"Uncle Jimmy" Weldon (as he liked to be called) died last Thursday at the age of 99. Folks around my age who grew up in Los Angeles remember him as the host of Cartooneroony — I don't guarantee that spelling — a Monday-Friday afternoon kid show on KCOP Channel 13 locally. It was also known as The Webster Webfoot Show, named for a little duck puppet with which Jimmy performed a ventriloquist act. Actually, Jimmy and Webster did local kids' shows in many cities, sometimes concurrently. Webster couldn't fly but Jimmy could — in a private plane via which he sometimes commuted, doing a morning show in, say, Fresno and an afternoon show in L.A.

His Channel 13 gig gave him exposure in 1959 when Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera were looking for a new voice for a baby duck character of theirs. The baby duck under various names had appeared now and then in Tom & Jerry cartoons they'd done for MGM and then when they started their own studio, the duck popped up as a supporting player usually called (though not onscreen) Iddy Biddy Buddy or Itty Bitty Buddy. A comedian named Red Coffey — often spelled "Red Coffee" — had always done the duck voice for Bill and Joe. In 1959 when they renamed the duck Yakky Doodle and planned to star him in cartoons on the new Yogi Bear Show, Mr. Coffey was too often outta town on tours.

So they needed a new duck voice and they found him on Channel 13. And interestingly, they found the guy to voice Yakky's bulldog friend Chopper concurrently on Channel 5 where Vance Colvig was starring daily as Bozo the Clown. So when The Yogi Bear Show debuted in Los Angeles, you had Mr. Weldon voicing Webster Webfoot on Channel 13 and opposite him on Channel 5 was Mr. Colvig playing Bozo while — and these were all on at the same hour — The Yogi Bear Show with both actors was on Channel 11. At the age of eight, I actually noticed this.

I also noticed Jimmy Weldon popping up all over Los Angeles with Webster making personal appearances, hosting on telethons, even apparently appearing at birthday parties for what I heard was a rather modest fee. Jimmy was a charming gent who loved to entertain and he often popped up on TV shows in guest roles. I remember him on a Rockford Files and on Dragnet and on The Waltons, among others. He usually played a flamboyant preacher or some kind of inspirational speaker.

In fact, the last decade or two of his life, that was his main line of work — inspirational speaking. In 1996 when the prolific character actor Peter Leeds (also an occasional Hanna-Barbera voice) passed away, I took Stan Freberg to the funeral and one of the speakers talked to us not so much about Peter but about coping with death and not sinking into depression over it. The speaker was Jimmy Weldon.

He addressed many groups, often with a speech he called "Go Get 'Em Tiger: Becoming the Person You Want to Be," which was also the title of his autobiography. It urged everyone to realize their full potential, never give up, grab onto that star, etc. He was also a super-patriot and very active in the American Legion. (During World War II, he served with General Patton and was involved in many heroic efforts including the liberation of the concentration camp in Buchenwald.)

Back in 1982 when I wrote a prime-time Yogi Bear special for Hanna-Barbera, Yakky Doodle had a cameo role with one or two lines. Jimmy had not worked for H-B for a while and when Yakky had recently appeared, they had Frank Welker do his voice and then Frank would also play other roles in the show. I asked them, pretty please, to bring Jimmy Weldon in to do the one or two lines plus some other roles. They did. I'm not sure I can explain why that mattered to me as much as it did but it did.

I met him briefly at the recording session and then, about eighteen years later, I was in a Hometown Buffet in Van Nuys and there, dining with some friends of his who I'm sure were army buddies, was Jimmy Weldon. I went up to him at the buffet table and told him I grew up watching him and Webster on Channel 13. Before I could even tell him about the cartoon special I wrote that he was in, he put down the plate he was filling with food, gave me a big hug and dragged me over to his friends' table to tell them, "This young man knows who I am!"

He had me repeat what I'd told him about growing up with him and Webster and he seemed so proud of that that. And his pals were responded good-naturedly, "Yeah, yeah, Jimmy. So what is this? The tenth time this week you've introduced us to someone who told you that?"

There's a new production of the musical 42nd Street current touring the U.K. Here's a peek at the cast rehearsing one of the big numbers…

I'm trying to not look at the news much but the whole Rudy Giuliani story is hard to ignore. Basically, the affronts for which he seems likely to face some disbarment have to do with filing a flood of "frivolous" lawsuits. And what was frivolous about them is that they charged massive voter fraud without offering any real evidence. It was kind of like "The official vote count for this state should be overturned and Trump should be declared the winner because some of us have suspicions!" Read this for more.

