A FEW QUICK HITS

With Topher Grace leaving and Ashton Kutcher going part-time on 'That '70s Show' next fall, co-star Wilmer Valderrama, who plays Fez, will be getting a higher profile next season. Does this mean Valderrama might be getting a spin-off as a result?

"There's been talk," he says. So would he be interested? Valderrama says maybe -- if the stars align. He certainly isn't dismissing the notion.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ABC has ordered a pilot of an updated Night Stalker series from former The X-Files executive producer Frank Spotnitz, Variety reported. The show will rework the classic 1970s ABC show Kolchak: The Night Stalker, which detailed a hard-boiled journalist's investigations into freakish occurrences, the trade paper reported.

Ironically, The X-Files creator Chris Carter has said he was inspired in part by the original Night Stalker series, which starred Darren McGavin.

This new series would have to be relegated to the alternate TV dimension of Earth Prime-Time Delayed, as the one true Kolchak already made his mark in Toobworld back in the 1970s.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
League of Themselves alert:
Scott Reeves (ex-Ryan, 'The Young and the Restless') will play himself when his hit country band Blue County appears on 'As the World Turns' Feb. 14 in scenes with Craig and Jennifer. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
By JOHN PAIN, AP Business Writer
MIAMI - When Burger King decided to try a new promotion to cash in on the reality TV craze, the No. 2 fast-food chain turned to the master of the pitch — Donald Trump.

Burger King put a twist on product placement into the premiere of the third season of Donald Trump's NBC hit "The Apprentice." The two teams in the latest incarnation of the cutthroat reality TV show each had to help design a new Burger King product along with the chain's head chef, Calvin Harris. They then had to sell it while running two busy stores in midtown Manhattan during lunchtime. The team with the most sales won.

The winning team, Networth, hawked a Western Angus steak burger, loaded with onion rings, cheese, barbecue sauce, lettuce and tomatoes That burger was being debuted in 7,800 restaurants nationwide Friday.

"It will feel like a product has come from the boardroom into the restaurant in 24 hours," Klein said, even though the episode was taped months ago. Burger King is planning to run a 30-second commercial featuring Trump on NBC until the end of January, Klein said. The burger should be in stores until Feb. 4.

"It's a short, quick, targeted campaign ... It's driven more by the association with The Apprentice and Trump than it is with this particular burger."

Toobworld addendum:
It also ratchets up Trump's numbers when it comes to the TV Crossover Hall of Fame. He's appeared as himself on 'The Drew Carey Show', 'Suddenly, Susan', and 'The Job', plus commercials for Visa, Pizza Hut, and - quel horrors! - MacDonald's!

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

MECHANICAL CONNECTION

I was watching an old Western on the GoodLife Network and I decided to look up the actor John Dennis in the IMDb.com as he looked very familiar.

Here were three entries that jumped out at me:

"Taxi" playing "Maintenance Man" in episode: "The Reluctant Fighter" (episode # 2.5) 9 October 1979

"Incredible Hulk, The" playing "Mechanic" in episode: "The Hulk Breaks Las Vegas" (episode # 1.6) 21 April 1978

"Kolchak: The Night Stalker" playing "Second Maintenance Engineer" in episode: "The Devil's Platform" (episode # 1.7) 15 November 1974

Here's how I think it played out:

The Maintenance Man/Mechanic played by John Dennis decided that cold and windy Chicago was no longer the life he was meant for. So in 1975 he moved to Las Vegas. (He probably heard Carl Kolchak mention it.)

But a liking for the dice proved to be his undoing and so a year later, he decided to move again. This time he headed East, to NYC, to begin again.

What he probably noticed was that he'd still be close to Atlantic City should the fever ever come upon him again.......

(My only fear is that his mechanic in the 'Kolchak' episode might have been killed by the monster of the week! And dat would be da name of dat tune!)

John Dennis also helps give credence to the idea that certain characters are not only reincarnated, but that they come back to do exactly the same thing they did in the previous life:

"Man from Atlantis, The" playing "Bartender" in episode: "Giant" (episode # 1.8) 25 October 1977

"Barbary Coast" playing "Bartender" in episode: "Irish Luck" (episode # 1.6) 13 October 1975

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

ATTENTION, JUNIOR TOOBWORLDERS!

