So the story goes that while on the road in Chicago, the Wheel of Fortune game show had a contestant drop out at the last minute.  The producers found some guy named Raymond Taylor on the street, gave him a suit, and propped him on the stage.  I have no idea if this is true or urban legend, but legend is the operative word when describing Raymond Taylor’s exploits on Wheel of Fortune.  Raymond was a skinny Chuck Berry clone who could never look anyone in the eye, and was constantly fidgeting around the set.  He was also TV gold.  He was genuinely witty and cutting in all his remarks and timing, and he was a stunningly adept “Wheel” player.  Many people assume, with racist underpinnings, that Raymond was a crack addicted clown.  I’m not going to go that far.  Television has a way of either making people conform with fear, or bringing out their inner star.  I think this was the case of the latter.  Raymond ended up winning over 80k in cash and prizes, and actually began to stalk the Wheel of Fortune studios looking for a job.  The studio ended up putting a restraining order against him.  It’s a bizarre end to a hilarious and peculiar story, but check Raymond out yourself in his best moments on his unreal Wheel of Fortune run.

So, its common knowledge that there are some gaping plot holes in the “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” the first Indiana Jones movie.  One is, how did Indiana Jones know how to close his eyes when the Nazis opened the Ark?  Another is, how did he escape the island when all the Nazis died in the ensuing ghost melting party?  The most famous one is concerns how Indiana Jones got to that island in the first place.  We swim him swim to the submarine, climb on top of it, then the film wipes to the dock the Nazis land in, and Indiana Jones looks really wet.  How in hell did he manage this?  Wasn’t the submarine closed?  Wouldn’t someone notice if he climbed in?  Well, according to the original script, Indiana uses his whip to lash himself onto the periscope and sort of surfs along somehow.  Here is an image with a tiny Indiana Jones model mounted on top of the periscope of the submarine.

The sheer lunacy of this stunt was cut from the final movie, and most people never noticed how Indy made it to the secret Nazi island.  However, it was during the close examination of this scene last night, where I made a startling discovery.  When Indiana Jones swims to the submarine, he no longer has his trade marked fedora.  I made sure to rewind and fast forward a bunch of times, but sure enough, by the time Indiana gets to the secret island, he has no hat.  Then he jumps a Nazi guard, steals his uniform, and definitely has no hat.  Where is the hat?  It’s gone!  But wait, isn’t Indiana never supposed to lose his hat?  They make a point of it in each succeeding movie.  As you know, the opening of “The Last Crusade” is dedicated as the origin story of how young Indiana Jones got the hat in the first place.  Hold up, you’re saying, isn’t Indiana Jones wearing his hat at the end of Raiders?  Surely he must have retrieved it from that boat with all the Jamaican dudes, right?  Actually, if you look closely, that is a different hat, his gray fedora; the hat he uses to wear when he travels.

Holy shit.  There is very little discussion on this matter on the internet, but luckily I found one that attempts to explain what happened to his goddamned hat; his lucky iconic hat, the hat he is NEVER supposed to lose.  According to the “internets,” in the original script, it basically says, ‘when Indy boards the submarine, he “loses his hat once and for all.”‘  In the novelization of the movie, Indy even comments on the fact saying, “Finding the ark cost me my favorite hat.”  Then he laughs…!  Now obviously, after “Raiders” debuted as a smash success, iconography was created, sequels were lined up, and hat mania swept the world.  The conveniently missing hat would never be missing again, and like “Last Crusade” depicts, Indiana would never lose the hat his whole life.  According to further novelization, Indiana would have the hat repaired and reblocked countless times, as a simple felt fedora would never be able to survive the destruction and mayhem Indiana exposed it to.  So, is it a conspiracy?  Does Indiana have a closet full of replacement hats, but acts like he never lost the original to prove his hat keeping badassery?  No, there is a much more boring word for the case of Indiana’s missing hat, retcon.

Making a television show is difficult, especially one like Saturday Night Live where all the content is written and produced a week in advance before live airing.  From the looks of this video, making an SNL is a long an tedious process.  Here, they are just making a promo spot, and even though this video is edited to 9 minutes, it probably took well over an hour.  It’s fantastic to watch though.  First you have Eddie Vedder, appearing in April of 1994, a few days after Kurt Cobain killed himself.  Eddie and Pearl Jam did a nice little tribute to Kurt as you can see in the picture above with the “K” on Eddie’s chest.  That’s just a bit of rock and roll history, but in this clip you get to see a nervous and very young Adam Sandler yuck it up with Eddie, whom Adam is clearly enamored with.  You also get to see the oddly detached Emilio Estevez, famous brother of Charlie Sheen, and son of Martin Sheen, interact with these other two icons of film and music.  At one point Eddie asks Emilio, how’s it been this week, to which Emilio replies, “I believe everything’s been good, just fine.”  It was awkward, and Emilio looks like he’d rather be anywhere else then with some long haired grunge rocker and with the jittery nutbar Adam Sandler.  This video is fascinating and revealing, and an awesome time capsule of one of SNL’s golden eras.  Check it out!

