Retro TV Monday - this week in TV Guide, April 23, 1966

A mostly interesting "compilation of opinions about Andy Williams" is Dwight Whitney's cover story, which leads off this week's clip-filled TV Guide review.

I'm usually suspicious of articles like this, which consist of no original writing whatsoever, just a collection of quotes that could have been dug up (and probably was) by a research assistant.  However, it's a refreshing change from the celebrity hit pieces we read so often in this era of TV Guide, filled with snarky quotes from anonymous sources.  This one reads more like an authorized biography, as we get quotes from friends, family, and past and present co-workers, telling the story of Andy's rise to his current celebrity.  There's the odd sour quote, but the image that comes through is of a pretty good guy, one who's certainly ambitious and wants to succeed, but doesn't seem inclined to run over people in order to get there.

The most interesting thing to come from the story is how difficult it was for TV people to figure out what to do with Williams.  Is he an urbane sophisticate, dating back to the time when he and his brothers performed with singer Kay Thompson?*  Or is he the farm boy from Iowa, the kid in a tuxedo on a tractor, as he once put it?  Is he hip, simple, down-home, what?

*Fun fact: Although she had a successful singing career and was a mentor to Andy, she's best-known today as the author of the Eloise kids' stories, supposedly based on her goddaughter, Lisa Minelli.

The producer of his first television special, Bud Yorkin, puts it best when he says that "all he has to do is be himself."  He can control the audience now, Yorkin says, because "At last he is in charge."  And you know what?  Simply being Andy Williams led to a pretty good career for Andy Williams, didn't it?

Read the rest here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide, April 12, 1969

What's with the talk about the Academy Awards in this week's issue, you're probably thinking. Wasn't that last month?  Why are you bringing it up now, in the middle of April?

Well, that's the way it used to be, back in the days when the only significant movie awards show besides the Oscars was the Golden Globes, and those were confined to an hour-long broadcast on the Andy Williams Show.  Back then, the Oscarcast was held in early April or late March, usually on a Monday night, and it was the only awards show for most people.  Now, it's just one of many.

TV Guide's take on the Oscars concerns the revamping of the show, under the direction of famed Broadway choreographer Gower Champion.  Bob Hope has been banished as host, to be replaced by ten "Friends of Oscar" who will share the emcee duties.  The venue has changed, from the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles.  The dress code is relaxed, with black tie replacing white tie and tales.  He even proposed getting rid of the bleachers outside the auditorium, where the fans gather to watch the stars walk down the red carpet, but that was going too far in the eyes of many, and Champion eventually relents.

Dwight Whitney, writing the article, expresses an appropriate level of skepticism regarding Champion's plans.  After all the Academy Awards are now "an electronic monster which no one seems able to control on any level."  But, in the end, the broadcast comes off pretty well.  It's one of the longer broadcasts in recent years, checking in at what now would be considered a svelte two hours and 33 minutes, but it brings in good ratings, along with some surprise winners, and Champion is accorded a standing ovation when he arrives at the after-broadcast party.  As stagnant and dull as recent broadcasts have been, it's a pity we don't have another Gower Champion waiting somewhere in the wings.

Read the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: April 9, 1966

We're a hard lot to please, aren't we? First we wonder when TV's going to give us new movies, and now we complain about the ones they won't let us see!  It sounds a lot more sinister (or provocative) than it really is.

For the most part, we're talking about movies that don't appear on TV because of rights problems of one kind or another, something we've gotten all too used to when it comes to the release of DVDs. The Cat and the Canary, a 1939 flick with Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard, 1947's Life With Father with William Powell, Irene Dunne and Elizabeth Taylor, and Irving Berlin's This Is the Army are among dozens of movies that have fallen victim to the inability to reach an agreement with the rights owners, usually the widows or estates of the authors.

Other movies are no-shows for various reasons: Anna and the King of Siam was kept from television so it wouldn't compete with its musical version, The King and I.  The Buccaneer, The Desert Song, and So Big are among films that the studios themselves have withheld in order to protect remakes.  And when movies are remade - Show Boat, Cimarron, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, for example - the originals are often shelved to avoid confusion, or have their names changed - the original State Fair, starring Dana Andrews and Jeanne Crain, became It Happened One Summer to differentiate it from the newer version, with Pat Boone.  Blockbusters from years past - Gone with the Wind, the Disney movies like Pinocchio, Bambi, Snow White - are re-released periodically, and as long as they continue to make money for their studios, they'll be MIA on TV.

Have no fear, though; there's confidence that many, if not all, of these movies will eventually make it to the small screen - one way or another.  For example, a note elsewhere in this issue tells us that ABC has just paid a reported $2 million for the rights to the Oscar-winning Bridge on the River Kwai.  I just checked: you can get it today at Amazon for $8.48 and watch it as often as you want.