While searching the web in hopes of finding a justification as to why I like the new sitcom 'Committed so much, I came across this intriguing item in one of the show's bulletin boards:

by - misfitdoll67 4 days ago (Sat Jan 8 2005 11:04:58 )
Whenever they show an establishing shot of the apartment building where Marni lives I get deja vu. I know it's from another sitcom. Anybody recognize it? "Mad About You", "Seinfeld", "Friends"??

by - dsera-1 1 day ago (Mon Jan 10 2005 20:54:12 )
I think it's Seinfeld. I immediately thought that when I saw it.
Cristina
~Get LOST~ http://www.lost-tv.com/

Could it be? Is it possible that I might make the claim that 'Committed' is taking place in the same building in which the TV Jerry Seinfeld lives?

If you've been watching the show, - and better yet, have been taping it so that you could go back and check out those establishing shots, - let me know what you think!

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

THE GREAT CARSONI

"And so it has come to this. I am one of the lucky people in the world. I found something that I always wanted to do and I have enjoyed every single minute of it.'"
- Johnny Carson
'The Tonight Show'

Who else could lay claim to the power of their impact that they not only caused a toilet paper shortage in America, but that they were also a plot point in an episode of 'Columbo'?*

The butler played by Maurice Evans in the episode "Forgotten Lady" told the Lieutenant that he and his wife had been watching Carson on the 'Tonight Show' until 1 am at which time he had gone to check on the master of the house.

It not only provided Columbo with a time frame for the death, but it also serves as an historical record for the audience. It wasn't until 1980 (approx.) that the 'Tonight' show was cut back to just one hour.

For the thirty years he hosted 'The Tonight Show' alone, Johnny deserves accolades and honors as a true TV Giant. But there were all those other shows in which he honed his craft before getting that gig - 'Carson's Cellar', 'The Johnny Carson Show', 'Do You Trust Your Wife?'/'Who Do You Trust?'.....

Carson also appeared as himself, on other variety programs, game shows, retrospective specials, or even the many movies that made use of 'Tonight' archival footage.

Here are the main reasons Johnny is going to be eventually inducted into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame in a combination of "Classic TV" and "The League of Themselves":

"The Simpsons" playing "Himself" (voice) in episode: "Krusty Gets Kancelled" (episode # 4.22) 13 May 1993
"Cheers" playing "Himself" in episode: "Heeeeeere's... Cliffy!" (episode # 10.24) 7 May 1992
"Newhart" playing "Himself" in episode: "Malling in Love Again" (episode # 7.22) 22 May 1989
"Night Court" playing "Himself" in episode: "Russkie Business" (episode # 5.18) 25 March 1988
"Mary Tyler Moore" playing "Himself" (voice) in episode: "Mary's Big Party" (episode # 7.22) 5 March 1977
"Here's Lucy" playing "Himself" in episode: "Lucy and Johnny Carson" (episode # 2.11) 1 December 1969

As the man for whom Carson once wrote jokes would say, "Good night and may God bless."

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

*If I also covered movies on a regular basis in this blog, of course I would have mentioned Jack Nicholson's blood-curdling version of the classic introduction: "Heeeeeeeeere's Johnny!"

LAMONT BENTLEY, R.I.P.

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Lamont Bentley, who was a regular in the 1990s sitcom "Moesha" and appeared frequently in television and movies, was killed in a car crash, his manager said yesterday.

Bentley, 31, played Hakeem Campbell, the longtime friend of pop singer Brandy's character, Moesha Mitchell, in the UPN sitcom. He also played the role of Hakeem in three episodes of the 'Moesha' spin-off 'The Parkers'. (The episodes were "Road Trip", "Scary Kim", and "There's A Shag".)

And in the 'Clueless' crossover episode ("Prom Misses, Prom Misses"), he also made the leap as Hakeem.

Somewhere down the road, Hakeem Campbell will be inducted into the TV Crossover Hall Of Fame.

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

BISHOP OF TOOBWORLD

On a recent episode of 'Alias' (in fact, the one which had a crossover with 'Lost'), the villain was known by the name of "Martin Bishop".

For all I know, he was using an alias as well. And if so, it helps illustrate that there is a difference between the movie and TV universes.

Certain movies are connected to the TV Universe, - spin-off franchises and maybe MAYBE a few remakes, - but for the most part, the so-called "Cineverse" is a fragmented series of alternate dimensions that would be impossible to gel into a cohesive whole.

More than likely, the Martin Bishop of 'Alias' took his nom de espionage from either one movie which was inspired by another, or from them both:

In "Sneakers", Robert Redford played Martin Bishop. But that's just an alias he had gone by for the last 20 years, since running from the authorities. He was wanted for hacking into things he wasn't supposed to, causing quite a bit of mischief in the name of his bleeding-heart causes.

He and his team of security experts regularly broke into high-security establishments to check for security holes, so that these places can keep bad guys with the same means out.

