In the 1970s The Dating Game would book celebrities and pop stars for their bachelors and bachelorettes, after all they looked good on TV and could deliver a media savvy performance. Did they actually go out on the dates? Who knows.
Believe it or don't, 13-year old Michael Jackson was a contestant on a 'very special' 1972 episode of The Dating Game. This was when he first attempted to escape his sick family with a top ten solo album, singing sweet chart-toppers like 'Ben' and 'Rockin' Robin' - years before he turned weird and white.
Just think if The Dating Game had set Michael up with 3 boys his own age he might have had the first appropriate relationship of his life.
BONUS: The Dating Game in '73 - won't the bachelorettes be pumped up to accompany Arnold Schwarzenegger on that romantic trip to Tijuana, Mexico?
Saturday, May 25, 2013
On the Road with an Eccentric Tiny Tim
While composing an oral history a couple of years ago I talked with musical director Tim Fowlar, he reminisced about his time in the 1970s with the Roy Radin Vaudeville Review... or as Tiny Tim called it, "the cavalcade of has-beens."
Roy Radin was a notorious promoter (and soon to be the victim in the notorious Cotton Club Murder) who cobbled together stars like Milton Berle, Donald O'Connor, The Drifters, Frank Fontaine (aka Crazy Guggenheim, who had a heart attack on the bus), Ronnie Spector, and Georgie Jessel, then poured their drunken carcasses on to a bus for shows in VFW halls and school auditoriums all over the northeast. It was a grueling pace but it gave folks in the hinterlands an opportunity to see the stars they loved.
Tim was just getting started in the business when he joined the Radin cavalcade and he would go on to great heights in Las Vegas and television. Here he tells us about being on the road with Jackie Vernon and Tiny Tim, two rather eccentric performers. Vernon is best known to modern audiences as the voice of Frosty the Snowman in the first TV holiday special. Tiny Tim... I wouldn't know where to start, but he was weird bird with a hang-up about venereal disease... and crossing the street. He was also a musical genius I invite you to explore.
The late, great Tiny Tim:
Roy Radin was a notorious promoter (and soon to be the victim in the notorious Cotton Club Murder) who cobbled together stars like Milton Berle, Donald O'Connor, The Drifters, Frank Fontaine (aka Crazy Guggenheim, who had a heart attack on the bus), Ronnie Spector, and Georgie Jessel, then poured their drunken carcasses on to a bus for shows in VFW halls and school auditoriums all over the northeast. It was a grueling pace but it gave folks in the hinterlands an opportunity to see the stars they loved.
Tim was just getting started in the business when he joined the Radin cavalcade and he would go on to great heights in Las Vegas and television. Here he tells us about being on the road with Jackie Vernon and Tiny Tim, two rather eccentric performers. Vernon is best known to modern audiences as the voice of Frosty the Snowman in the first TV holiday special. Tiny Tim... I wouldn't know where to start, but he was weird bird with a hang-up about venereal disease... and crossing the street. He was also a musical genius I invite you to explore.
The late, great Tiny Tim:
40 Years Ago Comic Book Collecting Changed Forever With the First Big Action Comics # 1 Sale
I think I'm going to play the lottery today, my odds of winning have to be infinitely greater than finding a copy of Action Comics #1 stuffed in the wall. But that's just what happened to David Gonzalez who discovered the 10 cent gem was serving as part of his newly purchased fixer-upper's insulation.
As you may know, this is the most valuable comic book on earth, the very first appearance of Superman. Unfortunately Gonzalez' aunt-in-law grabbed at the comic, causing what an auction expert called a "$75,000 tear." The book was already in poor condition, now a 1.5 out of 10, but is still expected to bring in over $110,000. The guy only paid $10,000 for the house!
Back in May of 1973, 18-year old Mitchell Mehdy made national news when he bought Action Comics # 1 for a little over $1,800. He was the laughing stock of the nation, what kind of idiot would pay that much money for a comic book?!? He was joke fodder for morning radio jocks and late night TV shows (Carson made a crack about him). The generation that lived through the tough times of 1938, when that comic was published, were not amused that a teenager had that kind of cash to spend on something so frivolous.
But seeing this item in the newspapers sparked families into searching their attics in hopes of turning up unexpected gold; many did. Suddenly the neighborhood kids who were amassing comic book collections didn't seem so dumb after all.
The publicity that followed was swift and pervasive, Mehdy even made it on 'Tomorrow' with Tom Snyder. That summer the New York Comic Art Convention run by Phil Seuling really took off in popularity.
So here's to Mitchell Mehdy, he brought respectability to comic book collecting by monetizing the hobby. For better or worse, it would never again be the same.
As you may know, this is the most valuable comic book on earth, the very first appearance of Superman. Unfortunately Gonzalez' aunt-in-law grabbed at the comic, causing what an auction expert called a "$75,000 tear." The book was already in poor condition, now a 1.5 out of 10, but is still expected to bring in over $110,000. The guy only paid $10,000 for the house!
Back in May of 1973, 18-year old Mitchell Mehdy made national news when he bought Action Comics # 1 for a little over $1,800. He was the laughing stock of the nation, what kind of idiot would pay that much money for a comic book?!? He was joke fodder for morning radio jocks and late night TV shows (Carson made a crack about him). The generation that lived through the tough times of 1938, when that comic was published, were not amused that a teenager had that kind of cash to spend on something so frivolous.But seeing this item in the newspapers sparked families into searching their attics in hopes of turning up unexpected gold; many did. Suddenly the neighborhood kids who were amassing comic book collections didn't seem so dumb after all.
