I continue to just peek now and then at the news and what I see is amazing. I hadn't thought my opinion of Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and the whole Fox News gang could get any lower but, sure enough…
It's looking like there's an interoffice battle going on there to see who can do the most damage to the network's reputation and its chances in the Dominion lawsuit. I know they profit off a kind of viewer who wants to be lied-to and told that Trump won, January 6 was a love-in, Joe Biden thinks he's president but Donald is secretly running the country while at the same time, everything is a mess and all that's because of Joe's actions, etc. But there's gotta come a time when those viewers will go elsewhere for their Alternative Facts…
…but maybe not. There are still people in this world who think Nixon was innocent. If you want to see ten minutes of Jake Tapper doing a good job of debunking the current fibbing, click here. Still, there are sentient human beings who could watch those ten minutes and not be convinced.
And that's probably all I'll have to say about the news this week. I really can't take a lot of this. Posting on more important topics (like old comedians and comic books) may be sparse here for the next few days but as always, I will eventually make it up to you.
On this British talk show, John Cleese was confronted with three men who kinda looked and/or kinda sounded like his character, Basil Fawlty. He had to guess which one did the impersonation professionally. Can you?
I agree with this article by Matthew Crowley: The word "woke" is becoming increasingly useless since so many people use it with so many definitions…and often, definitions that are inconsistent from one instance to another. It's amazing how many polls ask about it with no stated meaning, thereby allowing respondents to define it any way they like. There are actually people who say, in effect, "I don't know what it means but I know I should oppose it."
I watch cooking videos on YouTube for the same reason a lot of people like to watch videos of daring stunts, incredible athletic feats or porn: To see others do things they themselves will never do. I used to be a passable cook but over the years, I have turned into a very poor one because, I suspect, I don't have the patience to do things right. Seems to me that you can't be a great or even a good chef if you don't enjoy the chopping, the measuring, the stirring, the braising, the frying, etc. I simply don't.
Cooking videos, at least, let me see how it's done in fifteen minutes or less because I don't watch the longer ones. I also get to see what goes into certain dishes that I might someday confront on a restaurant menu. As is oft-mentioned on this blog, I have many food allergies and it's crucial that I know what's in something before I decide whether or not to consume it. Cooking videos help.
But two things bug me about them. One is the ending of most where the chef has completed the cooking process and it's time for him or her to taste it and tell us how absolutely fabulous and wonderful and delicious and perfect it is. I'm also bothered by writers who tell me that about their own scripts like they're unbiased observers.
And secondly, an awful lot of cooking videos go like this: "Today, I'm going to show you how I can make a better Whopper than Burger King" or "I'm going to make better Panda Express Beijing Beef than Panda Express" or "I'm going to make a better Arby's Beef 'n Cheddar than Arby's."
First off: Why?
You're trying to replicate and improve on something that was designed to be made cheap and fast. All you have to do is spend more time and money on it. I'm sure you can make a better quarter-pounder than McDonald's just by putting in more than a quarter-pound of beef and buying higher-quality meat.
But if I want one, will yours cost me $5.49 and can I be eating it and an order of great fries in ten minutes? Can I grab one by detouring through a drive-thru on my way to somewhere else? Can I get your burger in a Happy Meal that includes a toy? Bettering fast food is aiming at a real low target. We who buy this stuff buy it for value and convenience more than great quality.
Oh — and because we don't feel like cooking. Lately, I don't and if I did, I don't think I'd spend the time and effort to whip up something I can get with a six-minute car ride or have DoorDash deliver. I've sometimes gotten delivery from Five Guys in fifteen minutes.
I can't make me a burger and fries that good in fifteen minutes, especially since my kitchen is not set up for it. You, maker of online cooking videos, spend hours every day in yours so when you say, "You can make this from items you probably already have in your kitchen," that's true…for you. When you tell me I need to add a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar to something, that's a trip to the market for me…
…and a whole bottle of balsamic vinegar (minus one tablespoon) that will then sit in my cupboard taking up space until months/years from now when I throw it away. YouTube Chefs keep saying they never allow "unitaskers" (implements only good for doing one thing) in their kitchens but for folks like me, a tin of corn starch is a unitasker. Fresh nutmeg is a unitasker. A non-stick muffin tin is a unitasker. I'm just never going to cook so often that it could be otherwise.
I've gained valuable knowledge watching cooking videos. I've learned what I can't do and what not to eat. They're very valuable to me…just not in the way their makers intend.
The controlled demolition of the comic strip Dilbert's client list has been the subject of much recent commentary. For a solid overview of what happened, read this piece by Michael Cavna and Samantha Chery. For some observations on the racial/racist aspect of all this, read Lucian K. Truscott IV.