We are edging closer and closer to Comic-Con. Some people online seem very upset that there won't be a lot of movie stars there promoting their upcoming releases and some of them seem to blame the convention for that. I assume those folks will remain upset but I feel pretty confident that most attendees won't notice much difference.

And I continue to have no idea what will happen with the Writers Guild Strike or when it will or won't happen.

This article in The New York Times has aroused much arguing among professional magicians. Basically, it states that the magic community, which once treated faux-psychic Uri Geller as a charlatan, has now embraced the guy. According to the article, magicians still think he's a charlatan but now they kinda admire him for being such a good charlatan. The sheer reaction to the piece suggests that the embrace is not as widespread as the reporter claims. The professional magicians I know have always kind of regarded the guy as someone who got very rich and famous duping people with the kind of magic most of them could do when they were thirteen — and probably do it better.

Lastly for now: On this blog, we sometimes discuss annoying spam calls. Kevin Drum read this article in the L.A. Times about an operation that scammed both major candidates for the presidency in 2016. Drum notes that the scammers made more than 275 million robocalls and took in close to $4 million smackers. From this, Drum calculates that "a single robocall nets one-hundredth of a dollar" — otherwise known as a penny. That's still more than they deserve and it makes you wonder what the spam calls from live human beings are grossing.

The 2023 Comic-Con International in San Diego commences with Preview Night from 6 PM to 9 PM on Wednesday evening, July 19. This is basically your chance to walk around the main Exhibit Hall with slightly fewer folks clogging the aisles. The real action starts the next day and here's what I'll be up to…

Thursday, July 20 — 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM in Room 32AB
SPOTLIGHT ON BARBARA FRIEDLANDER
Fresh out of high school in the sixties, Barbara Friedlander got a job at DC Comics and quickly ascended to a job in the editorial division working with or alongside, among many others, Carmine Infantino, Jack Miller, Robert Kanigher, Mort Weisinger, Julius Schwartz, and Joe Orlando. What was it like to work in that office on DC's romance comics and on her creation, Swing With Scooter? Comic-Con Special Guest Mark Evanier will be quizzing her — and on Friday evening at the Eisner Awards, he'll be presenting Barbara with the Bill Finger Award for Excellence in Comic Book Writing.

Thursday, July 20 — 11:30 AM to 12:30 PM in Room 10
COMICS FOR UKRAINE
Comics for Ukraine is a new and important book that is raising funds to aid people whose lives have been devastated by the ongoing war in Ukraine. Some of the top names in comics have donated their time and artistry to this book, which is debuting at Comic-Con. Come join several of those folks as they talk about their stories and why this project is so important. Mark Evanier, John Layman, Stan Sakai and Billy Tucci will be on hand, as well as Richard Walden, the founder of Operation USA, the charity that is funneling funds to help the struggling people of Ukraine. Moderated by book organizer Scott Dunbier.

Thursday, July 20 — 2:00 PM to 2:45 PM at the Dark Horse Booth
I will be signing stuff, especially copies of Groo in the Wild #1 along with colorist Carrie Strachan at Booth 2416.

Friday, July 21 — 12:30 PM to 1:30 PM in Room 10
WALT KELLY AND POGO
The brilliant newspaper strip Pogo was created, written and drawn by one of the great geniuses of comic art, Walt Kelly. It's currently being reprinted in full in a series of books from Fantagraphics, one of which is up for an Eisner Award tonight. Meanwhile, fans of Mr. Kelly and his zany swamp denizens can gather to discuss him, his work, and what it was that made his cartooning so very special. Come hear from artist Steve Leialoha, scholar Maggie Thompson, Kelly archivist Jane Plunkett, and the co-editors of the current reprint series, Eric Reynolds and your moderator, Mark Evanier.

Friday, July 21 — 3:30 PM to 4:30 PM in Room 10
THE GROO PANEL
For 40+ years, the irrepressible (and ignorant) barbarian Groo the Wanderer has wandered the land and through comic book shops making good things bad, bad things worse, and all things hilarious. What's it like to work on this comic with master cartoonist Sergio Aragonés? Since Sergio isn't attending the con this year, these three people can speak freely about the experience: letterer (and creator of Usagi Yojimbo) Stan Sakai, colorist Carrie Strachan and a guy named Mark Evanier who does something on the comic but we don't know what. Also, they'll try to phone Sergio, which will be great fun if it works and probably funnier if it doesn't.

