LITTLE BIG SCREEN: "THE THIN MAN" ON "THE LOVE BOAT"?

The author of "Murder In Eden" was Evelyn Bosworth - at least according to the book's jacket cover.  But that was just a nom de plume for the writing couple, Teddy and Lillian Smith.

In the 1980s, they sailed on the Pacific Princess in order to do research on their next book, "Murder On The High Seas".  The basic plot was to be about the murder of a cruise ship's captain and the Smiths promised that it would be particularly grisly.

What the Trueniverse audience didn't learn when they met the Smiths was that their nom de plume was in itself a mask.  Having learned the identities of the authors, most would have had their curiousity satisfied and left it at that.

But "Teddy and Lillian Smith" were not their real names either.....

I mean, really!  Smith?  

Teddy and Lillian were actually the famous multiversals Nick and Nora Charles.  They exist in the five largest fictional universes - BookWorld, the Cineverse, Toobworld, the Audioverse, and WorldStage.  There may be a few more besides, including a sub-dimension of Toobworld (a "Movie of the Week" world).  The two versions from WorldStage share the same dimension of that universe, but with one run-through of their lives, they must have been visited by the stagebound version of Sweet the Demon.  None of these couples can be transferred to a different universe; save for WorldStage, they are unique to their own world in looks and setting.

Nick and Nora Charles

(Working undercover in a burlesque show)

But we're focused on the Mr. and Mrs. Charles (and their little dog Asta too!) of Earth Prime-Time, who were living in Greenwich Village during the 1950's. As with his counterparts in BookWorld and the Cineverse, Nick Charles was still a private eye who probably preferred living off his wife's inheritance rather than solving mysteries.  When he did work a case, it was probably against his will; only because somebody he or Nora knew was in trouble.

While Nick worked on a case for the President,

JFK offered to keep Nora company.....

Eventually, Nick tired of the game but he knew Nora's inheritance wasn't going to last forever.....

It was Nora who came up with the idea that they should write up Nick's case histories, but that they should fictionalize them to avoid potential lawsuits.  Nick came up with his own idea for their joint project which would pay off decades later - they would create an alias to use instead of their real names.  That way they would have some lead time in case anybody came gunning for them about what they wrote.

Nora took the concept a step further: why not create fictional personae for the two of them and have those names hiding behind the alias of "Evelyn Bosworth" instead of their own names?  And so Teddy and Lillian Smith were born.

The first few books enjoyed moderate sales.  But as Nick and Nora became more proficient at the writing game - in between martinis - the sales began to rocket.  Until they were overshadowed by Jessica Fletcher, the "Smiths" rivalled the sales of Glynis Granville and Daphne Wallace combined. 

Time to celebrate!

(With Nick, it's always time to celebrate.....)

Suddenly their popularity on the best-seller lists threatened the cozy if dissipated lifestyle they had enjoyed for so many years.  

Nick and Nora's foresight proved fortuitous, although the double ruse of their nom de plumes turned out to be better protection against their fanatical followers than against the inspirations for the characters they created.

So we know of two books that were written by Evelyn Bosworth aka Teddy and Lillian Smith aka Nick and Nora Charles - "Murder In Eden" and "Murder On The High Seas".

"Teddy and Lillian Smith" were sailing to Mexico on the Sun Princess Cruise Ship to celebrate the publication of the novel which was published just before "Murder In Eden".  It was during that trip when they stumbled across a real murder mystery - that of the cruise ship's lounge singer Jessica Wells.  The couple didn't get involved, but observed from a distance as another passenger, a Los Angeles homicide lieutenant named Columbo, solved the murder.  

The experience gave them the idea for a new novel, but unfortunately the cruise was cut short because of the crime.  Before they could do any real first-hand research about cruise ships, Nick and Nora - that is, Teddy and Lillian - were forced to fly home to New York at the expense of the cruise line.

