Here Come the Brides

One of my favorite sixties TV series has always been HERE COME THE BRIDES in spite of the fact that I haven’t seen a single episode since a brief syndication run about twenty five years ago. Billed originally as a non-musical TV version of SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS, I didn’t hold out much hope for the show as that was perhaps my least favorite musical of them all. Strangely, the reason I got a chance to see the first episode at all was that the local ABC affiliate stuck it on a Sunday afternoon so they could put more lucrative local programming on in prime-time. Thus, I was visiting an old friend (from kindergarten yet!) and we had just come in from killing each other out in his back yard for about an hour and plopped at the TV.
HERE COME THE BRIDES is the story of the three Bolt brothers, Joshua, Jeremy and the oldest, Jason. They "own" a mountain and a lumber business in 19th century Seattle but they’re in danger of losing a lot of their lumberjacks as there are no marrying women around. Thus, to save the family business Jason makes a deal with rival Aaron Stempel that he will travel by ship to Massachusetts and return with 100 potential brides. Once the girls arrive in the West, the stories take over and the colorful characters carry them along for two seasons.
Jason was played by Robert Brown. With an over-the-top theatrical delivery and a larger than life smile, Jason is the father figure of the show, setting himself above it all in a way. A pre-STARSKY AND HUTCH David Soul was the hot-headed Joshua Bolt and brother Jeremy, the shy, stuttering type, was played by Bobby Sherman. Right there was the secret to what there was of the show’s success. Bobby’s sensitive performance got him noticed and his records made him the flavor of the month teen idol for a couple of years. In retrospect he wasn’t really that got at either acting or singing but my 4th grade girlfriend loved him and I stuck with the show (and bought his records) because of it!
Mark Lenard, STAR TREK’s beloved Sarek, was ostensibly the villain of the piece as Aaron Stemple but even he got a few good moments and turned out not to be such a bad guy after all. Delightful newcomers Bridget Hanley and Susan Tolsky were the two main "brides and the main cast was rounded out with the double act of Henry Beckman as the scene-chewing, tipsy Captain Clancy and the great Joan Blondell as Lottie, the innkeeper at the heart of the series. Guest stars and semi-regulars included Bo Svenson and even Bruce Lee!
In spite of the lack of available reruns, a small but fiercely loyal fanbase has kept the show’s memory alive all of these years. The magazine seen here from 1990 was one of the few I’ve seen with a lot of coverage on the show. The STAR TREK novel seen here, ISHMAELby Barabar Hambly from 1985, is perhaps the single strangest spin-off of all time. Spock goes back in time, loses his memory and ends up in old Seattle, living with Aaron Stemple (who, as you’ll recall, was played by the actor who played Spock’s father!) and working as a lumberjack! With appearances by Lottie, Clancy and the Bolts, the whole novel is basically an episode of HERE COME THE BRIDES!! It’s also completely uncredited as such. No trademark notices, no thank you’s, no indication at all to the casual reader that this is anything but another STAR TREK book. A fascinating idea, though, but it does make one’s head hurt when you realize that Stemple, although resembling Spock’s father, is portrayed as the ancestor of Spock’s earth mother instead!
Here’s a couple links for you to peruse: http://www.bridgethanley.net/
http://aa.1asphost.com/CTVA/US/Western/HereComeTheBrides.htm and just for the fun of it, a nifty cheesecake shot of Joan Blondell from about thirty years before she appeared as Lottie- Then check the stores in May for the just announced DVD first season collection of HERE COME THE BRIDES as seen above. Finally, a chance for a whole new generation to discover the series!