Saturday, July 22 — 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM in Room 6DE
DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: AN ANIMATED ANNIVERSARY
Mark Evanier (show developer), Katie Leigh (voice of Sheila), David M. Booher (writer, IDW's Dungeons & Dragons: Saturday Morning Adventures), Frank Todaro (voice actor, Netflix's The Cuphead Show), and Luke Gygax (son of D&D creator Gary Gygax) discuss the legendary tabletop game's 40th anniversary as a Saturday morning cartoon from the perspective of the talent who worked on the show and today's creatives who grew up on it. The session will be moderated by TJ Shevlin (2023 Eisner Awards judge).

Saturday, July 22 — 11:45 AM to 1:00 PM in Room 6BCF
QUICK DRAW!
No matter when you're reading this — hopefully before the event — run and get a seat for Quick Draw!, the fastest and funniest presentation at Comic-Con. Your Quick Draw quizmaster Mark Evanier will be putting three of the swiftest cartoonists in the business to the test, inventing well-projected humor on the spot. Competing this year are cartoonist and Comic-Con co-founder Scott Shaw!, MAD magazine's Tom Richmond, and Disney legend Floyd Norman. As usual, there will be no wagering on the outcome.

Saturday, July 22 — 1:00 PM to 2:30 PM in Room 6BCF
CARTOON VOICES I
Once again, Mark Evanier has assembled a roster of some of the most-heard performers in the world of animation, and they're here to tell you what they do, how they do it and then demonstrate it. The dais includes Adam McArthur (Star vs. the Forces of Evil), Elle Newlands (Lego Marvel's Avengers), Keith Scott (Bullwinkle Moose), Bill Farmer (Goofy, Pluto), Dave Fennoy (Batman, Transformers) and Jessica DiCicco (The Emperor's New School, Muppet Babies). And as usual, the actors will mangle a classic fairy tale for your enjoyment.

Saturday, July 22 — 3:00 PM to 4:00 PM in Room 4
MAGGIE THOMPSON SPOTLIGHT: Wrangling History (How to Preserve the Past So We Can Read in the Future)
As we lose creators, memories fade, and collectibles are lost or damaged, what can be done to hang onto the creations and establish the facts? Maggie is joined by writer and producer Mark Evanier, Columbia University comics and cartoons curator Karen Green, and Abrams ComicArts editor-in-chief Charles Kochman.

Saturday, July 22 — 4:30 PM to 5:30 PM in Room 7AB
THE HISTORY OF CARTOON VOICES
Keith Scott is one of the top voice actors and impressionists in Australia, and he's also an expert on cartoon voices for theatrical cartoons in this country. He's making a rare visit to America this year and he'll be talking about Mel Blanc, Daws Butler, June Foray, Walt Disney, and many you've never heard of. Don't miss this rare chance to hear all about how cartoons learned to talk, with not only Keith but also historians Jerry Beck, Leonard Maltin and your moderator, Mark Evanier.

Sunday, July 23 — 10:00 AM to 11:15 AM in Room 5AB
THE ANNUAL JACK KIRBY TRIBUTE PANEL
It's a Comic-Con tradition to assemble on Sunday morning to remember the man some still call, and with good reason, The King of the Comics. His life and career will be discussed by folks who knew him or wish they did. They include writer Tom King, Jack's grandson Jeremy Kirby, Kirby experts Bruce Simon, Mark Badger and Jon Cooke, attorney Paul S. Levine and your moderator, former Kirby assistant Mark Evanier.

Sunday, July 23 — 11:45 AM to 1:00 PM in Room 6A
CARTOON VOICES II
Cartoon Voices I on Saturday will be so wonderful that we'll need another such panel on Sunday with other top actors in the animation-voicing profession. This time, moderator Mark Evanier will welcome Maurice LaMarche (Futurama, Pinky and the Brain), Anna Brisbin (Final Fantasy VII Remake), Fred Tatasciore (Team America, The Hulk), Frank Todaro (The Cuphead Show, Transformers), and Courtney Lin (Monster High, Rainbow High).

Sunday, July 23 — 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM in Room 7AB
COVER STORY
There have been comic book publishers who believed that what they put inside the comic didn't matter much — that readers decide to buy or not to buy because of the cover. It's arguable, but a great cover never hurt a book. On this panel, your host Mark Evanier welcomes four artists who have drawn great covers: Todd McFarlane (Spawn, Spider-Man), Becky Cloonan (Batman, Gotham Academy; this year's Comic-Con Souvenir Book cover), Joe Quesada (Daredevil, Spider-Man), and J. Scott Campbell (Danger Girl, Amazing Spider-Man).

