SATURDAY COMICS - "LEAVE IT TO BEAVER"

Back on April 13th, Tony Dow, immortalized as Wally Cleaver on 'Leave It To Beaver', turned 72 years old.  We would have celebrated last Saturday but we used the TV comic book showcase to continue mourning Don Rickles.

So here we are, sixty years after the debut of that classic sitcom, to look at how it appeared in the Comic Book Universe.....

You can click on these pages to enlarge them.

 And finally, a non-sequitur.... 

......

GLADYS KRAVITZ - STILL KICKIN', STILL ZONKIN'

Lucy Chambers:

Hello.

Frankie Bergstein:

Oh! No solicitors.

Lucy Chambers:

No, no, I-I live across the street, 

and I saw an ambulance here a couple of days ago.

Frankie Bergstein:

Are you Gladys Kravitz? 

Lucy Chambers:

No, I'm Lucy.

Oh, Grace! Grace! 

She knows me.

Grace Hanson:

Lucy.

Lucy Chambers:

Hello.

Lucy Chambers:

Hello.

Listen, what's going on? 

I've been very worried.

Grace Hanson:

Thanks for stopping by, Luce.

Lucy Chambers:

Ah! He's all right? 

Grace Hanson:

Yeah, he's fine.

Lucy Chambers:

Oh, well, I'm so relieved.

Grace Hanson:

We're all relieved.

'FRANKIE AND GRACE'

Team Toobworld knows how we should play this - if there is no attribution connected to the character mentioned, we should be able to assume that the character exists in the same TV dimension as the person who mentioned them,

But Gladys Kravitz lived in Westport Ct., while Frankie Bergstein was in La Jolla, California.  And even though she was subjected to a magic spell which transformed her appearance, that never raised her recognition factor within Toobworld because the spell was designed so that nobody would be able to notice the change.  But even so, she could have been known to the general public.

That's because Samantha Stephens' secret life as a witch did become public, to the point where a TV show was developed based on the news reports, the Kravitzes could have been a reference by Frankie to their place in the public consciousness.

Abner and Gladys Kravitz did visit California after Tabitha had moved to Los Angeles in order to force their niece Nancy back home.  And when that failed, they left to return to Westport.  

However.... 

Abner Kravitz passed away around 1980, leaving Gladys a widow.  I think it's pozz'ble, just pozz'ble, that Mrs. Kravitz may have taken stock of her life after the death of her husband and thought she should move closer to her only close relative - her niece Nancy Kravitz in Los Angeles.  So that's what must have happened - Gladys Kravitz moved to the West Coast and down to the La Jolla area.  I think she may have been a neighbor living not too far away from Grace Hanson.

And even in her advancing years, her nosy behavior remained unabated.  I think Gladys Kravitz was such a snoop into the private lives of the Hansons (especially after Robert had his "episode".)  And Grace must have complained about it all the time to Frankie.

So when Lucy Chambers showed up, showing just as inquisitive an attitude as Gladys Kravitz, then Frankie naturally assumed it was the former Connecticut native.

So our decision: the reference to Gladys Kravitz was about the actual woman, but she was also fictionalized in the Toobworld version of 'Bewitched'.

One final note - Sandra Gould, the second woman to have played Gladys Kravitz, died in 1999 at the age of 82.  Had she been alive still, she would be reaching the century mark.  This is not out of the realm of possibility for Gladys, if not for Sandra.  (My great-uncle just turned 100 last week.)

So I have no problem thinking that Gladys Kravitz could still be alive, so that Frankie's mention of her was a contemporary one.  And who knows?  Maybe when Samantha transformed her so that her physical appearance was changed, it also caused her basic cellular structure was "refreshed", literally giving her a new lease on life.

As the Claviger for the Toobworld Dynamic, I'm going to stick with that theory.

BCnU!

(My thanks to "Cousin" Steve Goldmintz for bringing the reference to my attention.  I am way behind on my Netflix queue!)

THURSDAY THEORY OF RELATEEVEETY - THE WHITFIELDS

Dan Whitfield was an author living in the Minneapolis area in the early 1970s.  He wrote a book entitled "Television Journalism" and traveled across the country lecturing on the subject.  

In 1971, Mary Richards, the associate producer of the WJM news program in Minneapolis (Channel 12), took Whitfield's class along with her friend Rhoda Morgenstern.....

