AS SEEN ON TV: ANDY ROONEY III

ANDY ROONEY

AS SEEN ON:
'Saturday Night Live'

AS PLAYED BY:
Norm MacDonald

From the SNL Transcripts site:

"Andy Rooney"

Ed Bradley ... Tim Meadows

Andy Rooney ... Norm MacDonald

[Bumper for CBS' TV newsmagazine "60 Minutes": a ticking stopwatch. Dissolve to correspondent Ed Bradley addressing the camera.]

Ed Bradley:
As the old refrain goes, "People who need people are the luckiest people in the world." And then - there's Andy Rooney.

[Dissolve to elderly, graying weekly commentator Andy Rooney who sits at the desk in his office, with his jacket off and shirtsleeves rolled-up, addressing the camera in his irritatingly snide, cadenced voice.]

Andy Rooney:

People are everywhere nowadays. It seems like you can't go anywhere without bumping into some people. People follow you when you're shopping. They ask you for directions. And, sometimes, they ask you what time it is. People never know what time it is. They have to ask you.

There are over four billion people in the world. That's a lot of people. And I suppose most people like each other all right. But I don't. I don't like people and I never have. I guess that makes me bad.

Advertisers are always using people to help sell their products. [holds a box of Kellogg's Corn Flakes cereal] Here's something called corn flakes. It's got a picture of some people on the box. I guess we're supposed to think, "Well, these people like corn flakes. I guess I will, too." [sets box aside] But I don't think that. I don't like people. And I don't like pictures of people either.

There's even a magazine now about people. [holds up a copy of People Magazine with a photo of Clint Eastwood on the cover] It's called "People Magazine." This issue has a picture of some fellow's head on the cover. I'll bet that's a good article. [sets magazine aside]

Here's a box of letters from different people. [dumps a large box of envelopes on the desktop] Seems there's nothing people enjoy more than writing me letters. [picks envelopes from the pile and holds them up to the camera, one at a time] Here's one from - Washington. This one's from - Ohio. Here's one from - North Dakota.

Here's one from - Paris, Texas. Now, I don't know where Paris, Texas is - but I do know this -- I'm getting pretty tired of cities in Texas naming themselves after cities in France.

Here's one from Chicago. This one's from Iowa. Here's one from Iowa, too. Here's one from Montana. This one's from someplace called "Kansas City." Here's one from Montana. Here's one from Arizona. This one's from Las Vegas. Here's one from Virginia - and here's another one - from West Virginia. This one's from Indiana. I don't know where this one's from - but it's yellow and has a big stamp on it. This one's from Colorado. Here's one from Michigan.

I receive about one hundred of these letters every single day. I never open them. I don't like opening them. I set fire to them.

Then, I pour water on the box of burning letters to put it out the fire. Then, I take the whole mess and I dump it out of my window on the people below. People don't like that much. But I like doing it to them. I suppose that makes me bad.

[Dissolve back to Ed Bradley, addressing the camera.]

Ed Bradley:
We'll be back next week with another edition of "60 Minutes."

I wonder if 'Saturday Night Live' will take one more whack at Andy Rooney tonight, the evening before his last broadcast on '60 Minutes'....?

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: THE DEATH OF JAMES DEAN

It was on this date in 1955, that James Dean died in a car crash.....

THE DEATH OF JAMES DEAN

AS SEEN IN:
"James Dean: Race With Destiny"

AS PLAYED BY:
James Dean: Casper Van Diem
Rolf Wutherich: Unknown
Donald Turnipseed: Dale Gibson

From Wikipedia:
[James] Dean was driving west on U.S. Route 466 (later State Route 46) near Cholame, California, when a black-and-white 1950 Ford Custom Tudor coupe, driven from the opposite direction by 23-year-old Cal Poly student Donald Turnupseed, moved to take the fork onto State Route 41 and crossed into Dean's lane. The two cars hit almost head-on.