In the meantime, Dilbert creator Scott Adams is sounding increasingly like a guy who has a lot of needless issues. People who aren't like you are only a problem if you insist on getting upset that they aren't like you.
As you may know, I love "old" Las Vegas, back when it was run by The Mob or by guys who wanted to project the image of being mobbed-up. There's a lot to love about current Vegas but not nearly as much.
Las Vegas was 75 years old in 1980 and that's when the video below was made. It was produced for the B.B.C. and it's all about the town turning 75. You'll see a lot of buildings that ain't there no more and there are also interviews with Liberace, Wayne Newton, Neil Sedaka and others…
I didn't see Chris Rock's much-talked-about special the other night but I think, among the various news clips, I saw all of his verbal slapback at Will Smith. So I guess the next question is whether Smith is going to try and let this die or if he's going to somehow try for some sort of peace treaty. The various apologies I've heard outta Will Smith sounded like he was most concerned about the matter harming the box office take on his movies…but maybe that's not proving to be a concern.
Here briefly is my usual complaint about folks forecasting the next presidential election way before it's time. Articles that say Trump can't be denied the G.O.P. nomination or even the White House again are saying that so many factors — including but not limited to indictments or even convictions — can't change the trajectory of this election. I don't think that's the case.
A number of folks have written me to say they had bad experiences at the Hotel Pennsylvania the last decade or two. That's not surprising and it's all a piece of the decline of what was once a great place to stay. By the way, did you know that the hotel had a working TV studio in it the last few years? Comedy Central did a lot of shows — including one of Jordan Klepper's — from what had previously been a ballroom at the Hotel Pennsylvania.
Lastly for now: We're eighteen days from the first day of WonderCon down at the Anaheim Convention Center just a snowball's throw from the Disneyland Matterhorn. Badges are still available and the schedule will be up soon. I'm still planning on being there and hosting a few panels. They're all set but I haven't figured out yet how to get down to Anaheim. Knee problems are preventing me from driving these days and my friend Amber, who's coming with me, also has a problem in that department. We may be in for very expensive Uber rides there and back.
Guess I'm in a New York mood today. Here's a profile of Utopia Bagels, a firm which claims to make 100,000 bagels by hand each week. I'm a little skeptical of the numbers but their bagels sure look good in this video.
Alas, I'll probably never taste a freshly-made Utopia bagel. I never have any other reason to visit Queens and I sure ain't making a special trip there just for a bagel, no matter how wonderful it might be. They presumably have them in some Manhattan shops and I can order them shipped out this way…but notice I said "freshly-made." It has been my observation that a great bagel is only a great bagel for about 18 hours, 24 at most. Any older than that and they're all about the same.
Right now, the Goldbelly company will ship me a baker's dozen for $59.95, which works out to…well, you can do the math. They'll take 72 hours to get here and by the time I eat the last few, they'll be indistinguishable from any bagel I can buy in L.A.
So I shall just gaze longingly at this video. And I'll marvel at how if you were making a movie and casting someone to play the guy in charge of this place, you couldn't do any better than Scott…
The first time I ever went to New York was in the summer of 1959. My mother took me on a trip to that city and then on to Hartford and then Boston. In New York, we stayed at a hotel on Seventh Avenue between 50th and 51st Streets. It was then called either the Taft Hotel or the Hotel Taft depending on where you looked. At the age of nine, I found that very confusing. These days, it's called The Michelangelo.
The second time I went to New York was the summer of 1970. My then-partner Steve Sherman and I flew back there on Sunday, June 28 and we stayed at the Statler-Hilton, which was located at 401 Seventh Avenue across from Pennsylvania Station and Madison Square Garden. It opened in 1919 as the Hotel Pennsylvania and changed names several times but it was back to being the Hotel Pennsylvania when it closed for good on April Fool's Day of 2020.
There was much talk of preservation and refurbishing and renovation both before and after the closure but as The New York Times explains…
Bit by bit, floor by floor, the building that once rose 22 stories over Penn Station is shrinking before the city's very eyes. The black netting draped over its ever-diminishing brick is like a magician's handkerchief; once removed, it will reveal — nothing.
Behold: The Great Disappearing Act of the Hotel Pennsylvania.
Steve and I picked the Statler-Hilton because our first comic book convention — The 1970 Comic Art Convention — was being held in its penthouse meeting rooms on July 3, 4 and 5. At the time, Steve and I were assisting Jack Kirby with his then-forthcoming new creations for DC Comics. We were also working with a crooked (as we later found out) operation called Marvelmania International that was selling Marvel-based merchandise…or as we now call it, "merch."