Read the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: April 5, 1958

When, the cover asks, will we see new movies on television?  Back in April of 1958, could one possibly have imagined that someday you'd be able to pay to see a movie on television the same day it premiered in theaters?  Or that the quality of some home theater systems would eventually rival that of a movie house?  That there would be entire networks that would show only movies, uncut and without commercial interruption (for a fee, of course)?  Or that you didn't even need television, just a machine into which you could put a tape or a disc and watch your favorite film, any time you wanted, usually less than a year after it premiered on the big screens?  This, I think, is one of the biggest ways in which we've changed the way we think about television, as a form of entertainment.  You don't even have to read the article - the headline says it all.

I do read the article, of course - it's part of my service to you, the loyal reader.  And the consensus is: television is hurting the theaters.  As our story opens, theater bigwigs are gathered in Mike Romanoff's Beverly Hills restaurant trying to figure out how to keep "new" movies - defined as those produced since August 1, 1948 - from making it to TV.  The Sindlinger research organization estimates that movie exhibitors have lost $50,000,000 due to movies being shown on TV, and that to release the post-'48 movies would be "'suicide' for the entire movie industry."

TV Guide, of course, isn't so sure about that.  Yes, it's "probably true" that old movies on TV have had an effect.  But there's also the high price of movie tickets (which in 1961 was $0.69), the increasing number of "boisterous youngsters" turning a trip to the theater "into an unpleasant experience," and that movies just might not be as good as they used to be.  And then there's the "dilemma" for talent guilds (actors, writers, producers, etc.) - on the one hand, they'd love to get the revenues that would come from selling newer movies to TV.  At the same time, they fear the effects on their business if television really is that harmful to the industry, so much so that if the studios decide to sell newer movies to TV, the guilds could strike.  In between are the television stations themselves.  They want the new movies, yes, but they point out that with over 10,000 already available, they can afford to wait for awhile.

Who knows where it will all end?  Well, of course, we do.  As I said at the top, I wonder if they could have imagined it?

Read the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide, March 25, 1961

It's possible you might be getting just a bit tired of 1961, since we've spent most of March there. To tell the truth, regardless of my affinity for the year I'm getting a bit tired of it as well. However, you deal with what you have, and for some reason March was never one of the big months in my collection.  Therefore, we're back to '61 one more time!

Unfortunately, in many respects this week's issue looks a lot like last week's.  NBC telecasts the NIT championship from Madison Square Garden on Saturday afternoon (Providence defeats Saint Louis 62-59), Channel 11 covers the championship of the Minnesota State High School basketball tournament Saturday night, and on Palm Sunday evening Hallmark Hall of Fame presents James Daly in "Give Us Barabbas."  Armstrong Circle Theatre is on both weeks, and Paul Hartman, subject of a feature story last week, is a featured player this week in NBC's Bell Telephone Hour on Friday night.

Don't despair, though - there are certainly enough differences for us to be able to squeeze something interesting out of this week.

Read the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: March 23, 1968

We are, in a sense, revisiting this week's issue, having used it once before in last year's discussion on the content of Saturday morning children's programming.*  And that was an interesting topic, but by no means does it exhaust the material at hand.

*I just love it when I link to myself.  Because, as they say, if you won't do it, nobody else will.

***
One of the great controversies of the 1950s surrounded Princess Margaret, Queen Elizabeth's sister, and her romance with the divorced Group Captain Peter Townsend.  A marriage between the two was vetoed by the Church of England, which at the time forbade divorce and remarriage (head of the church: Queen Elizabeth), and in 1960 she married the photographer Antony Armstrong-Jones, who upon marriage became Earl of Snowdon.  Tonight, CBS Reports presents "Don't Count the Candles," a photographic essay by Lord Snowdon on aging.  In addition to pictures depicting ordinary people dealing with various aspects of getting older, there are interviews with people at both ends of the aging spectrum, from Twiggy to Noel Coward to Field Marshal Montgomery.

For her part, Margaret turned out to be the black sheep of the royal family, having scandalous love affairs, saying outrageous things, and in general embarrassing the rest of the family at every opportunity.  My mother always thought Margaret did those things on purpose, and while I don't know whether or not there's any empirical data proving this, it doesn't require an advanced degree in psychology to suggest that Maggie was getting back at Liz for what happened with Townsend.  The only thing that could have made this story better was if the stymied Group Captain went on to become a rebellious rock musician, but such was not the case.

Eventually, Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon divorce (a delightful line from the always-reliable Wikipedia notes that their marriage was "accompanied by drugs, alcohol, and bizarre behaviour by both parties such as Snowdon's leaving lists between the pages of books the princess read for her to find, of 'things I hate about you'"); Snowden goes on to marry (and divorce) the former wife of film director Michael Lindsay-Hogg, while Margaret never remarries, but carries on a, shall we say, colorful life.

