SCHLEP or SCHLEPP also SHLEP - Slang vb schleps , shlepping , schlepped to drag or lug (oneself or an object) with difficulty n 1. a stupid or clumsy person 2. an arduous journey or procedure [ Yiddish, from German schleppen ] Chapter One OUT OF WORK AND ON THE CORNER The Horn & Hardart automat. Here [...]
A tall, neon approximation of Dean Martin's face once radiated a mysterious ambiance down on the Sunset Strip. The sign could be spotted in episodes of Dragnet , blaxploitation favorite The Candy Tangerine Man and even an episode of The Andy Griffith Show . Much of the time it was treated as if it were just a typical building facade that fictional characters would drive past without comment. But today, to see a giant neon Dean Martin face makes one arch an eyebrow. What in Lord's name is that!? Dino's Lodge was a real-life [...]
Hockey Night in Canada is the longest running program in the history of the world. Starting on radio in 1933, it adopted its current moniker in 1936. It moved to television with separate broadcasts in French and English in 1953 and has remained on the air ever since. Hockey Night in Canada managed to unite an enormous, sprawling landmass in a way Confederation never could. While Canada struggled for decades to establish a show business culture it could call its own, Hockey Night in Canada stood as its only competent showcase in the entertainment world. [...]
"Frank Sinatra saved my life once. He said, "Okay, boys. That's enough." - Shecky Greene "You dirty Jew sunofabitch, you're sicker than Lenny Bruce." - Ed Sullivan yelling at Shecky Greene The odd dichotomy of Shecky Greene is that, for anyone under the age of fifty, his name is associated with an out-moded style of comedy. To use the moniker Shecky is almost an insult, a parody. The name Shecky has been brandished by characters in plays, satires and short stories. The appellation is used to indicate that this is a comedian to please grandpa, something [...]
"The time is eight-thirty in Boss Angeles!" - The Real Don Steele, Los Angeles Disc Jockey, 1967 Los Angeles is a wonderful city, yet it seems much of society despises what it represents. Few cities stoke such anger in the heart of civilians as does Hollywood. I am not just talking about the fabricated outrage of Bill O'Reilly and his vendetta against the place that gave him John Wayne and Ronald Reagan. Beyond that, it is common to hear Los Angeles ridiculed for its superficiality, its insistence on driving everywhere, its fashionable health kicks and its [...]
"I tell you I am the greatest man in the world and it doesn't trouble me in the least." - Mel Lyman It seems unlikely that a scrawny, disheveled kid wearing a sailor hat and oversized military coat could actually hold power over one hundred people, let alone convince them he was God. A 1966 Oscar-nominated film called Festival is the closest look at this man we have today. The stark, black and white, cinema-vérité style documentary follows the goings-on at The Newport Folk Festival. It opens with a shot of Mel Lyman, flashing a toothy [...]
"The magazine Confidential had been running stories about me ... I rankled ... I acknowledged my own peccadilloes, and if and when there are real incidents, I make no denial, no apology, and I even stand by them." - Errol Flynn, 1959 Errol Flynn is one of the more storied personalities in Hollywood history. Women swooned over him. Men desperately wanted to emulate him. He had no shortage of lovers and certainly no shortage of scandals. An inordinate amount of literature has been devoted to Flynn. Co-stars, ex-wives, stunt doubles, and even the coroner that tampered [...]
"I guess he was funny in his own way. I don't think he had a very good nightclub act." - Ronnie Schell, comedian "His life centered around dating strippers." - Steve Rossi, comedy straight man Joe E. Ross was the kind of grotesque, boorish, nightclub comedian that over the years has been satirized ad nauseam. Andy Kaufman's alter ego Tony Clifton, a talentless lounge singer with a penchant for drinking, smoking and whoring, is in many ways the fictional equivalent of Ross. Best known for his featured role in the early nineteen sixties sitcom Car [...]
"It is no disgrace to be a Negro, but it is very inconvenient." - Bert Williams, vaudeville star "Pigmeat Markham was many things: the ranking funny man on the Avenue, a hero to young fans, the Judge. He was also a curious anomaly, the last great black comic to perform in burnt cork." - R.J. Smith, author "I'd been working blackface for so many years that I was scared to go on without it." - Pigmeat Markham Pigmeat Markham was probably the only African-American comedian equally as popular in 1939 as he was in [...]
"Nixon said ... that appearing on Laugh-In is what got him elected - and I believe that. And I've had to live with that." - George Schlatter, Creator of Laugh-In "He is the president of every place in this country which does not have a bookstore." - Murray Kempton, Journalist and Pulitzer Prize Recipient "While basically a dullard, [Paul] Keyes nonetheless is an interesting cat." - Gary Deeb, TV Critic "The one thing I try to avoid is making audiences think." - [...]
