Budget DVD Theater: Life with Elizabeth

Let me tell you something about my dad. He loves old TV, and he loves finding 1950s and 1960s TV shows on dollar DVDs. I should say LOVED, because it looks like the days of dollar DVDs are gone. We miss the joy of entering a Target and finding a new batch of cheapo discs, and I even regret not having the opportunity to wade through dozens of "Bonanza" and Superman cartoon discs to find something I haven't already seen at 18 different stores.

Yes, my dad and I love Budget DVD Theater, but there's one show he does not love. In fact, he hates it. In much the same way the womenfolk in the family cringe when the men raise the specter of a Wheeler and Woolsey marathon, I can make him shudder with the mere mention of one mostly forgotten 1950s syndicated sitcom:

"Life with Elizabeth."

(Note to self: Next time, enhance suspense by not revealing name of sitcom in question in the title of the post)

My father and I are pals, and I can't ever see myself intentionally causing him harm, but much like Batman keeps some kryptonite in the Batcave in case he needs to confront Superman, I always have a cheapo DVD or two of "Life with Elizabeth" on hand just in case Dad ever goes rogue.

Now, you might think this show isn't all THAT bad, especially considering it stars Betty White. Everyone loves Betty White, the sharp-witted comedienne, game show personality, and all-around talented TV icon, right?

Well, that Betty White isn't in "Life With Elizabeth." No, here she is playing a goofy, naive young bride--not stupid, exactly, but sort of childish in her overall outlook and tendency to get her cute little self into these darned crazy situations. There's no edge, no guile, just a lovably silly housewife who often needs to get her comeuppance from her smug, condescending husband Alvin.

On "I Love Lucy," those crazy situations might include struggling to keep up with a conveyor belt of candy or clowning around with a Hollywood celebrity. On "Life with Elizabeth," the TV is broken. Or she wants to plant a tree, and Alvin says no. Or the couple goes to a drive-in restaurant and encounters a malaprop-spouting waitress who can't get their order right.

Yes, folks, this is gentle comedy. Gentle comedy has its place, especially in old-school TV, but I also like comedic comedy, and the problem with "Life with Elizabeth" is it's just not that funny. Almost all the jokes come in the form of some groan-inducing pun Elizabeth shares with Alvin, and even though she giggles each time she delivers one as if to let us know she knows it's silly, it's still supposed to be funny.

The show is pretty bad, to be sure, but I don't think it's as bad as my father thinks it is. I don't think anything could be as bad as he thinks it is. Yet all I have to do is suggest we put in an episode of this one, and I can practically hear him thinking, "How difficult is it to legally disown your son?" And this is a man who has seen and enjoyed an awful lot of garbage over the years--much of it stuff he would admit is garbage.

I don't know what makes this particular series his nemesis, but I do find the format sort of intriguing. An announcer (future game show mainstay Jack Narz) introduces the show and the characters and tells us we'll see 3 incidents in the life of this married couple. He sets up the first segment by saying, "In our first incident..." and then he pops up throughout the show to introduce and bridge the segments. This all looks rather quaint today.

Oh, and Betty White often looks to the camera and responds to comments from the announcer when those segments begin. From what I've seen, though, she usually ignores us when Alvin enters the room. That Alvin! As played by Del Moore, this insufferable hubby is grating today, but perhaps back then his generic imperious male character was more tolerable.

In fact, the only way I can really enjoy "Life with Elizabeth" is to imagine that Elizabeth loathes Alvin and spends all her waking hours plotting ways to aggravate him as payback for being such a pill. She keeps a dopey smile on her face the whole time to mask the genuine delight she takes in disrupting Alvin's day with her inane comments and puns.

I guess the show is going for this on some small level, with White playing a mischievous but pleasant scamp, but as played, it's not good enough for me. No, I have to believe Elizabeth herself is a brilliant performer, not to mention cunning enough to never let her guard down and reveal to anyone--not the viewers watching her 30 minutes a week, not the pesky announcer who keeps sticking his nose in her business, and CERTAINLY not her "better half"--that her entire existence is but one long buildup to the day when her ridiculous jokes finally lull Alvin into a deep enough state of weary indifference that she can bludgeon him with a rolling pin and marry an insurance salesman.

That is almost enough to get me through an episode in which the big joke is Elizabeth making a pun with "votes" and "volts" while Alvin tries to fix the TV set. I don't think it works for my dad, though, and if he sees this post, he may try to bludgeon ME with a rolling pin just for writing so much about this show.

Ranting about reruns (Part 1)

Today I want to talk about what you ARE NOT seeing on television these days. I rent a lot of TV on DVD through Netflix, and I try to feature a handful of shows in an informal rotation, spreading the series out rather than watching a whole season in a short period of time.