"Murder In Eden" was already in the pipeline, so they finished that up before they began their research for their cruise ship crime novel.

Nora Charles aka Lillian Smith
At the Paradise Village Resort

"Murder In Eden" was loosely based on a murder case solved by Nick at the Paradise Village Resort on the Kona coast of Hawaii.  It all had to do with a rumor that would not die - about buried treasure on the grounds of the resort.  (A few years later two other treasure-seekers named Dave and Stan would cause havoc in their search.  They may have been inspired by the mystery novel.)

Dave and Stan

All those years of imbibing finally caught up to Nick Charles and he finally succumbed to its effects in the mid-1980s.  Nora on the other hand lived to a ripe old age and only just passed away last year.  After Nick died, she carried on with the Evelyn Bosworth mysteries, staying loyal to her publisher, Whitestone Press, right to her last book.

AN O'BSERVATION

Some of you may have noticed that I employed a recastaway to make this Missing Link - Phyllis Kirk played Nora Charles and Dana Wynter was Lillian Smith.  However it can be easily splained away with the oldest of excuses for recastaways - plastic surgery.  As for the difference in their heights in comparison with Nick/Teddy?  (Don't let this picture fool High heels or lifts....

SHOWS CITED:

• 'The Thin Man'
• 'The Love Boat' - "Murder On The High Seas"
• 'The Love Boat' - "The Pride Of The Pacific/The Viking's Son"
• 'Columbo' - "Troubled Waters"
• 'Aloha Paradise' - "Treasure Hunt"
• 'Fantasy Island' - "The Last Whodunnit"
• 'Murder, She Wrote'
• 'Glynis'
• 'Magnum, P.I.' - "Double Jeopardy"(The photo of Dana Wynter in Hawaii is from this episode.)

BCnU!

THEORIES OF RELATEEVEETY - THE BENEDICTS

Alex Benedict was the conductor for the Southern Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra of Los Angeles until 1972.  That's when he was arrested for the murder of Jenifer Welles, the orchestra's concert pianist.

Unbeknownst to Benedict and his wife, Janice Fielding Benedict, Janice was pregnant at the time of the murder.  (Had she known, I'm sure she would never have played tennis and risked harm to the fetus.)

And in real life, Blythe Danner, who played Janice, was pregnant - with Gwyneth Paltrow.  I think we might as well keep that in mind with regards to the baby that would be born after her father was already in jail for Ms. Welles' murder.

There was nothing he could give his daughter now that he was in prison and with his career in ruins.  But he didn't want her to be disillusioned with her family name of "Benedict" just because he blemished it.  Especially if Janice decided to drop the name after she divorced him.

And so while he was in prison, Alex Benedict began a project to chronicle the Benedict family tree.  But he was only able to sketch out the life of the founder of the Benedict lineage and a few scribbled notes about some of the current members of the family.  

That's because Alex Benedict died in prison, victim of a stabbing by a crazed inmate.  Benedict's murderer was found standing over the former conductor's body holding the bloody shank and shouting "Who's the Maestro now?"

 

Among those names were his uncles Sam and Jules, who was the oldest of the siblings.  The youngest brother was Sam Benedict, a high-powered defense attorney in San Francisco.  As for the intensely irascible Jules, he ran the Benedict Workshop of the Dramatic Arts in New York City.  

SEAN BENEDICT

(with TYGER HAYES)

Another mentioned in the list was Sean Benedict, Sam's son by Margaret Marshall of the family who controlled the Kellico conglomerate.  Jules never married and had no children - in the parlance of the times, he was a "confirmed bachelor".  (Not that there was anything wrong with that......)

And of course there was his own father, James Benedict, who served as an Army Captain during the Italian campaign of WWII.  The missions of Captain Benedict's infantry company were chronicled by journalist Conley Wright, which gave the men some notoriety back home.  