'The Mary Tyler Moore Show'

    - "Room 223" (1971)
Mary enrolls in a nighttime TV-journalism class, hoping to sharpen her professional skills. Rhoda also enrolls, hoping to improve her social life. Ultimately, however, it is Mary and not Rhoda who ends up dating the class' handsome lecturer. Michael Tolan makes his first series appearance as Dan Whitfield, who'd turn out to be one of Mary Richards' most persistent suitors.

(Synopsis by Hal Erickson)

Frustrated with her lack of progress at WJM, Mary decides to sharpen her skills with a class in television journalism. Naturally, she catches the teacher's eye.

After she is the cause of a writing gaffe at the newsroom, Mary, on Phyllis' advice, decides to take an introductory television journalism course. Rhoda decides to join Mary in the class. Mary ends up being the only student there who is taking the class to enhance her already established television journalism career. When Dan Whitfield, the teacher, asks Mary to stay after class, she believes he is going to chastise her for dominating the class discussion with her rather benign anecdotes of life at WJM. Instead, he, attracted to her, asks her out, which she accepts. He even accepts her offer to have a slightly reluctant Lou give a talk to the class. Will Mary and Dan's new dating status affect the way he treats her in class? And will Mary wish his professional treatment of her was different?

(IMDb)

But the romance between Mary and Dan didn't last very long and after a few months they broke up.  However, a year later.....

'The Mary Tyler Moore Show'

    - The Courtship of Mary's Father's Daughter (1972)
Mary runs into her former boyfriend Dan Whitfield in an elevator by chance. Subsequently, Dan realizes he still has feelings for Mary, breaks off his engagement, and begins dating her again.

Mary runs into her old journalism teacher and one time boyfriend, Dan Whitfield. She is happy to see him in a somewhat romantic way until she learns that he is engaged, with his fiancée, Judy Conrad, being the woman standing right behind her. Regardless, Dan invites Mary and Rhoda to their engagement party. Mary isn't sure why she ends up going, but upon her and Rhoda's arrival, it is obvious that Judy doesn't want her there and that Judy and Dan have been fighting about her. Mary ends up being the reason for Judy and Dan breaking up. In turn, Dan and Mary start dating again. Everything between them is moving very quickly, with Mary believing that Dan is soon going to ask her to marry him. Although she thinks she loves Dan and loves him more than any man she has ever known, she gets the feeling that he's more in love with the idea of being in love than he is with her. If that is indeed the case, Mary and Dan have to figure out if there is any future for them at all. 
(IMDb)

Just a side note of conjecture at this point:

Dan Whitfield may have been engaged, but had he married Judy Conrad it would not have been his first marriage.  I believe he had been previously married, perhaps once he got out of college in the late 1940s.  Whenever the marriage began, it lasted until around 1967.  Mr. and Mrs. Dan Whitfield had a son, named after Dan, whose full name was Dean; "Dan" was just a nickname.  

"Mary Tyler Moore"
    - One Boyfriend Too Many (1975)
Mary is pursued by two charming bachelors, each of whom wants her constant companionship.
Mary's old flame Dan Whitfield, who once proposed to her, returns to Minneapolis and she's forced to choose between him and her current boyfriend.
(TV.com)

Mary has to choose between her current boyfriend and an old flame that returns to town.

Mary and Joe's relationship is at a stage of public declaration of love on both sides. But their relationship hits a potential bump when Mary's old boyfriend, journalist Dan Whitfield, returns permanently to Minneapolis, he who wants to rekindle their relationship. The only reason they broke up was because Dan moved to New York for work which crushed Mary at the time. Despite Mary's feelings for Joe, she isn't sure if she's over Dan and feels like she needs to explore if her romantic feelings for Dan are stronger than they are for Joe. She tries to be as up front to both Joe and Dan about the other, at which she isn't very good. Joe, in particular, doesn't take the news well. Mary's friends all have their own view if Mary should pick Joe or Dan, especially Ted who has bonded with Joe. An impulsive and somewhat reckless move by Joe in the matter makes Mary come to some conclusions about the situation.

(IMDb)

Joe Warner won out in the end because of that reckless act.  And Dan Whitfield left Mary's life forever.

