of last year, Disneyland unveiled a little tribute to Robert and Richard Sherman, the two gentlemen responsible for so many memorable songs heard in that park and elsewhere. It was a window on Main Street that now features their names. As part of the dedication ceremony, they brought out two actors (sadly, unidentified) to portray characters from the old Carousel of Progress, for which the Sherman Brothers wrote the music. Here then is a little medley of some of the Shermans' Greatest Hits…

Some of you know my pal Will Ryan as one of the top cartoon voice actors in the field. Did you know he's also a singing cowboy? I must admit that for years, I didn't. Then one day, he and his musical posse began turning up in clubs and theaters in Southern California, warbling like a modern-day Gene Autry. Below, we have a little sample of them in action…Will Ryan and the Cactus County Cowboys.

If'n you like what you hear, they'll be playing on Thursday, June 16th at a watering hole called the Coffee Gallery Backstage in Altadena, CA. You can go to that there site and order tickets…and get this:

June is National June Foray Month. I didn't know that but Will says so and a singing cowboy never lies. The Cactus County Cowboys are not only dedicating their show to the First Lady of Cartoon Voices, they're going to have her there as a Special Guest Star…in person, no less. Sounds like a hoot and a holler to me. Here are these latter day Sons of the Pioneers in action…

Over at the intersection of La Cienega and Beverly here in Los Angeles, there used to be a little amusement park…and whenever we drove by it, I could never figure out exactly what it was called. All the signs were different. Maybe it was Beverly Park. Maybe it was Kiddyland or Kiddieland. It may have been Ponyland. I later learned that Ponyland, where tots could ride a live pony around a little track, was a separate, adjacent business. Everyone, however, seemed to think it was all one operation.

As amusement parks go, it was pretty standard. There was nothing there that you couldn't see or ride at a jillion other amusement parks and it was all for the very young — no thrill rides, nothing for teenagers. It is said Walt Disney visited the place in the years before Disneyland and it became the model for what he did not want his new amusement park to be.

The place seemed to thrive on two kinds of business. One was birthday parties and the other was divorced fathers who had custody of their kids and didn't know where else to take them. Since my parents never divorced, I only went there once — to a birthday party where I had a miserable time. They also made some bucks renting the place out for location shoots and it was in a lot of TV shows and movies, its film appearances including Three on a Couch with Jerry Lewis and A Guide for the Married Man with Walter Matthau and Robert Morse. In that one, Matthau and Morse take their kids there and discuss the joys of adultery while the toddlers toddle. Just the place. (You can see a few seconds of that footage in the trailer at this link.)

The video below is a collection of someone's home movies over several years. It says the park closed in 1974 and I'm not sure that's right. I remember taking a date to see the movie Equus at a matinee at the Writers Guild Theater and passing that corner on the way home. I remember because both of us, having just watched a film wherein horses were blinded, shuddered at the sight of Ponyland. That would have been in '77…but perhaps it was closed down then and they just hadn't started clearing the land for the new business which opened on that land in 1982. If you know L.A., you probably know what they built there but if you don't, I'll let you find out as the punch line to this little flashback…

Johnny Carson chats with Kermit the Frog…

I linked to a short, fuzzy excerpt from this before but today, we bring you a better copy of the whole thing, which runs 25 minutes. It's Shenanigans, a game show for kids that ran on ABC on Saturday mornings in 1964 and 1965. The host was Stubby Kaye, the announcer was Kenny Williams and the whole show was an indirect commercial for Milton-Bradley games, interrupted occasionally by direct commercials for Milton-Bradley games.

The series had a long genesis that started on local TV in New York with a much-less-elaborate kids' game show called Shenanigans, hosted and produced by a man named Bob Quigley. Mr. Quigley later moved from in front of the camera to behind, partnering with a gent named Merrill Heatter to produce game shows. One of their first successes was with a show for CBS called Video Village which had contestants running around on a giant game board. Kenny Williams was its announcer, as well. It aired from 1960 to 1962. For part of that time, there was a Saturday morning version called either Video Village Jr. or Kideo Village. As I recall, TV Guide gave it one name and the show seemed to bear the other…then they switched and TV Guide had the name that had been on the show and the show had the name that had been in TV Guide.

Two years later, Heatter-Quigley retooled the kids' version into the show you see before you which used Quigley's old title. I liked Mr. Kaye a lot and the way he sang the title song. This was one of the last game shows ever produced with live music on stage. (I wonder why in the age of synthesizers, no one has tried that again.) I thought the game itself was kinda silly and at times, condescending to children. Still, it's sad to hear that most of the episodes of this program are forever lost. I'm told only two of 'em still exist but this is the only one I've seen around…