|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Jul 11, 2023 11:34:13 GMT
Seeing those two work together is gold. They were such close friends it's sometimes sad to think about. I do remember reading about when Jack Benny died, George was set to give the eulogy but once up front to deliver it he was so overcome with emotion he couldn't speak and had to be helped back to his seat. And earlier, when Gracie died, Jack and George were having a telephone conversation and George told Jack that he was having trouble sleeping and asked Jack if he had the same trouble when HIS wife, Mary Livingston, died some years earlier. Jack said he did too, and advised George, "Try sleeping on HER side of the bed." And that advice worked for George, and years later it also helped me out. And I passed it on to my brother in law Stan a few years after that. And never a day goes by where I don't watch something of their's. Sepiatone That's a beautiful story you told about Mary and Gracie and how you applied it to your own life and your brother's. When we think of show business we don't usually think of that kind of deep connection but you came up with a perfect example. I know what you mean about still watching them. It isn't just nostalgia; they both really had a gift. |
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Jul 11, 2023 12:33:42 GMT
Steve Allen was the first host of The Tonight Show (originally just called Tonight) and, after Jack Paar took over, he hosted the well-received Steve Allen Show on NBC (1956-1960) on Sunday evenings opposite The Ed Sullivan Show. One of my favorite features was his in-house repertory comedy troupe featuring Louis Nye, Don Knotts, Tom Poston and Gene Rayburn, sometime augmented by appearances by comedians like Jonathan Winters and Tim Conway.
The Steve Allen Show switched networks briefly and then went into syndication in 1962-1964. During all of its versions he brought in musical acts, some of which other shows had shied away from. Elvis made an famous early appearance, for which Steve maybe ill-advisedly asked him to sing "Hound Dog" in a tuxedo to a basset hound, ticking off a lot of fans, though RCA apparently approved. During the syndicated shows he often went beyond the pop charts when booking talent like Lenny Bruce, Jack Kerouac and Frank Zappa. He gave Bob Dylan an early TV appearance, though his clumsy interview style makes me wonder how much he really knew about Dylan. I'm posting this because I just watched Till (2022) yesterday and it put me in the mood to hear Dylan's incredibly moving "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll".
|
|
|
|
Post by sepiatone on Jul 11, 2023 16:02:57 GMT
If you think "Hattie Carroll" is moving you must create your own landslide when hearing "The Ballad Of Hollis Brown". But anyway.... I used to enjoy Steve Allen's late night show back in '63 when opposite Johnny Carson's "Tonight Show" I would wait until I could find out who some of he guests were on each before deciding which one to watch.  Looked for clips, but none can be found of any Lou Rawls appearances on Allen's show. He was a frequent guest on the show. But I did find a few of this guy's appearance and actually do recall the show! Sepiatone |
|
|
|
Post by dianedebuda on Jul 12, 2023 22:49:28 GMT
Smock, Smock! 
|
|
|
|
Post by sepiatone on Jul 13, 2023 15:21:52 GMT
Yeah, Allen's late night show could get crazy at times. Like the show on which he persuaded the audience to play a mammoth game of "follow the leader". With a mobile camera he was shown leading the audience out of the theater, marching around a couple of blocks from the studio, then quickly trotting back into the studio way ahead of the audience who he closed and locked the doors on. He let them pound and yell just outside for a few minutes before letting them back in. Or the time he wore a wet suit with a few hundred tea bags fastened to it and had himself dunked into a large tank of warm water. Sepiatone |
|
|
|
Post by kims on Aug 20, 2023 1:13:44 GMT
I'm watching ROY ORBINSON & FRIENDS on PBS. Bonnie Raitt, K.D. Lang, Bruce Springstein, Elvis Costello, TCB band, etc. Makes me long for the days of all those variety shows y'all have mentioned. Big name stars and musicians guest starred performing their own material and participating in skits. Mostly I miss that there were only 3 networks for many years and your friends and co-workers were watching the same shows. Next day you'd say "did you see Carson last night?" or IRONSIDES or Eartha Kitt on BATMAN? etc. With a gazillion channels on cable and streaming choices, I miss the commonality we had when forced to watch the same few stations, as we used to call 'em.
In a weird way I find this another factor in the fragmenting of our society-one less thing you can have in common with your neighbor.