As was the case with the Ingrid Bergman story last week, what we see here (albeit in a far more tangential way, since Margaret is mentioned nowhere in the listing*) is more evidence of how perspectives on marriage have changed over the years.  It was one thing for Margaret, not even the heir to the throne, to scandalize Church and Country by marrying a divorced man; it is, apparently, something else that the current heir is, in fact, married to a divorced woman with whom he apparently conducted an affair while married to his former wife.  Again, no judgement here, merely observation.

*But if you insist on a television link, the subject of Margaret's later relationship with Roddy Llewellyn was once brief fodder for an episode of We Interrupt This Week, a show I looked at a couple of days ago.

Read the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: March 4, 1961

Raymond Burr was on the cover of TV Guide at least a dozen times, between Perry Mason and Ironside, not to mention his turn as Pope John XXIII.  There's very little new to be written about him, and we know that much of what we've already read will turn out not to be true.  There are a couple of things that remain consistent through all these stories, however: that Ray Burr is a very private man, and that he's a mensch to work with.

Richard Gehman's profile of Burr this week alludes to his life as "one long series of heartbreaking tragedies," most of which didn't actually happen, but there's a significant line in this section, in which Gehman remarks that "few of Burr's friends know anything about him."  It's likely that, in retrospect, what they did know of him might not have been so.  Lest you think I'm hammering Burr, I'm not, or at least I don't mean to.  It is, however, impossible to write about him without picking up these small pieces, which appear in so many articles about him, and contrast them with what we've since learned about him.

Raymond Burr is one of my favorite actors, just as Perry Mason remains one of my favorite series.  And the comments from Burr's colleagues on Mason demonstrate why he was so well-liked on the set.  He's a practical joker, for one thing, his favorite victim being Barbara Hale, who plays Mason's devoted secretary Della Street.  He's good to the crew, with "a desire for everybody to be happy, to be wanted and to belong," leading one person to refer to the Mason set as "the happiest company in Hollywood."

He's also loyal, and not afraid to fight for what he believes in.  When William Talman, who plays Mason's nemesis Hamilton Burger, was suspended from the show following a morals charge (later dismissed), Burr was outraged and fought CBS constantly until Talman was reinstated.  And Ray Collins, who plays Lt. Arthur Tragg, remained listed on the opening credits even after his health prevented him from appearing on the show.  This was, of course, also at Burr's "request."

This article is the first of a three-part series on Burr's life; subsequent parts will go into detail on the more dubious assertions about Burr's past.  In later years, articles will elaborate on these events, but they'll also discuss Burr's devotion to visiting American troops in battle areas, and his continuing commitment to his colleagues. A mensch indeed.

Read the rest here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: February 24, 1979

The last time we saw James Arness,he was patrolling Dodge City as Marshal Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke.  He's now on a different network, ABC, in a different role, Zeb Macahan, on a different show, How the West Was Won. But Arness remains a larger-than-life star in a genre that's been very good to him: the Western.

Westerns used to dominate television - in 1959 alone there were 26 of them.  But there hasn't been a successful one since - when? Brisco County, Jr.?  That was a quirky series that really tried to transcend the genre to make it more relevant to the 21st Century, but perhaps it was too far ahead of its time, and it only lasted one season on Fox.  Firefly?  That was another series that Fox didn't really get, and it too ran only one season.  It was a blend of the old West and the new West - space. For all its sci-fi trappings, though, its sensibility was the Western.  Then there are the modern-day Westerns, from Walker, Texas Ranger to Justified to Longmire, but those are programs that I'd say are set in the West geographically more than philosophically. Little House on the Prairie had a good pedigree, Michael Landon having been one of the stars of one of the last big-time Westerns, Bonanza.  Doctor Quinn probably qualifies as a Western in spirit as well as setting, but that strikes me more as soap opera than horse opera.

How the West Was Won wasn't what you'd call a long-running success, but it's one of those shows that seemed always to be on TV one way or another.  It started as a TV-movie in 1976, The Macahans, then had a go in miniseries format the next season, before becoming a regular series for 1978 and 1979.  As the notoriously reclusive Arness sits down for his "one and only" interview of the new season, he explains to Dick Russell the difference between his two titanic characters.  Machaan, he says, is a man from "an era when men were the law unto themselves," making their own rules, taking advice only from themselves.  Matt Dillion, on the other hand, "was the opposite - a guy who not only had to see that the laws were carried out, but live by them himself.  He had to do the right thing." Arness took this code to heart, as "Miss Kitty," Amanda Blake, recalls: "He didn't want Matt to make a mistake."  She wondered why he couldn't be "on the other end of the pole" even once.  "Might've been interesting.  But Jim would never hear of it."