Getting back to the theory of relateeveety, he may have focused more on re-establishing his relationship with his son Dean, who was born in 1964.

After his parents divorced around 1967, Dean and his mother moved back to her home state of Connecticut.  There Dean grew up, attended Yale, and became immersed in state politics.  His was a meteoric rise and he was his party's golden boy, eventually becoming the governor of the Nutmeg State.

But Dean Whitfield wasn't the knight in shining armor which his publicity depicted.  He cheated on his wife; he made shady deals which primarily enriched him; he betrayed his allies to get ahead.  Most of this went unnoticed by his constituents, but eventually he paid the price.

"A popular US governor died.
Maybe he wasn't popular with everyone."
Dr. Jason Bull

"Bull"

'BULL'

"FREE FALL"

When a state governor and the co-owner of a sky-diving company die during a jump, Bull helps the co-owner's brother and daughter fight a lawsuit filed by the governor's widow.

"Governor Whitfield would take us on these thrill seeking adventures to show off.
I guess the last one didn't turn out too good for him."
Avery
'Bull'

Governor Whitfield at least outlived his father, if only by a few years - Dan Whitfield passed away in 2011.  

Like I said, this has only been conjecture, a theory of relateeveety.  But I feel comfortable with it.  And while this is the type of thing that keeps me off the streets, I at least want to make sure what I blog doesn't keep me awake at night.....

BCnU!

WEDNESDAY WISH-CRAFT - MR. FANTASTIC IN THE MAIN TOOBWORLD

Bill Potts: 

“You can’t reach the controls from the seats.
What’s the point in that? 

Or do you have stretchy arms like Mr. Fantastic?”

'DOCTOR WHO'

There are a lot of permutations on the Borderlands which blend the fictional universes of Television and Comic Books.  (Some of these Borderland dimensions also pull in the movies as well.)  Here are a few examples:

COMIX TOOBWORLD-MARVEL1
The Marvel Universe Movies:
Iron Man
Iron Man 2
Iron Man 3
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Captain America: Civil War
Thor
Thor: The Dark World
Thor: Ragnarok
Doctor Strange
Spider-Man: Home-coming
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy II
Daredevil
Jessica Jones
Luke Cage
Iron Fist
The Defenders

COMIX TOOBWORLD-MARVEL2
Hulk
Spider-Man
Spider-Man 2
Spider-Man 3

Fantastic Four (1994)

COMIX TOOBWORLD-MARVEL3
The Incredible Hulk
The Amazing Spider-Man
The Amazing Spider-Man 2

Fantastic Four (2005)

Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer

COMIX TOOBWORLD-MARVEL4
Captain America (1990)

Fantastic Four (2015)

COMIX TOOBWORLD-DC1
Arrow
The Flash
Legends of Tomorrow

COMIX TOOBWORLD-DC2
Supergirl

COMIX TOOBWORLD-DC3
The Adventures of Lois & Clark

COMIX TOOBWORLD-DC4
Smallville

COMIX TOOBWORLD-DC5
Superboy

But superheroes are not confined to just the various Comix Toobworlds.  Some shows featured well-known superheroes who were too dumbed down to go anywhere else but:

DOOFUS TOOBWORLD 
Powerless
Legends Of The Super-Heroes: The Challenge
Legends Of The Super-Heroes: The Roast

Got Milk commercial with the Avengers

Earth Prime-Time does not go super-hero free and several high-ranking characters from both DC and Marvel have appeared in their own shows (or as guest stars in other shows) over the decades.

EARTH PRIME-TIME
The Adventures of Superman
Batman
Captain Nice
Mr. Terrific
Wonder Woman
The Incredible Hulk
The Incredible Hulk Returns (with Thor)
The Trial of the Incredible Hulk (with Daredevil)
Spider-Man
Captain America
Captain America II: Death Too Soon
The Manimal
Nightman
The Flash

The Tick
Witchblade
M.A.N.T.I.S.
Blade

Swamp Thing

(I have to admit, I'd prefer some of those shows to be shipped out to Doofus Toofworld - 'Mr. Terrific', 'The Tick', and 'Captain Nice'.  But if the main Toobworld can support 'Get Smart' as well as 'Danger Man', it can survive those caped clowns.)

