Recently I’ve been writing about my favorite armchair detective, Nero Wolfe, whom I consider to be in the same league as a detective as the much more famous Sherlock Holmes. Today I want to spotlight another detective, who, while he may not be in the same league as those two, still deserves a bit of a spotlight and serves as a reminder that even though Mr. Holmes may be the most famous of the Victorian-era detectives, he is far from the only one operating or being written about in that era.
One of those other detectives is Thomas Carnacki, otherwise known as the Ghost-Finder.
Carnacki is the creation of writer William Hope Hodgson, and appeared in a series of six short stories published between 1910 and 1912 in The Idler magazine and The New Magazine. Unlike Holmes, however, Carnacki’s adventures, as is perhaps obvious from the Ghost Finder subtitle, usually involved the supernatural in some way or another. I say usually, because in at least a couple of circumstances, it is discovered that there actually is no supernatural instance involved, thus leaving the reader unsure until the end whether this is the case or not, which adds to the suspense of the stories.
The structure of each of the stories tends to be quite similar. In each of them Carnacki invites four friends, including Dodgson from whose perspective the stories are told, to dinner at his flat in Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, England. At the end of the dinner, everyone settles into their chairs, and Carnacki relates his latest exploit. At the end of the tale, Carnacki may entertain a few questions, but he usually does not go any further into an explanation than he already has.
Though it seems as though the character of Carnacki and his stories might be ripe for development as a television series, or a series of movies, as far as I can tell, the only adaptation that has been made thus far is as an episode of the two-season BBC series The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes. This adaptation of the story The Horse of the Invisible stars Donald Pleasance as Carnacki.
The last time I did one of these Classic Television Thursday posts (and I apologize for the intervening weeks, but what with the holidays and life intervening as you’ve noticed, I’m sure, my posting here lately has simply been on the sparse side), I posted a few of the Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts just to give you a taste of what they were like. Today I’ll go into a bit more about them.
From 1965-1974 Dean Martin hosted one of the most popular variety shows on television. The show aired on Thursday nights on NBC except for the final year which saw it move to Friday night. It’s during this final season that the show changed, and upon which I want to focus today.
Due to declining ratings during the show’s eighth season it was decided that it was time to retool things. During this season, a series of “Man of the Week Celebrity Roast”s were added to the weekly offerings, and these proved to be very popular with the television audience. Therefore, rather than renewing The Dean Martin Show for a tenth seaon, NBC decided to work with Martin on this format and signed him to a series of specials, including roast specials. Martin was agreeable to this because it actually meant less work for him, while still keeping his name in the spotlight.
The first specials, which began airing early in 1974 with a roast of Bob Hope were shot in California before they finally moved to a permanent home in the Las Vegas MGM Grand Hotel’s Ziegfeld Room. For 10 years, from October 1974 to December 1984, Martin held court as roastmaster as some of Hollywood’s and Vegas’s top comedians and other celebrities would come together in a Friar’s Club style roast to playfully chide and or insult one of their fellow celebrities about his or her career. Then, at the end, the “honoree” would get a chance to take to the dais to respond to these quips and taunts with a few sharp lines of their own. Unlike some later iterations of the celebrity roast (I’m thinking particularly of the Comedy Central iteration of the concept) all of this was obviously meant as good, relatively clean fun as opposed to an occasion to see who could be the most insulting to the guest of honor.
Actually, I feel like I should go back and clarify a bit. Though Martin did indeed havea 10 year contract with NBC to do these specials, there were actually only 5 of them produced, with none airing from 1980-83, and the show finally returning with a few specials in 1984 to wrap up Martin’s obligations and fulfill the terms of the contract.
Okay, I’ve nattered on enough. Now I think it’s time to just sit back and enjoy a few more of these roasts, beginning with a roast of the man himself. Have fun!
Not a whole lot of time this week just because sometimes life intervenes, but instead of leaving you without your classic TV fix, I’ll give you a preview of next week’s column where I’ll go into some detail about these shows…
There are times while I’m researching these posts that I am completely caught off guard by something that will turn up. That’s what happened while I was looking for information for today’s post on Dan Rowan and Dick Martin’sLaugh-In. As a matter of fact, it happened twice.
Laugh-In was, of course, one of NBC’s highest rated shows in 1969, so it only made sense that the network would want to find some way to capitalize on that and spin-off shows of popular series were always good bets. The only question for the network was what kind of show would take advantage of the original show’s popularity without diminishing the original’s popularity.
I’m not sure exactly who came up with the idea of creating a daytime game show, but that’s what they went with.
Letters to Laugh-In was created to fill the void left by the recently cancelled Match Game. The concept of the show, hosted by Laugh-In‘s announcer Gary Owens, was simple: viewers would send in their jokes which would be read by a panel of comedians which usually consisted of two Laugh-In regulars and two other comedians. Each joke would then be rated on a scale of 1-100 and the viewer who sent in the highest rated joke each day would win a prize.
If you don’t think that sounds like the premise for a winning show, well, you would be right, as it lasted for only three months, from September 29 to December 26, 1969.
Here’s the only episode I could find readily available. it’s the second episode, and don’t worry if your screen goes black while watching it, as it actually looks like it could be a network feed to local stations with blank spots for the insertion of commercials.
Even more of a curiosity is the Saturday morning cartoon Baggy Pants and the Nitwits.