How the West Was Won gives Arness a chance to live out a different kind of Western hero, one closer to his own persona - the rugged outdoorsman, less restrained and buttoned up than Dillon.  But the strength of Dillon, and of James Arness the man, remains paramount.  In real life, as a close friend confides, Arness "really believes in the law of the West - what's right is right, and wrong is wrong; there are no grays."  It's impossible to not see this quality in Arness, and perhaps that had to do with the end of the Western.  As the 50s morphed into the 60s and 70s, society was less confident, less able to tell the difference between right and wrong, more willing to see the shades of grey that Arness was unwilling to acknowledge.  The kind of self-assuredness of a Matt Dillon or Zeb Macahan threatens people at times like this, people who lack that kind of knowledge of themselves, and when confronted with it they often shut their eyes to it.  By the time the public was again ready for that kind of television hero, as Steven Stark comments in Glued to the Set, the maverick cowboy had been replaced by the maverick police detective.

How the West Was Won leaves the air in 1979, and James Arness will return to Gunsmoke, making five TV-movies between 1987 and 1994. His own foray into police procedurals, McClain's Law, has a brief run in 1981-82.  Arness' character, Jim McClain, is described as an "old-school" cop; but when it comes to taking the bad guy to school, nobody does it better than the heroes of the Old West, the ones James Arness plays so well.

Read the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: February 20, 1965

When we think of Burgess Meredith, we tend to associate him with the Penguin in the original Batman, or as the hapless librarian in the Twilight Zone episode "Time Enough at Last," or perhaps as the veteran cornerman in Rocky, for which he received an Oscar nomination.  But in February 1965, he's co-starring with James Franciscus in the high school drama Mr. Novak, where he plays Principal Martin Woodridge.

Meredith has come to the series in its second and last season, as a replacement for the ailing Dean Jagger, who was forced to leave due to an ulcer.  It is hoped that Meredith's character will inject some tension into the series; Jagger, as Principal Albert Vane, had been more of a father-figure, and Woodridge's introduction figures to inject some conflict with the idealistic Novak.  (It doesn't work, or at least not enough to boost the ratings; Meredith appears for 17 episodes, after which the show is cancelled.)

It's considered quite the coup to attract Meredith to series television; he'd previously turned down series such as The Travels of Jamie McPheeters, and is known much more as a Broadway actor and director. His TV guest shots, including four appearances on Twilight Zone, have been memorable, but he's well aware of the difficulties facing veteran actors.  "Let's face it, I live high," he tells Dwight Whitney.  "I raise jumping horses, Kaja [his wife] flies airplanes.  The younger people don't know who I am.  And that, in this day and age, is essential."

So Novak is not the show that will bring Burgess Meredith to prominence among the younger generation. But just wait a couple of years, and that will change. . .

View the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: February 11, 1961

Until a few years ago, the most I could say about Peter Gunn was that Craig Stevens played a suave private eye, and it had one of the coolest themes of all time.  Now, to know that I had to have seen it at some point in time, probably many years ago, before I was old enough to understand Lola Albright.  But then I was able to get the complete series on DVD - and then I got Lola Albright.

[Pause while heartbeat returns to normal.]

Albright plays Edie Hart, the singer who's also Gunn's girlfriend. She works out of a bar called Mother's, which doubles as the place where Gunn meets his clients and conducts his business.  She's a smart, sassy character* who's graced with some snappy dialogue, every bit Gunn's equal in the scenes in which they're matched.  She has a fine singing voice, doing her own vocals in the occasional set pieces at Mother's.  She exudes an adult sexiness that makes it impossible to take your eyes off of her when she's on screen.  And she's a likable character, as is Gunn, making this one of the easier private eye shows to watch.

*Gunn's nickname for her was "Silly."

Off screen, Lola Albright has some things to say about what she sees as an unreasonable invasion of her privacy since her divorce from actor Jack Carson.  "To tell the truth, I'm sick and tired of the line 'Does Lola get what Lola wants?'*  Every magazine and newspaper seems to leap on it as though discovering it for the very first time.  I am equally sick and tired of the line 'Lonely Lola.'"  Such are the curses of having an alliterative name, it would appear.  "If my name were Betty, I'd be two cliches to the good."  She struggles with the line between personal and public; while she understands the sacrifices of privacy that are part of stardom, she wonders "why does the press have to go so far?  Why do they print things you never said, things they make up out of a blue sky?  Why do they twist what you say into meanings you never meant?"  Lola also denies she's dissatisfied with her role on Gunn; she likes how Edie got her own place in the third (and final) season, a plot devise that gives her a chance to sing more.  "I don't want to dominate the show and I certainly don't want a series of my own."

*If you're unsure of the origin of the line, watch this.

People who work with her have nothing but good things to say.  Frank Stempel, who was her ex-husband Carson's manager, says that "Even now that she's making good money, she doesn't really know what it is.  She goes out of her way to help people.  She'd give away her last dime if she thought it would help somebody."  Press agent Bill Stein remembers how when his wife was in the hospital, "Lola must have called me a dozen times offering to come out and take care of the two kids while I was working.  If you know her, you like her."