Nick Clooney

One of the wire service reports on George Clooney’s OSCAR win noted that the actor’s father was "a former newscaster from Cincinnati." I’m afraid that’s not giving Nick Clooney enough credit. Nick Clooney came from the talented family that gave us radio singer Betty Clooney and her even more successful sister, Rosemary, legendary recording artist and star of WHITE CHRISTMAS. If anything, Nick Clooney was even more multi-talented than his sisters. He, too, went to Hollywood. IMDB lists his one movie appearance as THE HIGH COST OF LOVING, a 1958 picture directed by and starring his then brother-in-law, Jose Ferrer (Rosemary’s husband and comics fan Miguel’s dad!). His big role was "man in parking lot." He does get a line, though, and one cheeky local movie host once ran the scene on a loop for days after showing the film. I once asked Nick if that was the only film he made, however, and he assured me that there were, in fact, several others but that he had been a day player and wasn’t even certain what they were about! He did say that the working title of one had been "MURPHY’S SLED." Your guess is as good as mine. Either way, Nick chose to head back to the Midwest where he became a popular second banana (his term) on not one or two but three separate local talk/variety series before being offered his own show in 1968. That show was out of Columbus, Ohio and while it didn’t last long, it led directly to THE NICK CLOONEY SHOW premiering on Cincinnati’s WCPO shortly afterwards. After a few years, that show switched to WKRC (after a year-long break due to a non-competitive clause) and continued with a few new regulars but otherwise intact. Nick would sing, there were comedy sketches, local commercial pitches and bigger and bigger celebrity guests as the star honed his considerable interviewing skills. Sometimes, his wife and kids…yes, including George…would even appear. While all of this was going on live five days a week, Nick would occasionally trod the boards in dinner theater, host local charity events and he even found time to host the short-lived network game show, MONEY MAZE (note the MONEY MAZE TV mag cover I'm showing him in these photos).. Needless to say, a break was needed. In this case, that break came when Nick became the anchor of WKRC’s local news! At first a seeming joke (later Cincinnati would develop a reputation for making former Mayors into news anchors…including Jerry Springer) Nick pulled together a great news team and took the news to the top in local ratings. The genuine sincerity he had brought to his commercials, songs and celebrity interviews served him well in the new position and awards were won for several years. Eventually, a carrot was dangled and the West Coast wanted him back…only as a newscaster. He packed up all and moved to California where he became just another newscaster in a very big pond. After a good run there, Nick returned to the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky area yet again, this time taking a position as a disc jockey on a nostalgia radio station and beginning a long-running stint as an all-purpose columnist for THE CINCINNATI POST. In his spare time (!) he commuted out of town to become an on-camera movie host at AMC.
In 1995, Nick Clooney published the collection of his columns seen here. Some are folksy, some political, some have showbiz stories and some have family anecdotes. All of them are entertaining. Note that the cover art here is by George Clooney. I was managing a bookstore when the collection came out and thought Nick would be good for an autographing. I had known his wife, Nina, off and on for fifteen years at that point (which remains another story for another time) and I had spoken to Nick on the phone but I had never met him. It looked as though it would remain that way, too as he announced that his schedule didn’t have time to do any autographings. Luckily, I didn’t ask him…I asked Nina. She talked him into it and we set the date!
They arrived on that Saturday afternoon to one of the biggest crowds we had ever had at the store and proceeded to take over the day. Both Nick and Nina were impeccably dressed and had more charisma than any ten people I had ever met! People continually congratulated him on George’s success and he beamed like a proud father should. He joked that George hadn’t been on a magazine cover that month so he had called and told him, "Your career’s over son, Come home." He had agreed to stay an hour but he smiled until the very last customer got his signature. One employee from out of town couldn’t figure out what all the excitement was about at first but by the end she was totally enamored of the man. She took most of the pictures seen on this post except this one, which I took of her. Then he took me aside and whispered that he was sorry he wasn’t his usual self but that they had just come from a close friend’s funeral! I assured him that we had all found his boundless energy and friendship simply amazing but nonetheless, he insisted on returning the following Monday night to "make it up" to me!
With little time for publicity, when Monday came he arrived early, stayed late and again worked the crowd like the professional he is. When folks heard Nick Clooney was in the house, the crowd grew. We sold hundreds of his books!
Nick continued his column, went on to host more TV movie shows and ran for Congress here in Northern Kentucky! My wife and I campaigned for him but in the end I’m kind of glad he lost as I think he has too much honesty, ethics and integrity to succeed in that cutthroat world.
When Rosemary Clooney died, my wife sent a simple condolence card to Nick and Nina. As I’ve said, we’ve met them on a number of occasions and I’m pretty certain they’d know us on sight but probably not recognize our names. A few weeks later, we received a handwritten thank you card from Nick with 3 sides of reminiscences about his sister. Let me repeat: HE DOESN’T REALLY KNOW US! This tells me that he did this for every single one of the probable hundreds of condolence cards he received.
I’ve never met George Clooney but he stole my first job out from under me. A new mall was opening in 1979 and he and I both applied for the shoe department in the anchor department store. George got it, reportedly was lousy at it and quit after a few months. I had to settle for beginning my long bookstore career that eventually led me back to that mall for 9 years. By that point, George was a star. The only really bad thing I’ve ever heard about him is that he has an ego. He couldn’t survive long in Hollywood without one. Actor, producer, director…he continues to grow in all aspects of show business, just like his father. With a role model like Nick Clooney, who could expect anything but success!

Linus Magazine

The Italian LINUS is considered to be the most important comics-related magazine in the world...it's my understanding. I've actually only ever seen this one thick issue, a 1970 British edition that I purchased in 1974. In fact, based on the editorial by Michael Bateman, this may well be the FIRST English-language edition. Featuring a combination of contemporary and classic strip reprints as well as brief articles on comics, it was a fun read and I looked for years for other issues to no avail. It starts out with an interesting overview of Charles Schulz illustrated by panels that introduced new characters into PEANUTS over the years (note "Piperita Patty" Apparently this issue wasn't COMPLETELY translated from the Italian!) and followed by a nice run of 1969 PEANUTS strips. Then there are some full page pieces by various artists including Ralph Steadman, known for his illustrations of Hunter S. Thompson's work. Steadman is actually listed as the art director of the magazine. Here's a link to HIS current website: RALPH STEADMAN dot COM. Next up is a rather adult (although certainly tamer than some of the artist's work) selection from Guido Crepax's VALENTINA. Take one look at this page and tell me Crepax wasn't a MAJOR influence on Frank Miller's SIN CITY! My favorite piece in the issue is THE UPSIDE DOWN WORLD OF GUSTAVE VERBEEK, introducing a 15 page reprint of the legendary 1903 comic strip THE UPSIDE DOWNS OF LITTLE LADY LOVEKINS AND OLD MAN MUFFAROO. Examples have been trotted out in history books fairly frequently since the seventies but if you haven't seen it, it's a revelation! The artist drew every single strip so that it would both look and read DIFFERENTLY if you turned the panels upside down! Thus the 15 pages here actually represent 30 pages of story! What work! What dedication! What insanity!!! For the example I chose, note that it's printed both ways so you will NOT need to turn your screen upside down. Rounded out by POGO (note the name on the boat!), B.C., THE WIZARD OF ID, FEIFFER and KRAZY KAT reprints, there's also a nice article on Winson McCay's LITTLE NEMO IN SLUMBERLAND. This is accompanied by a folded, pull-out section that's designed to emulate the original size the strips appeared in the Sunday papers a century ago now. This amazingly cool section suffers only because it's too sparse but it does present a choice selection of little known strips bookended by beautiful full-page, full-color NEMO and, BUSTER BROWN reprints.

