This is how surfing the net works. You start with one person/subject – in this case, Bobby Darin. I hear him sing The Start of Something Big which, of course, was written by Steve Allen.
This gets me thinking about writer/comedian/musician/author/faith healer Steve Allen and that leads me to this fabulous clip I’d never seen before. It’s a wonderful window into early television as well as showing you the ad-lib abilities of the first Tonight Show host.
Of course, seeing Steverino singing(?!) Bingo with Skitch naturally led me to this absolute gem!! Make sure you stick it out for the entire clip. It’s terrific.
The others around the piano besides Bing, Skitch and The Mills Brothers were Dorothy Collins and Charles Aznavour. It’s ironic they handed Bing the megaphone because Bing’s great breakthrough in the 1930s came, in large part, because he was the first singer to really master the use of the microphone. Many singers of the time were scared to death of the transition from megaphone to microphone. Bing learned to use it as an instrument before and better than anyone else at the time and it propelled him to heights of stardom never before achieved in the entertainment industry. Many of you toungsters would have a difficult time believing this but if you adjusted sales and revenues for today’s values, Bing is probably still the most phenomenal success the world of entertainment has ever known. Keep in mind that Bing was really the very first international star of his kind, known and loved all over the globe.
And it STILL doesn’t get any better than Bing and The Mills Brothers.
I always loved the Muppets and The Muppet Show. But then, how could it be any other way? I started watching Sesame Street when it debuted in 1969. I literally grew up with Kermit, Grover, Oscar and Cookie Monster. When The Muppet Show hit the scene around 1975 it was awesome. It was all the fun of Sesame Street without all that bothersome educational stuff.
My Muppet Show favorites were Fozzie Bear, The Great Gonzo and Animal. I really loved all the members of the band because by that time I’d become a bit of a jazz fan. Blues and Funk were by no means my #1 interest but I could dig it.
Appearances on The Muppet Show by jazz legends were therefore especially appreciated. What follows are two of the greatest players, and characters, of the jazz world.
Animal vs. Traps, the Drum Wonder . . .
When I was in high school and college, I’d go to see various music/jazz legends whenever they were playing in Rochester. It didn’t matter that I had no one my age who liked all “the old music” that I liked. I’d go by myself – it didn’t matter to me. I remember seeing Dizzy one night under the stars at a downtown park called Manhattan Square Park. He was awesome and I remember sitting there listening and watching and thinking to myself – this guy is an American musical legend. I’m glad I was able to appreciate it while it was happening although it all went by so fast.
I tried one night to see Buddy Rich as well but to no avail. He was scheduled to play a concert at Monroe Community College but got stuck in Buffalo in a snowstorm. If I remember correctly this was early-mid March which in Western New York is still the middle of winter. Unfortunately, I never did get to see him.
My youngest son was at a friend’s house for a sleepover on Saturday night and my wife had a rare night off from work so I felt it was the best time to cave in and finally let the oldest two kids watch The Godfather. As my wife said, if they’re going to watch it, it’s better that they watch it with me (their movie loving father who once considered himself somewhat of an expert on the film) rather than some stranieri.
In the last twenty years I have friends who have continued to watch this movie over and over again. As for me, I don’t think I’d seen it all the way through in close to seventeen or eighteen years.The movie did what it had to do for me twenty-five years ago as it helped contribute to my education as a cynic. Now, as I grow older, I’m drawn to lighter fare to ease the ugly realities of daily life. Even so, I still recognize it as a classic of the American cinema and felt my children should see it. My thirteen year old (soon to be fourteen) was really chomping at the bit so I’m happy I was able to guide him through it.
In the nearly forty years since the movie first appeared on movie screens, an entire “fan culture” has grown up around this film. It’s probably the most parodied film in the history of entertainment. There have been books that documented how, at some point after the release of movies like The Godfather and Good Fellas, real life organized crime figures started acting like the characters they’d seen at the movies instead of vice versa! I’ve seen references to The Godfather in sitcoms insinuating that every man “has a thing” about The Godfather.
