Mag Rack: Because they are still making 'em and I am still reading 'em

Some thoughts on current periodicals:

*Entertainment Weekly still ain't what it used to be, but it still surprises every now and then with an interesting piece. I have noticed that much like sister pub Sports Illustrated, it is really increasing the number of "double issues" it publishes, presumably as a way to cut costs by releasing less issues.

I'd hate to see it go away. Somehow it's comforting that even in 2017 it can irritate me by finding a way to devote 10  pages to Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

*That reminds me of the incredible shrinking Rolling Stone, the masthead of which still declares "All the News that Fits." A lot less of it fits these days. I can understand the dilemma. People like me want to read about dinosaurs like Tom Petty and don't care about the likes of The Weeknd. So the mag has to scramble to avoid being Classic Rock and runs things like a piece in a recent edition that asks a current band who its influences are. It's like another way to get Springsteen in there while claiming you are covering new music.

But I think most new music stinks and would rather read about Werner Herzog.  I saw a compelling look at the enigmatic director by veteran profiler Erik Hedgaard...that was only a few pages long.

The review section is only the equivalent of 2-3 pages for music, no regular book coverage (apparently), and one single page of movie reviews.

*ESPN the Magazine never gets any pub, not even in the recent flurry of layoffs at the company, but it is actually still producing good work. The most recent issue I've seen features an excellent look at the Raiders' move to Vegas by Don Van Natta and Seth Wickersham, plus an interesting account of the Buss family struggle for control of the Lakers written by Ramona Shelburne.

*MAD Magazine is still around, and it produces some amusing content. I don't like all of it, but I enjoy a lot of it, and it's cool that it's still around. In the run-up to the election, it made fun of both candidates, and now it's making fun of the prez, as it should in both cases. The movie parodies are done in the same style and still work, and there are less words in the features, but the graphic design is excellent in many of them. You see clever pieces with realistic-looking mock ads or movie posters that look fantastic and really sell the premise. So I make my semi-regular call to those of you who haven't seen the mag in a while: Give it a look, and you might get something out of it.

Mag Rack #2: Shocking Secrets of America's Favorite TV Shows of the '50s and '60s

Will you lose what little respect you had for me if I told you I bought this "Globe Collector's Issue" at the bookstore? Will it help if I told you I used a gift card?

Hey, I couldn't resist. It's classic TV, it's tabloid, it's glossy, and it has a picture of Ralph and Alice Kramden (along with many other icons of the medium) on the cover. I figured I'd gamble a virtual 6 bucks and take home the thin but spiffy-looking mag.

The 80-some pages go by quickly. Each show gets maybe a few pages at most, many a page or even half a page, and the photos are so big that you don't really get a lot of substance here. I know, I know, we're talking about a publication of that mass-market tabloid "The Globe." But still, while I'm not expecting a dissertation on each show's impact on popular culture by Professor Robert J. Thompson, it would be nice to get a little more content.

Those photos are purty, but I don't think there are a lot of new or rare shots here. Many entries are illustrated with the same publicity pics we've seen for decades. There are some nice extras, though. For example, while the "Honeymooners" section offers that same shot of the 4 Classic 39 cast members poking their heads through the windows of a Gotham bus, then the standard still of the 4 in the Kramdens' apartment (you'd know it if you saw it), it also features a rarer black-and-white pic of a Lost Episode segment with Pert  Kelton as Alice, plus a behind-the-pic glimpse of Art Carney rehearsing a "Twilight Zone" appearance. And of course, this being a tabloid pub, you get a few unflattering shots of stars as they looked years later or as they look today.

Let's talk about these scandals, though: Are they really Shocking and Secret? Much of the gossip in this mag is old news to anyone who has followed the tabloids for years or who has more than a surface knowledge of TV history. Yet there is something to be said for having all of it in one place. We get stories about alcoholism, behind-the-scenes squabbles, and affairs. Sometimes the writers have to strain to come up with anything remotely scandalous, as with "My Favorite Martian," which gets a short entry that basically says Ray Walston resented being known for the role. Big whoop, right?