Once again, this is one of those shows that I cannot explain, but since there are episodes available to be watched, I have to accept it as a real thing.
The show was created by the prolific team of David H. DePatie and Friz Freleng. It was comprised of two segments, Baggy Pants, which featured the adventures of an anthropomorphic cat version of Charlie Chaplin’s Little Tramp character, and though there was music, there was no spoken dialogue. The second segment, which is the one that relates it to Laugh-In, was The Nitwits.
The Nitwits, you see, were Arte Johnson’s mumbling old man character Tyrone and his wife, Ruth Buzzi’s Gladys. However, instead of occupying the bench where they could be found “courting” (if you want to call it that) on Laugh-In, in this show the two were married, and Tyrone was a superhero who had come out of retirement in order to show the younger heroes how it was really done. Johnson and Buzzi even provided the voices for the show.
Yeah. I know. Complete WTH? But here it is:
Again, probably not too surprisingly, Baggy Pants and the Nitwits was not destined to last. If anything is surprising it’s that it did get a full 13 episode run.
So there you go. Two completely different and I dare say widely unknown spin offs from Laugh-In. And a couple of examples of the surprises that can turn up on the internet when you least expect them.
Last time I mentioned that the cornpone comedy Hee Haw was heavily influenced by Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, (generally referred to simply as Laugh-In) so it seemed only fitting this week to take a look at the original show itself.
I suppose I’d never really given the name of the show much thought, and it’s one of those things that I suppose should have occurred to me before, but just never had, but for those wondering where the name Laugh-In came from, it was a play on the sit-ins, love-ins, be-ins, and other -ins that were popular forms of protest during the civil rights and anti-war protests of the times.
Which seems fitting, since Laugh-In is very much a product of its time, a fact that, looking at it from the world of today, can be both a positive and a negative.
Certainly there is much about the setting, the atmosphere, and the topicality of so many of the jokes that plants it firmly in the late 60s and early 70s of its original creation and broadcast and can make it hard for viewers today, who may not have much familiarity with the general milieu and attitudes of the period to miss many of the jokes that are made, but the rapid-fire pace of the show and the simple quantity of material gone through in each episode which made it seem so much ahead of its time then serves it well now, as there is still quite a lot of it that remains timeless.
The show began life as a one-shot special which aired on September 9, 1967, and proved popular enough for NBC to bring it back as a regular series which aired on the network at 8pm eastern time on Monday nights.
Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, as suggested by the full title was hosted by comedians Dan Rowan and Dick Martin. In traditional form for this type of duo, Rowan was generally the straight man while Martin was the dimmer-but-slicker comedian. However, though they got top billing, Laugh-In was an ensemble show featuring, over its six season run such famous comedians and actors/actresses as Arte Johnson (who eventually wrangled himself a “with… credit during announcer Gary Owens’ introduction to the show), Henry Gibson, Ruth Buzzi, Lily Tomlin, Jo Anne Worley, Goldie Hawn, Larry Hovis, Judy Carne, Richard Dawson, Dave Madden, Sarah Kennedy, Jeremy Lloyd, Pigmeat Markham,, Pamela Rodgers, Barbara Sharma, Jud Strunk, Alan Sues, and Teresa Graves.
The show generally opened with a short intro/dialogue between Rowan and Martin before segeing into a bit which became known as the “cocktail party” during which the cast members would dance to a few bars of music then when the music would come to a sudden stop one or two of the cast would be focused in on to deliver short jokes. Then the music would start up again, the dancing would begin again and after a few seconds, there would be another stop for another joke.
After this it would be off to the races with a number of split-second edited one-liners, pre-taped bits, and recurring segments. At the end, there would be another short bit of dialogue, Rowan would tell Martin to “Say goodnight, Dick” to which Martin would reply “Goodnight, Dick”.
(A quick aside here: though many people, at least those old enough to remember George Burns and Gracie Allen, might think that this was a throwback to the closing lines of the comedic couple’s Television show (and the radio show which preceded it), they never actually used that line. Though George would say “Say ‘goodnight’, Gracie”, she never actually responded with “Goodnight, Gracie”)
After that, the cast would appear in the “joke wall” a psychedelically colored wall which had different panels which would open up to allow them to get in one last line even as the credits were rolling.
Laugh-In was the source of an amazing number of well-remembered catchphrases and one-liners as well as recurring characters. Among these was “Laugh-In Looks at the News” which could be considered one of the precursors to Saturday Night Live‘s Weekend Update. Other memorable lines and characters include:
Judy Carne being tricked into saying “Sock it to me”, which led to her being doused with water or otherwise assaulted.
“The Mod, Mod World” which comprised brief sketches on a theme interspersed with film footage of female cast members go-go dancing in bikinis, their bodies painted with punchy phrases and pithy wordplay.
“Here come de judge!” – The Judge character was originated on the show by British comic Roddy Maude-Roxby, though the catchphrase wasn’t used until Flip Wilson came on the show as a guest star, and then nightclub comedian Pigmeat Markham, who actually originated the phrase was brought in for a season. The most popular Judge, however, had to be Sammy Davis Jr., who really made the catchphrase his own.
The Flying Fickle Finger of Fate Award, saluted actual dubious achievements by the government or famous people.
