#like simone and wally and jerry

[jacksnowy]

um, hello. it’s been awhile. im not sure if anyone who still follows me is active, or even remembers me for that matter. but, I wanted to check in - to reminisce a little.

I remember when this movie came out, so ahead of it’s time, to this day it remains as one of the most beautiful movies ever created - to me. I remember the community it created, so loyal, so friendly and so welcoming. we weren’t the biggest community, but we tried our best. we had good times, we laughed and we cried and made silly memes. how it impacted lives, I remember so well how it was a light in my darkness, and to so many other people. 

I still think about this blog often, of the people I met - people who stayed and people who left. I’m grateful for all of it, all the people I met and talked to, the experience they provided, the growth and impact they had on me. but I’m also regretful for not working harder towards some friendships. ah, I guess that’s in the past now, I’m still grateful for them while they were there. 

I still see posts I’ve made get notes as if I hadn’t even left and it makes me rly happy, it shows me the fandom is still here, even though im very out of touch with it and how big it is. 

it’s been years, yet, I don’t have the heart to delete anything. I have everything in my jack folder, icons, gifs, art pieces, memes, pictures of people. I don’t have the heart to delete them. perhaps it’s good, good to remember and smile back on it. maybe one day I’ll return, maybe not. at least, it no longer makes me anxious, but, calm instead. that I’ve had this experience. I couldn’t have asked anything more. to anyone who reads this, who ever followed me, messaged me, wrote with me, sent me an ask, tagged me, reblogged me, supported me, and found me worth a time of their day, truly, thank you.

I still believe in jack and I knew it would never change. 

[papermoonloveslucy]

BOB HOPE’S WORLD OF COMEDY

October 30, 1976

Produced and Directed by Jack Haley Jr.

Written by: Charles Lee with Gig Henry, Jeffrey Barron, Katherine Green, and Jack Haley Jr.

Bob Hope (Himself, Host) was born Lesley Townes Hope in England in 1903. During his extensive career in virtually all forms of media he received five honorary Academy Awards. In 1945 Desi Arnaz was the orchestra leader on Bob Hope’s radio show. Ball and Hope did four films together. He appeared as himself on the season 6 opener of “I Love Lucy.” He did a brief cameo in a 1964 episode of “The Lucy Show.”  When Lucille Ball moved to NBC in 1980, Hope appeared on her welcome special. He died in 2003 at age 100.

Lucille Ball (Herself) was born on August 6, 1911 in Jamestown, New York. She began her screen career in 1933 and was known in Hollywood as ‘Queen of the B’s’ due to her many appearances in ‘B’ movies. With Richard Denning, she starred in a radio program titled “My Favorite Husband” which eventually led to the creation of “I Love Lucy,” a television situation comedy in which she co-starred with her real-life husband, Latin bandleader Desi Arnaz. The program was phenomenally successful, allowing the couple to purchase what was once RKO Studios, re-naming it Desilu. When the show ended in 1960 (in an hour-long format known as “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour”) so did Lucy and Desi’s marriage. In 1962, hoping to keep Desilu financially solvent, Lucy returned to the sitcom format with “The Lucy Show,” which lasted six seasons. She followed that with a similar sitcom “Here’s Lucy” co-starring with her real-life children, Lucie and Desi Jr., as well as Gale Gordon, who had joined the cast of “The Lucy Show” during season two. Before her death in April 1989, Lucy made one more attempt at a sitcom with “Life With Lucy,” also with Gordon, which was not a success and was canceled after just 13 episodes.

Neil Simon (Himself) is a playwright and screenwriter responsible for more than 30 plays, most of which were seen on Broadway and adapted into films.  At the time, one of his most enduring plays The Odd Couple was being done on television. In 1983 became the only living playwright to have a New York theatre named in his honor. In 1960, when it was still called the Alvin Theatre, Lucille Ball appeared there in the musical Wildcat.

Don Rickles (Himself) worked as a stand-up comic in nightclubs for nearly 20 years before making his film debut in 1958. Rickles was known as an insult comic and became a staple of Hollywood roasts. In “Lucy the Fight Manager” (TLS S5;E20) he made his first and last acting appearance with Lucille Ball, but would be seen with her on variety shows and specials through 1988. Rickles was the voice of Mr. Potato Head in the animated Toy Story franchise. He died in April 2017 at age 90.

Norman Lear (Himself) is a television writer and producer responsible for such hits as “All in the Family,” “Maude,” “One Day at a Time,” “The Jeffersons,” and many others. He received three Emmy Awards for his work on “All in the Family.”  