Drew Friedman is not just one of America's most well-known and widely respected illustrators, but his work is arguably the most identifiable. Having worked for counterculture bibles over the years like National Lampoon, RAW, Screw, SPY and Mad, Friedman has, in the past fifteen years, garnered mainstream respectability with onslaughts of work for Entertainment Weekly, Mother Jones, Newsweek, The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The New Republic, The Weekly Standard, Time and countless others. Friedman has also published several entertaining books, including his two critically acclaimed collections of portraits titled Old Jewish Comedians . I spoke with Drew [...]
" Everyone knew who Rusty Warren was." - Dick Odette, 84 year old jazz drummer The early nineteen sixties experienced a comedy record boom unlike anything ever seen before. Every comedian that had ever worked a nightclub pressed an album. Some had high production values and were released on major labels like Capitol, Decca and Warner. Others were recorded in one-take, capturing mediocre comics bombing before an unsympathetic crowd. This was of no concern. If it were in the comedy section, people would buy it. For six solid years comedy albums were [...]
"My father has created a huge myth about himself."- David Lewis "Yeah, I met The Beatles ... Ain't no big fuckin' deal." - Al 'Grandpa Munster' Lewis There are two surefire ways to start a fight in America: you can call someone a socialist or you can call someone a liar. Al Lewis, known to millions of television viewers as Grandpa Munster, was both. Had Al Lewis ever written an autobiography, it most certainly would have been marketed as a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book. Lewis was an outspoken progressive, a chronic cigar smoker and [...]
I've always been intrigued by Jack Paar. Regarded as an immensely important cog in Tonight Show history, his name was referenced heavily in 'Late Night' news items at the start of 2010. However, few during the last forty years have seen an episode of his show from beginning to end and even less understand why he was special. He had wit, class, taste and a great ability for conversation. Many concede that it was Paar who truly put the 'talk' in 'talk shows.' He was also somewhat of a nut. One of Dick [...]
Betty White is universally loved. Best known for her work on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and The Golden Girls , she has been in show business for over sixty years. But what is it that made Betty White so famous in the first place? A recent blitz of cliché-laden profiles aggrandize about Betty's enduring television career, but rarely do they delve into detail. Betty White was a ubiquitous show business personality long before she ever played Sue Ann Nivens or Rose Nylund. As the most prolific female of nineteen fifties television, she was [...]
"I knew Cary Grant very well and he loved ... what did they call it? Acid! LSD. He said he liked to take the trip." - Debbie Reynolds "I learned many things in the quiet of that room ... I learned that everything is or becomes its own opposite ... You know, we are all unconsciously holding our anus. In one LSD dream ... I imagined myself as a giant penis launching off from earth like a spaceship." - Cary Grant It was 1943. Cary Grant was starring in the motion picture Destination [...]
Woody Allen is one of very few comedic delineations universally respected by comedy writers the world over. Held in high esteem by comedy's upper crust, the snooty savants of literature and the vast film literati, Allen is one of the few comedy titans actually considered an artist. Woody Allen's comedic acumen spans all genres. It has yet to be matched. However, the first several years of his career are rarely discussed. It is a fascinating period. Comedy devotees swear by the recordings of his stand-up act. At the time of his 1963 debut comedy record, Woody was a [...]
"If history were past... history wouldn't matter ... But history is present ... You and I are history. We carry our history. We act our history." - James Baldwin "It's stunning how Jay Leno outfoxed you again ... Your agent [said], 'There's good news and bad news. You are doing The Tonight Show ... Uh, but remember that discussion we had where you said I'll never have to fuckin' follow Leno again?" - Norm Macdonald appearing on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, February 10th, 2009 1 It's a maxim and [...]
I love Arnold Stang. During the filming of It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963), Spencer Tracy laughed every time Arnold Stang said good morning to him. It wasn't that Stang was "always on," although he could be when he wanted to, but Stang was just unintentionally funny all the time. When he actually tried to be funny it was doubly hilarious. Stang feigned confusion and indifference about Tracy's incessant laughing, "I guess he found me amusing," he said. It is hard to believe that anybody in his presence wouldn't. Arnold Stang had [...]
"Pitching is the art of instilling fear." - Sandy Koufax How many hits did Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Dock Ellis have to contend with on June 12th, 1970? Depending on your interpretation of the question it was several or none. In an amazing story that is rarely in any baseball highlight reel, Ellis pitched the only LSD induced no-hitter in the history of major league baseball. Let's see Barry Bonds or Alex Rodriguez enhance their game on psychedelics (no really, let's see it!). Dock Ellis was baseball's first true king of performance enhancing drugs. Ah, but wait... there's more. [...]
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