As a young man in my late teens and early twenties, I admit that I did “have a thing” about this story. In addition to seeing the movie multiple times, I also read the book probably three or four times. I didn’t see it as just a gangster movie. I certainly don’t think Coppola did either. It’s about the corrosive nature of power on a human being’s psyche and soul. It’s about the pursuit of the American Dream at all costs. And finally, it’s about the quest for independence, the desire to be free, to be in control of your own destiny. This goal is, of course, nothing but an illusion. All of us control our own destinies but only to a point. There are always, and there always will be, things that happen that are out of our control. Nevertheless, the desire to be in control of our own lives and destinies is one that many harbor deep inside themselves every day.
There’s a scene with Michael and his father in the garden shortly before Vito dies. At one point in the conversation, Vito says to Michael that he never intended for his youngest son to get caught up in “the family business” the way he did. He wanted his son to be a legitimate power in the American world – a banker or a politician. He refused to apologize for his own actions saying, “I refused to be a fool, dancing on the string held by all those big shots.” You need to read the book, or at the very least, to see The Godfather, Part Two, to really understand Vito’s attitude about how the world treats you if you don’t take things into your own hands. It’s important to a fuller understanding of the Vito Corleone character.
I hate to say this but it was actually hard for me to take everything in this film as seriously as in the past. After all these years, there are aspects of Caan’s and Pacino’s performances just seemed a little too over the top for me. It’s hard to take Michael seriously in that hat – particularly in the first scene where we see him as “the Don” when he comes to find his second choice for a wife, Kay Adams. I was actually able to take Brando’s Vito Corleone more seriously, cotton-mouth and all. The scenes is Sicily are still fabulous, some of the very best in the whole film. The editing and structure of the opening wedding scene and the climactic baptism scene almost seem too basic and fundamental now but that’s because they literally became required teaching for film students starting in the mid-seventies. The reality is that they were startlingly brilliant in their time.
There are scenes that are still very disturbing to watch even after all the ensuing years of gratuitous violence and gore on movie screens. Sonny’s massacre and the scene where Carlo beats his pregnant wife are, for me, the most jolting, discomfiting images in the film. Surprisingly, I think the “horse scene” still works pretty well – do in large part to the editing and the music.
The music, as in all great films, is as wonderful and important to this film as it was the first day it was shown. The great Nino Rota created a masterpiece of film music with the score. My kids were only somewhat aghast to learn that I’d had the organist at our wedding play “Speak Softly Love” as the ushers were seating our guests in the church. They’ve always thought their father was a little nuts so this revelation wasn’t a complete shock.
All in all, The Godfather, Parts One & Two, were masterful stories in their day and remain so to this day. Unfortunately, The Godfather, Part Three is as awful as the first two are terrific. The last piece of the trilogy was nothing more than a pathetic soap opera tacked onto an epic American tale.
The Godfather, Part Two will have to be secured next for my son and I to watch. It’s important that he sees what Michael Corleone’s lust for power ultimately does to his expectations for happiness and control.
One last thing, even though I am less passionately attached to the story now than I was twenty-five years ago, I must admit my heart still breaks a little when Sal Tessio looks at Tom Hagen with those puppy dog eyes and says, “Tom – Can you get me off the hook? For ol’ times sake?” And Tom looks somberly at him and says, “Can’t do it, Sally.”
Today is Gene Kelly’s birthday. He would have been 98 years old today. Knowing Kelly, if he had made it to 98, he’d still be able to dance. Maybe not as sprly as in this clip with Donald O’Connor from 1959 but he’d be hoofing one way or another.
My Aunt Marge passed away this past week and we just had her funeral yesterday. Like so many of my aunts and uncles she encouraged and supported my interest and love of the music of The Great American Songbook. Her favorite performer was Perry Como. I’ve always said that of all the great male singers of that era – Sinatra, Crosby, Bennett, Martin, etc. – Perry had the best instrument, the best pure voice of them all.
