Friday, August 29, 2014

Best TV Show of All-Time?


The show ran on the CBS television network from September 1957 through April 1963 for an astounding 225 episodes. (A radio show starring a different cast also played for four of those years.) Almost 40 episodes per season, at 26-minutes per, with many locations. (Current half-hour TV series: 20 to 22 episodes a year at 22-minutes each.)

And it is the best western series of all time. Of course, there are problems. Boone insisted on the often silly intros with him in 1870s San Francisco gentry garb, almost always coming on to a girl / rejecting a girl / or sighing with a "what can I do?" expression. (Thankfully these ficelles are not part of every episode.) And that's about it. Out of the 225, maybe 10 are stinkers. But the rest. . . .

No other series is more dominated by a single personality and consciousness than is Have Gun Will Travel by Richard Boone's. His greatness as both actor and director -- and his deeply humanist sensibility -- makes HGWT a model of popular and populist art. Sometimes that sensibility goes awry, wasted on chum. At its best (actually, at its average as well), it was a constant search for what was the right thing to do. Paladin himself is a western superman: brilliant, handsome, rich; a boxer, a gunman, a stud. Yet the character is almost completely devoid of narcissism. Or if it is there at times, it becomes the subject of the piece. In the candy-colored yet morally black-and-white world of the 1950s, this is an astonishingly complex show, in terms of meaning and character.

There are many glories beyond him. Along with his artistic domination, Boone's heart is generous as both actor and director. Some of the best HGWT episodes are directed by Andrew McLaglen, Lamont Johnson, and Ida Lupino -- and he completely gives them their lead. Very literate (sometimes too literate) scripts by the great Herb Meadows and Sam Wolfe (and Gene Rodenberry). An endless succession of special acting turns, by both leads and supporting players: George Kennedy many times, Charles Bronson (amazingly good) many times, Kam Tang as Hey Boy,  Ben Johnson and Ken Curtis fresh off the Ford lot, Charles Aidman, Strother Martin, Ed Nelson, Harry Carey Jr., Shirley O'Hara, Denver Pyle, Jacqueline Scott, June Vincent, on and on. Also, the very lovely Lisa Lu as Hey Boy's replacement, Hey Girl. (Lu's also in several episodes as characters other than Hey Girl, where she also burns a hole in the screen.) Such a slender beauty it's no wonder Henry Miller started stalking her after seeing HGWT.

It is a beautiful show to look at, with a stark sheen. (Many cinematographers are credited, with Stuart Thompson grabbing most titles.) Much of the music is by Bernard Herrmann or based on Herrmann cues. Plus the immortal Johnny Western theme song.

If one comes to knows the series well, what's most remarkable is the continual changes in tone. Alternately leisurely, calm and quiet (and at times very funny); titles tight and tense as a Tohlakai drum; plots so dense they are opaque; stories where nothing much happens at all. We come back, though, to the show's awesome star. No actor has ever surpassed his engagement and commitment to a weekly role. His humor, strength, and charisma get more unique and impressive with each passing year.

One of the many good ones, from Season 2 (April 25, 1959): "The Man Who Lost"

Monday, August 11, 2014

Jeopardy '97

Oliver Stone:
I look back on Jeopardy as one of my highlights during a strange time in the '90s when I was having an enormous amount of fun. I was so bored at this point with the number of interviews, appearances, and junkets that I had to do. I don’t know how anyone can convey the torture of having to do fifty interviews in a day, repeating yourself about a film. These are the kinds of things that drive you insane, so I suppose in rebellion against that kind of mindset. I was on Jeopardy as a charity effort with Arianna Huffington and Wolf Blitzer, and I was trying to pick up this Korean girl in Washington D.C. who I was meeting for the first time, and these first time things can be very exciting, so she was in the audience and I had decided that morning to take ecstasy. I was on it on Jeopardy, and I was totally enjoying the show in a way that neither of my two co-contestants possibly could. In fact, Wolf was so uptight I was laughing even harder at his “projection” of intelligence. Arianna, a graduate in art history apparently forgot everything that day because she got zero points as I remember. I think I lost everything and won it back several times, and at the very end I whipped Wolf Blitzer with a question that I thought was ridiculously simple, but neither of these two could remember the painter of the “Last Supper.” I think a first grader could’ve figured that out, but I jumped on it and I won. The secret of Jeopardy is how fast your finger can get to the button. That millisecond makes a difference. Ecstasy gave me the power that day, but I couldn’t stay in the box however. Alex Trebeck kept telling me to get back into that box; he’s lucky I did. Anyway, I had a great night afterwards with that wonderful Korean girl who actually worked in a relief organization in Africa. All these Washington girls work in relief organizations… good hunting ground.
Including actual 1997 commercials!

Friday, August 8, 2014

Sadism


Noam Chomsky on the Zionist destruction of Gaza.

Monday, August 4, 2014

Take a Number