In "Three Days Of The Condor" (1975) which also starred Robert Redford, a CIA building was hit. Subsequently, a list of the casualties was displayed.... The final two names on the list being Martin and Bishop, which was Redford's alias in "Sneakers".

It could be that the Redford character in "Sneakers" saw his resemblance to the character played by Redford in "Three Days Of The Condor". Who knows? Doesn't matter to me; I work for Toobworld.

But the Martin Bishop of 'Alias' must have liked the connection when he saw both movies; he must have been a big fan of the spy genre in films to have noticed it.

Unfortunately - but only for him, - the name's mojo didn't translate to his own success in the field.

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

PASSAGES

Three actors passed away in the last two weeks that made their mark in Toobworld......

GENE BAYLOS
First, comic Gene Baylos died at the age of 98. He was known at the Friar's Club as the comic's comic, but was never able to translate that to major success or recognition from the public.

He appeared in a few movies and on several TV variety shows of the sixties, but he is remembered here for being one of the first people to whom I applied the "By Any Other Name" theory.

In 1961 and 1963, Baylos played "Backdoor" Benny Harper on 'Car 54, Where Are You?'. He was a bookie and an ex-con and never seemed to remain on the straight and narrow. On his last appearance on the sitcom, Toody and Muldoon tried to help Benny by setting him up with a candy store. But he soon lapsed into old habits and used the place as a front for illicit activities.

In 1965, Gene Baylos made an appearance on 'The Dick Van Dyke Show' as the hobo who found the script for the next week's episode of 'The Alan Brady Show' at Grand Central Terminal. But instead of returning it for a small reward, he decided to hold it for ransom in exchange for 2500 dollars.

The character had no name; he's just referred to as "The First Hobo" or as "The Bum".

When I was first poring over episode guides in search of such mundane trivialities, it occurred to me that there was nothing really preventing me from saying both the Bum and Benny the Bookie were the same character.

It's not hard to believe that in 1963, Benny Harper was sent back to prison for a year or so because of his criminal activities at the candy store. And after a short sentence, he might have been returned to the outside world where he soon fell on hard times and had to live on the street.

I made such a notation in my first Tubeworld notebook and didn't do anything else with it at the time. But I did go on to apply that same kind of thinking to other shows in which I wanted to make connections, most notably with characters played by Michael Dunn so that in actuality they ALL were Dr. Miguelito Loveless.

RUTH WARRICK
For those movie fans who are rabid in their love for the silver screen, "Citizen Kane" is the film which reduces them to the fervor of Trekkies. Ruth Warrick was the last surviving member of the main cast (she played Emily Norton, the President's niece and Kane's first wife) and she passed away Saturday at the age of 88.

But as Phoebe English Tyler Wallingford Matthews Wallingford on 'All My Children', Ruth Warrick gained her greatest acclaim and renown from TV fans. She was with the show from the very beginning in 1970 and was still relatively active with it. (Only two weeks ago, she taped a special appearance for the show's upcoming anniversary.)

She also crossed over and took the character to 'Loving' for a time.

Now, if it turned out that she had any scenes with characters from either 'One Life To Live' or 'General Hospital' who might have appeared on either of her two soap operas, then I'd say Phoebe Tyler Wallinford deserves an eventual place of honor in the Crossover Hall of Fame. But we'll see.

She also played Hannah Cord, the Mrs. Danvers-like housekeeper for Martin on 'Peyton Place'. She returned to the role in the 1985 TV movie reunion. Again, she falls short of the minimum requirements for entry into the Hall, but she does have a distinction of playing two different roles in two different sets of shows.

So who knows? Maybe one day she'll be inducted in the birthday honors.....

VIRGINIA MAYO
A classic beauty from Hollywood's Golden Age, Ms. Mayo passed away at the age of 84. She starred in one of my favorite Bob Hope flicks, "The Princess And The Pirate" - now THERE'S a movie that would make a fine B'way musical!

On the soap opera 'Santa Barbara', she played a character named "Peaches DeLight". Man, how can you resist a great name like that? For me, that's right up there with "Pinky Likewise" from an episode of 'Burke's Law'.

But she made her mark in the framework of Toobworld more for playing herself. She did so twice in fictional settings: once on 'The Naked Truth' and then a few years earlier in 'Remington Steele'.

Teaming with Lloyd Nolan and Dorothy Lamour, who were also playing themselves, Ms. Mayo hired Remington and Laura to find out who was threatening them with bizarre fan mail. And when Nora Wilde's ex-husband announced that he was getting remarried, Ms. Mayo somehow got involved because Nora was convinced she had seen the future bride's face before.....