This year, I've seen some excellent TV series this way, and I think it's a shame that I have to see them on DVD rather than on the tube. Sure, I'm thankful that I at least have the opportunity to view these neglected shows, but come on, isn't the point of TV to recycle itself? These days, reruns are endless screenings of shows that were on a few years ago or "repurposed" airings of episodes that were on a few weeks ago. I grew up on a heavy diet of classic reruns. Where would I be without my endless viewings of "Brady Bunch," "Gilligan's Island," or--OK, maybe the Sherwood Schwartz sitcoms aren't the greatest examples. But the point is there is not much room for quality old-school television in today's landscape. For example, why can't we see...

The Invaders: I believe this was on Sci-Fi back before I got the channel, and of course the new SyFy isn't interested in an ancient show like this Quinn Martin production anymore than it is interested in offering a name that doesn't induce guffaws.

Season 1 is really good stuff, and while I wouldn't recommend watching big chunks of it at a time--the format gets a little repetitive, and you start to question some of the show's plot elements--it would make a great weekend rerun offering. A Sat.-Sun. slot would also avoid burning through the show's limited number of episodes. If invading aliens are passe just because they're 40 years old, well, then it's a sad time for TV. Of course, ABC is remaking "V" and trying to avoid using the word "aliens," so I guess they're half-afraid of sci-fi. But why is Sci-Fi afraid of sci-fi? Because it's "old," I guess--even though this one is, as it proudly proclaims at the start of each episode, IN COLOR.

Room 222: I talked about this one before. It's a gentle, amusing show, probably quaint to younger audiences today. But who cares about younger audiences? Well, besides advertisers? Good TV is good TV, and this is the kind of show that deserves another look. I mean, it's no "Saved by the Bell," but don't baby boomers have any kind of cachet anymore?

Mannix: OK, I understand why a laid-back show about kindhearted teachers and the social problems of the 1960s might seem a tad dated in this era of "The Wire," but "Mannix" is hip even today. The show is in color (if not IN COLOR), it features a private eye, and Mike Connors kicks ass. And I mean that literally. The show is violent as hell, which ought to appeal to today's bloodthirsty audiences. People die in this series. Mannix often kills them. Oh, if Sleuth would only show something like this instead of...whatever it shows these days.

The Paper Chase: I can actually understand why this one isn't on anymore. It's a dramedy about law students, but they don't hop into each other's beds each episode or pass out after drug overdoses at off-campus parties every night. I've only seen most of the first season, but I'm pretty sure "The Paper Chase" never built up an episode on the intrigue of which of its characters would engage in a threesome. The fact is, the straight college drama genre just doesn't appeal to the powers that be anymore. Straight-up dramedy is getting rarer. "The Paper Chase" is an example of a genre known as GOOD TV, and sadly, that's just not enough to get it in reruns nowadays.

Maybe an outlet like RTV will eventually get around to showing programs just because they are good, but until then, we will have to rely on DVD to check out these sort-of-lost classics. After all, the TV channels we have are filling their schedule with...Well, let's get to that in a future post.

Wonderful World of TCM: Lightning Round!

Arsene Lupin: This 1932 account of the master jewel thief is a little slow in the middle, but it's still entertaining to see Lupin, played by John Barrymore, match wits with Detective Guerchard, played by my favorite Barrymore of them all, Lionel.

By the way, "Arsene" is not pronounced by starting with "Arse," and his name is not a fancy way of saying "Wolf Man." Despite those disappointments, the movie is still a good one. Lionel knows who the mysterious criminal is, but he can't prove it, and John delights in getting his goat. What he REALLY delights in getting is the Mona Lisa, which he vows to seize right under Guerchard's nose.

Nobody takes any of this seriously, and there is a romantic element that adds to the lightness of it all. The dueling Barrymores are pretty much the whole show, and they're enough. I don't care much for the ending, but it's more or less in line with the rest of "Lupin," which treats the whole situation as a game between two gentlemen rather than any kind of high-stakes police crisis.

Hallelujah! I'm a Bum: A fascinating Depression-era musical that "proves" that poverty ain't so bad--in fact, it's downright grand! Al Jolson is the de facto mayor of the Central Park bum community, but he is good friend to the "real" mayor of NYC, played by Frank Morgan. When Morgan's girlfriend tries to commit suicide after a misunderstanding, Jolson saves her and falls in love with the amnesiac woman. Complications ensue, and while the movie is mostly a lark, there is some genuine emotion in these relationships and how they unfold.

The movie is a real curio in part because of how it blends Rodgers and Hart songs with rhyming dialogue and regular dialogue. There's never a dull moment in "Hallelujah," and Jolson and Morgan create likable but credible personas even within this offbeat format. Silent film legend Harry Langdon even gets a nice supporting role.

The music, the rhyming dialogue, the performances, the witty script, and the interesting depiction of life from the "bum's" perspective all contribute to the unique atmosphere. This one's a real keeper, and while I haven't seen much of Al Jolson, I can't imagine him coming off much better than he does here,

Tales of Terror: A fun collection of Edgar Allen Poe adaptations, with old favorite Vinnie Price narrating and appearing in each segment. Fun but unspectacular, though I'll bet the set design and cinematography really popped in the theater (and on a better TV than mine). The highlight is the middle chapter, "The Black Cat," with Peter Lorre's hilarious performance carrying a story that takes a while to get to where it ends up getting.