The Daredevil and Thor didn't have their own shows, but they were featured in TV movies which brought back the Hulk of the main Toobworld.  And I think the reference by Bill Potts to Mr. Fantastic is the next step once removed - Reed Richards doesn't actually show up in Earth Prime-Time, but the way the reference is phrased suggests that he does exist in the main Toobworld.  (But as we don't have a visual yet for a Mr. Fantastic in Earth Prime-Time, I chose the one I prefer from the three options in the Borderlands.)

MR. FANTASTIC
(From Comix Toobworld Marvel-3)

This doesn't mean we have to accept that all of the Fantastic Four exist in that world, just ol' Stretchy.  But the door is always open to them being accepted into the citizenry at some point.  (But so far I only have found references to the movies in 'The O.C', 'I exafanisi', 'Entourage' and a few other Toobworld mainstays.)

BCnU!

TV ON TV SUPER SIX LIST - FICTIONAL VERSIONS OF REAL TV SHOWS

We have seen that the TV shows in our world, Earth Prime in the "Trueniverse", have their counterparts in Earth Prime-Time, the main Toobworld.  Toobworld Central had to accept that in Toobworld, just about everybody is going to have a TV show made about them - it was the only reasonable way to deal with what would have been an epidemic of Zonks otherwise.

But that's not to say that every "televersion" of our TV shows has to be exactly the same as the original.  We have had mentions of the alterations on occasion.

1) 'DOWNTON ABBEY' - Actor Freddie Thornhill ('Vicious') played a butler in an episode of that historic recreation TV series.

2) 'DOCTOR WHO' - Actors Andy Millman ('Extras') and Freddie Thornhill again played villains in episodes of this series which serves as a cover story for the Doctor's "real" activities - the TV version of swamp gas and weather balloons.

3) 'MURPHY BROWN' - Cosmo Kramer ('Seinfeld') got to do a cameo as one of the many secretaries Murphy had to wade through at her 'F.Y.I.' office.

4) 'ALL MY CHILDREN' - Victoria Chase had a running feud with AMC star Susan Lucci which culminated on the set of the soap opera.

5) 'PIERS MORGAN LIVE' - Several fictional characters have appeared on the short-lived CNN replacement for 'Larry King LIve': Peter Bash and Jared Franklin ('Franklin & Bash') and those '2 Broke Girls', Caroline Channing and Max Black.
http://toobworld.blogspot.com/2014/03/tuesday-news-day-short-piers.html

6) GAME SHOWS - Several TV characters have appeared on the fictional versions of real game shows - Cliff Clavin ('Cheers') and Thelma Harper ('Mama's Family') competed (but not against each other) on 'Jeopardy!'; Barney Stinson ('How I Met Your Mother'), Sammo Chung ('Martial Law') and Sylvester Dodd ('Scorpion') came on down for the chance to take part in the Showcase Showdown on 'The Price Is Right', Douglas Brackman, Jr. ('L.A. Law' spun for "big money big money" on 'The Wheel of Fortune' and former model Nina Van Horne ('Just Shoot Me') was the answer to one of the puzzles on the show.  (An excerpt from this was show on an episode of A&E's 'Biography', so that's another fictional entry for a real show.)

I really wanted to include 'THE TWILIGHT ZONE', but most references are how the experiences of certain characters are similar to the show.  Alex Tabor ('Saved By The Bell: The College Years') claimed she saw an episode which had "goat people" in it.  But she was probably lying just to scare the others, the bitch. No matter.  At least I got a Super Six List without it.

So that brings me to the topic of today - 'The Joey Bishop Show.'

This sitcom began with Joey Barnes working for a talent management company, with a good chunk of the storylines being about his home life with his interfering family.  But as the first season wound down, Joey was being groomed to host his own talk show and his family life changed for the better in the second season once he was in New York City where he married the lovely gal from Texas, Elle.

Now we're not talking about Joey Barnes' talk show - despite having League of Themselves members like Roberta Sherwood, Jack Jones, and TVXOHOF members Andy Williams, Milton Berle, Jack Carter, and Buddy Hackett on as his guests, it was still a fictional show.  

But for the series fourth season, it switched networks and ended up on CBS.  With this reboot to the situation, Joey Barnes was fired from the network which broadcast his talk show*, and was finally brought into the fold at the Eye network.  There he was going to be given his own show to air on Sunday nights at 9:30 pm.  This brought dismay to him once his writer, Larry Corbett, pointed out that it meant that they would be up against 'Bonanza' in the ratings.  