Wolfgang the German soldier – a character created and portrayed by Arte Johnson who would comment on the previous gag by saying “Verrry interesting”, often following that up with lines such as “…but shtupid!”
Tyrone F. Horneigh, another Arte Johnson character who was a dirty old man usually seen coming on to Gladys Ormphby ( played by Ruth Buzzi) seated on a park bench, which would usually end with her beating him with her purse.
Henry Gibson’s poet, who would hold an over-sized flower and read offbeat poems.
Lily Tomlin’s Ernestine who was an obnoxious telephone operator with no concern for her customers and a very unique laugh.
Edith Ann, another Lily Tomlin character who sat in an oversized rocking chair and told short monologues which she would end with the phrase “…and that’s the truth” with the final “th” stretched into a Bronx Cheer or raspberry.
Big Al , an obviously gay sports anchor played by Alan Sues, who was continuously ringing his “Featurette” bell, which he called his “tinkle.”
Uncle Al, the Kiddies’ Pal , another Sues character, the short-tempered host of a children’s show, who usually went on the air with a hangover.
“Look that up in your Funk and Wagnalls”
“You bet your sweet bippy!”
“Beautiful downtown Burbank”
“One ringy-dingy…two ringy-dingies…”
“A gracious good afternoon. This is Miss Tomlin of the telephone company. Have I reached the party to whom I am speaking?”
And those are just a sampling.
One other note before we take a look at a sample episode. It’s kind of amazing when you think about the fact that all of the cuts that comprise an episode of Laugh-In had to be done by hand. This was well before the advent of computer editing of videotape which means that all of the edits were done by physically cutting the master tape and then physically splicing that tape together. That had to be quite a feat.
Okay, so what I have for you today is a sample episode of the show from its second season, which features as its guests Davy Jones, Robert Wagner, and Greer Garson.
I’m not sure that I really loved the TV show Hee Haw when I was a kid, or whether I just remember it that way through a nostalgic haze. Either way, it was definitely a Saturday night staple here in my Nashville home.
One thing I was surprised to find out when I was looking up information on the show was that it was initially inspired – especially in it’s quick cutting from joke to joke – by the then-popular show Laugh In. When I read that, it made perfect sense, but it was a connection that I never would have guessed. I was also surprised to find out that it was initially designed to be a Summer replacement series for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with the show – which I’m guessing would be most of you out there – Hee Haw is probably best described as a cornpone comedy/variety show. Set (as much as it can be said to be set anywhere) in fictional Kornfield Kounty, it was pretty much just an excuse to share a whole lot of backwoods/hillbilly jokes and as a showcase for both classic and up-and-coming country music stars. I suppose in a way you could also compare it to Saturday Night Live, except that instead of sketch comedy it focused on piling in as many one liners as possible in one show.
That’s not to say that it didn’t have recurring buts and settings, however. It actually had quite a few, including KORN News, Lulu’s Truck Stop, Stringbean’s Letter From Home, The Haystack, “Hee Haw Salutes…”, The Joke Fence, The Empty Arms Hotel, “Hey Grandpa! What’s for supper?”, The Cornfield, and many, many, many more. And that’s not to mention the most popular segments,
“PFFT! You Were Gone!”
and “Gloom, Despair and Agony On Me”
Much like Laugh-In was hosted by Dan Rowan and Dick Martin – it’s official on-screen title is Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In – Hee Haw was hosted by Roy Clark and Buck Owens. But also like its predecessor it is very much an ensemble show. Actually I’d say it’s also more of a variety show than a strictly comedy show, since so much of each episode was devoted to the music. Among those regularly appearing on the show were Gordie Tapp, Don Harron, Roy Acuff, David “Stringbean” Akeman, Cathy Baker, Barbi Benton, Archie Campbell, Jim and Jon Hager, Grandpa Jones, George Lindsey, Irlene Mandrell, Rev. Grady Nutt, Minnie Pearl Slim Pickens, Lulu Roman, Misty Rowe, Junior Samples, Gailard Sartain, and Jonathan Winters, and many, many others.
Hee Haw actually only lasted for two years on CBS, from 1969-1971. CBS dropped the show in July 1971 as part of what became known as the “Rural Purge”, along with fellow country-themed shows The Beverly Hillbillies, Mayberry R.F.D. and Green Acres because the network felt that those shows skewed too far outside the younger demographic they were trying to draw in. After that, the show moved to syndication where it lasted for 20 more years. Personally I’d say that the move was the right one for the show, as I doubt that it would have lasted anywhere near as long on a network.
Okay, that’s probably enough background. Let’s take a look at a sample show. Unfortunately, I have no idea where this episode comes from or when it first aired, but it does seem pretty exemplary of the show.
And as a special bonus, here’s a short (roughly 30 minute) documentary featuring some behind the scenes footage and interviews with some of the show’s creators and stars.
The past couple of weeks in this space we’ve looked at the Dan Curtis produced made for television movies The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler, topping the Halloween celebration off with a look last week at the TV series that sprang from them. I’d originally planned for that to be the end of things, but while I was researching all of that, I was reminded of another Curtis telefilm from the same time period.
So here’s what apparently happened: when it was announced that that Curtis wasn’t going to be involved in ABC’s Night Stalker series, he was courted by NBC to create a slightly different show for them Thus The Norliss Tapes was born. As was typical at the time, he created a made for TV movie which would run an hour and a half and serve as an undeclared pilot for the series.