But the main focus of Alex Benedict's research took him back to France of the 1760s, and the founder of the family.  It would be at most two generations more before the family gained the surname of Benedict, but there was no denying that Alex Benedict shared the genetic pattern of his forebear, Nicolas Le Floch.

Le Floch was born in Guérande, Brittany, around 1738*.  He was the illegitimate son of the Marquis de Ranreull and was raised by the Canon Le Floch, from whom he aquired his name.

By 1761, Nicolas Le Floch was the Commissaire of le Châtelet, in association with Antoine de Sartine, the Lieutenant General of the Paris Police.  

And basically, that's all Alex Benedict was able to complete before he was murdered in prison.  His daughter, named Abigail by her mother (but who goes by the nickname of Abby) may have kept the family name.  Or she may have changed it to the more French rendition of Benoit.  Then again, she may even have tossed it aside as her mother had done and gone with her mother's maiden name of Fielding.

In 2012, Abby "auditioned" for the chance to be the egg donor for a gay couple, Dr. David Sawyer and Bryan Collins.  It is assumed her eggs were chosen because of her resemblance to an actress named Gwyneth Paltrow.  (Bryan wanted to have a skinny blonde daughter.)

So the family tree, begun in the mid-1700's, continues into the 21st Century....

SHOWS CITED:

• 'Nicolas Le Floch'
• 'Columbo' - "Etude In Black"
• 'Sam Benedict'
• 'The Gallant Men'
• 'That Girl'
• 'Bare Essence'
• 'The New Normal'
• 'Columbo' - "An Exercise in Fatality"
• 'F Troop'

BCnU!

* Usually TV characters are the same age as the actors who portray them, unless otherwise stated - as was the case with Milo Janus the fitness expert, or Hekawi medicine man Roaring Chicken.  If Nicolas Le Floch had been the same age as Jerome Robart, then he would have been born around 1723.......

TV-GPS: MAARDAM

I've become a big fan of the internation mystery TV shows to be found each night on the Mhz Network.  Right now my two big favorites that are currently playing are period pieces - 'Crimes Of Passion', set in 1950s Sweden and 'Nicolas Le Floche' of 1760s France.

There is a series of at least nine TV movies based on a character named Van Veeteren, a retired Detective Chief Inspector who originated in novels by Håkan Nesser.

The stories take place in the town of Maardam, a city just as fictional as the country it's located in - and that remains unnamed.  This country is described as being somewhere in the north of Europe with heavy influences of Sweden, Poland, Germany, and Netherlands.  The City of Maardam has a population of 300,000 as of the first novel "The Mind's Eye" (which may be the one Van Veeteren novel that has not been adapted for Toobworld.)

Someday Mister Nesser might reveal the name of his fictional country.  But it's probably too late - I'm sure there are too many readers who have come up with their own choices and will never be satisfied with anything else.  

But for a little fun here at Toobworld Central, there are a few options to be found among Northern European countries already established in other TV series, many of which might be found on that extra land mass above Russia.

I'm torn between Drublegratz from 'The Girl From U.N.C.L.E.' and Caronia from 'Get Smart'.  And even though my druthers lean toward Caronia, I think there's something about Maardam, Drublegratz, which I find amusing.....

BCnU!

TV-GPS: THE MAP OF TOOBWORLD

MAP OF EARTH PRIME

From the Bionic Wiki:

The world map shown during the NATO briefing reveals that the world Steve Austin inhabits is physically very different from the real world. Aside from the existence of fictional countries established in previous episodes, not to mention Balinderry in this one, the map shows that the northern portion of North America is shaped completely differently than the way it is for real, and that there appears to be an extra continent to the north of Eurasia.

 

Forget the bionics and the splainin for Bigfoot.  It's this map which makes 'The Six Million Dollar Man' an essential for the Toobworld Dynamic.  This is proof that Toobworld is not our Earth - it's Earth Prime-Time, not Earth Prime.