Thanks to her membership in the League of Themselves, 'Remington Steele' thus has a firm connection to the TV Universe. ('The Naked Truth' had plenty of connections to lock them both in.)

On a technicality, she also appeared as herself on the forerunner of 'The Ed Sullivan Show' - 'The Toast Of The Town'. More than likely she would have been one of those celebs who would be sitting in the audience and saluted by Ed from the stage.

Still, as 'The Ed Sullivan Show' served as an inspiration for many a plot point or joke in plenty of sixties sitcoms, I think the original should then be included as a legit thread in the Toobworld fabric.

They all played their parts on the world's stage, and now that they have made their exits, we salute them.

Be seeing you.


Tele-Toby

THE ZONK TREK DIALOGUES

When two of the leading theorists of Toobworld discuss great matters of import, the cohesion of the TV Universe only becomes that much stronger.

Here's an email conversation I had with Hugh D regarding 'Star Trek' fandom within the "reality" of Toobworld:

Toby:
Lost didn't zonk this time. In the very Friends episode you are thinking of, you'll remember that the reason they knew you had to pee on someone was because Chandler and Joey had seen a special on the Discovery Channel (as had Ross, who realized where the anecdote was going and exclaimed the ever intellectual "ewwww") which revealed this fact. I'm sure Joey Tribbiani and Hurley saw the same special.

And speaking of Joey, Brent Spiner was on last night's episode playing himself (which did prompt Star Trek references, of course).
Hugh

Thanks for the input, can you tell me who got stung and who did the peeing?
Toby

Monica got stung. Joey was going to pee on her, but he was nervous and couldn't perform under pressure. Chandler stepped up. Part of the ongoing punchline for that episode was that Chandler kept asking Monica if she'd ever date him. She told him "you'll always be the guy who peed on me."

Do you remember the Night Court in which some Trekkies were taken to court after starting a fight at a convention over which was better, classic or Next Generation? They left the courtroom by energizing out of there on the transporter. I've tried to figure a way that could be used to cover the Trek zonks. They've got transporter technology, so perhaps they've travelled back in time and sold the stories of the 23rd/24th century to producers, so contemporary people know (of) it, but it also will occur in the future? Okay, just rambling.
Hugh

I do remember the episode of "Nurses" in which a passel of Trekkies (they must have their own grouping name!) got food poisoning and ended up creating havoc around the nurses' station.

The Wonder Years dream, etc.

It could be those Trekkies on Night Court were fellow Saturnians, like the two old men (one of them the legendary Phil Leeds!) who took Bull with them back to their home planet.....
Toby

Little known fact, but Judge Stone's courtroom is one of the "nexus" points for crossovers. Back when DC Comics had their multiverse, there were certain points in the multiverse which seemed more fertile for interactions among different series, such as the Rock of Eternity. Some cities seemed to be strong for these interactions as well. In the televerse, one finds certain places are stronger than others, such as the corridors of St. Eligius Hospital, the alleyways of Sesame Street, or the world of the Electric Company. The halls of night justice are like this too. Even though only one legitimate crossover comes from Night Court (the pseudo-spinoff with My Two Dads), there are lots of small connections that can be made. Wile E. Coyote was once a defendant in a blackout, opening up a myriad of animated links, and another blackout gag featured Eugene Greytak as the Pope, a role he's also played in Naked Gun 33 1/3 (the cineverse take on Police Squad!), and on The Wayans Bros., Picket Fences, Golden Girls, Murphy Brown, and Just the Ten of Us, and I have a memory of an ad for Father Dowling Mysteries with him in it as well.
Hugh

Final thought:
For the 'Trek' zonk/transporter conundrum, those particular 'Night Court' Trekkies might have had access to the matter transmitter technology which Dr. Westin was working on before it transformed him into 'The Invisible Man'.
Toby

And what do YOU think?

PISSED BY ZONKS

[Yet another "Lost In Thought" essay]

'Lost' came perilously close (for the TV Universe, that is) to throwing out a Zonk in the latest episode, "Hearts And Minds".

As you should know by now, a Zonk is a TV show's mention of another TV show when both series should be co-existing in the same universe. They should NOT be aware of each other as TV shows.

This past week, Hurley was in the surf, trying to catch a fish. Suddenly he was stung by a sea urchin and had to be helped back up on the beach by Jin.

Hurley kept pleading for Jin to pee on his foot; that it was the only way to take care of the poison from the sting. But Jin refused.

"You gotta pee on my foot, Dude!" Hurley begged. "I saw it on a TV show once. It's the only thing that will work!"
(paraphrased)

Like I said, he came awfully close to Zonking us! More than likely the TV show he was referring to was 'Friends'. In one episode, they all went out to the beach in the Hamptons and somebody got stung in the foot. So the bond of friendship was cemented even harder when one of the other five volunteered to pee on the foot.