To call The Norlisss Tapes a rip-off of The Night Stalker is a bit unfair (can you really rip yourself off?), but there are certainly similarities between the two. Instead of being an investigative reporter like Stalker‘s Carl Kolchack, Tapes‘ protagonist David Norliss (played by Roy Thinnes, at the time probably best known for his role in The Invaders) is a book writer researching – and along the way debunking -the supernatural. They both show an inclination for recording/narrating their adventures on audiotape. They both run afoul of disbelieving lawmen, etc. etc. The biggest difference between the two is that whereas The Night Stalker had a more lighthearted – at times almost comedic sense to it, Norliss plays the horror straightforward, definitely going for the chills.
I guess you could call it Stalker‘s more serious cousin.
Anyway, just to touch a bit on the plot, the movie opens with a telephone call between Norliss and his publisher during which the titular character begs him for a meeting. When Norliss doesn’t show, the publisher becomes worried, and when it becomes obvious that he has disappeared, he decides to investigate. Upon arriving at Norliss’s house, he finds a series of tapes, supposedly containing the narration of the book, and he decides to listen to them in order to try to find out what might have happened to the missing writer.
All of this, of course, is merely set-up to get us into the actual story.
The always lovely Angie Dickenson plays a woman who awakens to find her home being invaded by a figure who appears to be her dead husband. He has already killed her dog, and begins to come after her. Fortunately she’s able to grab a shotgun, and in a very explosive P.O.V. shot shoots him at point blank range. However when the police get there, the only hing they find is the dead dog. Not only is there no other body, there isn’t even any other blood.
Norliss is called in to help investigate the mysterious goings-on, and it of course turns out that the dead husband is actually a… well, it’s kind of unclear what he is. Though he mostly looks and acts like a vampire, and the victim of his bodies are drained of blood, he doesn’t seem to be drinking it, instead, he’s mixing it into clay that he’s using to make a statue of the demon Zardoth who is temporarily inhabiting his body, but wants to use the statue as his new earthly body.
In the end, it’s pretty easy to see why NBC wound up taking a pass on making this into an ongoing series. Thinnes’s Norliss really doesn’t display any of the charm or personality of Darren McGavin’s Kolchack, and the show in general just seems flat compared to lot of Curtis’s other offerings. As a one-off it’s okay, but mostly forgettable, (which may be why it’s mostly forgotten today) and with The Niight Stalker already on the air and covering what would likely be most of the same ground that Norliss would pursue – let’s be honest, there’s only so much that can be done with a monster of the week show, though it would have had the advantage of the overarching “What’s actually happened to David?” subplot – it seems like it wouldn’t be long before the show simply ran out of tapes and ran aground.
Still, if you’re a fan of The Night Stalker and/or Dan Curtis it’s certainly worth checking out, which you can do below
Having spent the past couple of weeks looking back at the original made-for-television movies The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler, it’s time to move on to the main event, the TV series that was spun out of them.
Kolchak: The Night Stalker (the series’ official title, presumably to differentiate it from the TV movie) finds dauntless reporter Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin) and his ever put upon boss Tony Vincenzo amazingly still working for the INS or Independent News Service, though this time they’ve been shuffled around to the Chicago office.
There’s a lot I could write about the show and it’s influences and its influence upon later shows, (This is, of course, one of the shows that X-Files creator Chris Carter cites as one of the main influences on his show.) and other aspects of why it’s so fondly remembered – not only is there the atmospheric narration by Kolchak as he dictates his notes for each story into his much abused tape recorder (speaking of which, one has to wonder just what INS’s budget for cameras was since it seems Carl get his destroyed in one way or another almost every episode. No wonder he always seems to be using such a cheap one. I can imagine there had to be some kind of dictate from on high that he wasn’t to be allowed anywhere near the good ones.), but there’s also the great rapport and banter between Kolchak and Vincenzo that is a highlight of each episode. Instead, however, I think I’ll take a different tack this week and give you an episode-by-episode rundown of my thoughts on each of them.
Yeah, it’s true, this is really just an excuse to binge-watch the entire run. But hey, it’s only 20 episodes, and thanks to Netfliix and other outlets, that’s the vogue nowadays isn’t it? Of course, I’m not really going to give you a detailed analysis of them, just a paragraph or so of my thoughts as we go along. So let’s get into it, shall we
Episode 1: The Ripper -This is, of course, the set-up episode, introducing us to some of the new regulars, including Jack Grinnage as Kolchak’s rival reporter Ron Updyke whom Carl repeatedly infuriates by referring to him as “Uptight”. As noted above, the action also shifts to Chicago (It’s amazing how all the INS offices in these different cities tend to look exactly alike. Or then, maybe it isn’t.), which will be the setting for most of the series, with occasional forays to other locales. It’s a fairly decent lead-off episode, though in syndication episode four is usually shown first. As far as the Monster of the Week, this time around we’re given a seemingly immortal take on Jack the Ripper.
Episode 2: The Zombie – Kolchak investigates a series of underworld murders in which various mobsters are found with their backs snapped. During his investigations he discovers that the murderer may be a… well, you saw the title. Though the zombie’s costume and makeup don’t look that great in the still pic accompanying this post, they’re actually effective onscreen. Also, the method that Kolchak initially uses to attempt to dispatch the zombie is kind of disturbing. Oh, and it’s nice to see both Antonio Fargas and Scatman Crothers in supporting roles.