Earth was manufactured to look somewhat similar to the original planet in the same solar orbit, Mondas.  Only the design was turned upside down from the original.  (Probably the Magratheans wanted to avoid a copyright infringement charge from God.)

On this NATO map, it looks like there could be a connected land-bridge between Russia and Alaska.  But it's that extra continent above Eurasia that is most exciting - that makes plenty of room for all of those vest-pocket kingdoms, and duchies, and Soviet states so often to be found in shows like 'Mission: Impossible and 'The Man From U.N.C.L.E.'.  We can fit them up there and not have to worry about squeezing too many tele-nations into an already over-populated Europe.

These are the candidates for that new continent:

• Boldavia ("Night Court")
• Boravia ("Danger Man")
• Bukovia ("CHAOS")
• Drublegratz ("The Girl From U.N.C.L.E.")
• The Federated People's Republic ("Mission: Impossible")
• Pavlonia ("The Rogues")
• Povia ("Mission: Impossible")
• Slobodia ("My Favorite Martian')
• The UCR ("Mission: Impossible")
• Vukanova ("Freakazoid!")
• Yakastonia ("Doug")
• Zemenia ("Monk")

And that would leave plenty of room for other nations should the need arise.

BCnU!

TVXOHOF IN MEMORIAM FOR JUNE 2014 - ALICE NELSON

Real life has once again intruded into the preferred dream-state of my personal reality so that I haven't been keeping on top of any Toobworld stories of major import.

At least here in the Inner Toob blog.  If you're on Facebook, look for the page for The Toobworld Dynamic and click "Like".  I put up stuff there all the time that I wouldn't otherwise get to in the blog.

But moving right along....

From the Los Angeles Times:

Ann B. Davis, the Emmy-winning actress best remembered as the nutty housekeeper on television's "The Brady Bunch," has died. She was 88.

Davis died Sunday [June 1, 2014] in San Antonio, said her agent, Robert Malcolm. She had fallen Saturday at her home there and did not regain consciousness.

Her most famous role was Alice Nelson, as stated in the obituary, but she was also known before that as Charmaine "Schultzy" Schultz in 'Love That Bob'.  I'll have to do more research but Schultzy may be eligible for the Television Crossover Hall Of Fame - if I can find one more separate appearance for her.  (Besides 'Love That Bob', Schultzy was also seen in at least one commercial.)

But today we're remembering Alice Nelson, who could rightly be called the Queen of the TV Crossovers.

Look at her tally and see if you don't agree:

"The Brady Bunch"

117 episodes

"The Brady Bunch Variety Hour"

9 episodes

Shake n Bake Commercial

The Brady Girls Get Married (1981) 

A TV movie

"The Brady Brides" 

6 episodes

A Very Brady Christmas (1988) 

Another TV movie

"Day by Day" 
    - A Very Brady Episode (1989)

A dream sequence

"The Bradys" 

4 episodes

"Hi Honey, I'm Home" 
    - SRP (1991) 

From an alternate dimension

Swiffer Commercial

I think only Detective John Munch and Sam Drucker can rival her.  And perhaps Dr. Frasier Crane.....

O'BSERVATIONS:

Alice was so much a part of the Brady family that I would not be surprised if some viewers thought her last name was Brady as well - in much the same way as some people think Granny was a Clampett (No, Granny Moses!) and that there was a vampire named Grampa Munster.  (He was actually Sam Dracula.)

I was tempted to toss 'The Brady Bunch Variety Hour' into an alternate TV dimension, but it's still logical that they could have done a variety show in the main Toobworld since they had some fleeting fame in the early 1970s as a singing group:

And it was because of that TV variety show that Alice had a doppelganger in the dimension in which all TV characters are recreated.  This was the world from which the Nielsen family came from.

The variety show (which must have had a LOT of behind-the-scenes footage) was also responsible for a dream/nightmare Ross Harper once had when he should have been studying for his high school exams.  In the dream, Ross was now the long-lost Brady son, Chuck.