According to a story in the October 1, 2005, edition of the Los Angeles Times, California Highway Patrol officer Ron Nelson and his partner had been finishing a coffee break in Paso Robles, when they were called to the scene of the accident, where they saw an unconscious, heavily breathing Dean being placed into an ambulance. Paramedics were attending to Wütherich who had been thrown from the car and was lying on the shoulder of the road next to the mangled Porsche Spyder barely concious, but survived with a broken jaw and other injuries.

Dean was taken to Paso Robles War Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival at 5:59 p.m. by the attending emergency room physician. His last known words, uttered right before impact when Wütherich told Dean to slow down when they saw the Ford coup in front of them about to drive into their lane, were said to have been: "That guy's gotta stop... He'll see us."

According to the postmortem, it is believed that Dean's head struck the front grill of the other car. This impact and the accompanying crash resulted in Dean suffering a broken neck, plus multiple fractures of the jaw, arms and legs, as well as massive internal injuries. He is believed to have died around 10 minutes after the crash upon examination in the ambulance. For years, there were rumors a photographer friend, traveling to the race in another car, took photos of Dean trapped in the car dead or dying. Such photos never surfaced in public.

Contrary to reports of Dean's speeding, which persisted decades after his death, Nelson said "the wreckage and the position of Dean's body indicated his speed was more like 55 mph (88 km/h)." Turnupseed received a gashed forehead and bruised nose and was not cited by police for the accident. He was interviewed by the Tulare Advance-Register newspaper immediately following the crash, saying that he had not seen Dean's car approaching, but after that, refused to ever again speak publicly about the accident. He went on to own and operate an electrical contracting business and died of lung cancer in 1995. Wütherich died in a road accident in Germany in 1981 after surviving several suicide attempts.

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: ANDY ROONEY II

ANDY ROONEY

AS SEEN ON:
'Saturday Night Live'

AS PLAYED BY:
Phil Hartman

From the SNL Transcripts page:

Don Pardo V/O: [over a graphic that reads: BLACK HISTORY MOMENT] NBC is proud to present another Black History Moment. And now ... Andy Rooney.

[Dissolve to elderly, gray-haired Andy Rooney, seated at the desk in his cluttered office, addressing the camera.]

Andy Rooney:
February's Black History Month in this great multicultural nation of ours. I think I know just a little bit about history because, at the moment, I AM history. But did you know that George Washington Carver, a black man, introduced the cultivation of peanuts to America? He also invented peanut butter. He was a wonderful man. And did you ever notice how peanut butter tastes better on dark bread? Dark beer is better, too. And black bean soup is much better than white bean. Dark is just better. And black is best. I'm Andy Rooney and I like black people. I really do. ... It's fags I hate.

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: ANDY ROONEY

Because Andy Rooney is retiring from '60 Minutes', and because I'm in a deadline crunch for another Inner Toob project, we're showcasing the curmudgeonly commentator the rest of  this week....

ANDY ROONEY

AS SEEN ON:
'Saturday Night Live'

AS PLAYED BY:
Joe Piscopo

From the SNL Transcripts site:

A Few Minutes With Andy Rooney

Andy Rooney...Joe Piscopo

[Open on the title "A FEW MINUTES WITH ANDY ROONEY"]

Announcer: And now, "A Few Minutes With Andy Rooney."

[Dissolve to Rooney sitting at a desk covered in shoes]

Andy Rooney:
I've been doing some serious thinking about shoes. Ever notice shoes? Everybody wears them. Just look down. There's so many different kinds. A lotta shoes sound like what they are. Oxfords, work shoes, loafers. I guess the good thing about loafers is you don't have to tie them. Space shoes, boots! Ever notice there weren't many Nazis named Steve? You know what's annoying? When that little plastic thing on the end of your shoelaces falls off and gets frayed at the end, and you can't get 'em through the holes, and you gotta do this [licks end of shoelace] to do this. [pushes shoelace through hole in shoe] Ever notice what a weird name Morley Safer is? Morley, is that the opposite of Leslie? And Mike Wallace. Boy, what a jackass! I mean, if you did something illegal, would you tell Mike Wallace about it? I wouldn't. Ever notice how annoying my voice is? Of course, you can turn it off. I can't. Ever notice it gets dark at night? Where does the sun go? Nobody knows. Ever notice how much rouge I have on my cheeks? Of course, some people think it makes me look like a clown.