Episode 3: They Have Been, They Are, They Will Be… – This is one of those episodes which makes apparent how tight the budget was on the show. Though the “monsters” this time around are aliens (of the U.F.O. type, not of the “from another country” type), we never really see said creatures or their craft, as they are invisible, which allows a wind machine to be their stand-in. This is also another episode which highlights the ability of the stuntmen in the show to jump backward and fall as if thrown by an invisible force (or in other episodes by a very strong opponent) which apparently was the number one qualification required by the show.
Episode 4: The Vampire – The always entertaining Larry Storch drops by to offer a Carl a tip that leads him to Los Angeles and a sequel to the original TV movie. The twist this time is that the titular monster is a female victim of Janos Skorzeny who was apparently overlooked when the Las Vegas police went around staking all of the people who fell to his fangs. I do have to applaud the episode for a rather ingenious method of trapping the vampire so that Kolchak can apply the final blow. Also, in the wrap-up we’re given the information that three years have passed since the events of the original movie and this episode.
Episode 5: The Werewolf – It seems like Carl just can’t get away from the weirdness. Even on a cruise ship. Tony Vincenzo’s been saving for this cruise forever, but at the last minute he gets a call that auditors are coming in from New York. It’s kind of a shame, really, because it might have been an interesting showcase (and change of pace) for Simon Oakland to see how he would have handled himself in such a situation. Of course, if he had witnessed what was going on, it would have been harder to carry on his complete and utter disbelief at Kolchak’s zany stories. Two pluses here: since the creators were definitely working in a low-def situation, the budget for the wolf makeup didn’t have to bee too much (plus, this is a classically designed wolfman, meaning they basically just had to apply a lot of fur to the actor’s face and hands), and there’s not a lot of time spent on building a “who is the werewolf” mystery. I’m still not sure, though, that I buy carl being able to so easily find what he needed to fabricate his silver buckshot, but we’ll just let that go.
Episode 6: Firefall – I really do miss the kind of arcade depicted at the first of this episode. And those games. And hey, for a change, since Carl’s not taking on one of the classic monster types, the title doesn’t really give anything away, so I’m not going to give everything away here either . Let’s just say that investigating multiple cases of spontaneous human combustion may have Kolchak seeing double. Oh, and David Doyle, Charlie’s Angels‘ Bosley, puts in a guest appearance.
Episode 7: The Devil’s Platform – What can I say? This episode is a real dog (pun intended). We all know the devil is usually mixed up somewhere in politics, and in this instance, the “platform” in the title is indeed a political one. It is interesting – and a sign of the difference between then and now – to see Karl spending time in the darkroom developing his own pictures as opposed to today’s ubiquitous digital pictures. And for that matter seeing Carl having to use actual books from the library to do his research as opposed to just Googling for answers. I do have to admit that I was a little surprised at the way this one ended. Oh, and Miss Emily (for whom Carl was subbing answering letters for the syndicated Dear Miss Emily advice column in the first episode) finally gets back from her vacation, bringing presents for all, including a new hat for Kolchak.
Episode 8: Bad Medicine -Another shape-shifter though this time around he’s not limited to a lupine form. Carl goes native in this one as the monster of the week is a Diablero. Yes, such a creature does exist in native American lore, but he’s a long way from home and well out of his time. Apparently someone on the writing crew was a fan of Carlos Castaneda Guest stars for this episode include Richard Kiel, Alice Ghostly, and Victor Jory.
Episode 9: The Spanish Moss Murders -Hey, how about that! Somebody at NBC found some money in the budget for another creature costume! Not a lot of money, of course, but enough that, by delaying the full reveal of the monster until late in the episode and then only showing it at night or down in the sewer it’s effective enough. At least this time they did manage to keep the zipper out of the view of the camera. As far as the actual nature of the creature, it’s what – according to the show at least – the Cajuns call Père Malfait which apparently translates to “walking salad bar”. Oh, and Ricard Kiel returns from last episode, but nit as the same character. This time he’s the guy inside the creature suit.
Episode 10: The Energy Eater – We’re back to Native American legends this time with the invisible bear god Matchemonedo. Yep, we spent all the costuming budget last episode , so we’re back to invisible monster mode. Not much to say about this one, really, except that it’s a good thing even bear gods like to hibernate.
Episode 11: Horror in The Heights – No, the monster this week isn’t the guest-starring Phil Silvers, Instead, it’s a Rakshasa, a Hindu demon who is terrorizing the Roosevelt Heights area of Chicago, preying on the elderly Jewish residents of the neighborhood. The interesting twist to this one is that the creature appears to its victims as someone they trust thereby luring them into it’s crushing grip. So who does it yank from Carl’s mind as being perhaps the only person that he really trusts? I’ll give you a hint: it isn’t Ron Updyke. But then, it isn’t (as one might expect) Tony either.
Episode 12: Mr. R.I.N.G. -This episode goes all Westworld on us, with a self-aware android on the loose. Unfortunately, since R.I.N.G. was taken over by the military during its development, it was programmed with aggression and survival instincts, but without any notion of ethics. That’s why he hunts down one of his programmers who attempts to enlighten him on the idea. Unfortunately, he’s turned off with a bullet to his artificial brain before he can perhaps calculate the answer to the question that Kolchak puts to him about the difference between right and wrong.