So we spent the days before the con visiting the offices of DC Comics, Marvel Comics, MAD magazine, Steve Ditko and a few other businesses or people. Beginning on or around July 1, we had another roommate with the arrival of our friend, comic book artist Mike Royer.
Mike flew to Manhattan and bunked with us at the Statler-Hilton while he tried to secure work from a couple of New York publishers. Kirby was hoping that some or all of this work for DC would be inked by Mike but the folks at the company said no. In fact, they said "no" pretty firmly. That was never ever going to happen…
…until it did about a year later. One thing I learned early about creative fields is that "Absolutely not" usually means "Absolutely not at this moment" and "never in a million years" could expire as quickly as in a week or two. I was once told by a senior executive at Hanna-Barbera that I would never work for the studio again and that I was banned forever from the building. This ban was firm, absolute and in full force for about fourteen minutes.
In later years, I was a guest a couple of times at comic conventions at what was by then, back to being the Hotel Pennsylvania. When I was such a guest, I stayed there for the duration of the con and any days before or after I wished to spend in Manhattan. When I went to New York and was not attending a con at the Hotel Pennsylvania, I usually stayed in or around Times Square. That was a lot closer to places I was going on those trips — places like publishers' offices or Broadway theaters.
Still, my last few trips east, I thought about staying at the Hotel Pennsylvania…and not just because it was cheaper. Despite its age and all the wear and tear, it was a fascinating place to stay. So much history. So many interesting stores and ballrooms and tourists. The wi-fi seemed to be powered by a hamster on a treadmill and the rooms didn't seem to have been cleaned since my 1970 stay but I didn't care. Of all the hotels I've stayed at in New York, the Hotel Pennsylvania felt the most like staying in New York.
And now, it's vanishing floor by floor. Every floor on which I ever stayed may be gone by now.
I am not one of those people who believes that every place about which any person ever had a fond memory must be preserved forever. Old buildings are often torn down to make way for much better buildings…and it's possible that what will eventually be at that address will be much, much better.
I just remember that the first few times I took my dear friend Carolyn to New York — a city in which she'd lived for a couple decades — we stayed in fancy places in or around Times Square. And then one year, we stayed at the Hotel Pennsylvania because of a convention there and she was so much happier. It wasn't that she hadn't liked the more modern ones but our first night at the Penn, she turned to me and said what I just said above about how it really felt, for all the right reasons, like being in New York.
That's not a reason to preserve an ancient hotel that might eventually have fallen down out of sheer old age. It's just a reason to remember it fondly…because I remember Carolyn fondly.
A group called Postmodern Jukebox favors us with their rendition of the theme from The Flintstones…with a little Andy Griffith Show for reasons which should be obvious.1
1I often say "…for reasons which should be obvious" when I have no friggin' idea what those reasons are.
I've received an amazing number of messages about Herbert "Tiny Tim" Khaury, the subject of this recent posting here. If I post them all here, this will turn into a Tiny Tim website so I'll just share this one from my buddy Howard Johnson…
Tiny Tim was a friend of my good friend, improv icon Del Close.
Del used to tell me about Mr. Tim. Around the latter part of 1958, Del first met him when he was working as a fire-eater at Hubert's Museum and Flea Circus in New York. At that time, Tiny Tim was working there as Larry Love, the Human Canary.
Del once described him as "…not so much a singer as a haunted house. He'd turn into people like early Bing Crosby or Tex Ritter. 'Cause this falsetto voice is only one of the many personalities haunting the caverns of Mr. Tim's mind. He got his start playing lesbian bathhouses in New York…so he basically thought of himself as a lesbian. That's why he wore makeup, to make himself more attractive to the ladies…"
Hugh Romney convinced him to come to L.A. to appear in The Phantom Cabaret Strikes Again. (He and Romney had previously been part of the original Phantom Cabaret in New York.) He arrived with nothing but twenty cans of Popeye Spinach. He stayed in Romney's guest house (Close was also a guest), where he used to take 2 to 3 hour showers.
The theater was across the street from the Hollywood Ranch Market. On his last night there, he had so endeared himself to the management of the market that they let him sing over the public address system. According to Romney, "There wasn't a dry eye in the whole place as he sang 'Old Shep' and 'I Didn't Raise My Boy to Be a Soldier.'"
After that, Mr. Tim went on to national fame and fortune thanks to Laugh-In and The Tonight Show.