Peter Gunn, which ends its three-year run at the end of the current season, is probably the high point of Lola Albright's career, although she's hardly a recluse once the series ends, appearing in several big-screen movies and is a steady presence in guest roles on TV through the 80s.  But there's no disagreeing that in a genre that often produces more than its share of annoying characters, Peter Gunn's Edie is one of the most enjoyable; in fact, after you've watched her in a few episodes, you'll probably be singing these words as well:



Read the rest here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: February 4, 1967

Dale Robertson is my kind of guy: plain-spoken, to the point, conservative.  The star of ABC's The Iron Horse, and previous Western series such as Tales of Wells Fargo and Death Valley Days, "believes in income taxes but thinks that they should be a flat 25 percent with no limit on how much the high rollers can make."*  He also believes that the troubled urban areas such as Harlem can be rehabilitated by installing some pride of place, perhaps an early version of the "Broken Windows" theory, and that anyone fortunate enough to have the kind of life he has - a loving wife, obedient children, and three square meals a day - should be able to "do anything on God's green earth he sets his mind to."  No wonder that Robertson was out campaigning for Ronald Reagan during his successful 1966 run for Governor of California.

*Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose, as I've said more than once.

It's not a surprise to learn Robertson's values; a graduate from Oklahoma Military Academy, joined the Army right after Pearl Harbor, fought with Patton's Third Army in Europe.  Nor is it a surprise to read Robertson's opinions in TV Guide, or that a man with them is the star of a new series.  It's not quite so common today, however, to find conservatives in the industry so outspoken.  As Clint Howard (brother of Ron, and formerly of Gentle Ben) said not too long ago, “I always tell younger conservative-minded people that they better mind their P's and Q's and remember that you want to have a career."  This isn't a judgement on my part, by the way, just an observation. Of course TV Guide, a conservative publication, gives voice to conservative actors.   And there are still conservatives in Hollywood today - they're just a little harder to find.

On the opposite end of the political spectrum, Sunday night features the premiere of one of the most notable, controversial series of the 60s: The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.  Once upon a time I reviewed a DVD release of season 3 of Smothers Brothers.  Upon looking back at it, I find I didn't think much of it, which doesn't surprise me since I didn't think much of the show when it was originally on, just as I never thought much of the Smothers Brothers themselves, other than as a testimonial on just how far one could get in the entertainment business without much talent.

But here we are, at the very beginning.  The Brothers are coming off a mildly amusing sitcom in which Tom played an angel (no typecasting there), not to mention a fairly successful stand-up act, and numerous appearances on various television shows.  Their opening night lineup is amazingly conventional, with Ed Sullivan (welcoming them to the Sunday night lineup; they immediately followed Ed's show), Danny Thomas, Jim Nabors, and Jill St. John.  The ad accompanying the show promises a "riotous new series,*" with "daffy ballads and oddball humor."  Sounds pretty innocuous, doesn't it?  As I mentioned in that review, for all the shouting about the Smothers Brothers, their show was actually pretty conventional, and when it's removed from the topical context it's actually kind of stupid.

*I don't know what CBS was expecting from the show, but I doubt they thought the biggest riots would come from the network's relationship with their stars.

Nonetheless, that innocent listing is exactly the kind of thing we like to look for here: an advertisement for a historic program, with no hint as to what lies ahead.  The Smothers Brothers were, in my opinion, far more influential in terms of the precedent they set for the shows that followed them than they were with their own show.  One thing's for sure, though - the times, they were a 'changing.

Read the rest here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: January 29, 1966

I'm generally not one to make hay of other people's misfortunes, but there's a line in Robert De Roos' cover story profile of Pat Crowley that shouts out for contextualization.

The actress, currently starring with Mark Miller in NBC's Please Don't Eat the Daisies, is talking about her marriage to attorney Ed Hookstratten.  De Roos asks her if the marriage, now eight years long, will last now that she's working on a weekly series.  "It sure is," she tells him.  "We are Catholics and there is a little solidity there."

That sounded like such a refreshing attitude to me that I immediately went to Google, to find that the Hookstrattens had divorced sometime in the 70s or 80s - Crowley remarried in 1986, to producer Andy Friendly.*

*Fun fact: Andy Friendly's father is legendary TV newsman Fred Friendly; his brother, David Friendly, was nominated for an Oscar in 2006 as producer of Little Miss Sunshine.