There are other fun aspects of this Roger Corman joint , including lovely ladies such as Debra Paget. I wasn't overwhelmed by anything in the film, but it offers 3 amusing tales and makes for a nice pre-Halloween movie. Uh, sorry for telling you that AFTER Halloween.

Brooks on Books: I Killed: True Stories of the Road from America's Top Comics

I'm the kind of guy who often works on 3 or 4 books at the same time. For example, I might have a large volume I read at home, a more compact paperback I can carry with me, and maybe a "light reading" kind of book I can dip into every now and then.

I often find the "light reading" book, the one I intend to look at sporadically, is so engrossing that I just plow right through it. This is the deal with "I Killed," a fantastic read that I could not set aside for any significant length of time. I highly recommend it for anyone interested in standup comedy.

Authors Ritch Shydner and Mark Schiff, themselves standup comedians, assembled a host of "road" stories from their brethren, then arranged them into bit-sized anecdotes typically no longer than a page or so. The life of the comic is not an easy one, filled with cheap hotels, dive bars, and shady characters, but it sure provides grist for a lot of hilarious stories.

Many of these tales involve sex, drugs, and alcohol. Many involve various forms of illegal behavior. Some are likely exaggerated. Some, especially a few near the end, are actually sweet and touching. Almost all of them are entertaining.

You'll see almost every big name comic of the eighties and nineties represented here, plus some older and newer. The authors don't arrange them in any kind of real order, with the exception of a some sidebars that group really short tales--like a paragraph--that share a theme. I kind of like this approach because you never know who or what will turn up next--though you can bet it will involve heckling.

Despite what Bill Maher says in here about the phenomenon being much rarer than one would think, reading "I Killed" gives you the impression that standup comedy is basically a war between the guy on stage and the inevitable lout in the audience who seeks to disrupt the performance. Whether it's as frequent as the sheer number of stories in this compilation indicates, it sure makes for some humorous war stories.

I'm not sure how much work Shydner and Schiff did in crafting this book after conducting the interviews. Many entries read like simple transcriptions of what the comic said in person or over the phone or whatever. That's not a knock. The (apparent) lack of editing and extraneous material get the comic's voice across and give the book a kind of casual authenticity.

If you're easily offended, you might not be a big fan of many of these performers, anyway, and in that case, you ought to skip this book. Almost everyone who has enjoyed standup comedy on any level, though, will love "I Killed" and hope for a sequel.

Panel Discussion: Good Morning, Spidey

I love this combination of panels in "Amazing Spider-Man" #12. First we get the great image of Giant Dream Spidey lecturing himself.

As for the next panel, all I'll say is that Peter Parker is becoming a young man, and he will soon learn that it is not unusual to wake up in the morning with a "zingarooo."

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas (whether you like it or not)

I always say I like Christmas as much as the next guy, unless I'm standing beside Mick Foley, but this year, the early onset of the yuletide season deserves a particularly potent SHEESH!

It all began when I saw a busy display of Christmas trees at Macy's...several weeks ago. OK, it was cool-looking, and my daughter loved it, but still.

We're all hearing how desperate retailers are eager to start pushing the holiday shopping season even earlier this year--yes, even before Halloween. Remember when it used to be a big deal to hear Christmas songs on the radio before Thanksgiving?

But of course, we here at Cultureshark believe nothing is official till it be validated by television, so this next item will stand as the true sign that we've all lost our minds and the season is here too early. Last week, Sitcoms Online ran a story discussing ABC Family Channel's plans for holiday programming. You see, not only does the network roll out its annual 25 Days of Christmas lineup, it offers a COUNTDOWN to the 25 Days of Christmas.

First of all, while the festival of lame TV movies and classic Rankin-Bass specials is always a hit and a better use of the channel's resources than many other ventures it could trot out there, is it really so daggone notworthy as to merit a COUNTDOWN to itself? If the commercialization of the holidays isn't enough for you, here's a little self-importance courtesy of ABC Family.

Second, it starts November 10! November 10 is just too early to roll this stuff out, and I say that as a relatively new parent who realized last year how quickly the season flies by and how hectic it can be without preparation. November 10!

Third, the story tells us one of the movies premiering in the Countdown to the 25 Days of Christmas is "The Dog Who Saved Christmas," with Dean Cain, Mario Lopez, and Adrienne Barbeau. 'Nuff said.

Hey, if this is where we're headed, though, Cultureshark will have to adapt. Look for round 2 of my Classic TV Christmas Festival in December, only this year, you'll really love the Countdown to the Classic TV Christmas Festival, starting...3 DAYS AGO!

That's right, this blog has been counting down to its Classic TV Christmas Festival for several days, and you didn't even know it! Don't feel too bad, though. I only just realized it myself. Ho ho ho!