Fast forward to December 11, 1993. I was working as Marketing Director for Moondog's Comics in Chicago, where one of my duties was to produce and host Moondog's Pop Culture Radio Show for Gary Colabuono. Del would occasionally co-host with me, which was always fun, and we had pop culture and comic book guests on each show. That week, our guests included Don Simpson, Joe Quesada, and Jimmy Palmiotti, along with my wife, Laurie Bradach. And somehow, thankfully, we booked Tiny Tim.
I picked up Del (who only lived a block away from me), and we drove out to the suburban hotel where Mr. Tim was staying. I met him in the lobby, where he brought his ukulele in a brown paper shopping bag, and an overpowering scent of a very strong cologne. He was very effusive and grateful to be appearing on the show, and he was very surprised and happy to be reunited with Del; the two hadn't seen each other in nearly 30 years. ("Oh, Mr. Close! Mr. Close!") He called everyone "Mister" or "Miss," even when it was just the three of us, so I took a cue from Del and called him "Mr. Tim."
The ride from the hotel to the radio station was one long, joyous reunion with his peer; I only wish I'd had a tape recorder running. I recall the two of them discussing ex-wives, mind-blowing when I suddenly realized he was married on The Tonight Show. Mr. Tim noted ruefully that "The marriage was over as soon as they turned off the TV cameras."
We got to the radio station and proceeded with a jam-packed show. Del sat in on the interview, and Mr. Tim played a few songs on his uke (he didn't attempt "Tiptoe Through the Tulips," as he didn't seem like he wanted to attempt the high notes). But it was a very memorable program. He told the story of owning the first 20 issues of Captain America comics when he was younger, and losing them when he gave them to a girl he was trying to impress. I had known about this in advance (it may have been noted in a Marvel Bullpen Bulletins page) and so when the show had finished, I gave him some reprints of Golden Age Captain America comics, which thrilled him.
We rode back to Del's apartment and dropped him off, and I turned back to take Mr. Tim to his next appointment. For nearly the entire ride, Mr. Tim gave me a private solo concert on his uke, singing some incredibly obscure century-old songs. (Who knew that "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" had actual verses? But he knew every one of them!)
During my hours with Mr. Tim, I think everyone found him to be very intelligent, very entertaining, and he was constantly using religious epithets like "Praise God!" in every other sentence — but only off the air). There are several stories about Mr. Tim in my Del Close biography The Funniest One in the Room.
And lastly, I should point out that for the next two weeks, I thought of Mr. Tim whenever I got in my car. Because that was how long I could detect the scent of his cologne.
Several folks sent me stories that mentioned Mr. Tim's overpowering cologne, detectable even when seated in the tenth row of a performing space. But I had not known he had a relationship with Del Close, who was one of the most important people in comedy in his era. For those unfamiliar with Mr. Close, I have put on an Amazon link on its title above. A very fine book.
I think the main takeaway from all this is that Tiny Tim was more than a guy some TV shows had on so they could laugh at a human oddity. He was a serious performer who often enchanted audiences with his ukulele, voice and knowledge of music from the first part of the twentieth century. It's nice to realize how popular he became for a while there.
Here are ten songs you know but you don't know their names — except that I knew seven of them. This video will be fun for folks who like to identify classical music and/or enjoy having a strange man stare at them. And stare and stare and stare and stare…
First off: Thank you all for the lovely birthday wishes that were sent my way yesterday on social media and even some antisocial media. I do not feel 71 years old except sometimes around the knees. And I certainly do not fit the image I had of being 71 back when I was much younger. I would thank you all individually but that would take me until I'm 72 and then I'd have to start sending out thank you notes about that birthday and that would take until I was 73…
Second off: I have a very busy day ahead so this may be the extent of the posting here day. For those of you who don't know, that's what it means when I post a picture of a can of Campbell's Cream of Mushroom Soup. This is a well-known ancient custom that began in the year 1412 A.D. in The Ming Dynasty except that they used sesame cakes instead of mushroom soup and they posted on Gingko Trees instead of on the Internet. Otherwise, it's exactly the same tradition.
I've been talking a lot about Phil Silvers here and a reader of this site named Robert Atendido suggested that I link you to a piece I wrote about him here. I'm going to save your mouse a click and quote it below.
Before I do, I think I should explain a little about what's the big deal with Phil Silvers? Simple: I thought he was of the greatest comic actors who ever lived. I also have a personal "thing" about him. Two life-changing moments for me were when I first saw the movie, It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World in 1963 and when I saw a live production of the musical, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum in 1970.
Phil Silvers was the star of the second one and he was in and stole much of the first one.