I hasten to say here that I have no knowledge of why Crowley and Hookstratten divorced, and I don't want to play either a pop psychologist, a pop marriage counselor, or a pop theologian.  But one of the many tragedies of the Catholic Church in the latter half of the 20th Century - particularly the post-Vatican II turmoil, which reached a peak in 1968 with Paul VI's encyclical Humanae Vitae - is the breakdown of basic Catholic beliefs.  By the late 60s, Catholic doctrine had become a smorgasbord; if you didn't like what one priest had to say on birth control, for example, you could shop around and find a priest who would readily sanction it.  Similar situations existed for everything from premarital sex to divorce and remarriage to a whole host of previous elements of Catholic teaching that had rarely been questioned.  Inevitably, this kind of confusion among the faithful led many to doubt the Church's sincerity, authority, - what have you.  Bottom line: no solidity.

Again, I have no reason to think that this might have had any role to play in Pat Crowley's divorce from Ed Hookstratten. But I do think it's part of this blog's narrative to fit these kinds of things into the larger cultural environment.  The 60s were already a period of flux by now, and they were headed toward even more cataclysmic change. Understanding the climate of the times (even though the insufficient space here hardly scratches the surface) puts little moments like this into some sense of context.  It even adds, I think, a note of poignancy.

*Hookstratten, Elvis Presley's personal attorney, represented The King in his divorce from Priscilla, which certainly suggests mixed feelings regarding divorce.  

Read the rest here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: January 14, 1961

After two weeks in the 70s, it's back to this 60s with this issue celebrating the upcoming inauguration of John F. Kennedy as President.

Actually, it's kind of strange (not to say disconcerting), having so recently spent a good amount of time on Kennedy's assassination, to suddenly be propelled backwards to a time before "Ask not," before Camelot, before any of the myth.  In an ideal world I might well be giving you this TV Guide series in chronological order, but I have to go with what I have, and this happens to be the only available issue that fits the bill for what we need this week.*

*Of course, if' you'd like to help me rectify this by expanding my TV Guide collection, I'll be more than happy to accept your donations.  Email me and I'll give you my Paypal account.

***

Perry Como has no complaints about being labeled a nice guy.  "I suppose it is a tag it's hard to swallow at times.  Mr. Nice Guy.  But what in hell is wrong with that?  I don't know anyone in his right mind who doesn't like to be thought of as a nice person.*"

*Dennis Rodman doesn't count; we're talking about people in their right minds, remember?

Como is the 50s version of the king of cool, with one wife, three children, two homes, two cars and two offices, all of which are an oasis of calm.  As of 1961, Como has been on television longer than any other singer, and NBC pays him $1,250,000 per year for his services.  (He has an additional two-year, $25 million contract with Kraft Foods, sponsor of his show.)  And his biggest problem, according to industry insiders, is that Perry Como is bland.  As one says, "Perry's got all the seven sins - green, envy and so on - but he's blocked them out - almost."  When asked to explain the "almost," the source replies, "Well, he gets just as angry as anybody else if the men's room is locked."

Como's lifestyle would probably be considered unacceptable today, lacking the spicy elements of "celebrity" that seem to be prerequisites for stardom.  He's heard it all, of course, but "It really doesn't make a hell of a lo of difference to me."  But, he adds, ""I've got my moments, like everyone else.  But I hide 'em better'n anyone else*.  That's all it is."  When arguments do arise during production, "It takes me just 10 seconds to tell 'em - to set things straight.  And then maybe they think, 'Maybe this old so-and-so, he's been around, maybe he's right.'  I haven't beat anyone up lately.  Nobody's beat me up.  Maybe they have respect for my old age.  Here's a guy - me - sings a song, goes home, takes a bath, grabs what few dollars he can - of course, I'm exaggerating; it's a damned sight more than a few dollars - and doesn't beat up the old lady. She could probably beat me up.  What do they expect me to do?"

*Obviously, the man is immune to Freudian theories of repression.

Is it just me, or is this kind of refreshing?  It didn't hurt Como's career; his regular series runs until 1967, and his Christmas specials run for years after that.  Perhaps it's because Como was a barber before his musical success, and could probably go back to cutting hair if he wanted.  There's no sense of entitlement from Mr. C, though - "I've had things so good, I've just never really had to worry.  It's a hell of a feeling.  If that's bland, then I'm bland.  And pretty damned glad of it, at that."


Read the whole piece here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: January 10, 1976

Thought we'd stay with the 70s for another week, see what happens.  Will I live to regret it, or be pleasantly surprised?  Stay tuned.

This is another TV Guide from my own personal subscription, meaning it has my name on the mailing label and serves as a constant reminder of the programs I wasn't able to see while living in the world's worst town.  Shows like Happy Days, starring our cover boys, Ron Howard and Henry Winkler.  Oh sure, I'd heard of Happy Days, was aware that it was a hit, but the only time I might be able to see it was when we traveled back to the Twin Cities on vacation.  It seemed a lot more exotic then than it does now.

