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October 23, 2009:

THE SOUPY SHUFFLE

Bruce Kimmel Photograph bk's notes

Well, dear readers, for anyone who ever loved White Fang and Black Tooth, for anyone who did The Soupy Shuffle, Soupy Sales has shuffled off at eighty-three. My memory of when I discovered him must be a little screwy because if Wikipedia is to be believed I had to have discovered him in 1959 when his show was still coming from Detroit and carried nationally over ABC. I must have been flipping channels and found it, found this funny-looking man talking to puppets and being silly and taking a pie in the face. It wasn’t like any kids show I’d ever seen – there was some sort of feeling of anarchy. In 1960 he and his show moved to LA and began its run and I watched it all the time, and it just got funnier and funnier and then he caught on and was all the rage with kids and adults. According to Wikipedia that incarnation of his show went off the air in January of 1962, but I don’t think that’s correct because I started high school in September of 1962 and became great friends with an older gal (about a grade and a half ahead of me) named Ellen Bank. And Ellen Bank, with whom I wrote my first musical, which I’ve talked about before in these here notes, just happened to be the president of the Soupy Sales Fan Club, and one fine day she took me over to ABC Studios in East Hollywood and I met Soupy, who was just a wonderful man and really as funny off the screen as he was on. So his show was still going on at that point. In any case, Soupy was unique and even after his LA show folded, he began one in New York, and he made some records for Reprise that I, of course, bought, and I would always enjoy his appearances on What’s My Line and when I attended a taping of that show in 1969 at the Ed Sullivan Theater, Soupy was one of the panelists. He sort of disappeared after the 70s, at least on my radar, but his show holds a very special place in my heart and was very influential in terms of its comedy and improvisational feel. It is unthinkable that such a show could exist today, which says a lot about just how boring things are these days. I think I’ll take out my Soupy Sales CD (his Reprise albums on CD) and give it a spin and maybe I’ll go stick my face in a pie in memory – or maybe I’ll just do the Soupy Shuffle.

I had a perfectly pleasant day yesterday doing perfectly pleasant things. Nothing earth shattering, mind you, just a nice medium sort of day. I got up much later than I’d planned to because I’ve been going to bed around two every night this week – I really must stop doing that. So, I slept till ten and it was too late to do the jog, so I just answered e-mails, printed orders, and went to the bank. And then it was time to lunch with our very own Mr. Jason Graae. We met at Hugo’s and both had the pasta papa. We always have a really good time and we laughed and laughed and just when we thought we could laugh no more, we laughed again. We talked about people, we dished dirt, and then talked about doing a new CD together, much in the same way we just did Brent Barrett’s new CD. Jason had had an idea last year, but I don’t think either of us felt it was exactly the right thing to do – but we talked it out over lunch and came up with something that will show off all sides of Jason, not just the funny side. He had a list of songs, most of which we will do, I made a couple of suggestions, and we set a tentative sort of general timeline to do it next March. It will be our third together and the second studio album. I know that the experience will be fun and that we’ll have a grand time. We were there for about two hours, and then I toddled off to the mail place where I found an unbelievable number of new bills to pay, and a package mailed on October 9 first class from Texas that took, oh, just thirteen days to get here. That’s the USPS for you – keep raising those rates and giving us service that is beyond inept. That’s the American Way, ladies and gentlemen. I came home and answered more e-mails and packed up a few orders, but I finally just sat on my couch like so much fish.