Caroll Spinney (Big Bird) started playing Big Bird on “Sesame Street” in 1969. In 2000, Big Bird was named a Living Legend by the United States Library of Congress. Created by Jim Henson, Big Bird is one of two Muppets to have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Spinney has been honored with four Daytime Emmy Awards for his portrayals on the series and two Grammy Awards for his related recordings. Two recordings of Spinney's voice have earned Gold Record status.

As with many Bob Hope specials, the show is sponsored by Texaco.

Bob Hope's opening monologue talks mainly about the Presidential Election, which would take place in two weeks. Incumbent president Gerald Ford ran against Jimmy Carter. He also touches on the World Series, the Swine Flu epidemic, Zsa Zsa Gabor's multiple marriages, and the CB radio craze.

Bob's first guest is Big Bird from “Sesame Street” (Caroll Spinney). Big Bird does an ad-lib impersonation of Jack Benny that makes Hope laugh. This kicks off a montage of clips about animals.

A pet shop staffed by Bob Newhart 

Jackie Gleason playing golf with Mildred, a chimp in How To Commit Marriage (1969)

Roy Rogers and Trigger “the wonder horse”

Julie London with puppies who prove not to be housebroken

Dan Rowan with a horse and Dick Martin with a camel 

Hope with his dog in a vet's waiting room and Betty Grable there with a race horse

Hope and Greer Garson in divorce court fighting over their dog, Mr. Smith

Lassie as the subject of “This is Your Life” in a spoof from “The Bob Hope Show”

Next Hope introduces a montage of clips featuring international stars.  

Maurice Chevalier (France)

Eva Gabor (Hungary)

Zsa Zsa Gabor (Hungary) with Angie Dickinson

Ingrid Bergman (Sweden)

Anita Ekberg (Sweden) with William Holden and Robert Strauss

Olivia Newton John (Australia)

Rex Harrison (England) and Lilli Palmer (Poland) with Janis Paige

David Niven (England) with Marilyn Maxwell

After a Texaco commercial, Bob introduces Lucy Ricardo aka Lucy Carmichael aka “the bionic woman of comedy” - Lucille Ball. 

Lucy reminisces with Bob, which leads to a black and white clip of a sketch from “The Bob Hope Show” (September 24, 1962). In it, Lucy plays a District Attorney and Bob a gangster named Bugsy Hope.

Back on stage, Bob asks Lucy the secret to her show's endearing success. She says that it has to do with the realatable domestic situations created by the writers. Bob add that the physical comedy gives her comedy world-wide appeal. Lucy says that as of last count her shows were seen in 79 countries. Lucy says she's heard herself dubbed in Japanese, and that in South America it is HER who as the accent. Asked about being a legend, Lucy says it is “kind of like an obituary” but she's very grateful.

After another Texaco break, Bob talks about slapstick and introduces a montage of clips.

Ernie Kovacs trying to sell his house during an earthquake

Bob as Bobby Riggs playing against Billie Jean King (Ann-Margret)

Hope and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. as astronauts walking in space

Jack Benny using hidden cameras in his home to avoid paying Hope a guest-star fee

The second hour of the special kicks off with Hope introducing playwright Neil Simon. They talk about writing, the difference between drama and comedy, and ethnic humor, which is the cue for the next montage of clips about vaudeville.

Hope and Crosby do a routine

Hope, Crosby, Steve Allen, and Jack Paar are child actors competing for the same job

Danny Thomas as a candy seller interrupting Hope's act by stealing all his punchlines

Donald O'Connor as Wingo the Magnificent, a knife thrower, with Hope as Courageous Targo, his human target

Hope introduces Don Rickles, who promotes his new show “CPO Sharkey” which he compares to Phil Silvers in “Sergeant Bilko.”  Hope says he's been the victim of insult comedy, which begins a montage of clips where Bob is insulted by:

Milton Berle

Tony Randall

Redd Foxx

Glenn Campbell

Gina Lollobridgida

Jerry Colonna

Dorothy Lamour

Tony Bennett

Fred MacMurray

Joan Crawford

George Sanders

Frank Sinatra

Troy Donahue

Hedda Hopper

John Wayne

Dyan Cannon

Debbie Reynolds (with Jack Benny)

Juliet Prowse

Bob Hope introduces Norman Lear, who mentions he has no shows on NBC. They talk about “Mary Hartman Mary Hartman,” the 'Family Hour,' his flops like “Hot L Baltimore,” and Archie Bunker. The next batch of clips is about satire.  