And I think the show in which he played Sgt. Ernest T. Bilko was one of the five-or-so best comedy shows ever on TV. It was a show that had (usually) great writing and a superb supporting cast, but it was about about Phil Silvers in a way that no other TV series ever was about its lead performer. Here's an excerpt from the time I spent with him…
One of the more thrilling afternoons of my life came about when I had a brunch-interview with the great Phil Silvers. It took place at Nate 'n Al's delicatessen in Beverly Hills in 1982, a little less than three years before he passed away.
Expecting it to last an hour, I only brought along about 90 minutes of tape, but Mr. Silvers was in a talkative mood. This was in spite of the lingering effects of a stroke that had thickened his speech and created odd holes in his memory. He could recall the name of the landlady at a hotel he'd lived in for two weeks while touring in burlesque, but not his current phone number. He could (and did) rattle off whole pages of dialogue from plays he'd done on Broadway decades earlier but had no memory whatsoever of The Chicken Chronicles, a movie he'd made five years before our chat.
My recorder ran out of tape long before Silvers ran out of anecdotes. Fortunately, I captured this remembrance about the "Make Way for Tomorrow" dance sequence in the 1944 film classic, Cover Girl. (I did not have to edit any questions from me out of what follows. Charmingly, Silvers did not require questions. He jumped from one topic to the next without prompting. And I just sat there and listened.)
Cover Girl was another Blinky role for me. I played the same character in every movie…Blinky. The guy who ran in in the next to last reel and said, "I got the stuff in the car." I never found out in all those movies what the stuff in the car was. Cover Girl was my first good movie. In this one, Blinky was named Genius but I was still Blinky. I was Blinky in every movie I made until I did Bilko. After that, I was Bilko in everything I did, which was fine. Bilko paid a lot better than Blinky.
We made Cover Girl at Columbia. At the time, Harry Cohn was God there. There was a different God at every studio. When you worked for M.G.M., Louis B. Mayer was God. At Columbia, it was Harry Cohn. I got along with him but no one else did. He liked me because I was a gambler. I gave him tips on horses. They always lost but he didn't blame me because to a gambler, a bad tip is better than no tip at all.
A man named Charles Vidor directed Cover Girl but from where I sat, Gene Kelly was the man in charge. He and his assistant Stanley Donen took over the choreography from the man they hired to do it. I don't remember his name but he choreographed the scenes with the chorus girls and then Kelly did everything else. Stanley Donen did some of it but it was mainly Gene. There was this song, "Make Way for Tomorrow." It was supposed to be a six minute dance down the street with Rita Hayworth and Gene dancing and leaping over trash cans and doing cartwheels. I watched them rehearse it for three days and I thought, "Thank God I don't have to do that."
The fourth day, Gene came over to me and said, "I think it would strengthen the story if you were in the number." There was a drunk who had a tiny part in it. I think it was Jack Norton, who was the drunk in any movie that had a drunk in it. I thought Gene meant I'd do a little bit like that in the number so I said, "Yes, sure, I'll do whatever you want." The next thing I know, Gene and Stanley had redesigned the whole number for three people and I was one of those three people.
He did not design it for a non-dancer, which is what I was. It was designed for Gene and Rita, who were the two best dancers in the business. I had to come up to their standard. They danced up and down stairs. I had to dance up and down stairs. They leaped over boxes. I had to leap over boxes. All the time, I'm thinking, "I'm dancing next to Gene Kelly, doing the same steps. Everybody's going to be comparing us. If we're out of step, no one's going to assume Gene's the one who's wrong." Gene was still a newcomer on screen but everyone knew he was the best dancer to come along.
It was rough. They were going to shoot it in pieces but Gene insisted we rehearse it straight through, start to end. I don't remember how long it took to learn. Rita, I think, required four weeks. It must have been longer with me but I did it. Whatever Gene and Rita did, I did, and I did it as well as they did. And Gene was right. It did strengthen the story. It was a surprise for me to be in that number and to dance it like that. When we were done shooting, I ached all over. Every muscle in my body hurt. But I felt like I could do anything.
In later years, every time I had something to do in a film or a TV show that I thought I couldn't do, I thought back to that number. And I said to myself, "If you can do that, you can do anything."
This is me again. Later, after the tape recorder was no longer running, he lamented the physical problems from his stroke and said, "If I could do that number in Cover Girl, I ought to be able to walk across the street on my own, don't you think?"
Robert Atendido also suggested that I show you the dance number under discussion. Mr. Silvers recalled it as a six-minute number but it was actually more like three. If I'd had to dance that, I'd probably think it lasted a couple of hours…but give it a watch. He really did dance it as well as Gene Kelly and Rita Hayworth…