Saturday Night Live is really hit or miss this days, mostly miss, but sometimes, when they get a guy in there who knows sketch comedy, like Ben Stiller, they can hit a few home runs.  That was case the other night when Ben revived his classic impression of Bruce Springsteen from his cult hit “The Ben Stiller Show.”  The bit was a clever, almost throwback comedy parody that reminded me of the golden age of sketch comedy found in the 90s.  In the sketch, Ben is Bruce selling you nothing but the stories he tells in between songs, and it’s pretty damned funny.  It was nothing revolutionary, but it really evoked that spirit of classic grunge era sketch comedy.  The next clip is a collection of all the Ben as Bruce bits from the “Ben Stiller Show.”  You get to see Bruce teaching kids how to count, delivering a baby, fighting in a bar, and warding off aliens.  You even get to see Bruce travel through time and help out old Abe Lincoln, (awesomely played by Stiller Show alum Bob Odenkirk.)  Speaking of Bob, if you catch a hint of Mr. Show whilst watching the Springsteen compilation, you’re not smellings things because both Bob and David were head writers there, and went on to make their own masterpiece of sketch comedy shortly following the Stiller Show’s brief run.  So get ready to laugh in UHN, TWO, HEE, HOOR!

The greatest cover song the Beatles ever did was of The Isley Brothers 1962 hit, “Twist and Shout.”  Written by Bert Russell and Phil Medley, the original song was a tepid little dance song, but when John Lennon and the Beatles got their hands on it, they redefined rock and roll, and gave the genre one of its most iconic performances.  John Lennon’s throat shredding vocal is one of the greatest expressions of pure joy in the entire universe, and it’ll never ever get old.  When John Hughes had Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick) sing the song on a float in downtown Chicago, he only added to the universal authority of the song’s power.  It’s the best scene in a movie that helped put a big cultural stamp a whole generation of 80s and 90s kids.  I wonder what sort of impact, if any, this film has on current and future youthful generations. I have a feeling people will always like it, after all, who doesn’t like Ferraris, ditching school, hanging out with the coolest kid ever, and singing “Twist and Shout” in front of 10,000 people?  Also, Charlie Sheen sums up his entire life through a fictional character at the end.  Amazing.  (Insert daily CBS plug…) Remember  to vote me as CBS’s best local NYC blogger by clicking these words!  Thanks!

The trailer for “Bored to Death” season 3 just came out, and of course, its awesome.  I have an incredibly soft spot for this show.  For starters, I live in Park Slope, Brooklyn, the predominant location of the show’s adventures.  Next, I love detective comedies, long story there.  Lastly, the cast is brilliant and the show high brow and hilarious.  That’s two or three things, but whose counting?  Anyway, the season 3 trailer is just Ted, Jason, and Zach gallivanting around Coney Island to the Beastie Boys “Triple Trouble.”  If this doesn’t make you happy, I want you to stop reading my site.  Well…read my site less, or just read it the same amount, but respectfully disagree with me on the subject of liking this show.  BORED TO DEATH!!!!

I had no idea that They Might Be Giants didn’t write this song!  It turns out that the Four Lads, in 1953, came up with this incredibly catchy and insane song.  It was a top ten hit and a certified gold record.  Imagine that!  I learned all this from hearing a tape of Bob Dylan’s satellite radio show “Theme Time Radio Hour,” where he spun the original record.  Thanks for the heads up Bob because like most kids who grew up in the 90s, I first learned about the song from Tiny Tunes.  I remember being absolutely mesmerized by the song, and relished every time a repeat of that episode would come on.  The song, “Istanbul (Not Constantinople),” speaks for itself.  It’s one of those rare tunes where the lyrics communicate 100% of the songs idea without a trace of ambiguity.  I love songs like that.  The more modern incarnation comes from They Might Be Giants’ 1990 record Flood which I thoroughly recommend picking up.  As a bonus I’m also including a live performance of the song TMBG did in 1990 for MTV Europe. It’s equally spellbinding and hilarious, especially when the host asks them if the Four Lads had any other good songs, and John Linnell replies in a complete deadpan that “No, that was their only good song.” Too funny.

I’m pretty sure this is from the “Curb Your Enthusiasm” pilot, but who cares where its from exactly, I’m not double checking Wikipedia.  All you need to know is that its genius and hilarious.  This is Larry returning to his roots, doing strait up stand up, and killing.  He riffs on masturbation, blow jobs from Jews, Clinton, Hitler, Chinese men, answering machines, and Jack Kevorkian.  It’s a brilliant montage of his best jokes, and it all ends on a joke that sums up his entire comedy philosophy.  Just sit back, press play, prepare to laugh, and thank me later.

The “Seinfeld” obsession continues, this time with a great documentary on it’s unlikely creation and even more unlikely smash success.  It’s a revealing 6 part look into how the show started off as a quirky experimental program whose premise was wrapping a sitcom around a standup comedians act.  It was a totally novel creation springing from the minds of Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld.  The documentary is great because you see the enormous strain and pressure Larry David was under in the creation of this thing countered with the unnatural calm and ease that Jerry Seinfeld exuded during the whole creation.  The whole video series is great, a must for “Seinfeld” fans, which should just about include the entire human race. Sadly, Part 3 and 5 cannot be embedded! Stupid youtube censors. Don’t worry, I’ve provided links so you won’t miss out. Enjoy.

PART 3, Click here!!!!!!!

PART 5, CLICK HERE!!!!!!

If you caught last Sunday’s episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” “Palestinian Chicken,” you know Larry David is on a hot streak.  There are a lot of genius comics in the world right now, but Larry is going for the throne of world’s funniest man.  I can’t get enough of Larry and the world of “Curb,” and because of my addiction, I found this awesome series of clips featuring Larry, Cheryl Hines, and Jeff Garlin talking about the creation and origins of “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”  This is a long multi-video post, so be sure to click the more button so you don’t miss out on any videos.

VIDEO #1- Larry on the show’s creation.  Here Larry talks about how he thought his return to standup would be stale, so he decided to wrap it around a clever little mockumentary idea.

VIDEO #2- Jeff Garlin, director and executive producer of the show, explains how Larry coaxed him into starring on the show as Larry’s agent.
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