Just a reminder that I'll be a guest on on the podcast of The San Diego Comic-Con Unofficial Blog in a few hours. It all starts at 6:30 PM Los Angeles time at this link. I'll be discussing the past 49 years of attending Comic-Con International in its various incarnations since 1970 and what may happen 70 days from now at the fiftieth such gathering. Who knows? I may even tell an anecdote or two. I've been known to do that on rare occasions.

And now, Playbill has up some photos from the original production on Broadway of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, which opened May 8, 1962 at the Alvin Theatre. That's 57 years ago today.

I was at a party once where everyone was playing Theatrical Time Machine: "If you could go back in time and see one production from the past…" I think this might be it for me.

We've had a lot of televised car chases lately here in the City of Angels.  That's meant many opportunities on the web and on TV to watch/hear Stu Mundel in action.  Stu, who I've mentioned before here but not lately, is an "Aerial Correspondent" for local stations KCBS 2 and KCAL 9.  Those two stations are owned by the same company and share the same newsroom and crew…so coverage on one is often duplicated or handed over to the other.

"Aerial correspondent" means Stu's the guy in the helicopter covering and narrating the action below.  He's the fellow I dubbed "The Vin Scully of Televised Car Chases," and others have picked up on the analogy, including someone in the video below.  Like the now-retired Mr. Scully, Mr. Mundel is really good at making boring action on the screen interesting with his colorful play-by-play narration.  Here's a little story that ran on at least one of the two L.A. stations that employ him…

The New York Times has been looking into Donald Trump's past finances and come to the conclusion that he was a terrible businessman…and often when he did succeed, it was with deals where he got others to invest heavily, they lost big and he got out with a lot of their money.

I'm not sure any of this really matters. The people who don't like the guy couldn't have a lower opinion of him than they already do. The people who do like the guy won't let anything change their mind. When any evidence comes up that shows he's shady or incompetent, Trump or his minions just deny it as "fake, fake, fake" without explaining or offering proof that it's fake.

I am reminded of back when I was attending U.C.L.A., there was a lecture announced by an author who insisted the Holocaust was a myth. It never happened, Hitler and his mob never killed a single Jew…it was all a hoax. And this author was offering a cash prize — I think it was $10,000 which was a lotta money in those days — to anyone who could prove by rules he set down that the Holocaust was true. And what were his rules? They stated that you had to prove it without using "phony evidence." And what constituted "phony evidence?" Well, since the Holocaust had never happened, anything that indicated it had was "phony evidence."

And here's a reminder that Maltinfest — a celebration of some films my pal Leonard Maltin thinks have not received enough attention — kicks off this Friday at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood. I'm not sure when I'll be there but I'll be there. You should be there, too. Here's an article about this very special event.

We're 71 days from the start of this year's Comic-Con International in San Diego and one day from my appearance on the podcast of The San Diego Comic-Con Unofficial Blog. The folks who run that blog have nothing to do with the operation of the convention. They're just enthusiastic congoers who report on all the news and gossip about the con. If you're attending or just interested in the event, you should of course be reading the official convention website but you should also be reading the unofficial site.

As the con draws near, the unofficial blog does weekly podcasts to keep you informed on what's likely to happen there. Tomorrow night (Wednesday) their guest is me and I'll be discussing things that have happened at the last 49 of these cons I've attended. That's right: I said 49. I've been to all of them and expect this year to attend the fiftieth one. I also expect to set a new personal record for appearing on and/or moderating panels, beating my old record of sixteen in four days.

The podcast kicks off tomorrow night at 6:30 PM Pacific Time and you can watch it live on this page. Join us, won't you?

Hey, if you're interested in the history of the theater — especially musical theater — they always seem to have something interesting over on the Playbill website. Recently, they posted some great photos of the original production of Damn Yankees with Gwen Verdon and Ray Walston. And in connection with a forthcoming revival of 1776, there are some pics of the original staging of that show.

Last Saturday evening, the sparkling Shelly Goldstein and I attended a benefit for the Alcott Center for Mental Health Services and the Los Angeles LGBT Center. It was the second and final of two performances and I wish there were many more so you all could see "An all-star reading of Jacqueline Susann's Valley of the Dolls."

Valley of the Dolls was the best-selling book of 1966 and it was turned into a pretty popular movie in 1967. The film starred Barbara Parkins, Patty Duke, Paul Burke and Sharon Tate, and the screenplay is quite wonderful when you recast it for a live reading with, for example, Alec Mapa in the role Ms. Parkins played. They are, as you can see below, pretty much the same type…

And they had Wilson Cruz in the Patty Duke role and Bruce Vilanch playing the role Sharon Tate played, with other parts filled by Steve Bluestein, Mo Gaffney, Robert Cant, Tom Lenk, Greg Louganis (yes, the diver), Sheryl Lee Ralph (she played the character Susan Hayward played in the film), Gordon Thomson, Joan Van Ark and Marissa Jaret Winokur, with Laraine Newman as the Narrator.

Sometimes, men played women. Sometimes, women played men. Sometimes, the genders matched up. All the time, it was hilarious. The production was produced by Jon Imparato and Steve Tyler, and directed by Richard Hochberg. (By the way, the original screenplay for the movie was by Dorothy Kingsley.)