In the real world?  Not too far off - 'The Joey Bishop Show' sitcom found its new home there, so it was a distorted mirror version of Toobworld.

Joey Barnes probably went from his late night talk show to a sitcom with that half hour slot in prime-time.  And that's not the draw here - we are talking about alterations to real TV shows as seen in Toobworld.

So how much more of an alteration can there be than total O'Bliteration?

Lots of TV shows are somewhat Zonked by references in other TV shows.  But there are only mentions listed in the IMDb under the heading for 'The Joey Bishop Show':

Saturday Night Live: 
Richard Benjamin, Paula Prentiss/The Grateful Dead (1980)  
Title mentioned by the Joey Bishop fans

The Simpsons: 
Krusty Gets Kancelled (1993) 
Krusty comments about his competitors on TV: "I've buried them all. Hobos, sea captains, Joey Bishop."

Primetime Glick: 
Regis Philbin/Russell Crowe (2001)  
This show is discussed during the Regis Philbin interview.

Saturday Night Live: 
Sigourney Weaver/The Ting Tings (2010) 
Larry King (Fred Armisen) refers to "The Joey Bishop Show" as "the greatest talk show of all time."

Here's that full reference:

Larry King: Good evening, I'm Larry King! Are these glasses getting bigger, or is my face SHRINKING?! You decide!! Tonight: The late night wars are heating up once again, with new rumors flying every day! Conan is out, Jay is in, and no one is talking about the greatest talk show of all time -- Mr. Joey Bishop!

However, all of these are references not to the real world sitcom but to Bishop's late night talk show which ran/struggled on ABC from 1967 to 1969.  The aforementioned Regis Philbin was Joey's version of Ed McMahon.  

So the sitcom was never such a pop culture icon to merit mention in other shows.  The best we can do is within the sitcom itself with the guest appearances on the talk show within a talk show by celebrities who played themselves.  And many of them have since gone on to become members of the Television Crossover Hall of Fame - Buddy Hackett, Andy Williams, Milton Berle.....  I'm thinking that one day Joey Barnes should be inducted into the Hall himself one day as a special Birthday Honors salute for the same reason as Brady Hawkes back in the first year of the TVXOHOF - for aiding in the showcase of other TV shows, a crossover enabler.

But for the televerison of the actual Joey Bishop as a sitcom star?  Nope.  He's better known within Toobworld as a talk show host and a member of the Rat Pack.  The show might as well have never existed.

And that is the greatest alteration to a real TV show within the main Toobworld.

Son of a gun....

BCnU!

O'BSERVATIONS:
* It couldn't have been the "Peacock network", NBC, which aired 'The Joey Barnes Show', because it was long established that Johnny Carson and the 'Tonight' show owned the 11:30 PM to 1 AM timeslot.  Joey was on from 11 to midnight.  I don't see why we can't assume he was on one of the fictional TV networks which could have been around at the time.  (Or at least one of the later TV networks which established its past history.)

TVXOHOF, 05/2017 - ELLY MAY, QUEEN OF THE MAY

Well, doggies!

Our May Queen this year is Queen Elly May......

From Wikipedia:

Elly May (Donna Douglas in all 274 episodes), the only child of Jed and Rose Ellen Clampett, is a mountain beauty with the body of a pinup girl and the soul of a tomboy. She can throw a fastball as well as "rassle" most men to a fall, and she can be as tender with her friends, animals, and family as she is tough with anyone she rassles. She said once that animals could be better companions than people, but as she grew older, she saw that, "fellas kin be more fun than critters." Elly is squired about by eager young Hollywood actors with stage names such as "Dash Riprock" and "Bolt Upright". Other boyfriends for Elly include Sonny Drysdale, Beau Short, accountant Fred Penrod, beatnik Sheldon Epps, and Mark Templeton, a Navy frogman.

Elly's most notable weakness, often mentioned when she is being "courted", is her total lack of kitchen skills. Family members cringe when, for plot reasons, Elly takes over the kitchen. Rock-like donuts and cookies, for example, are a plot function in an episode featuring Wally Cox as bird-watching Professor Biddle. On one of the family's visits back to the hills, a miller bought a cake baked by Elly May at a fair because he needed a new grindstone for his flour mill.