Here’s a wonderful clip of two generations of great musical talent, Perry Como and The Carpenters.
Just watched the “season finale” of Hot in Cleveland with my kids. My daughter likes the show. My oldest son thinks Betty White is hilarious and my youngest son pretty much likes whatever the grown-ups like. I don’t really think the show is anything special but I like all the actresses involved so I watch it if its on.
Of course, now we have to wait until January for the next episode. Remember when there was just one television season and it ran from September to May? From June through August there were summer replacement shows – primarily for the variety hours. For instance, for the audience who was used to tuning in on Wednesday evenings for Tony Orlando and Dawn, they might put in a summer replacement variety hour with Donny and Marie so the similar program would keep the similar audience tuning in on Wednesday nights.
For everything else, they’d repeat the episodes of the previous season’s shows. This helped more than one show through the years to find an audience. For example, All in the Family was a mid-season replacement that started in January. It didn’t get very good ratings the first time around but then CBS replayed the episodes that summer and the audience “found the show.” Needless to say, it became one of the biggest TV hits of the 1970s.
In other Betty White news, the woman has officially become an industry unto herself. They just played a commercial during the show tonight for another movie she’s appearing in this fall called You Again with Sigorney Weaver and Jamie Lee Curtis and I read today that she has, not one, but two book deals! The lady is on fire!! I think the best thing about it all is tonight my 15-year-old daughter says, “I love Betty White. I’d like to meet her.” That’s pretty impressive.
Received an enthusiastic response to the earlier Gleason video and why not? He was “The Great One,” after all.
Below he plays the character that he once told Johnny Carson was the one closest to the real Gleason. Perhaps. Or maybe just closest to the image that Gleason loved to portray. Either way, he was a dan-dan-dandy!!
I just blew about 90 minutes on the internet. Don’t ask me what my original intention was because I don’t remember. I do know that I checked in on Ken Levine and discovered that he posted his 2000th entry today on his blog. Congratulations to Mr. Levine. I find his blog to be one of the most enjoyable destinations on the internet. I heartily recommend a visit to his site.
From Levine’s blog, I visited Mark Evanier’s blog. Evanier was the guy who originally recommended Levine’s blog to me. I haven’t visited Evanier’s site in a while – not because it isn’t any good but just because I’ve been so busy. Upon my visit I found some really good stuff including a wonderful video from an old CBC talk show with Bert Lahr, Eddie Foy Jr. and Buster Keaton.
Evanier also had some posts about a short-lived (like one episode!) show that Jackie Gleason hosted in 1961 called “You’re In the Picture.” It was a game show, of sorts, and it bombed so badly in it’s first show that rather than come back the second week with another episode, Gleason actually came on the air and apologized to the audience for inflicting this horrible show on them the week before.
What follows is a clip that shows Jackie Gleason’s explanation of the game from week one and then his apology from week two. Many things to take note of as you watch this clip. First of all, the CBS executives were not amused that Gleason was going to go on the air and apologize for a show. Of course, at this point, Gleason had a lot of clout so he did what he wanted. The result was, according to most sources, a very funny half hour of television. What you’ll see here is funny, I only wish we had the whole show.
The other thing that will be amazing to many viewers is the smoking and drinking on the air. You don’t see too much of that on TV anymore. Nowadays there would be absolutely no reason to believe that there was actually booze in that little coffee cup. As for those days, and Jackie Gleason’s reputation, I’d say it’s a pretty safe bet there WAS booze in the cup. I believe Mr. Sinatra once hypothesized that if the United States ever formed an Olympic Drinking Team the participants would include himself, Jackie Gleason, Toots Shor and Dean Martin. We’ve since been told that Dean often had apple juice in his little glass on stage. Gleason, however, was the real deal.
It also says something about Gleason that he had enough respect for his audience and what he did to apologize for something he thought didn’t live up to what audiences expected of him. And while he jokes about the others involved, please note he takes the blame for the debacle himself. Wow – personal responsibility and integrity. Something else you don’t see on TV anymore.