Sunday, July 23 — 3:00 PM to 4:30 PM in Room 7AB
THE BUSINESS OF CARTOON VOICES
Are you interested in a career in the highly competitive world of voiceover? There are plenty of folks who will take your money to advise you, but you can get a ton of information for free with no strings attached at this panel. Two very busy voice actors (Vanessa Marshall and Gregg Berger), a top agent (Cathey Lizzio of C.E.S.D.), and a voice director (your moderator, Mark Evanier) will tell you how one goes about learning the craft, breaking into the business, staying in the business, and maybe even making a living in the business. This panel is not for entertainment. It's for enlightenment.

Each and every item above is subject to change for reasons that even I may not be able to explain. The entire programming schedule can be found and studied on this page.

Last year in this space, I wrote — and this is a quote, you can go check it — that "as usual, I will be exercising my constitutional right (until the current Supreme Court strips me of it) to not sit behind a table in the exhibit hall very much." Clearly, they're well on their way to doing that but they haven't yet…so this year I will only be writing my name on things at the Dark Horse booth from 2 PM until 2:45 on Thursday. Other than that, you may be able to catch me before or after panels. Please don't try it before or after Quick Draw!

We haven't had many lately but there used to be frequent rumors or predictions — it was sometimes hard to tell which — that Comic-Con would leave San Diego and relocate in some other city, usually Los Angeles, Anaheim or Las Vegas. I have spent a decade or two predicting that it would stay right where it is — and indeed, ten days from now it will convene…in San Diego. Where I believe it will remain for a long, long time.

There is at least one lady in this world who is certain the con is secretly planning to move soon to Las Vegas. I believe she also thinks that Trump is still president, John F. Kennedy Jr. is still alive and that COVID was the result of a Penn & Teller trick that went horribly wrong. I still see her posts online once in a while about Vegas and she occasionally drops me an e-mail to tell me that I am about to owe her a huge apology.

There are dozen of reasons why it's unlikely Comic-Con will ever move to Las Vegas but around this time o' year, I sometimes like to post this one: The National Weather Service says that next week when Comic-Con commences in San Diego, the projected average high temperature for the city will be 75° — and down by the water where the San Diego Convention Center is located, it's usually around five degrees cooler than the rest of the city. So call it 70°.

The projected average high temperature for Las Vegas for the same dates is 115°. No one wants to have the con there then unless you enjoy watching cosplayers melt. No matter what they were to dress as, they'd all wind up like this…

Sorry for not posting today.  I'm battling a deadline and I just couldn't think of anything to write here today.  I'll make up for it tomorrow or as soon after that as I can.  In the meantime, here's another video you may enjoy…

I don't watch a lot of baseball but every so often, I notice some superhuman feat that even a non-fan can appreciate. Here's Elly De La Cruz doing — well, you'll see what he does…

The MGM Grand hotel in Las Vegas is the largest free-standing hotel in the United States and each day, its 6,852 rooms and all its restaurants and other facilities produce a lot of dirty laundry. It works out to about 24 million pounds of washing per year and it's all done by one cleaning lady who drives it, a ton at a time, to a laundromat on Tropicana Boulevard and takes along a crapload of quarters.

No, that's not true. It's actually a slightly bigger chore than that. This video will tell you how it's done. It runs seven minutes and is way more interesting than you might think…

Among the many mysteries I find in this world is this: How could a man like Rudy Giuliani — who was once the most respected heroic figure in this country — wind up being recommended for disbarment as an attorney? I mean, I understand that greed and a love of money seems to have had something to do with it but aren't there ways to cash in on people thinking you're a man of honor and courage? And did it ever look like there was a lot of wealth to be gained fighting for Donald Trump?

Here's a link to the bar report. And notice these lines…

Respondent's frivolous lawsuit attempted unjustifiably and without precedent to disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of Pennsylvania voters, and ultimately sought to undermine the results of the 2020 presidential election. He claimed massive election fraud but had no evidence of it. By prosecuting that destructive case Mr. Giuliani, a sworn officer of the Court, forfeited his right to practice law. He should be disbarred.

"Had no evidence of it." How does an attorney go around spreading claims but when it comes time to prove his case in court, he has no evidence? I'm not sure that was hair dye leaking on Giuliani's skull. It may have been brain matter.