Episode 13: Primal Scream -Hmmm… well, no, it’s not exactly Jurassic Park, with scientists regrowing dinosaurs from dino DNA, but we do get a primordial ape-man growing from cell samples found in core samples taken from potential oil fields in the Antarctic. Yeah, the science is more than a little wonky, but the episode does feature Jamie Farr (Corporal Klinger from M*A*S*H*as a biology teacher. (Hey, guess what? He apparently gets to teach about evolution without also teaching creationism or any other -ism. Oh, those unenlightened times.)
Episode 14: The Trevi Collection -Kolchak brings his seersucker suit and trademark hat to Chicago’s high fashion district where he is obviously welcomed with open arms. Hey, if nothing else being backstage at the fashion shows did give the producers an excuse to feature a few lovely young ladies in… well, let’s just say less clothing than usual for the show. There’s even a surprisingly revealing/suggestive – for TV at the time anyway – shower scene. I mentioned the dialogue exchanges between Kolchak and Vincenzo earlier, but I haven’t quoted much of it. This episode does contain a great example however, when the two are looking at some photos taken by an informant just before he was thrown out of a fourth-floor window: Tony – “He wasn’t much of a photographer.” Carl – “Yeah, he wasn’t much of a skydiver, either.”
Episode 15: Chopper -Okay, let’s just be upfront about it The entire concept for this one – a headless motorcyclist – is just a wee bit ridiculous, and if the term “jump the shark” had been around at the time it probably would have been used to describe this episode. On the other hand, it’s this complete acceptance that sometimes it’s okay to go the humor route instead of taking things completely seriously all the time that really makes the entire series work. Of course, the cyclist himself looks incredibly cheesy, and there was no way that the network was going to allow them to show actual beheadings in all their gory glory, but the workaround that the producers found for that can only be described as ingenious. Well, okay, there probably are other ways to describe it, but that’s the one I’m going with. Add in M*A*S*H*’s Larry Linville as this week’s police obstructionist and a cameo by Jim Backus (Gilligan’s Island’s Mr. Howell) and as far as I’m concerned this is one of the best worst episodes you’ll find.
Episode 16: Demon in Lace – At least Chopper, with it’s over the top goofy charm made some sense. This one on the other hand which features a suck your face… umm I mean succubus, well, not so much. According to the show’s mythology, the succubus is a demon who inhabits the bodies of recently deceased women and then uses those bodies in order to seduce men so that it can then kill them by apparently scaring them to death and then… well, that’s the real problem. We’re never really told why the demon is making these healthy young men die of seeming heart attacks or what it gets out of it, other than that’s just what it does. It doesn’t really seem to be drawing life force from them, since the bodies appear to still be healthy after they die, nor does it seem like it really needs to, since it is already strong enough to reanimate the dead women. I will give the episode high marks for a really nice and gruesome makeup job for the succubus, but otherwise it really doesn’t work.
Episode 17: Legacy of Terror – Well, this episode certainly gets off to a good start with a Psycho-esque attack in a stairwell that very effectively implies much more than it shows. This time out we’re dealing with an Aztec mummy. It seems that the mummy god still has a cult of followers who come out of hiding every 52 years in order to sacrifice five people by tearing their hearts out so that he can eventually arise again at the dawn of the new millennium. Unfortunately, the mummy himself only rises during the sacrifice of the last victim, so he doesn’t really get much screen time. The first four murders are carried out by the cult members who are dressed in flamboyant costumes bedecked with colorful Mexican parrot feathers. No amount of flamboyance on their part, however, can come close to matching a pre-CHiPs Erik Estrada’s pink leisure suit and deep blue flare-collared shirt.
Episode 18: The Knightly Murders – Who better to use medieval weapons to murder people than the ghost of a medieval knight animating a suit of armor? This is one of the best of the later episodes, with a nicely atmospheric climactic showdown between Carl and the Black Knight, though it may be best not to ask exactly how no one else in Chicago notices a suit of armor walking the streets as it stalks its victims. Hans Conreid, whose voice you’re as likely to know as his face has a wonderful turn here as a museum curator, as does John Dehner as this week’s police antagonist, Captain Vernon Rausch, who, following a long-winded analysis in answer to Kolchak’s question about how he explains what Carl saw drollfully sums it up thusly: “In short, I believe your brain has turned to onion dip.”
Episode 19: The Youth Killer – The lovely Cathy Lee Crosby – TV’s first Wonder Woman, and definitely not to be confused with daytime TV drunk Kathy Lee Gifford* – guest stars in this episode as Helen of Troy, sucking the life force out of young, vigorous, “perfect” people in order to keep herself young and beautiful.One thing that’s always bugged me about episodes like this, though: It seems like while she’s in Chicago Helen needs a continuous stream of youthful bodies in order to hang onto her girlish charm, And even though it’s explained that the computer dating service that she runs to find her candidates is a recent set-up, one would think that if she’s been living like since ancient Greek times someone would have caught in to (and up with) her long before this .Ah, well, why question the logic of a rather entertaining episode? Oh, and hey, we also get the return of John Fiedler as Gordy the Ghoul, the morgue worker, who has been missing since episode three. (By the way, among his many other roles both as an onscreen actor and as a voice actor, Fiedler provided the original voice for Piglet in the Winnie the Pooh features.)