How hilarious this all was is hard to describe except to say that everyone in the Renberg Theater in Hollywood laughed from start to finish. Some of that was due to the performers expertly camping it up but a lot of it was that many of the lines and situations in the film haven't aged well. Even read the way they were supposed to be read, they were quite ridiculous.

There was a reception before the show and a reception afterwards and it all made for an enormously fun evening. I'll try and let you know if they ever do it again. If they do and you go, you might just see Shelly and me there in the audience again. Bruce Vilanch as a slinky supermodel was worth the price of admission alone.

Matt Taibbi discusses "electability" and doesn't really make the point that all the old definitions have been proven false by the fact that You-Know-Who is now in the Oval Office. I agree generally with Taibbi.

There are really two questions about any candidate: Can he or she win? And would he or she make a good president? They're obviously related but I don't think anyone's going to think too hard about the second one this time around.

Gary Conrad was one of the storyboard artists (and one of the best) on the Garfield & Friends cartoon show. One time, he brought a video camera to one of our recording sessions and captured these few minutes. This was one of the times Jim Davis came out and was the voice director. Thanks to Bob Bergen for telling me about this…

Reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show have just returned to the cable channel MeTV, kicking off with what are supposed to be Carl Reiner's ten favorite episodes.  For the record, they are…

1. "Coast-to-Coast Big Mouth" (The one where Laura went on national TV and told America that Alan Brady was bald.)
2. "That's My Boy?" (The one were Rob and Laura brought Ritchie home from the hospital and Rob was convinced they had the wrong baby.)
3. "It May Look Like a Walnut" (The one where Rob had a nightmare in which the world was being conquered by Danny Thomas.)
4. "The Curious Thing About Women" (The one where Rob, Buddy and Sally wrote a sketch about women being too curious and Laura lived down to it.)
5. "Never Bathe on a Saturday" (The one where Laura got her toe stuck in a bathtub faucet.)
6. "Where Did I Come From?" (The one where Laura went to the hospital to have a baby and Rob went insane.)
7. "October Eve" (The one where a painting for which Laura once posed turned up at a Manhattan art gallery.)
8. "All About Eavesdropping" (The one where Ritchie's toy intercom caused Rob and Laura to overhear their neighbors in conversation.)
9. "4 1/2" (The one where Rob and Laura got trapped in an elevator with Don Rickles.)
10. "The Alan Brady Show Goes to Jail" (The one where Rob, Laura, Buddy and Sally went to entertain at a prison and Rob got locked up.)

Those are ten pretty good episodes, though I might have swapped out the last three for three others.  But hey, it's Carl Reiner.  If he says those were the ten best, fine.

In June of 2009, I attended a performance of what was billed as the "first last tour" of the flamboyant Dame Edna Everage. In January of 2015, I attended a performance of what was billed — with apparent seriousness and an ending that made it pretty clear — of his/her actual final tour. I wrote here then, "If it turns out there's another [tour], I'm going to feel a little baited 'n' switched…but I'll probably go again then, anyway."

Looks like I'm going to get another chance to see comedian Barry Humphries in his greatest role. He (or she, if you prefer) is about to embark on a tour around Australia. And if he/she plays Australia, he/she will play America. I'll probably be attending final tours until I can't do it any longer…and Dame Edna will continue on without me.

Sergio Aragonés, Stan Sakai and I — three-fourths of the squad that makes Groo the Wanderer comics — will be guests at the Heroes Con in Charlotte, North Carolina from June 14 to June 16. This is a rare venturing outta the state for Sergio and me. Stan goes everywhere people know his great comic Usagi Yojimbo…which is, of course, everywhere. But Sergio and I rarely go to cons outside California so this is an outlier…and I think my first time in North Carolina.

Sergio and Stan will be selling sketches and books. I'll be selling nothing but I will be doing some panels, including one with Sergio and Stan. I'll tell you more about it when I know more about it. In the meantime, if you want to make it to Heroes Con, here's a link to their website.

I just set my DVR (which is no longer a TiVo and I'll explain why one of these days) to record Jordan Klepper's new show on Comedy Central. It's called Klepper — which must have taken them months to think of — and it debuts May 9.

I liked Mr. Klepper a lot on The Daily Show and a bit less on his own show, The Opposition. The trouble with the latter was that they had him playing a right-wing nutcase so he was working an area that had already been strip-mined by Stephen Colbert.  And since they ratcheted up the intensity, it made him pretty unpleasant. It's also difficult to parody Alex Jones when Alex Jones is doing such a fine job of that.

Klepper is devoted to field pieces, which Klepper did so well on The Daily Show. These are longer and a much deeper dive into the topics he covers. Advance publicity is stressing that in one, he actually got arrested. In another, he was on a boat that capsized. Say what you will about the guy, he may be the gutsiest person to ever do that kind of thing for television. And when he isn't trying to do Alex Jones, I find him pretty funny. I hope I like this show.  It looks so promising.

I see people who are acting like it's a done deal that the next presidential ballot will be Trump v. Biden. I don't accept either side of that as inevitable…but just in case Biden is the guy for the Dems, it might be nice to know a little more about his record on foreign policy. This may not matter since Trump won with no record whatsoever on foreign policy but in case you want to know about Biden's, Fred Kaplan has summarized it for us.