My list for Alice's credits read down in the order I think they should be in.  The Shake 'n' Bake blipvert was in 1981, but had to be before the TV movie "The Brady Girls Get Married" because Alice was only cooking for nine (counting herself.)

Ms. Davis' last appearance as Alice may have been that Swiffer commercial that leads off that trio of advertisements in the final video.  I think she may have been on vacation at a resort for some kind of domestic servant convention as we also see Benson, Rosario, Florence, and Geoffrey from 'Soap'/'Benson', 'Will & Grace' (perhaps 'The Flying Nun' as well?), 'The Jeffersons'/'Checking In', and 'The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air' respectively.

About 142 appearanes in all for Ann B. Davis as Alice Nelson.  You can't beat that with a stick!

Good night and may God bless, Miss Davis.  And welcome to the TVXOHOF......

BCnU!

TUESDAY NEWS DAY - NEW "FARSCAPE" IN THE NOT-SO-FAR FUTURE?

It's pozz'ble, just pozz'ble, that 'Farscape: The Next Generation' may be coming to the TV Universe.  There are rumors that a writer and co-producer of the original series, Justin Monjo, is working on a screenplay for a TV movie that would be about the son of John Crichton and Aeryn Sun.  In that time when 'Farscape' has not been on our TV screens nineteen year old D'Argo Sun-Crichton was being raised in hiding on Earth.  But his whereabouts would be discovered by the villains of the piece and so he would have to go on the run to reconnect with his parents for their help.

This would  be in the near future of the Toobworld timeline.  D'Argo was born in 2004, Earth Reckoning, so unless they give him some accelerated alien growth spurt, this will probably be taking place in 2023.

If the rumors are true, this is still just a work in progress and it will be at least a year before it's ready for broadcast.

BCnU!

LEAGUE OF THEMSELVES - LEEZA GIBBONS

LEEZA GIBBONS

AS SEEN IN:

'The Adventures Of Lois & Clark'

"The Lord Of Flys"

TV DIMENSION:

The Land of Remakes (Toobworld Remade)

From Wikipedia:

Leeza Kim Gibbons (born March 26, 1957) is an American talk show host. Gibbons is the host of her own radio show, Hollywood Confidential, part of the United Stations radio syndication company.

She has hosted Entertainment Tonight and Extra, as well as hosting Leeza, her own NBC/syndicated talk show, which ran from June 1993 to September 2000. The show originated as John & Leeza from Hollywood, a talk show with former co-host of Entertainment Tonight, John Tesh. Tesh was dropped from the show after seven months, and Gibbons hosted solo for the remainder of the series. She also has guest-starred on several shows, including The Geena Davis Show, The Simple Life, The Simpsons, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Home Improvement, and Just Shoot Me. She played a television reporter Jess Perkins in RoboCop and RoboCop 2, she had a small role as a reporter in Soapdish. She also hosted a series that explores true stories of survival in Lifetime's What Should You Do?

In 2013 Leeza won her first Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lifestyle/Travel Host for PBS My Generation.

This dimension's Leeza Gibbons was host of 'Sunrise America' and was allowed into the domed Smallvill in order to interview Lord Nor, proclaimed master of Earth.

BCnU!

TOOB ON THE AISLE

Here's a post dedicated to the Tony Awards......

In a recent blipvert for Prolia, Blythe Danner is about to go on vacation from the theatrical play she's doing, "Coast To Coast".

That's her televersion.  In real life, she was in a run of "The Commons Of Pensacola" at the MTC with Sarah Jessica Parker which closed earlier this year.

The "Coast To Coast" theatre is certainly not what one would expect for a great Broadway house.  It looks like it's a reconverted movie house (old-fashioned ticket booth outside) and could be part of the Off-Off-Broadway scene.

I could be wrong, but I don't think there is a play in the real world with the title "Coast To Coast".  So this would be a theater presentation to be found only in Toobworld.

Break a leg!