Elly is briefly considered for film stardom at the movie studio owned by Jed. In one episode, hearing Rock Hudson and Cary Grant are both single, Granny asks that Elly be introduced to them.

During the final season, Elly May takes a job as a secretary at the Commerce Bank after Jed and Granny persuade her that it would be a good way to "meet a husband".

In addition to the family dog, Duke (an old Bloodhound), a number of animals lived on the Clampett estate thanks to animal-lover Elly. These animals were collectively known as her "critters". The most prominent pets were chimpanzees, but other animals (from typical dogs and cats to less-traditional house pets, such as deer, opossums, bobcats, bears, goats, raccoons, and kangaroos) were also occasionally featured.

In the 1981 TV movie of The Beverly Hillbillies, Elly May is head of a zoo.

Although Douglas was an active actress in the 1960s, she was still relatively unknown when selected from among 500 young actresses to work alongside veteran actor and dancer Buddy Ebsen on 'The Beverly Hillbillies'. This series ran for nine consecutive seasons, beginning in 1962 and ending in 1971. Continually typecast as a result of her 'Hillbillies' role, Douglas decided to focus on her career as a gospel singer.

With the 1973 death of 'Hillbillies' co-star Irene Ryan, and Max Baer Jr.'s refusal to participate, Douglas joined Nancy Kulp and Buddy Ebsen in 1981 as the only original cast members to appear in the reunion movie, "Return of the Beverly Hillbillies". Douglas was a guest star on a number of other television programs and the subject of paper dolls, dolls, coloring books, and various toys during the height of the show's popularity. In a 2003 interview with "Confessions of a Pop Culture Addict", she summed up her views on the role: "Elly May was like a slice out of my life. She is a wonderful little door opener for me because people love her, and they love the Hillbillies. Even to this day it's shown every day somewhere. But, as with any abilities, she may open a door for you, but you have to have substance or integrity to advance you through that door."

In 1993, Douglas, Ebsen, and Baer reunited for a final time in a CBS-TV television special, "The Legend of The Beverly Hillbillies".

So there are only three main titles for Elly May - a TV series, a TV movie, and a TV documentary.  But remember: there were 273 episodes of that TV series and during it she also met with characters from 'Petticoat Junction' and 'Green Acres'.  So her qualifications are stronger than many who are already in the Hall.

'The Beverly Hillbillies' 
(1962 - 1971)
273 episodes

"The Return of the Beverly Hillbillies" 
(1981 TV Movie) 

"The Legend of the Beverly Hillbillies" 
(1993 TV Special documentary)

Ms. Douglas passed away two years ago January and perhaps Elly May should have been inducted on the spot.  I apologize.  But we are rectifying the situation in this year of tributes and she will be memorialized there "forever".

Welcome to the Television Crossover Hall Of Fame, Elly May.  Take your shoes off; set a spell.....

VIDEO WEEKEND - "COURT MARTIAL (FOUR EPISODES)

From Wikipedia:

'Court Martial' is an ITC Entertainment and Roncom Productions co-production crime drama TV series that premiered in 1966. Set during World War II, the series details the investigations of a Judge Advocate General's office.

The series ran for one 26-episode season, with each episode being 60 minutes. The series was shown on ABC in the United States and won the 1966 British Society of Film and Television (later known as BAFTA) TV award for Best Dramatic Series.

The series had its genesis in a two-part episode of NBC's Kraft Suspense Theatre (also starring Peter Graves and Bradford Dillman), "The Case Against Paul Ryker" [10–17 October 1963], which was later re-edited into a 1968 theatrical feature, "Sergeant Ryker".

Here are four episodes, mostly chosen at random, but one episode does have Dennis Hopper and another has Sir Michael Hordern.......

TVXOHOF MEMORIAL TRIBUTE - PHINEAS TAYLOR BARNUM

I hope nobody is trying to reach me today.  I'm in Hartford, seeing one of the very last performances of the Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus.