Livio Sellone wrote me (several times) with this question…

In Garfield and Friends, why do some animals actually talk? I always thought that Garfield and other animals could never talk in the comic strips, but in Garfield and Friends, for some reason, Mark Evanier added actual talking animals. I'm talking about those awful Buddy Bears. They are shown to speak and able to communicate with both animals and humans. Can they talk, or it depends on the episode?

For example, in some episodes, Garfield can talk to humans, such as "The Legend of The Lake," but he usually can't speak to humans. Another animal character, such as Ichabod Cricket is shown to be understood by humans (in "Half Baked Alaska"), in fact, when he yells in Jon's ear, Jon can hear him. I've always wondered why they decided to add "talking animals" in the show, since Garfield's animals were never able to communicate with humans, and they rarely were understood by humans (In both comic strips and the show, sometimes Jon can hear Garfield, but it's usually, just a gag).

The answer, Livio, is that when you have to do 121 half-hour episodes, you find yourself breaking your own rules. The original working premise of the Scooby Doo cartoons was that all ghosts and unearthly creatures were hoaxes…and also, dogs could only mutter occasional words as long as Don Messick added an "R" sound at the beginning of each word. Then later, after umpteen episodes, they were looking for ways to "freshen" the show and not do the same unmasking-the-fake-ghost story line for the eighty zillionth time. So they added some relatives of Scooby, including Scrappy Doo, and allowed them to talk and they added in real ghosts and werewolves and such.

If the show had been canceled after Season Three or Season Four, they would have adhered to the original premises. Since the show goes on and on and on, the premises need to widen. It even works that way sometimes in live-action shows. My favorite TV sitcom is The Dick Van Dyke Show. When it started, the plan was that the audience would never see the star of the show Dick's character worked on. We'd never see Alan Brady.

Then the storyline in one episode seemed to need us to hear his voice so we heard his voice (provided by producer-creator Carl Reiner) but we didn't see him. Then there were stories that seemed to demand his presence in scenes so Alan Brady (Mr. Reiner, again) was seen but you only saw the back of his head. Then they came up with ideas for good episodes that needed us to see him for real so Reiner was seen on-camera in the role. What some people feel was the best episode ever of that series — "Coast-to-Coast Big Mouth" — wouldn't have worked if we'd only heard his voice or seen the back of his head.

In the case of Garfield, the original convention was that the cat didn't speak aloud. What we, as readers of the newspaper strip, read were his thoughts. His words were in thought balloons. And Odie the dog was so dumb that he didn't "think" at all so we never knew his thoughts. Furthermore, Garfield and his owner Jon were so close, Jon could sometimes intuit what Garfield was thinking.

That was fine for newspaper strip gags that were short enough to be done in three panels. When Garfield turned into a TV star in animated specials, they had to decide what to do about this "thoughts." For Peanuts, Charles Schulz and the producer decided that Snoopy would make sounds but would not have a voice. In some episodes, we heard Charlie Brown telling us what Snoopy was thinking, which worked pretty well. But Snoopy was not carrying the plots of those stories and, of course, they were much longer than your average daily (or even Sunday) newspaper strip.

For Garfield, Jim Davis and the producer (the same producer as the Peanuts specials, Lee Mendelson) decided that viewers needed to hear what Garfield was thinking. Garfield carried the storylines and the commentaries in his thoughts were a major feature of the strip. That was why Garfield's mouth didn't move. We were hearing his thoughts because he didn't talk but, again, Jon sometimes kind of guessed what Garfield was thinking.

Also, animals could hear each others' thoughts. Garfield could hear Arlene's thoughts and vice-versa. Garfield could even hear Odie's thoughts even though they weren't articulate enough to be translated into words we could understand. As more and more of the prime-time Garfield specials were done, more and more animals turned up and each could "hear" the others' thoughts.

In 1987 when I was hired to write a weekly Garfield show for CBS Saturday mornings, we discussed all this. Jim Davis came out to Hollywood. I flew back to his studio in Muncie, Indiana. CBS asked that Jim consider having Garfield talk on this show. They didn't demand it; just ask that he consider it.

We talked a lot and finally decided to continue the policy that Garfield would not talk, per se, but we'd hear his thoughts. His lips would not move…which gave me the idea of having him say something different at the end of the opening titles of each episode. No lip movements meant it was very easy to change what he said there.

We also agreed I'd be adding a lot more animal characters here and there because, well, we had a lot more storylines to invent. The new animal characters could exchange thoughts like dialogue.