Johnny Carson as a playboy movie star Rock Carson appearing on a talk show 

Hope, Burt Reynolds and Dyan Canon spoof the TV series “Paper Moon”  

A sketch called “Bananaz” (“Bonanza”) starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Juliet Prowse

A “Batman” spoof starring Martha Rae as Bat Girl and Bob Hope as the villain Lobsterman

Medical dramas are poked fun at by Hope, Barbara Eden, and Lee Marvin

After a commercial, the montages are about dancing. Some of Hope's choreographed clips: 

Dancing with Raquel Welch

Doing Eddie Foy's famous sand dance

Soft shoe with Pearl Bailey

A trio with Jeanne Crain and Betty Hutton

A challenge dance with George Burns

Rare footage of Dean Martin dancing alongside Hope

Polly Bergen, Jimmy Durante and Hope dance as babies while on their knees (above photo)

A partner dance with Ginger Rogers

Hoofing with Hope and Jimmy Cagney

Modern dance with Ann-Margret

Hat and cane steps with Sammy Davis Jr.

Hope wraps up the special with a look at some of the comedians of the past.  

Budd Abbott and Lou Costello (above photo)

Fred Allen

Gracie Allen

Cliff Arquette aka Charlie Weaver

Mischa Auer

Robert Benchley

Jack Benny

Willy Best

Fanny Brice, the original 'Funny Girl'

Joe E. Brown

Billy Burke

Eddie Cantor

Jack Carson

Charles Correll, Amos of “Amos 'n' Andy”

Wally Cox

Joan Davis

Marie Dressler

Leon Errol

W.C. Fields

Billy Gilbert, the greatest sneeze in show business

Ted Healy and the Three Stooges

Hugh Herbert

Judy Holliday

Edward Everett Horton

Buster Keaton

Edgar 'Slow Burn' Kennedy

Ernie Kovacs

Burt Lahr

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy

Harold Lloyd

Carol Lombard

Harpo and Chico Marx

Donald Meek

Victor Moore

Jack Norton, the perennial drunk

Franklin Pangborn

Joe Penner

Will Rodgers

Irene Ryan, Granny of “The Beverly Hillbillies”

Charlie Ruggles

S.Z. 'Cuddles' Sakall

Max Sennett, king of the Keystone Cops

Arthur Treacher

Burt Wheeler and Robert Wolsey

Ed Wynn

This Day in Lucy History – October 29th

“The Diet” (ILL S1;E3) – October 29, 1951

"Visitor from Italy" (ILL S6;E5) – October 29, 1956

"Lucy Buys a Sheep" (TLS S1;E5) – October 29, 1961

"Lucy and Andy Griffith" (HL S6;E8) – October 29, 1973

[biofunmy]

Mickey Kapp, Who Made Mixtapes for Astronauts, Dies at 88

Mickey Kapp, a record producer who, after forging a somewhat improbable connection with several Mercury 7 astronauts, went on to provide later space explorers with customized mixtapes to listen to during their historic flights, died on June 11 at his home in Carmel, Calif. He was 88.

His wife, Joyce Garvin Kapp, said the cause was congestive heart failure.

Mr. Kapp became the unofficial music provider to the space-bound thanks to José Jiménez, a fictional comic character with a thick south-of-the-border accent who was created by the comedian Bill Dana. “My name José Jiménez,” Mr. Dana would begin his routines, which today might ring as offensive — José being something of a dim bulb — but in the late 1950s, when he created the character, were regarded by many as hilarious.

One of those routines made José a reluctant-sounding astronaut, in full spacesuit, bumbling through an interview.

“What is this called, a crash helmet?” the interviewer says, pointing to his headgear.

José replies, “Oh, I hope not.”

Mr. Dana, who died in 2017, was on the roster of Kapp Records, founded by Mr. Kapp’s father, David. In an oral history recorded in 2007 for the Television Academy Foundation, Mr. Dana said that the idea to turn José into a spaceman came when he was booked on “The Garry Moore Show” in 1960.

“On the writing staff was Doc Simon — Neil Simon,” Mr. Dana said in the oral history, referring to the soon-to-be-famous playwright. “José was already established as kind of a hit, and Neil Simon said, ‘Has José ever been an astronaut?’ And I said, ‘No, what a great idea.’ ”

He developed a routine around the notion, and when he performed it at the San Francisco nightclub the hungry i, Mickey Kapp, working for his father’s company, captured it on tape and released it as a single. On a whim, Mr. Kapp sent copies to NASA, one for each of the seven Mercury astronauts, who were making the first manned American spaceflights, and one for Shorty Powers, a public affairs officer for NASA.