Last week I wrote about ABC's penchant for "prestige" dramas, and mentioned the acclaimed Eleanor and Franklin.  Well, that's the ABC Theatre two-part presentation on Sunday and Monday nights. The movie, which stars Jane Alexander and Edward Herrmann, will go on to win nine Emmys, a Golden Globe, and a Peabody, and spawn a sequel - The White House Years - that will air the following year. However, ABC doesn't have the Prestigious Presidential Biography category all to itself; NBC counters on Monday night with part five of Sandburg's Lincoln, starring Hal Holbrook in the title role.  That series, part of the ongoing Bicentennial celebration, was aired in six episodes over a year and a half, beginning in September 1974 and concluding in April 1976.  I won't spill the beans on the surprise ending...

Continuing our political theme, first lady Betty Ford appears on Saturday's episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, playing herself.  Probably just as well that I missed that one.  I didn't miss the replay of John Wayne's Swing Out, Sweet Land though.  The star-studded 90-minute special, which had originally been broadcast in 1970* and was being repeated as "A Bicentennial Salute," featured Lorne Greene and Jack Benny as George Washington and friend, Rowan and Martin as the Wright Brothers, Bing Crosby as Mark Twain, Bob Hope and Ann-Margaret as entertainers at Valley Forge - well, you get the idea.  Surprisingly, it's available on DVD (under the title John Wayne's Tribute to America), and it's actually not bad.  Mind you, it's not great, either.  But who am I to judge - see for yourself and make up your own mind:


*Come to think of it, that's probably the airing I remember.

Read the rest here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This week in TV Guide: December 16, 1961

It's a week until Christmas, and this issue of TV Guide is full of programs we’d never see on network television today.

Take, for example, NBC’s Project 20 documentary series, which on Wednesday night presents “The Coming of Christ.”  “The life and ministry of Christ and prophecies of His Coming were constant themes for painters of the 15th to 17th Centuries.  This taped, half-hour show, first seen last December, uses photographs of the works of many of these painters – to depict ‘The Coming of Christ.’”

A few thoughts on this: first, if a program like this were on today, it would be on PBS or one of the shrinking number of “arts” shows on cable, and the emphasis would be on the art, rather than the religion.* The sidebar ad underscores the idea that art is being used as a vehicle for the greater religious event: “’Project 20’ brings art treasures to life to tell their deeply moving story.”  This is reinforced by narrator Alexander Scourby’s reading of passages from the Old and New Testaments as the pictures are shown (in a “’still-pictures-to-action’ technique [used] to create the illusion of movement”; similar, I suppose, to what Ken Burns uses today).  It’s also interesting to note the capitalization of the pronoun “His” as well as “Coming,” and later capitalizations of “Virgin” and “Child.”  Again, this denotes a respect for religion that isn’t seen as often today, but was taken for granted back then even in secular publications.

*I say this because TVG clearly labels this as “religion” and not, say, “art.”  I think programs such as Sister Wendy’s undoubtedly had religious overtones, but were still packaged as art documentaries. 

Alexander Scourby had a fantastic voice; I wish I could track down a copy of this show, though an audio version is available, as well as a book tie-in.

Immediately following Project 20 is Perry Como’s Christmas show, which includes a scene in which “Perry reads the story of the first Christmas” to children from the production staff.  That’s very similar to Friday’s Bell Telephone Hour, where hostess Jane Wyatt “recites the story of the Nativity from the Gospel of St. Luke.”  Now, I’m not going to get into the larger question of a “War on Christmas” or anything like that; it’s simply to point out, as this blog is want to do, of how we can see the culture’s evolution through the programs on TV.  Undeniably, we’re at a point now where there seems to be a reluctance to even use the word “Christmas,” let alone discuss the religious ramifications it contains.  And while there are a lot of Hallmark- and Lifetime-style “Christmas” movies out there, they almost always deal with it as a secular event, perhaps with some quasi-touchy-feely “spirituality” wrapped up in its message.

Not so in 1961, where religion was seen as an integral part of Christmas.  Sure, there were variety shows such as Garry Moore’s and Red Skelton’s (both this week) that focus more on the secular, celebratory aspects of Christmas, but the larger point is that even within that context, it would not have been uncommon for the host or one of the guests to say or sing or otherwise do something that contained an explicitly religious message.

Perhaps it’s the fact that New Year’s isn’t far away, but I’m reminded of a song by Louden Wainwright III shortly after The New York Times building in Times Square (hence the name of the square) was renamed Allied Chemical Building.  “Have you been to Allied Chemical Square?/It used to be called Times, but times have changed.”

Indeed the times have changed.

Read the rest here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This Week in TV Guide, November 16, 1963

On Friday night's episode of Route 66, "After he stops Nola Neilsen from committing suicide, Linc becomes romantically involved with her - which disturbs the girl's possessive brother."  Meanwhile, on 77 Sunset Strip, "Chuck Gates has been sentenced to death for murder, but his father, big-time politician 'Boss' Gates, employs Stu to prove his son was framed."  And Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre presents John O'Hara's "It's Mental Work," adapted by Rod Serling: "Too long a bar owner, Ernie Wigman wants to sell out, preferably to his bartender Rich.  Rich has a yen for the bar; he just hasn't got the cash."