From Wikipedia:

Phineas Taylor "P. T." Barnum (July 5, 1810 – April 7, 1891) was an American politician, showman, and businessman remembered for promoting celebrated hoaxes and for founding the Barnum & Bailey Circus. Although Barnum was also an author, publisher, philanthropist, and for some time a politician, he said of himself, "I am a showman by profession...and all the gilding shall make nothing else of me", and his personal aim was "to put money in his own coffers".  Barnum is widely, but erroneously, credited with coining the phrase "There's a sucker born every minute".

Born in Bethel, Connecticut, Barnum became a small-business owner in his early twenties, and founded a weekly newspaper, before moving to New York City in 1834. He embarked on an entertainment career, first with a variety troupe called "Barnum's Grand Scientific and Musical Theater", and soon after by purchasing Scudder's American Museum, which he renamed after himself. Barnum used the museum as a platform to promote hoaxes and human curiosities such as the Feejee mermaid and General Tom Thumb. In 1850 he promoted the American tour of singer Jenny Lind, paying her an unprecedented $1,000 a night for 150 nights. After economic reversals due to bad investments in the 1850s, and years of litigation and public humiliation, he used a lecture tour, mostly as a temperance speaker, to emerge from debt. His museum added America's first aquarium and expanded the wax-figure department. While in New York, he converted to Universalism and was a member of the Church of the Divine Paternity, now the Fourth Universalist Society in the City of New York.

Barnum served two terms in the Connecticut legislature in 1865 as a Republican for Fairfield. With the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution over slavery and African-American suffrage, Barnum spoke before the legislature and said, "A human soul, ‘that God has created and Christ died for,’ is not to be trifled with. It may tenant the body of a Chinaman, a Turk, an Arab or a Hottentot – it is still an immortal spirit". Elected in 1875 as Mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut, he worked to improve the water supply, bring gas lighting to streets, and enforce liquor and prostitution laws. Barnum was instrumental in starting Bridgeport Hospital, founded in 1878, and was its first president.

The circus business was the source of much of his enduring fame. He established "P. T. Barnum's Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan & Hippodrome", a traveling circus, menagerie and museum of "freaks", which adopted many names over the years. Barnum died in his sleep at home in 1891, and was buried in Mountain Grove Cemetery, Bridgeport, which he designed himself.

I wrote about P.T. Barnum back in January when the news broke that the Circus was going to close.

When I was a little kid, I dreamed of working for the circus, any circus.  I had a big picture book that gave so much background information on becoming a clown and the various types.  I grew up, but I never grew out of that dream.  Even today, TV show episodes which use the circus as the backdrop are like catnip to me, in much the same way as mysteries set on trains are.

P.T. Barnum was a Multiversal and in the greater TV Universe he is multi-dimensional.  Because this great American institution is closing down, I want to honor the man who started it all by inducting Mr. Barnum into the Television Crossover Hall of Fame.

Of all his appearances in the many TV dimensions, his portrayal by Pat O'Brien (we're all related) is the only one who interacted with an established TV character.  As such, he will be the featured televersion of Barnum for the Hall.

This way to the egress, Mr. Barnum!

TOOBWORLD BEHIND THE SCENES

From the Hollywood Reporter:

Albert Freedman, a producer on the NBC program Twenty-One who became a central figure in the quiz show scandals that erupted in the late 1950s, has died. He was 95.

Freedman died April 11 in Marin County, Calif., his family announced.

In 1956, Freedman convinced Charles Van Doren, who was teaching at Columbia University, to come on as a contestant on 'Twenty-One'. The reigning champion, Herb Stempel, was winning week after week, but the ratings were suffering and Geritol, the sponsor, wanted him gone.

"I've thought about it, Charlie, and I've decided you should be the person to beat Stempel. And I’ll help you do it," Van Doran, writing in a first-person account that was published in The New Yorker in 2008, said Freedman told him.

"I swear to you, no one will ever know. It will be just between you and me. Jack Barry [the show's host] won't know and [producer] Dan Enright won't, either. Stempel won't know — I've got a way to handle that. The sponsors won't know — anyway, they'll be so happy they won't give a damn. And the audience will never know, because I won't tell them, and you won't, either."

In 1994,Robert Redford directed a movie about this quiz show scandal, which featured Ralph Fiennes as Van Doran, Paul Scofield as his father, John Turturro as Aaron Stempel, and Hank Azaria as Freedman.