'Lost' has already Zonked us, however. When Boone and Locke were out in the jungle searching for Claire, Boone was tying red flags up to mark their path back.

He pointed out that the red flags were made of a red shirt. And that anybody who wore a red shirt on 'Star Trek' (mostly the engineering or security departments) was usually flagged as a potential goner.

Don't go behind that rock!

'Star Trek' must be right up there with 'The Twilight Zone' and 'Gilligan's Island' for the most Zonk references in other TV shows. Up until now I've had to just shrug and accept it, for I couldn't see anyway out of splainin that one away.

At least with many of the other shows, their episodes happened (for the most part) in the "present time" of their original broadcast. There was always the possibility then that characters who referred to those shows later on were aware of the "history".

But how do you splain away a character's knowledge of what will happen in the TV Universe 400 years into the future?

'Lost' may provide the key to solve that problem. I won't say why just yet, because the show is very slow and patient in giving up its secrets.

So stay tuned!

BCnU!
Tele-Toby

CROSSOVER OF THE WEEK

At the end of the two-hour pilot for 'Lost', Charlie Pace asked, "Guys... where ARE we?"

Why, you all everybody are in Toobworld!

As is usually the case, I was in the various message boards for 'Lost' before the night was through. But this week, I held off for an hour in order to watch 'The West Wing' first.

When I did finally begin bouncing around the forums, I found a possible contender for the Crossover of the Week:

"You All Everybody" By Driveshaft!
wagirl98
Did any other Lost fans hear "You All Everybody," by Driveshaft during Alias? They played it in the background of a scene in the first 10 minutes of the show. Gotta love it! : )

This episode of Alias just had it playing in the background at a party.

An excellent episode guide site, TV Tome, confirmed the information:

"ALIAS"
69. The Awful Truth

To learn the location of a stolen NSA code-breaker, an undercover Sydney must convince a murderous arms dealer to fall in love with her. Meanwhile, Vaughn fears that Weiss might have been killed on a mission, and Sydney and Jack argue about telling Nadia the horrible truth about her mother, Irina.

b: 12-Jan-2005 w: Jesse Alexander d: Lawrence Trilling

NOTE: During Sydney's party, the song "You All Everybody" is playing in the background. [It was faint in the background and then they opened a door and it could be heard REALLY clearly!!] "You All Everybody" is the hit song of the fictional band, Driveshaft, on J.J. Abrams other show, Lost.

"Hercules", the TV spoiler-king for Ain't It Cool? News, has also addressed the issue already:

Crossover magic, Bad Robot-style:
Hey Herc,
Am I wrong or was Driveshaft playing in the background at Eric's birthday party on Alias tonight? It was real subtle, but I'm pretty sure I heard the chorus line "You all everybody". Too much fun!
cheers, tredeger

And in response, Herc bounces the crossover back to the island:

Wouldn’t it be cool if the thing Locke and Boone are excavating turned out to be a Rambaldi artifact? I miss my Rambaldi artifacts …

One of the TalkBack regulars pointed out:

It was Driveshaft. Watch the episode again with the Closed Captioning turned on. It says "You All, Everybody by Driveshaft playing"

So, first off, my thanks to wagirl98 for the first alert that I saw about the crossover.

Where it goes from here is you all everybody's guess. But if we accept the ABC 50th anniversary special sketch in which 'Columbo' met Sydney Bristow of 'Alias' as being part of the TV Universe, (And THANK YOU, Hugh Davis, for reminding me of this!), then both shows are definitely locked into the main TV Universe.

As mentioned in Columbo's induction into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame this month, Columbo was seen at a detective convention in Hawaii during an episode of 'Magnum, P.I.', which also was linked to 'Murder, She Wrote', 'Simon & Simon', 'Whiz Kids', and like the case with 'Columbo', to 'Kojak' and 'Mannix'. (Apparently there's also a very subtle reference to not only 'Hawaii 5-O, as one might expect, but also to 'Quantum Leap' in 'Magnum' episodes.)

'Mannix' then leads to 'Diagnosis Murder', which also links to 'Mission: Impossible', 'Jake And The Fatman', and 'Matlock'.

My brain is kind of fried right now, but I know somewhere in all of those shows there must be some appearance by a celebrity appearing as themselves who can then link the whole cluster to the main TV Universe.

But at any rate, we've got 'Lost' linked to another JJ Abrams show, 'Alias' and to boot, one leads right into the other.

BCnU!
Tele-Toby