Saturday, May 26, 2018

THE HAT SQUAD - REMEMBERING CLINT WALKER




Clint Walker, who starred as a gentle giant cowboy on the ABC Western "Cheyenne," died Monday, TMZ reports. He was 90.

HIs daughter Valerie told the outlet he died of congestive heart failure.

Walker's signature role, though, was Cheyenne Bodie, the nomadic post-Civil War cowboy he played for more than 100 episodes over seven seasons.

"Cheyenne" ran from 1955 to 1962, and earned one Emmy nomination in 1957.
By RACHEL DESANTIS
| NEW YORK DAILY NEWS | 

Cheyenne Bodie was inducted into the Television Crossover Hall of Fame in the Summer of 2003, when the Toobworld Dynamic website had gone off-line but before the Inner Toob blog had begun.  Here are his qualifications:

'Cheyenne'
108 episodes (1955 - 1962)
[Cheyenne (1955) season five, episode seven, "Duel at Judas Basin", was the only one to feature Ty Hardin as 'Bronco', Clint Walker, and Will Hutchins as 'Sugarfoot' all in the same episode.]

'Maverick'
"Hadley's Hunters" (1960)

"The Gambler IV: The Luck of the Draw" (1991)

'Kung Fu: The Legend Continues'

"Gunfighters" (1995)

Detective John Munch is now considered the King of Crossovers.  Before him, it was Sam Drucker from Hooterville.  But I would make the claim that Cheyenne Bodie was the first (with Lucy Ricardo as the first Queen of Crossovers.)

To honor the memory of Clint Walker and to celebrate his contribution of Cheyenne Bodie to the greater glory of Toobworld, I offer the following videos as my tribute.















Good night and may God bless Clint Walker.....


Friday, May 25, 2018

TVXOHOF (05/25/18) - MARTIN LANE


Well, I made the commitment last week to induct a new member into the Television Crossover Hall of Fame every Friday, so here goes.  And this week’s entry follows last week’s recruitment of the New York Daily Chronicle….


‘THE PATTY DUKE SHOW’
“THE PATTY DUKE SHOW – STILL ROCKIN’ IN BROOKLYN HEIGHTS”

As the editor of the newspaper, it stands to reason that Martin Lane would have his imprimatur on all those editions of the Chronicle as seen in other TV shows, at least into the 1980s.  



And that includes the four editions of the same paper seen in "And When The Sky Was Opened", an episode of 'The Twilight Zone' - even if he doesn't remember the alterations to Earth Prime-Time that day....



So even though he does have two official shows for his official tally, the rest have to fall into the reference category.


Martin Lane won’t be the only character from ‘The Patty Duke Show’ who will eventually enter the TVXOHOF, but there is only one other potential member, not two as you might expect.  I’ll just leave it at that for now.  The situation might change….

Welcome to the Hall, Martin Lane!





Thursday, May 24, 2018

HISTORY CHANNELLED - HARRY & MEGHAN AS SEEN ON TV




Last Saturday, the big news of the day was the wedding of Prince Harry to American actress Meghan Markle.  Normally, I wouldn't care but the pageantry at least kept the investigation of Trump's collusion with Russia off the TV screens at least for a few hours.

And their romance was already "immortalized" for Earth Prime-Time with a movie on the Lifetime channel.

Here are a few pictures from that movie:

THE TRIP TO AFRICA


HANGING WITH WILLIAM & KATE

MEETING THE QUEEN

THE PROPOSAL

The multidimensional televersion of Prince Charles will one day be added to the TV Crossover Hall of Fame and this new portrayal will among his collection of qualifications:


I didn't see it, but I can't imagine the producers were so bold as to include the future scenes of the wedding.  Luckily for the couple (if not for the British taxpayer), the wedding ceremony went off without a hitch.  (That's the only reason I watched some of it - as a potential news source.  I'll just leave it at that.)

As I said, I didn't watch the movie but I wonder if at any point did Harry call upon one of his trademark reactions:




I'm sure it was called into service at some point late Saturday night here in the Real World.  Know what I mean?  Nudge nudge wink wink.....

BCnU!

Wednesday, May 23, 2018

O'BSERVATIONS - THE NEW "MAGNUM P.I."




Over the years, my enthusiasm for the new Fall TV season has diminished.  I think it began with the loss of the digest-sized TV Guide magazine for the larger format.  There was just something exciting about poring through that magazine to learn everything about the new season.  And I could keep it hidden away from the nuns!

But thanks to my British blogging buddy Rob Buckley, I’ve perused the coming offerings for this year and I have to say I’m less than enthused.  However, there was one entry which did catch my eye.

Here’s the CBS press release:

‘Magnum PI’ is a modern take on the classic series starring Jay Hernandez as Thomas Magnum, a decorated former Navy SEAL who, upon returning home from Afghanistan, repurposes his military skills to become a private investigator. A charming rogue, an American hero, and a die-hard Detroit Tigers fan, Magnum has Juliet Higgins and her Dobermans to keep him in line, as well as his trusted buddies and fellow POW survivors TC and Rick when he needs back-up on a job. With keys to a vintage Ferrari in one hand, aviator sunglasses in the other, and an Old Düsseldorf longneck chilling in the fridge, Thomas Magnum is back on the case! Peter Lenkov, Eric Guggenheim, Justin Lin, John Davis, John Fox and Danielle Woodrow are executive producers for CBS Television Studios in association with Universal Television. Lin directed the pilot from a script by Lenkov and Guggenheim. Magnum PI stars Jay Hernandez as Thomas Magnum, Perdita Weeks as Juliet Higgins, Zachary Knighton as Orville “Rick” Wright and Stephen Hill as Theodore “TC” Calvin.