Episode 20: The Sentry – And so we come to the end, and it really is a shame, because there’s a charm to this episode that is actually quite reminiscent of some of the earliest ones that made all of us fans of the show in the first place. Sure, the giant lizard suit isn’t going to win any costuming awards – there’s a good reason that the first thing the critter does whenever it enters a new place or is heading down a corridor is to trash whatever light source there is -and yeah, in essence it’s a… let’s call it an “homage” to the classic Star Trek episode “Devil in the Dark”, but nonetheless this is still a much better episode than some of the others along the way. Perhaps the only real complaint that I have about it is the somewhat ambiguous ending, but even that seems appropriate, all things considered. I suppose what I’m saying is that if the series had to be cut short, this is as good a way for it to go out as any.
And in actuality the series was cut short. There were three other scripts that were written but never produced. Two of them have since been adapted into comic book form, but the third remains unproduced in any form.
So, just a few final words and then I’m out too. I have to admit this has been a fun exercise, revisiting one of my favorite shows from my childhood. Going into it, I was nervous that it might not hold up as well as I remembered, but considering the time and the budget constraints everything else that goes with it being a year old show, I wasn’t disappointed at all. Nor do I have any hesitation – especially if you’re a fan of shows from the time period or even if you’re just looking for a good way to pass a few hours – in recommending that you check the show out.
Finally, just for fun and to give you a taste of what the show was like here’s episode 15 – yep, it’s the infamous “Chopper”
*Okay, for legal reasons I should probably state that it’s unfair of me to use the phrase “daytime TV drunk” to characterize Ms. Gifford, as I have no factual knowledge that she is indeed an alcoholic. It may simply be that she enjoys portraying one on TV.
Last week we took a look at the made-for-television movie The Night Stalker, so I thought this week it would be appropriate to check out the follow-up TV film, The Night Strangler.
As I noted last week, the ratings for The Night Stalker were so high (the highest at that time for any made-for-TV movie) that a sequel was pretty well inevitable. The Night Strangler was an original story this time out, written again by Richard Matheson who had adapted the first film from the then-unpublished book The Kolchak Papers by Jeff Rice. (The book was, finally, published in 1974 under the title The Night Stalker, just in time to take advantage of the upcoming television series.) Another behind-the-scenes change was that this time out Dan Curtis not only produced the movie but also directed it.
Since our protagonist, reporter Carl Kolchak, (again wonderfully played by Darren McGavin) had been kicked out of the city of Las Vegas and told never to return at the end of the first film, the action for this movie shifts to the city of Seattle, Washington where he is hired by his former boss Tony Vincenzo (Simon Oakland also returns, which is a terrific move, since he and McGavin have such a wonderful chemistry between them) to investigate what again appears to be a string of serial murders.
This time out, however, the murderer is not a vampire, but… something else. In the course of investigating the murders, Kolchak discovers (with the aid of newcomer Wally Cox) that there have been similar murders – the victims are all exotic dancers who are are strangled and then drained of a few ounces of blood – have been occurring every 21 years over a period of 18 days since 1889.
Of course Kolchak is again stonewalled by the authorities, but he does, inevitably, find out the truth behind the mysterious killings.
Just as with its predecessor, The Night Strangler debuted to incredibly high ratings, prompting ABC, the network behind the two movies, to decide rather than go ahead with a proposed third telefilm instead to go directly to a series, which we’ll take a look at next time.
For now, though, why not just follow Kolchak into the depths of Seattle and uncover the mystery of The Night Strangler?
Halloween is fast approaching, so I thought I’d spend a little time revisiting one of my personal all-time favorite horror TV series, The Night Stalker.
The Night Stalker actually began its life as a made-for-TV movie adaptation by Richard Matheson of an unpublished novel by Jeff Rice entitled The Kolchak Papers. The story involves Las Vegas based reporter Carl Kolchak tracking down what he believes to be a serial killer terrorizing the city by night. Soon, however, despite the denials, disbelief, and obstruction of both the police and city officials, Kolchak becomes convinced that what they are facing is not just a run-of-the-mill insane human, but an actual vampire.
Produced by television veteran Dan Curtis who is perhaps best known for another great vampire-centric show, Dark Shadows, The Night Stalker stars Darren McGavin as Kolchak. McGavin proved to be perfect for the role bringing to it a balance of drama and humor which keeps it entertaining throughout.
Also of note is Simon Oakland, who plays Tony Vincenzo, Kolchak’s ever-put-upon editor who does his best to restrain the reporter but can never quite manage to. The interplay and obvious chemistry between McGavin and Oakland proved so great that even though the follow-up TV movie The Night Strangler moved its locale to Seattle, a reason was found to bring Vincenzo along, too.
The Night Stalker proved to be an immediate hit, scoring a 33.2 Neilson rating and a 54 share (meaning that 54% of American households tuned in), so it was inevitable that, as noted above, there would be a sequel. We’ll take a look at that next time, but for now sit back and enjoy The Night Stalker.
Recently I’ve been writing about my favorite armchair detective, Nero Wolfe, whom I consider to be in the same league as a detective as the much more famous Sherlock Holmes. Today I want to spotlight another detective, who, while he may not be in the same league as those two, still deserves a bit of a spotlight and serves as a reminder that even though Mr. Holmes may be the most famous of the Victorian-era detectives, he is far from the only one operating or being written about in that era.