But there was another thing: The year before, Jim had started a second newspaper strip — U.S. Acres, which was also called Orson's Farm in some other countries. It was about a bunch of barnyard animals who definitely talked to one another with moving mouths. It was going to share the half-hour with Garfield…which is why the new series was Garfield and Friends. When it went on, it was such a hit that the next season, they were sharing an hour.

From the start, everyone wanted Garfield to occasionally pop up in a U.S. Acres cartoon to unite the two properties…so Garfield (who didn't talk) was intersecting with animals who did. It seemed to work fine. If anyone noticed, they didn't write in.

When I decided to add in the Buddy Bears, I decided to have their mouths move. There were three of them and if their mouths didn't move, you wouldn't have known which one was speaking. Also, the idea was that they were singing their song on TV shows and…well, I just decided it made them more effective as characters to talk. Yeah, it was kind of breaking our own rule but that's the great thing about making your own rules: If you make them, you can decide when to break them. We broke the rules a few other times as you note.

I do not recall anyone ever asking about this before or giving any indication that they noticed. And those shows have been running pretty continuously on television for thirty-five years now. We have literally gotten more mail from viewers who felt that Garfield was eating too much lasagna or who wanted to know what the deal was with The Klopman Diamond.

So I hope this answers your question, Livio. We made a rule and we decided to break it now and then for the good of the show. I hope you won't hold it against us.

An agent I know who represents actors once told me that to be a movie star, it was no longer enough to be good in front of movie cameras. You also, he said, had to "give good panel," meaning you had to be able to go on a talk show and be witty and charming. According to this agent, you didn't even have to be that good at plugging your new movie. You just had to be entertaining…and if you were, people would then flock to see that film. Maybe.

Want an example of someone giving good panel? Here's Tom Hanks on the final episode of Late Night with David Letterman, which aired 6/25/93. He's everything a talk show host could want out of a guest…and take note of the skill of Mr. Letterman in his role.  Someone obviously told him that Hanks had a great anecdote to tell involving Cher.  Dave brings her up in a Carson-like manner, making it sound like conversation as opposed to a planned set-up…but Dave mistakenly thinks the story is about Hanks working with Cher. Not a problem in the least. Tom effortlessly redirects the dialogue to his days as a bellhop…which helps lead him into the story about Slappy White.

And then when he's aware that time for the segment is running out, Letterman slides into the plug for Tom's new movie, which is a lot less awkward than forcing Tom to bring it up.  And through it all, Dave lets Tom do his panel with little interruption and the host makes no attempt to top his guest or do what some might call a "Milton Berle."  That's when the other person on stage gets a big laugh and you try have to interject something to piggyback on that laugh and get a piece of it, even if it means stopping his flow.  A lot of talk show hosts think, "If the guest gets a laugh, I have to get a laugh."  The best ones know there are times when you have to be satisfied to be Bud Abbott.

And after Hanks, stay tuned for Dave's final words as an NBC on-air personality…

Two weeks until Preview Night at Comic-Con. They should start posting the Programming Schedules any day now on their website. I highly recommend that if you're attending, you spend the time to read over the schedule, make notes on what you want to attend…and make notes on what you'll attend as your second choice if you can't get in to your first choice. I will be posting my schedule here after the con posts their entire schedule over there. Other parts of their website may be of great value to you also, especially their COVID Policy.

It's kinda fun watching Chris Christie running for some job like Tucker Carlson's old one on Fox News. Pundits keep saying that he has no chance of getting the Republican nomination but really no one does if Trump stays in the race. If fact, if Trump has to drop out, it strikes me that Christie may have a better chance than the rest of that mob. All he might have to do is demonstrate that he can do as fine a job bashing Democrats as he's currently doing bashing Trump. If the Trump Fans have to look for another guy, they're not going to go with someone polite. They'll want an Attack Dog.

I had a call today from a lady who claimed to be with Medicare and almost immediately, she asked me to verify that I was a member by giving her my Social Security number. I told her, "If you were really with Medicare, you'd just be asking me for the last four digits because you'd already have the whole thing." She sighed, said "You're right…I'm not with Medicare" and hung up.

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When I wrote here the other day about the SAG-AFTRA negotiations for a new contract, I forgot to make an important point I was going to make…

Ordinarily when you have one of these negotiations or a threatened strike, there's a rift in the union that may be subtle or it may be somewhat overt. Imagine two kinds of members of the actors' union. One is the Tom Hanks/Scarlett Johansson type. The other is the guy or gal who's living from bit part to bit part, hoping to get a few lines in this movie or a decent role on that sitcom…and maybe having to supplement their acting income with other kinds of employment.