There are some things here that surprise me, like Jane Kean saying in her recent memoir that Ed Sullivan raped her when she was 17. If I ever heard that one before, I blocked it out. Nor did I know or particularly want to that Edd Byrnes once had a threesome that involved Roger Moore. Aw, who am I kidding? I bought this thing, didn't I? I also didn't know that Clint Walker claimed to have seen a UFO. No, he didn't claim he had sex with an alien. Not everything in here is salacious.

Some of it just sad, really. Even though this publication is a slim time-passer, I sometimes wish it went a little deeper. For example, one of the big controversies for which I don't think we have a definitive answer is the saga of "Make Room for Daddy" and why star Danny Thomas canned first-season wife Jean Hagen and replaced her with Marjorie Lord. This mag mentions the change and Hagen's struggles in her personal life, but only says that she quit the show and was killed off. Gossip I've seen over the years indicates that Thomas went so far as to try to prevent Hagen episodes from being seen again, and I've also seen interesting speculation as to why he would do that. But "The Globe" doesn't address that at all.

The focus here is more on personal lives than on those kind of creative issues, and I'd love to see some of those kinds of mysteries explored somewhere. However, for 6 bucks, this is a pretty good summary of dirt from the Golden Age of Television, and while you get a lot of the usual suspects (George Reeves, Adam West and Burt Ward, Lucy and Desi), between the regular entries and a short catch-all section of paragraphs at the end, you also see info about Steve Allen, Lawrence Welk, "Wagon Train," and "Julia." So it's a pretty good cross-section of 50's and 60's TV. I'd buy another one of these things without shame. Well, not too much shame. I might not brag about it here, but I might well buy it, read it quickly, and enjoy it.

Mag Rack #1

Welcome to the Magazine Rack, a new recurring feature in which I talk about some of the various magazines I read each month. Yes, I do read magazines, PRINT magazines--the kind that have smelly perfume samples, the kind that have cards that fall all over the place when you pick them up, the kind that you can take with you into the--er, into any room in the house.

I get most of my magazines from the library these days, but that doesn't make my opinions any less worthwhile. Hey, this blog is free, right?

A few weeks ago, "Time" featured Prince Charles' mug on the cover as part of a big feature story inside. That's interesting, but interesting in a "Does Time actually still want to sell magazines?" way more than a "Huh, I want to read about Prince Charles" way. For the record, the Prince seems like a fairly decent sort, and he's big on charity and environmental causes these days.

Elsewhere in the issue is a small picture of Christy Turlington topless. I kind of wish they had put Christy Turlington on the cover and had a small picture of Prince Charles inside.

"Entertainment Weekly" of November 8 spotlights Katy Perry on the cover with the copy: "ALL-ACCESS PASS We Spend One Wild Week With Katy Perry And She Tells Us...Everything!" Yeah, you can predict how that goes.

More interesting is a short story on "Modern Family's" Ariel Winter and how she lives with her older sister. Unfortunately, it's a bit too short, and it is (perhaps understandably) sparse on details of the sad situation that made the 15-year-old Winter petition for emancipation. It's an uneventful issue, but one more thing jumps out: "EW" loves "The Good Wife," and it wants you to love it, too.

Last month's "Vanity Fair" has Jay-Z on the cover, but I picked it up anyway. I'm willing to listen to people who try to convince us the guy is some kind of super-genius, but unfortunately this is an "all-access" article in which the author tells us about what it's like hanging out with the subject. It's not surprising, then, that the article begins with a whole lot of ink (I read print magazines, remember?) about how cool Jay-Z is. I just can't read an entire piece of that stuff.

I did read the article by Maureen Orth about Mia Farrow, updating her life now and reminding us of the sordid Woody Allen scandal. Now, this is clearly a pro-Mia piece that relies on access; Orth reported on the story originally for "Vanity Fair." Farrow does emerge as the sympathetic figure, but the bigger takeaway is this: Hey, wasn't Woody Allen a huge creep at best and something more sinister at worst? Didn't we all kind of forget about that? Reading this article made me wonder if maybe Woody needs to be lumped into that Roman Polanski category of directors you respect professionally but feel guilty about supporting.