The publicity that followed was swift and pervasive, Mehdy even made it on 'Tomorrow' with Tom Snyder. That summer the New York Comic Art Convention run by Phil Seuling really took off in popularity.
So here's to Mitchell Mehdy, he brought respectability to comic book collecting by monetizing the hobby. For better or worse, it would never again be the same.
40 Years Ago NYC TVs Tuned to Toddler's Birthday Parties in the Mornings
Birthday House
It might be hard to believe but forty years ago New Yorkers tuned in every morning to watch children's birthday parties complete with sing-a-longs, animals and staring into a tropical fish tank. For the 1960s, this was big city daytime TV at it's finest - and it was surprisingly entertaining.
Birthday House starred Paul Tripp, TV's first child educator. As the producer and star of the critically celebrated Mr. I. Magination program on the CBS network from 1949 until 1952, he influenced and predated Captain Kangaroo, Mr. Rogers, Sesame Street and every children's program that followed.
Birthday House aired live on WNBC 4 Monday through Saturday mornings from April 1, 1963 until September 8, 1967; it was nationally syndicated for a while and two best-selling soundtrack albums were released with songs from the show.
Similar in tone to Romper Room, the broadcast was a smash hit with kids and parents alike thanks to the exemploray talents of Tripp and his spouse, co-host Ruth Enders Tripp. A creative team since the pioneer days of television, they were masters of the intimate, seat-of-your-pants nature of live broadcasting.
Each day one, two or three lucky youngsters were selected from the New York / New Jersey viewing area to attend a birthday celebration with their friends on television. The WNBC studio could only accommodate a dozen or so children at a time, naturally tickets were highly coveted.
Tom Tichenor designed, manipulated and voiced the many cheerful puppet characters and portrayed Strawtop the silent scarecrow doll; Jan Lara and Kay Lande also appeared in character roles. In 1964, WNBC Channel 4 received a special citation for Birthday House at the NYC Emmy Awards.
The underlying focus of Birthday House was on learning, however simple the lesson. This was accomplished with segments like Buzzy the spelling bee, kids drawing together at a chalk board and a milk drinking game to encourage good nutrition.
In this found episode, Paul and his puppet pal Felicia the mouse play around with a couple of gerbils before Paul strolls to a fish tank where he ad-libs as the camera lingers on the exotic fish swimming about.
This is representative of what the NBC flagship station offered for the morning hours in the nation's number one television market, part of a steady diet of quality kidvid available around the dial - all day long - with top talent that included Chuck McCann, Sandy Becker, Officer Joe Bolton and a legion of other versatile performers who instilled in their viewers a sense of fair play, virtue and a love for education.
We've gone from watching children at play on TV to performing DNA tests to determine who the kid belongs to.
It might be hard to believe but forty years ago New Yorkers tuned in every morning to watch children's birthday parties complete with sing-a-longs, animals and staring into a tropical fish tank. For the 1960s, this was big city daytime TV at it's finest - and it was surprisingly entertaining.
Birthday House starred Paul Tripp, TV's first child educator. As the producer and star of the critically celebrated Mr. I. Magination program on the CBS network from 1949 until 1952, he influenced and predated Captain Kangaroo, Mr. Rogers, Sesame Street and every children's program that followed.
Birthday House aired live on WNBC 4 Monday through Saturday mornings from April 1, 1963 until September 8, 1967; it was nationally syndicated for a while and two best-selling soundtrack albums were released with songs from the show.
Similar in tone to Romper Room, the broadcast was a smash hit with kids and parents alike thanks to the exemploray talents of Tripp and his spouse, co-host Ruth Enders Tripp. A creative team since the pioneer days of television, they were masters of the intimate, seat-of-your-pants nature of live broadcasting.
Each day one, two or three lucky youngsters were selected from the New York / New Jersey viewing area to attend a birthday celebration with their friends on television. The WNBC studio could only accommodate a dozen or so children at a time, naturally tickets were highly coveted.
Tom Tichenor designed, manipulated and voiced the many cheerful puppet characters and portrayed Strawtop the silent scarecrow doll; Jan Lara and Kay Lande also appeared in character roles. In 1964, WNBC Channel 4 received a special citation for Birthday House at the NYC Emmy Awards.
The underlying focus of Birthday House was on learning, however simple the lesson. This was accomplished with segments like Buzzy the spelling bee, kids drawing together at a chalk board and a milk drinking game to encourage good nutrition.
In this found episode, Paul and his puppet pal Felicia the mouse play around with a couple of gerbils before Paul strolls to a fish tank where he ad-libs as the camera lingers on the exotic fish swimming about.
This is representative of what the NBC flagship station offered for the morning hours in the nation's number one television market, part of a steady diet of quality kidvid available around the dial - all day long - with top talent that included Chuck McCann, Sandy Becker, Officer Joe Bolton and a legion of other versatile performers who instilled in their viewers a sense of fair play, virtue and a love for education.
We've gone from watching children at play on TV to performing DNA tests to determine who the kid belongs to.
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