In the cause of unity, the union has to serve both kinds but their needs are very different. Tom and Scarlett aren't working for minimums and with their clout, they can probably get all or most of what they want when their agents negotiate their deals.

The difference has caused schisms in SAG and AFTRA negotiations in the past…but this time, a major part of the battle is over Artificial Intelligence. And that's an issue that both categories of actors care deeply about. Both kinds want some control over how their voices and likenesses will be used and how they'll be compensated for that usage.

So this may be the strongest the actors' union has been in many, many years. The topic has certainly united a lot of the richest writers with the poorer ones in my union.

I mentioned Dodger Stadium here yesterday and casually remarked that when it was built, people were probably sad to lose whatever it displaced. As several correspondents have reminded me, "sad" doesn't begin to describe what happened. "Furious" would be a better word as it was one of the most shameful episodes in the history of this city.

Naturally, I was too young to follow the story at the time but I remember some of the lingering outrage in the sixties. I knew a lot of people had been displaced from their homes in order to build Chavez Ravine but I didn't realize how many…or how poorly they'd been compensated for the seizing of their property.

It's one of those stories that should be remembered if only so we never do anything like that again. An e-mail from Chris Powe led me to this video which tells the sordid tale. Warning: If you have an ounce of humanity within you, it will make you angry…

CBS Television City still kinda stands at the corner of Beverly Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue in Los Angeles.  At the beginning of many a TV show, an announcer would say, "From Television City in Hollywood…" which was true if you think of "Hollywood" as a concept, not as a geographic area defined on a map.  If you go by the map, Television City is and always has been more like "Hollywood Adjacent."

A long, long list of TV shows were made there, not all of which appeared on CBS.  For example, Bill Maher's Real Time (and before that, his Politically Incorrect) were done at CBS Television City.  Among the CBS shows that were housed in that facility at times were The Jack Benny Program, The Red Skelton Show, The Carol Burnett Show, The Judy Garland Show, The Late Late Show with its Various Hosts, The Danny Kaye Show, The Young and the Restless, The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour, The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, All in the Family…

Oh, it's foolish of me to start listing them.  Hundreds and hundreds of shows, including many you watched, were done there — game shows, specials, sitcoms, daytime dramas, variety shows…everything. Its most famous tenant for over half a century is The Price is Right, which is now relocating to a studio in Glendale. Everything else has moved…somewhere.

I hear mixed things about what, if anything, remains in that complex. If any sort of production is still there, it won't be there for long. A whole new media city with some production and lots of retailing will soon begin appearing on that piece of real estate. Reports vary on how much, if any, of the existing structures will be incorporated into the new layout.

Online, you'll find a lot of people bemoaning the loss of all that history…a lot of folks wishing Television City could live on forever. Part of me is sad to see it go but another part of me has long since come to terms with the fact that the world moves on and old buildings are torn down to make way for new buildings. I worked for a number of years in the old Hanna-Barbera building on Cahuenga Boulevard and a lot of TV shows I loved were made there.

But there came a time after years of sitting empty when it was semi-demolished and turned into, I believe, some condominiums and a health spa. Hanna-Barbera was no longer a functioning studio. It had become a mere trademark for Warner Communications to apply or not to certain properties that had their origin decades ago on that property. I had every reason to be nostalgic about the place and to think of its repurposing as destroying something that was meaningful to my life…but when asked to join a "save the studio" campaign, I couldn't work up the emotion.

If Bill and Joe were willing to sell it, why should others raise funds to preserve it? And we weren't talking about something you could fund with a couple of bake sales and a Sunday afternoon car wash in the parking lot. We're talking about tens of millions of dollars so the building could remain…for what purpose? What would you put in it to fund the upkeep and the property taxes? Some people said it should be a museum of H-B history…but no one volunteered to make that happen. They just wished someone else would do it.

The folks who are sad about the closing of CBS Television City today probably sound a lot like people who were sad in 1952 when Gilmore Stadium was torn down. Gilmore Stadium was the home of the Los Angeles Bulldogs, the first professional football team in Los Angeles. It also at times housed other football teams including the Los Angeles Mustangs, the Loyola Marymount Lions and the Pepperdine Waves. It was also the site of two National Football League Pro Bowls.