“I never heard a word from any of them,” Mr. Kapp told The Monterey Herald in 2014. “Then I picked up Life magazine, which had published articles about each of the astronauts, and noticed that Alan Shepard had quoted two lines from the record. I called Bill Dana right away and yelled: ‘Billy, you’ve gotta get down there! They know us!’ ”

Mr. Shepard, who made the first manned American spaceflight in May 1961, was a particular fan of José. Neal Thompson, in his book “Light This Candle: The Life and Times of Alan Shepard” (2004), wrote that during lulls between simulation training, Mr. Shepard “would play the tapes at full volume over the Mission Control loudspeakers.”

At Mr. Kapp’s urging, Mr. Dana booked an appearance at the Kings Inn in Cocoa Beach, Fla., near where the astronauts trained. He usually did the astronaut bit with a straight man acting as interviewer, but for Cocoa Beach he was working alone.

“A few minutes into the routine, a guy in the front row began yelling out the straight man’s lines,” Mr. Thompson wrote. It was Mr. Shepard, who joined Mr. Dana onstage but was laughing so hard that another Mercury astronaut, Wally Schirra, who was there, took over, followed by another, Deke Slayton.

The 1947 album “Music Out of the Moon,” on which the bandleader Les Baxter played music written by Harry Revel, was a favorite of the astronaut Neil Armstrong.

José became something of a mascot for the Mercury program, and Mr. Kapp became friendly with Mr. Shepard and others at NASA. For the Gemini and Apollo programs, whose flights lasted days — the Mercury flights had lasted just hours — Mr. Kapp suggested that the cassette tapes the astronauts used for recording notes could be filled with music they liked, which they could listen to in their idle time and tape over as needed. He used his music industry connections to execute the plan.

“The astronauts would be up there for three and a half days, staring at nothing,” he told the Monterey newspaper. “So I got copies of the master tapes of anything they wanted to listen to and made the recordings for them.”

A recent Vanity Fair article about Mr. Kapp said that Buzz Aldrin, one of the Apollo 11 astronauts, favored an adult-contemporary mix that included Glen Campbell and Barbra Streisand. Neil Armstrong, his crew mate, who first put human footprints on the moon on that mission, requested the 1947 album “Music Out of the Moon,” on which the bandleader Les Baxter played music written by Harry Revel.

“There was no publicity,” Mr. Kapp told the Monterey paper. “The artists were never paid. The media and the public never knew.”

Michael Ivan Kapp was born on Oct. 26, 1930, in Chicago and grew up in New Rochelle, N.Y. His father worked for Decca and RCA before founding Kapp Records in the mid-1950s; his mother, Ruth (Sigal) Kapp, was a homemaker.

Mr. Kapp graduated from New Rochelle High School in 1948 and received a bachelor’s degree in speech and drama at Stanford University in 1951. After a stint in the Navy, he joined his father at Kapp.

Mr. Kapp’s other accomplishments included producing Louis Armstrong’s version of “Hello, Dolly!,” which dislodged the Beatles from the No. 1 spot on the Billboard singles chart in 1964.Creditvia Kapp family

Among his other claims to fame there was producing Louis Armstrong’s version of “Hello, Dolly!,” the title song from the Jerry Herman-Michael Stewart musical, although when Armstrong recorded the song in 1963 the show had not yet opened on Broadway. According to a 2014 article in The Queens Gazette, the song was an afterthought to Armstrong, who was more excited about another song he recorded that day, “A Lot of Livin’ to Do,” from another Broadway show, “Bye Bye Birdie.”

Mr. Kapp, though, saw a gem. He added a banjo introduction and some strings and, once the Broadway show opened, released the record. It became a hit — a surprise to Armstrong, who was touring at the time.

“After hearing people shout for ‘Hello, Dolly!’ at a live show,” The Gazette said, “Armstrong finally turned to bassist Arvell Shaw and asked, ‘What the hell is ‘Hello, Dolly!’?’ The band had to get a copy of their own recording of the tune to learn it again.”

In May 1964 Armstrong’s record dislodged the Beatles from the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, which they had held for 14 weeks.

Mr. Kapp consulted for NASA until 1972. From 1972 to 1993 he worked for Warner Communication in several capacities.

Mr. Kapp’s marriages to Elizabeth Leighton and Lydia Sarasohn ended in divorce. In addition to his wife, whom he married in 1989, he is survived by two sons and a daughter from his first marriage, Peter, Thomas and Laurie Kapp; seven grandchildren; and one great-grandchild.

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