In sports, the Los Angeles Lakers take on the San Francisco Warriors from the Cow Palace, and at Madison Square Garden Mauro Mina and Allen Thomas face off in a light-heavyweight bout.  On Jack Paar's prime-time show, Liberace plays the piano while Cassius Clay recites poetry.  Cliff Arquette and dancer Gil Lamb are Steve Allen's guests on Los Angeles' KTLA, while on San Diego's KFMB, the Allen show features jazz pianist George Shearing and singers Howard Keel and Vikki Carr.

Friday morning and afternoon are filled with game shows, soap operas, matinee movies and sitcom reruns - Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. and Lena Horne wind up a week as the celebrity guests on Password, on Father Knows Best, "Bud dates a beauty-contest winner," and on The Doctors, "Laura breaks her engagement."  Among the late night movies, KTLA is showing Berlin Correspondent, in which "A daring correspondent (Dana Andrews) attempts to sneak out secret information," and KNXT's Late Show is The Big Lift, "The story of the American airlift in 1958 when the Russians blocked off Berlin," starring Montgomery Clift and Paul Douglas.

In other words, it's a day pretty much like any other day.  Except, of course, it wasn't.

Read the rest of the article here. ◙

Retro TV Monday - This Week in TV Guide, November 9, 1968

Last week we dabbled in food, sharing a TV Guide recipe for minestrone. This week we go even farther, as Richard Gehman tells us how "You too can be a chef" by watching The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. You see, Carson makes a perfect companion for the hungry view (and Gehman finds himself, for some unknown reason, starved every time he watches Carson).  Forthwith, Gehman's complete late-night supper, made during a recent episode of Tonight.

Start with the small potatoes, which can be prepared for boiling during Carson's commercial for a new spot remover.  You can do the whole thing from your easy chair while Don Rickles comes on and insults everyone in sight.  As Rickles continues, it's time for you to separate slices of chipped beef, which you've brought to your easy chair along with the spuds.  As Ed McMahon shills for Alpo, take the separated beef to the kitchen, toss the potatoes in a pot for boiling, and while you're there put an eighth of a pound of butter in a frypan which has been preheated to 300°.  Turn up the TV while Sergio Franchi is singing, so you can hear him while toasting two slices of bread and opening a can of peas.  With the next commercial, you can drain the potatoes and toast a couple more slices of bread.  The next guest, possibly George Jessel, allows you to chop a fresh green or red pepper.

When the show pauses for a station break, that's your chance to add two tablespoonfuls of sifted flour to the sizzling butter, stir with a whisk, and add a half teaspoonful of salt, a couple of pinches of dried parsley, a very small dash of oregano and some pepper, preferably fresh-ground.  You can add a half-cup of water while the next singer (probably named Connie) warbles away.  Add the chipped beef to the mixture when shills for a sewer-cleaning device, along with a half-cup of milk, stirring until the mixture bubbles, at which time you include the drained peas.

This whole thing should take you to within about ten minutes of the end of Carson's show.  During the next-to-last commercial, add a tablespoonful of capped black pitted olives, and as Carson interviews his final guest (Mary Martin Mary McCarthy, Mary Healy, or maybe Mary Queen of Scots), you can serve your creamed chipped beef, either on the toast or the potatoes you've put on the side.  Turn off the set.  Eat heartily.

I don't know.  I don't think I can eat that heavy a meal right before bedtime.

Read the rest of the article here.  ◙

Retro TV Monday - This Week in TV Guide, October 1, 1966

Over at the TV blog, I've been running a feature for the past couple of years called "This Week in TV Guide," in which I take a look at some of the more interesting cultural notes from back in the day.*

*A phrase just one step removed from "Get off my lawn, you kids."  Of course, the fact that I don't have a lawn right now is beside the point.

At any rate, here's a preview of this week's piece - be sure to follow the link to read the whole thing.

***

For the first time, the stain of the 1960s - Vietnam - graces the cover of this week's TV Guide.

Neil Hickey, TV Guide's New York Bureau Chief and author of some of the best news features published by the magazine, presents the first of a four-part series on how - and how well - television is covering its first war. It is a war "exorbitantly more demanding, both mentally and physically, than anything those earlier newsmen faced in Europe or the Pacific." It's a guerrilla war, replete with everything from jungle disease to ambush land mines and booby traps, field telephones that barely work, and as one correspondent puts it, "pushing the cause of journalistic profanity to new horizons." As NBC's David Burrington puts it, "There are so many imponderables and ironies here that it's sometimes difficult, if not downright impossible, to explain what's happening in terms that an American audience will understand." 

Read the complete article.  ◙