|
|
|
|
Post by intrepid37 on Aug 20, 2023 23:05:50 GMT
I'm watching ROY ORBINSON & FRIENDS on PBS. Bonnie Raitt, K.D. Lang, Bruce Springstein, Elvis Costello, TCB band, etc. Makes me long for the days of all those variety shows y'all have mentioned. Big name stars and musicians guest starred performing their own material and participating in skits. Mostly I miss that there were only 3 networks for many years and your friends and co-workers were watching the same shows. Next day you'd say "did you see Carson last night?" or IRONSIDES or Eartha Kitt on BATMAN? etc. With a gazillion channels on cable and streaming choices, I miss the commonality we had when forced to watch the same few stations, as we used to call 'em. In a weird way I find this another factor in the fragmenting of our society-one less thing you can have in common with your neighbor. Wife Barbara said in an interview that that was really Roy's night - the crowning performance of his entire career. |
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Aug 21, 2023 12:27:21 GMT
I'm watching ROY ORBINSON & FRIENDS on PBS. Bonnie Raitt, K.D. Lang, Bruce Springstein, Elvis Costello, TCB band, etc. Makes me long for the days of all those variety shows y'all have mentioned. Big name stars and musicians guest starred performing their own material and participating in skits. Mostly I miss that there were only 3 networks for many years and your friends and co-workers were watching the same shows. Next day you'd say "did you see Carson last night?" or IRONSIDES or Eartha Kitt on BATMAN? etc. With a gazillion channels on cable and streaming choices, I miss the commonality we had when forced to watch the same few stations, as we used to call 'em. In a weird way I find this another factor in the fragmenting of our society-one less thing you can have in common with your neighbor. I totally agree with your sentiments about the lack of shared cultural experiences these days. Keeping with our love for Roy, here's an early appearance on Dick Clark's Saturday night show, which he started after the success of American Bandstand. Unfortunately, as on Bandstand, the numbers were lip-synched, but it was a great chance to see the best recording artists and I was a faithful viewer. From 1960, Roy before the glasses and/or shades. Shindig! was another teen-oriented musical variety show during the mid-60's and everyone performed live. Here's Roy with an assist from the Everly Brothers. Also, in the regular female backup group, The Blossoms, Darlene Love is in the middle; I'm sure it helped to pay the bills while Phil Spector was ripping her off. Prepare for a massive attack of "groovy" when the dancers come out. And check out Roy's hair in the closeups; so cool, but probably flammable. And here's Roy debuting "Pretty Woman" on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964. I love Ed's intro: "The spectacle number one king, Roy Orbison". Whatever that means, I couldn't agree more. Long live Roy Orbison. |
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Sept 19, 2023 18:01:52 GMT
Irene Dunne bowed out of films in the early 1950's, but appeared occasionally on TV. I love this appearance on the Perry Como variety series in 1956, when she recapped songs from the film Show Boat (1936). She's probably best remembered today for dramas like Love Affair and comedies like The Awful Truth, but she came to Hollywood from the musical theater and sang in many early films like Roberta, in which she sang "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes".
|
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Feb 2, 2024 15:35:18 GMT
Ann-Margret came up in another thread and I can't resist posting this great skit from SNL, with Kristen Wiig trying to stop moving long enough to throw a piece of paper into the trash. I think that's Ed Helms with her. She later reprised the idea by having Liza Minnelli try to turn off a lamp.
|
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Feb 2, 2024 16:42:51 GMT
Also in another thread, I was maybe a little disrespectful to the over-exuberance of Mickey Rooney in some of his early musical roles, so by way of repentance I want to post this charming reunion with Judy on her TV show, which works some of their numbers into skit format. Lovely.
|
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Feb 13, 2024 22:23:28 GMT
Here's a Valentine's Day offering. I've tried to track down the source and I suspect it may be a limited summer variety series Frankie Avelon did in the summer of 1976, but I couldn't confirm. She caught some flack over the years but Annette had a kind of indefinable charisma which transcended mere talent, though personally I think she had that too.
|
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Feb 19, 2024 0:15:04 GMT
i just came across this by accident but I'm going to take it as the universe doing me a favor. Circa mid-1960's and definitely from Shindig!, ABC's answer to Britain's Top of the Pops. Now I'm on a quest to see if there was an album; come on, universe, do me another solid. That's Darlene Love as part of The Blossoms, the house backup girl group.
|
|
|
|
Post by christine on Feb 19, 2024 6:56:20 GMT
For me of course THE DEAN MARTIN VARIETY SHOW was the best!!! Not only did it have a fantastic run but I don't think there was anyone who had more fun than DEAN himself! He would crack himself up with his beginning dialog jokes, have fun with his guests (since it was the first time he saw them), slide across the piano and joke with Les, open the mystery door where he didn't know who would be behind it and enchant his audience with the songs he sang! He did all this while messing up his lines (even though they were on cue cards) and hypnotizing the audience with that smile of his! People had fun watching DEAN have so much fun! One of my favorite shows has DEAN and Victor Borga singing songs with sound effects for punctuation marks. If you've never seen that you don't know what you're missing! I laugh until I cry every time I watch that! You can watch most of his shows on YouTube. Lee Hale, one of the shows producers, wrote a biography about Dean, called BACKSTAGE AT THE DEAN MARTIN SHOW. It's a great interesting read. Dean's shows are also on DVD. Whenever I want a good laugh or just enjoy myself, I watch Dean!!!  |
|
|
|
Post by I Love Melvin on Feb 22, 2024 14:10:37 GMT
I ran across this and thought I'd share. He says there's not much he hasn't done and after this there wouldn't be anything and I believe it. From 1987.
|
|
Looked for clips, but none can be found of any Lou Rawls appearances on Allen's show. He was a frequent guest on the show. But I did find a few of this guy's appearance and actually do recall the show!