Last night, between dozing off moments, I managed to watch a motion picture in hi-definitions on my DVR entitled The Boy Who Could Fly. I know I wrote about the film when the DVD came out back in 2003 – it’s a film that I love for ninety percent of its running time. The cast is really wonderful, especially the young gal, Lucy Deakins. It’s really surprising she didn’t have a major career – so cute, and such a good actress. She did a few more movies and a couple of guest shots, then went to college, then became a firefighter and a boat builder before getting her law degree and passing the bar in New York, where she is now an attorney. I guess I did my Lucy Deakins homework, didn’t I? Bonnie Bedelia is always great, and Fred Gwynne is endearing. The lead boy is also really good and a very young Fred Savage is very amusing. Nick Castle wrote and directed the film (he directed The Last Starfighter), and he’s just a really talented fellow who directed his screenplay beautifully. The film was not a success – not sure why exactly, although for me the film has one glaring flaw that is really harmful and I’ve said repeatedly that if you just removed the flaw (one scene) the movie would resonate much better and would have been more emotionally satisfying. The film is about a boy who may or may not be autistic, who thinks he can fly. We never know, of course, whether that’s true or not, but suspect it isn’t. He becomes close with the girl who has moved in next door, she being the only one who has sort of been able to get through to him. Towards the end of the film a high school class is on a field trip and Lucy Deakins stands on a precarious ledge trying to pick a rose. She falls, hits her head on the ledge and blacks out (the height is huge, like falling off a six-story building). She awakens for a moment to hear the doctors saying she’s going to be fine and has a mild concussion, which is amazing given the fall. She then has a dream and in her dream the boy is at the window and she asks him if he can fly and he shakes his head yes. And they fly. Then the dream turns slightly nightmarish and she wakes up. The film goes on from there and if you haven’t seen it skip immediately to the next paragraph because I’m giving you a SPOILER ALERT. The boy is put in an asylum. He escapes and goes back to his house, where he’s found by Lucy. The police arrive and they bolt and run to a school fair where Lucy hopes to enlist the aid of Colleen Dewhurst, a caring teacher who has heretofore helped the boy stay out of the asylum and with his uncle. But, the police are on their tail and they end up on the roof of the school with the police and others closing in on them. They stand on the ledge of the building and she asks him if he can fly and he nods yes and they let themselves fall – and he does fly with her in tow. It should be a completely magical moment but isn’t because it’s been ruined by the dream sequence – yes, it’s a dream sequence but in it we’ve already seen him fly, so instead of building the suspense by never having seen that – so when they fall off the building and suddenly take flight it’s the FIRST time we’ve seen it – they have taken the surprise away. Had they removed the dream sequence the flying scene would have been true magic and would have gotten cheers. But the film has a good heart and a truly beautiful and moving score by Bruce Broughton. The hi-def transfer looks so much better than the 2003 DVD.

I then watched a motion picture on DVD entitled Zotz, a film by William Castle. It’s a weird little movie – Castle directed a few comedies, none of which are particularly funny, but this one is amiable and was designed for kids and it moves right along. Tom Poston is fun as the leading character, a professor who comes into possession of an ancient stone that enables him to cause great pain to people by simply pointing at them, causes their motor functions to go askance by saying “Zotz” or by pointing AND saying “Zotz” he can actually kill. And any film that has Fred Clark, Cecil Kellaway, and Jim Backus, is fine by me. And a cameo by Tom Poston’s Steve Allen sidekick, Louis Nye. Transfer was fine.

I finished viewing around nine and just kept dozing on and off. Then it was too late to return a couple of calls I’d gotten (I hadn’t actually heard the phone when the calls came in, probably because I was snoozing like so much fish), so I took a hot shower and that was my day and that was my evening.

Well, let’s all click on the Unseemly Button below, shall we, whilst we all get up and do the Soupy Shuffle.

My goodness, that was a rather long first section, wasn’t it? Therefore, I will keep this section both short and sweet and sweet and short. Today I will definitely do some sort of jog, then I’ll be meeting my friend Lauren Rubin at the West Hollywood Hugo’s – I haven’t seen her in almost nine months, so it will be nice to play catch up or, at the very least, to play ketchup. After that, I have a work session with the lyricist of the long musical.

Tomorrow, she of the Evil Eye will be here and we will hopefully solve the mystery of the disappearing sleeping shorts. There are several options for the evening, and I’m not sure which will end up happening.

Sunday, we have a LACCTAA meeting, and I may have a dinner get-together to go to – not sure about the latter, but we shall see what we shall see.

Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do the long jog, I must lunch with Lauren, I must have a work session, and I must do some errands and whatnot. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s Friday – what is currently in your DVD/video player, and your CD player? I’ll start – DVD, in the bedroom player William Castle’s Homicidal, in the Blu and Ray player, Ghostbusters. CD, Jerry Goldsmith’s score for Seconds, and some great Japanese imports of some great Andre Previn albums from his Columbia days. Your turn. Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, as we bid a fond farewell to White Fang and Black Tooth and bleh-oh, bleh-oh, bleh-oh, and the Soupy Shuffle.

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