Karl Wallenda at Kings Island

My mother took a camera every time we went anywhere but the only KINGS ISLAND pictures I could find are those seen here. The one across the lake is earlier as it was a Polaroid shot and she stopped using Polaroid cameras during the mid-seventies. I believe the others to date from around 1976-77. My parents appear in the wide shot, an unintentional near-triptych that I took myself as we were having lunch along International Street.
The gentleman walking the wire is none other than the late, great Karl Wallenda himself, patriarch of THE FLYING WALLENDAS. On this day Karl spent hours walking the length of the park to the delight of gawkers down below. Not long afterwards, he was killed when a burst of wind knocked him off a wire between two skyscrapers in South America. Well, time to head off to work today.Everybody remember where we parked when we came in! Penelope Pitstop Area number three!

Another Cissy Colpitts Pic!

It's been like an obstacle course trying to get here today!
Now here we are and I have lots of keen and groovy things of which to blog and I find myself so tired that I can't put together the brain cells necessary to do it! Thus, since the number one keyword search term used to find my blog recently has been "Cisse Cameron," whom we discussed previously at http://booksteveslibrary.blogspot.com/2005/08/cissy-colpitts-rather-pulchritudinous.html, I'm offering my third autographed picture of the former Cissy Colpitts. The talented but largely unknown co-star of BILLY JACK, PORKYS II, THE PRIZE FIGHTER and the dreadful (but cultish!) SPACE MUTINY sent me these pics when she had just finished a very promising co-starring role under the Colpitts name on THE TED KNIGHT SHOW. I wonder if she knows how popular she seems to be on the net!

My Iron Man Art-Circa1966

Yesterday, the always amazing Robby Reed over at DIAL B for BLOG (and I thought it was ME that didn't have a life!) ran a number of impressive examples of IRON MAN artwork by current IRON MAN artist Adi Granov. Living in the past as I tend to do happily,I'm sorry to say that I was not aware of the artist's work. Within minutes of seeing it, however, his take on the bulky, original Iron Man armor was adorning my desktop as my wallpaper of the day. Quite impressive work! Much moreso than my own Iron Man artwork, seen here. Drawn in either first or second grade, I had discovered a batch of old issues of TALES OF SUSPENSE at Keith's Carryout, a dark little liquor store/mini-grocery across the "bad" side of the next corner. Their old comics went for ten whole cents when Mrs. Osborn (down at the opposite, "good" corner) sold hers for a nickel! Still, Keith's had stuff I'd never seen before including two mint condition copies of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN # 8 (which I promptly ripped the covers off of and poked holes in so I could store them in a binder for safekeeping. OUCH!) I was enamored of early Iron Man, though. Note the different armors I drew. In case you can't read my scrawl, the villains pictured with our metal hero are the Red (sic) Dynamo, the Black Widow, Hawkeye and the Mandarin. Why they're all doing the wave I have no earthly recollection!

1968 Fanzine Ads

Here’s one that I missed when it was new. As you know if you were here yesterday, I didn’t discover fandom until 1971 and this issue of the ROCKET'S BLAST/COMICOLLECTOR came out in 1968. I picked it up a few years back for its great Wally Wood cover of a Daredevil clone (note: no logo) tossing T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agent Dynamo off a building. The RBCC deserves its own post so we won’t really get into it too much today except to say that at the time it was primarily an adzine. Nearly the entire issue is made up of ads from fans wanting to sell comics by mail. (WARNING: Do NOT read these ads! Just seeing Mint prices on early FF and even Superman issues under $20.00 has been known to cause seizures in fans!) There are also, however, quite a few ads for more fanzines and these I found fascinating! Here are a few! The earliest Rich Buckler pro work I recall seeing was a ROBIN story from around 1971. Note friend Fred Hembeck’s name in the ad for THE COLLECTOR! Finally, one of the few bits of content in this issue is this newspaper clipping about the flap over CAPTAIN MARVEL. No…not THAT flap! Just zoom in and read it! I gotta SPLIT! ZAM!