[He continues over the applause as the "A FEW MINUTES WITH ANDY ROONEY" title fades back in]

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: SUSAN LUCCI

SUSAN LUCCI

AS SEEN ON:
'Saturday Night Live'

AS PLAYED BY:
Vanessa Bayer

TV DIMENSION:
Skitlandia

From CBS News:
After four decades in Pine Valley, "All My Children" has come to an end.

The long-running soap opera aired its final episode on Friday, ending the show's 41-year run.

The finale finished with a cliffhanger: It ended with most of the show's characters gathered at the Chandler house for a party. J.R. lurked outside with a gun and fired it when the screen went black.

Whether anyone was shot could still be revealed - ABC licensed the show to production company Prospect Park, which hopes to keep the show going online and on other "emerging platforms."

The series, which debuted in 1970, featured Susan Lucci as villain Erica Kane, and helped launch the careers of actors including Kelly Ripa and husband Mark Consuelos, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Josh Duhamel, Melissa Leo, Amanda Seyfried, Mischa Barton, Christian Slater and Michelle Trachtenberg.

ABC announced it was pulling the plug on the show back in April, along with the soap opera "One Life to Live," which will end its run in January.

The sketch dealt with the wrap party after the final episode of 'All My Children'. It turns out that all of the people working behind the camera had lives similar to some of the more outrageous situations found in the show (and in soap operas in general).

Or were they pushed?

BCnU!

THE HAT SQUAD: THE HENSON INFLUENCE

What does your favorite Muppet say about you?

For me, it's Rowlf.  I've been a fan since 'The Jimmy Dean Show'. 

Attitude, looks, it's all me. I just can't play the piano.

Too bad this author couldn't spell the name right.

Jim Henson's 75th birthday was last week.......

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: CHRISTIE WHITMAN

CHRISTINE TODD WHITMAN

AS SEEN ON:
'Saturday Night Live'

AS PLAYED BY:
Ana Gasteyer

From Wikipedia:
Christine Todd "Christie" Whitman (born September 26, 1946) is an American Republican politician and author who served as the 50th Governor of New Jersey from 1994 to 2001, and was the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency in the administration of President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2003. She was New Jersey's first, and to date, only female governor. She was the second woman and first Republican woman to defeat an incumbent governor in a general election in the United States. She was also the first Republican woman to be reelected governor.

Happy birthday, Gov!

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR

September 25, 1981 – Sandra Day O'Connor becomes the 102nd person sworn in as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and the first woman to hold the office.

JUSTICE SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR

AS SEEN IN:
'Futurama'

AS VOICED BY:
Tress McNeille

From the 'Futurama' wiki:
In the 20th and 21st centuries, Sandra Day O'Connor's head was an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court. By the year 3003, she had become an Associate Justice on the Earth Supreme Court. She participated in the case Earth v. Zoidberg.

Futurama S05E04 A Taste Of Freedom [dd]

Vezi mai multe video din animatie

BCnU!

SKED ALERT: THE RETURN OF "BOARDWALK EMPIRE"

Sunday night, 'Boardwalk Empire' returns to HBO, with the debut of the second season premiere which will be immediately repeated twice over.

It's now 1921 for the Atlantic City-based drama about the effects of Prohibition on so many inter-connected lives, and this Toobits Award-winning series should provide plenty of material for future Inner Toob posts. (As well as a chance to see one of my friends among the "atmosphere people"!)

Here are a couple of videos to transport you back to the Boardwalk - first up, a recap to get you prepped for what's to come with what already happened, plus a couple of promos and finally a scene from the season debut.

BCnU!