The structure of each of the stories tends to be quite similar. In each of them Carnacki invites four friends, including Dodgson from whose perspective the stories are told, to dinner at his flat in Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, England. At the end of the dinner, everyone settles into their chairs, and Carnacki relates his latest exploit. At the end of the tale, Carnacki may entertain a few questions, but he usually does not go any further into an explanation than he already has.
The last time I did one of these Classic Television Thursday posts (and I apologize for the intervening weeks, but what with the holidays and life intervening as you’ve noticed, I’m sure, my posting here lately has simply been on the sparse side), I posted a few of the Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts just to give you a taste of what they were like. Today I’ll go into a bit more about them.
Due to declining ratings during the show’s eighth season it was decided that it was time to retool things. During this season, a series of “Man of the Week Celebrity Roast”s were added to the weekly offerings, and these proved to be very popular with the television audience. Therefore, rather than renewing The Dean Martin Show for a tenth seaon, NBC decided to work with Martin on this format and signed him to a series of specials, including roast specials. Martin was agreeable to this because it actually meant less work for him, while still keeping his name in the spotlight.
The first specials, which began airing early in 1974 with a roast of Bob Hope were shot in California before they finally moved to a permanent home in the Las Vegas MGM Grand Hotel’s Ziegfeld Room. For 10 years, from October 1974 to December 1984, Martin held court as roastmaster as some of Hollywood’s and Vegas’s top comedians and other celebrities would come together in a Friar’s Club style roast to playfully chide and or insult one of their fellow celebrities about his or her career. Then, at the end, the “honoree” would get a chance to take to the dais to respond to these quips and taunts with a few sharp lines of their own. Unlike some later iterations of the celebrity roast (I’m thinking particularly of the Comedy Central iteration of the concept) all of this was obviously meant as good, relatively clean fun as opposed to an occasion to see who could be the most insulting to the guest of honor.
Letters to Laugh-In was created to fill the void left by the recently cancelled Match Game. The concept of the show, hosted by Laugh-In‘s announcer Gary Owens, was simple: viewers would send in their jokes which would be read by a panel of comedians which usually consisted of two Laugh-In regulars and two other comedians. Each joke would then be rated on a scale of 1-100 and the viewer who sent in the highest rated joke each day would win a prize.
The show was created by the prolific team of David H. DePatie and Friz Freleng. It was comprised of two segments, Baggy Pants, which featured the adventures of an anthropomorphic cat version of Charlie Chaplin’s Little Tramp character, and though there was music, there was no spoken dialogue. The second segment, which is the one that relates it to Laugh-In, was The Nitwits.
Certainly there is much about the setting, the atmosphere, and the topicality of so many of the jokes that plants it firmly in the late 60s and early 70s of its original creation and broadcast and can make it hard for viewers today, who may not have much familiarity with the general milieu and attitudes of the period to miss many of the jokes that are made, but the rapid-fire pace of the show and the simple quantity of material gone through in each episode which made it seem so much ahead of its time then serves it well now, as there is still quite a lot of it that remains timeless.
Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, as suggested by the full title was hosted by comedians Dan Rowan and Dick Martin. In traditional form for this type of duo, Rowan was generally the straight man while Martin was the dimmer-but-slicker comedian. However, though they got top billing, Laugh-In was an ensemble show featuring, over its six season run such famous comedians and actors/actresses as Arte Johnson (who eventually wrangled himself a “with… credit during announcer Gary Owens’ introduction to the show), Henry Gibson, Ruth Buzzi, Lily Tomlin, Jo Anne Worley, Goldie Hawn, Larry Hovis, Judy Carne, Richard Dawson, Dave Madden, Sarah Kennedy, Jeremy Lloyd, Pigmeat Markham,, Pamela Rodgers, Barbara Sharma, Jud Strunk, Alan Sues, and Teresa Graves.
(A quick aside here: though many people, at least those old enough to remember George Burns and Gracie Allen, might think that this was a throwback to the closing lines of the comedic couple’s Television show (and the radio show which preceded it), they never actually used that line. Though George would say “Say ‘goodnight’, Gracie”, she never actually responded with “Goodnight, Gracie”)
For those of you who are unfamiliar with the show – which I’m guessing would be most of you out there – Hee Haw is probably best described as a cornpone comedy/variety show. Set (as much as it can be said to be set anywhere) in fictional Kornfield Kounty, it was pretty much just an excuse to share a whole lot of backwoods/hillbilly jokes and as a showcase for both classic and up-and-coming country music stars. I suppose in a way you could also compare it to Saturday Night Live, except that instead of sketch comedy it focused on piling in as many one liners as possible in one show.
Hee Haw actually only lasted for two years on CBS, from 1969-1971. CBS dropped the show in July 1971 as part of what became known as the “Rural Purge”, along with fellow country-themed shows The Beverly Hillbillies, Mayberry R.F.D. and Green Acres because the network felt that those shows skewed too far outside the younger demographic they were trying to draw in. After that, the show moved to syndication where it lasted for 20 more years. Personally I’d say that the move was the right one for the show, as I doubt that it would have lasted anywhere near as long on a network.
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