I’m a fan of Knighton, and at least a fan of Perdita’s sister Honeysuckle.  (I’m not familiar with the work of Hill or Hernandez.)  But that admiration was for specific roles; they have not been elevated to the status of “I’ll watch them in anything.”  And I was never that big a fan of the original series.  I’ve probably seen less than twenty episodes.

But the blurb did catch my eye because the show is definitely a remake, not a continuation.  If Magnum was the only character who used the same name, maybe I could pass the show off as being in Earth Prime-Time along with the original: this Thomas Magnum could be the son Tom Selleck’s character never knew he had.  But a new TC, Rick, and a gender-swapped Higgins would make that too much of a coincidence. 

So off it goes to Toobworld2, where it might have a chance to cross over with the remakes of ‘Hawaii Five-0’ and ‘MacGyver’, also on CBS.  (It could also cross over with the new ‘S.W.A.T.’, but I like the idea that it is firmly entrenched in the alternate dimension of Black Toobworld.  Still, it’s a show which could have similar versions on a multitude of Toobworlds.)  And the mention of Five-0 by the detective in the trailer suggests that a crossover could be pozz'ble, just pozz'ble.

It might even share a Toobworld with another Tom Selleck show, 'Blue Bloods'.  That's not a remake, but it's in a dimension where the political landscape is different from that in the Real World and the main Toobworld.  This version of 'Magnum PI' might have a doppelganger there.


 BCnU!


Tuesday, May 22, 2018

TWO FOR TUESDAY - KHRZ-TV


We finally have a way to link ‘Ironside’ and ‘McMillan and Wife’ with more than just the fact that both shows take place in San Francisco.

‘IRONSIDE’
“FIND A VICTIM”



Chief Robert T. Ironside and “former” second-story thief Lou Karns appeared on a public affairs program hosted by John Barbour who would later host NBC’s ‘Real People’.

‘McMILLAN AND WIFE’
“DEATH IS A SEVEN POINT FAVORITE”


Sandy King was a sportscaster who covered the Hawks’ football games and got caught up in a betting scandal involving quarterback Billy Benton.

As you can see in the pictures, what connects both of these episodes is KHRZ-TV, Channel 16.

One more O’Bservation – “16” is one of the Numbers in the Valenzetti Equation from ‘Lost’.

BCnU!



Monday, May 21, 2018

DATELINE TOOBWORLD - REMEMBERING CATHLEEN CORDELL



Some time ago, Skeeter Ullman shared this on Facebook:


CATHLEEN CORDELL
The same character in 'Night Gallery' - Mrs. Mount who ran the employment agency in "The Housekeeper" and in "Satisfaction Guaranteed!'

'Night Gallery' was an anthology series, with several stories told in each episode and no prequels or sequels to be found.  The only character we saw each episode was host Rod Serling.  (And I do mean "character".  Although he played himself, he never guided tours through bizarre art galleries in the real world.  Add to this his fictional televersions in 'The Twilight Zone', 'The Jack Benny Program', and mentioned in an episode of 'Perry Mason' as a friend to the lawyer, and you can see why he was inducted into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame.)

But if Cathleen Cordell played the same character in both segments, then she was the only other recurring character on the show.  I looked into this and Mr. Ullman is right, not that the Powers That Be would agree with him....


According to the IMDb, which I derisively call "Ol' Reliable", Ms. Cordell was known as "Miss Beamish" in the first segment, "The Housekeeper" which was broadcast in 1970.  It was in 1972's "Satisfaction Guaranteed" in which she was identified as "Mrs. Mount".

But there's no Zonk in this.

During that gap of two years, this "woman of a certain age" got married.  We're never going to find out for certain who her husband was, so it's time for a bit o' televisiological fun in order to fill in the blanks.

Mr. Mount was an Englishman living in the United States in the early 1970s.  We don't know his first name, but he was born in London around 1915 and he was probably either an older brother or at least a cousin to Nurse Patsy Mount (born circa 1922) who worked as a midwife in the East End of London.

As always, this is conjecture.

He may have been in America as a businessman, a government official, or perhaps as a journalist; and in the course of his duties he met Miss Beamish.  Perhaps he needed clerical work done and he visited her business in order to secure the services of a secretary.  And there he found love instead.....


So that's why she underwent a name change, and as the curator for Toobworld I can reconcile those two characters as being one and the same.

As to the difference in the look of her office?  At some point in those two years she either renovated or moved.

My thanks to Skeeter Ullman and Jeff Alexander for bringing this TV tidbit to my attention.

By the way, today marks the 103rd anniversary of the birth of Cathleen Cordell.

SHOWS CITED:
  • 'Night Gallery'
  • 'Call The Midwife'
  • 'The Twilight Zone'
  • 'The Jack Benny Program'
  • 'Perry Mason'
BCnU!


Sunday, May 20, 2018