And it sometimes housed a baseball team, as well. Long before L.A. had its first major league team, the Los Angeles Stars played there until the construction of Gilmore Field next door. And Gilmore Stadium also housed midget auto racing and rodeos and circuses and other events. Surely many people felt a great sense of loss when it was torn down in '52.

Gilmore Stadium was torn down so they could build Television City in its place. And then five years later, Gilmore Field was torn down because Television City needed additional parking…and also because the field was kinda useless once the Brooklyn Dodgers migrated to Los Angeles. The team started playing in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum until their own stadium could be built. Someone probably felt sad over the demolition of whatever was demolished to make room for that stadium.

The point is that sometimes, people miss something when it goes away…but it makes room for something else that is so wonderful that people will miss that new enterprise when it goes away.

I have no idea if what will be built on the site of Television City will be wonderful. There have been some strong arguments against the new occupant of that corner, mostly having to do with what it will do to traffic in the area. Having been personally inconvenienced a few times by James Corden doing his little Crosswalk Musicals outside the studio in the middle of Beverly Boulevard, I shudder that the new development might turn out to be ten times worse…and every day.

But the argument that Television City should remain because it was part of our lives is a different argument…and I'm not saying I won't miss it. I probably will, especially when I'm sitting in gridlock caused by its replacement. I just think we have to accept the concept that the world around us cannot look the same way forever just because we want it to. Some things absolutely should be preserved but there has to be a better reason than "It's been there as long as I can remember." So I'll just tell myself that if the Columbia Broadcasting System can live without it, maybe I can learn to live without it too.

It's probably safe to assume that some of you are going to watch the movie of 1776 today. It's one of my favorite films and it's based on one of my favorite musicals — and the movie probably resembles the original Broadway production as much as any film adaptation could.

I don't know a whole lot about the history of the musical but I know that it underwent major revisions during rehearsals and out-of-town tryouts and that at least ten songs — some sources say double that number — were in and then out and one or two were then in again. It was not an uneventful workshop period.

In the finished play and movie, there's a scene in which via a dispatch, General George Washington requests that the War Committee (of which John Adams is chairman) would travel to the New Jersey training ground in New Brunswick. There is, he writes, much whoring and drinking there that needs to be dealt with. Adams, Ben Franklin and some others go there, in part because Franklin is enticed by the prospect of whoring and drinking. They later return to their congress to report on what they witnessed.

On stage and the film, of course, we do not see what they saw. They merely describe off-stage action. In rehearsal and tryouts, there was indeed a scene in New Brunswick with an actress named Carol Prandis playing one of the local "working girls." To her, Franklin — who came across more like an aging pervert at this stage of the production — sang a song about how more fornication would lead to more births and therefore more people to populate their new country.

It was called "Increase and Multiply" or maybe "Encrease and Multiply." I've seen it both ways. Here's how it sounded in a demo recording. The singer is Sherman Edwards, who wrote the songs for the show…

When it and the entire New Brunswick scene were cut, Howard DaSilva (who was Ben Franklin) quit the show and Ms. Prandis was dismissed. DaSilva was eventually persuaded to return to it while Ms. Prandis pretty much got out of acting and later married composer Stephen Schwartz. At least, that's what some have reported. 1776 was, of course, revised enough to become a hit when it opened in New York so at least that part of the story has a happy ending.

The big strike news as far as I'm concerned is that there's no strike news. Talks with SAG-AFTRA continue and, as is appropriate in such situations, there's kind of a news blackout. That's not bad or good. It just means that they're talking to each other and not to the press. A person who's very active in the actors' union said to me the other day, "The issue of Artificial Intelligence and how it's going to be used and not used in this business has united the actors in a way I've never seen before." And this person has been involved in actor-management labor dealings for a long time.

One possible scenario is that — and remember I say this with no inside info — is that SAG-AFTRA makes some sort of deal with the producers regarding A.I. and then that becomes the precedent/framework for a WGA deal regarding A.I. I don't think SAG-AFTRA can get its membership to vote for ratification of a new contract without a sensible, fair A.I. deal.

Whether that will then work for writers is an open question. The first time any of the above-the-line Hollywood unions made a deal involving cable channels, the Directors Guild made a deal that was great for them, not so good when the same formula was applied to writers. The strike that year was because the producers were saying "You must take the same deal we gave directors" and we said no.

I have several e-mails asking me if such-and-such a writer or show is violating the Writers Guild strike by being in production or doing promotion. The answer is "it depends" and whether the project is covered by the Writers Guild contract. Some animation is and some isn't. You can read the WGA Strike Rules here and if you have a question, it may be covered over on this page.