Hank Azaria as Albert Freedman

with

David Paymer as Dan Enright

There is an alternate dimension of Toobworld in which we see what went on behind the scenes of various TV shows.  (As of yet I don't have a pithy name for that world, but if you think of one, send it along!)

These docu-dramas can't be allowed into the main Toobworld as they are massive Zonks.

And every so often a theatrical film on a similar subject will be pulled out of the Cineverse to be absorbed into that Toobworld dimension.  However, it has to be a movie about real TV shows to qualify.  And the same would be true for TV shows about the TV business.  This would include "Tootsie", "Soapdish", "My Favorite Year", and "Champagne For Caesar," and TV shows like "On The Air", "Goodnight Beantown", "All Is Forgiven", "Lateline", "The Larry Sanders Show", "The Mary Tyler Moore Show", and "The Dick Van Dyke Show" would not be found there either.  But they'll always have a home in the main Toobworld.

Here are some of the movies that would be included in that TV dimension, both theatrical and made for TV:

• QUIZ SHOW
• THE ROAD TO CORONATION STREET
• SURVIVING GILLIGAN'S ISLAND: THE INCREDIBLY TRUE STORY OF THE LONGEST THREE HOUR TOUR IN HISTORY
• DYNASTY: THE MAKING OF A GUILTY PLEASURE
• BEHIND THE CAMERA: THE UNAUTHORIZED STORY OF 'THREE'S COMPANY'
  BEHIND THE CAMERA: THE UNAUTHORIZED STORY OF 'CHARLIE'S ANGELS'
• THE CURSE OF STEPTOE
• FRANKIE HOWERD: RATHER YOU THAN ME
• LUCY & DESI: BEFORE THE LAUGHTER
• BEHIND THE CAMERA: THE UNAUTHORIZED STORY OF 'MORK & MINDY'
• THE LATE SHIFT
• ERIC & ERNIE
• GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK
• AN ADVENTURE IN TIME AND SPACE
• AMERICAN DREAMS

BCnU,,,,,

LEAGUE OF THEMSELVES: RODNEY ALCALA, MAN WITH A CAMERA

"He was a handsome man, charming and seductive.  That's how Rodney Alcala approached his victims: with a smile and his camera. Telling them how beautiful they were. Some of his subjects told the police how charismatic Rodney was; how convincing that he was truly interested he was in them. In reality, he was only interested in stealing their lives - The mark of a master manipulator. A man who killed with kindness."

- LeMaster Cane

From Wikipedia:

In 1978, despite his status as a convicted rapist and registered sex offender, Rodney Alcala was accepted as a contestant on 'The Dating Game'. By then he had already killed at least two women in California and two others in New York.  Host Jim Lange introduced him as a "successful photographer who got his start when his father found him in the darkroom at the age of 13, fully developed. Between takes you might find him skydiving or motorcycling."

Actor Jed Mills, who competed against Alcala as "Bachelor #2", later described him as a "very strange guy" with "bizarre opinions". Alcala won the contest, and a date with "bachelorette" Cheryl Bradshaw, who subsequently refused to go out with him, according to published reports, because she found him "creepy".  Criminal profiler Pat Brown, noting that Alcala killed Robin Samsoe and at least two other women after his Dating Game appearance, speculated that Bradshaw's rejection might have been an exacerbating factor. "One wonders what that did in his mind", Brown said. "That is something he would not take too well. [Serial killers] don't understand the rejection. They think that something is wrong with that girl: 'She played me. She played hard to get.'"

Rodney Alcala is a member of the League of Themselves as well as probably having his own televersion implied by being the topic for LeMaster Cane's talk at the Real Murders Club meeting.  That's something that usually only happens to politicians and sports figures.

People from the real world sometimes have fictional family members in Toobworld.  So it could be that the televersion of Rodney Alcala might be related to Thomas Jefferson Alcala, who was once the mayor of a large city in the American Southwest.  He could have been the uncle who felt as though he failed his nephew, that his life of depraved crime was his fault.  And as unseen by the Trueniverse audience, it could have been that it was the scandal of Rodney's actions which caused Mayor Alcala to resign from office and turn away from any future political ambitions.

SHOWS CITED:

• "Real Murders: An Aurora Teagarden Mystery"
• 'The Dating Game'
• 'The Man And The City'

BCnU!